Broche Banter #27 -- Elizabeth from The Whole Pointe
Today, on the show, I chat with Elizabeth from The Whole Pointe.
We talk about her journey starting ballet at age 14 and getting her first professional contract at age 19. But, that didn’t come without its challenges, and we talk about her experience with disordered eating and how she has rediscovered her self-worth after spending her ballet career at the bottom of the ballet hierarchy.
The conversation winds to many lovely topics, including the exciting future possibilities of the budding world of online performances.
She now leads the Beyond Ballet community, which is a membership group that helps adult dancers develop positive mindsets to support their lifelong love of ballet through journaling, meditation and visualization.
Enjoy!
Before we get to the show, let’s take our Broche Bite!
On this segment, we’ll talk about bite-size ballet tidbits to give you something to chew on while you listen.
In this episode, Elizabeth talks about the ballet hierarchy, so let’s bite into what is!
While the organization of a ballet company can vary, the ballet world has a set of customs about the structure of the hierarchy within a ballet company.
The Artistic Director of the company directs the artistic vision of the works that the company performs. Choreographers may create original works or set classical ballets. The Ballet Master/Mistress often direct rehearsals as well as teaches daily ballet class.
Within the dancers, there are three main ranks:
The corps de ballet (spelled c-o-r-p-s, like the word “body”; d-e, ballet)
Solists
Principal dancers
The corps de ballet is where most pros get their start and is the big group of dancers who dance in unison and make neat formations on the stage to frame the soloists and principals. A classical ballet wouldn’t be the same without the corps de ballet!
Soloists are in the middle level, where they will dance solo roles to showcase their skills. In the Nutcracker, these would be roles like the Spanish dance, Russian dance, or Arabian dance.
The Principal dancers are at the top of the top. This level requires both incredible technical skills as well as artistry, acting, and stage presence. In Nutcracker, principals would dance the roles of Sugar Plum Fairy or the Cavalier.
Now, onto the show!
Elizabeth’s Start at Age 14 and Getting a Contract at Age 19
Julie: Well, today on the show, I am so excited to welcome you Elizabeth, from The Whole Pointe on Instagram on YouTube, on so many fabulous platforms. I'm so excited to chat with you. So welcome to the show.
Elizabeth: Yay. Super excited. Ballet’s my favorite thing to talk about
Julie: Yes, ballet is so good to talk about. But we we have a little bit of history together. We worked together for a little bit while Broche Ballet had the Denver studios. You taught for us a little bit there, we did some videos, YouTube collaborations together. We actually don't live too far from each other even though I think maybe even though I’m further north now. But so yeah, we've have had a lot of connection and every time we get together I swear we talked for five hours. So we are going to do our best to keep within a reasonable podcast listening amounts, but I could talk about ballet all day.
Elizabeth: Yes, definitely.
Julie: So, okay, let's just talk briefly about how you got into the ballet world right now you have a very strong voice in the ballet community helping people find their place in in ballet. And your message of The Whole Pointe is very much that you're a whole person and you’re whole dancer, and it's more than the dance itself. But where did this all start? How did you even start dance in the first place?
Elizabeth: Yeah, so I didn't know anything of the ballet world until I was 14. And my best friend wanted to take a class. But she didn't want to go by herself. We were actually doing worship dance at the church we were at. And so the lady who led that suggested it to her. And my best friend was like, “I'm not going by myself, you have to come.” And so who knew right? Who had any clue that my whole life trajectory was gonna change? But even after I started taking class at 14, it still took another year until I realized “I really love this, and I just want to do all of the time.”
Then from there, I went to a more serious studio at 15. I was put in class of like, eight and nine year olds, it was quite a ego journey. And then I got to take class from so many amazing people in Chicago and got my first ballet contract at 19 with Joffrey as a …. forget what it's called now… but they just needed someone for just an extra person. And I got a contract. It was like the most unreal moment of my life.
Julie: Did you basically get to be one of the Willie's standing in the back, like being dead the whole time?
Elizabeth: Yeah, I got to understudy a lot.
Julie: Oh, cool.
Elizabeth: So I had to learn like multiple Willies, and I would switch who I was. And then I got to learn like the peasants and be one of the royalty and just.. At the time, they were a little bit smaller, and this was they were starting to just break into the bigger ballets. And so they would bring people in for those. But yeah, it was wild.
Julie: That’s amazing So did you take any breaks between 14 and 19? Or was that just like constant straight through? Like you went from A to Z and got your contracts? Or what happened in there?
Elizabeth: So at 14, I started doing class like once a week. And then at as I progressed through that year, I started doing more classes, I think I was doing like three times a week. And then when I switched studios, that first studio had actually put me en pointe probably too early. So when I switched studios, it was kind of like starting over. And I got taken off pointe, put in the class with the little kids. I was working my way up through that studio when I took an open class in Chicago, and met Patti Isler, who I always refer to as my mentor because she really took me under her wing. I moved downtown and lived with her and took class all the time. And, and yeah, that was how…
I took a Summer Intensive at Joffrey was actually the first time they ever offered a Summer Intensive. And it was after that, that fall that I got that call. I was at of Panera with my friends. And I took the call outside and I think I literally got like down on the street. I was like “Oh my god.”
Julie: Oh, that's amazing.
Elizabeth: It was. It's definitely a highlight moment.
Julie: Well, that I mean, it's amazing. Because to start at 14 and have a contract and kind of a role at 19 is amazing and incredible. And wow, what a journey. What a ride. I'm sure that was
Elizabeth: It was. I definitely didn't expect it, so it was...
On “Ballet Bodies” Disordered Eating
Julie: So that time in people I saw obviously with this podcast and with owning the studio's for a while, I've talked with so many people who experienced ballet in that period of time. And many of them quit at some point during that period of time because of so many reasons. Sometimes just moving, sometimes life, but sometimes because it is just a really intense place to be as a teenage girl. As a teenage girl life is hard as a whole. Like the whole thing, obviously is very complicated. When you stick a teenage girl going through puberty and a leotard and tights in a room with a bunch of other teenage girls with people judging their bodies and judging their ability, it’s a very intense place — was it for you as well? Or did you kind of breeze through it and not have that?
Elizabeth: No. Yeah, it definitely was, I think I had a different perception going into it because I hadn't been brought up in that culture. I really had, I really had no idea like… I heard other people talk negatively about their bodies, but it wasn't until I got a specific talk from a ballet teacher that I was like, I remember being like, “Oh, wait a second. What?” And that really did change the trajectory for me, I think I was like, 17, then so I made it two or three years feeling pretty good.
Julie: This talk was like a teacher pulled you aside and was like, “So Elizabeth, like about your body….”
Elizabeth: Yes. Yeah. They were trying to help, I believe. But they were basically like, they were trying to tell me that they believed in me that I could go places, but that I had to change my diet and lose weight. I was not expecting that either. That was a hard conversation.
Julie: Did you talk with your parents about it?
Elizabeth: No. No, it really like, it hit me so hard. And so unexpectedly that I immediately believed like, “Oh, my gosh, everyone's known this whole time that I need to do this. And nobody's told me till now, and I'm gonna get on it.” And that started a very long journey with disordered eating and over exercising and stuff like that. So it's really unfortunate to me, which is why I talk about it all the time. Now that such a beautiful art form has this really sad, dark under belly?
“Julie: A teacher pulled you aside and was like, “So Elizabeth, like about your body….”
Elizabeth: It hit me so hard. And so unexpectedly that I immediately believed, “Oh, my gosh, everyone’s known this whole time that I need to do this. And nobody’s told me till now, and I’m gonna get on it.”
And that started a very long journey with disordered eating and over-exercising and stuff like that. So it’s really unfortunate to me, which is why I talk about it all the time now, that such a beautiful art form has this really sad, dark underbelly.”
Julie: Does it have to be that way. Is ballet pretty if you're not thin? Does it have to be like that? What do you think?
Elizabeth: I don't think so. I don't think so. I'm so against that, especially the more that I learn about our bodies, and specifically female bodies, and our hormones and our muscles, and just, the body is so amazing, so complex, and really, how different we all are, is something that I think we need to be bringing more into the ballet world, because the way that you approach your body, the way that you put your training and your eating, will make all of the difference in your performance and your success. And it's not talked about a lot. Instead, it's always focused kind of on making everybody look the same. And I think that's boring.
“The more that I learn about our bodies, and specifically female bodies, and our hormones and our muscles, and just, the body is so amazing, so complex, and really, how different we all are, is something that I think we need to be bringing more into the ballet world, because the way that you approach your body, the way that you put your training and your eating, will make all of the difference in your performance and your success. And it’s not talked about a lot.
Instead, it’s always focused kind of on making everybody look the same. And I think that’s boring.”
Julie: Well, it's so interesting, because classical ballet, it when you're on the surface level looks very uniform, right? The whole point is to be uniform, the whole point is to do it exactly. The if there's one first arabesque, and here is the perfect ideal of it. And I think that's where there's so much… I feel like with adult dancers, we feel so much that if we don't have perfect turnout, we're not doing ballet. If we don't have our extensions, we're not doing ballet… if it's not that we're not doing ballet. It feels like, if it's not perfect, you're not doing it except realistically, there's a spectrum of it, and you could be along that spectrum. And realistically, the audience doesn't even know a perfect turnout is and is really looking at your expression. And many, many other things.
Elizabeth: Right? And I think we have to look at, you know, where ballet came from, historically, and how any art form has to change with the times, right? And I just wonder, is that even what audiences really want? Do they just want to see everyone who's exactly the same doing exactly the same thing? Or are we starting to really embrace people's differences and the fact that the way that a certain person expresses their art is valuable, even if it's different than someone else's.
“Is that even what audiences really want? Do they just want to see everyone who’s exactly the same doing exactly the same thing? Or are we starting to really embrace people’s differences and the fact that the way that a certain person expresses their art is valuable, even if it’s different than someone else’s.”
Also, like, everybody's going to have different tastes and perceptions. So, in ballet, something that I've been talking about recently, a lot is this whole ballet hierarchy. It’s almost like a really old-school caste system, where you have like the artistic directors and the people who are in charge of the companies, and then you have like the principal artists and the soloist and the corps and then pre-professional students and students… It's just so interesting to me really, how it has all sustained that way, even as a society as we've come out of stuff like that. And I just think that we need to call it into question. Why is it that this person gets to put the stamp of approval and say this is it; this is the only definition and everybody goes along with it?
Julie: Yeah, it is an organization at the end of the day, like any other company or any other organization, I think there's so much with an organization. Obviously, having run an organization and betting many organizations, there's so much to be said, for taking into account the perspectives from other people within the organization to say, “Here's what I think about this. What do you guys think about this?” Ultimately, the person at the top has their name and their money on the line, so ultimately, they have the final call, but if you are creating something that represents your organization, it's not necessarily just you and your perspective and your only your ideas.
Elizabeth: Right? Yeah. And that's what I would say. It's like, when I first which was, I would only say, like, a couple years ago, when I first realized that the hierarchy system in ballet, and just everything, how it's set up, is a structure within the ballet culture. And it's not like a tangible thing. It's something that we all agree upon, and agree to play those roles and respect the roles. I think what's really important is, it's fine to play those roles and to respect that, as long as you're not tying it to your truth and your worth. I think in order to dance in a company, or to be auditioning, yeah, you have to respect those things because that's the way that ballet is set up. And that's fine. You just don't want to take it on as “Because I'm not this level. I am not worthy. I can't talk to this person. I can't try this. I can't do this,” that sort of thing.
“[Within the ballet heirarchy,] I think what’s really important is, it’s fine to play those roles and to respect that, as long as you’re not tying it to your truth and your worth. I think in order to dance in a company, or to be auditioning, yeah, you have to respect those things because that’s the way that ballet is set up. And that’s fine. You just don’t want to take it on as “Because I’m not this level. I am not worthy. I can’t talk to this person. I can’t try this. I can’t do this,” that sort of thing.”
You Are Good Enough, Even Before You’re Perfect
Julie: Why is it that ballet seems to have this “not worthy” thing going on in general? What's that about? Does everyone have that? Or is that an “us” thing?
Elizabeth: I wonder about that, too. Every time I talk about it lately, I tried to make like the the insert of like, “I'm sure it's a problem elsewhere?” Because I know, everywhere people worry about being enough and worthy. But like, the ballet world definitely seems to just be dripping with it. So that's such a good question. I think it is because like, what you were talking about with the teenage girls…. our instrument is our body, right? So it's not like we can go set it down at the end of the day. That's something I used to always think about as a teenager, I was like, “It’s not fair, I can't just put my clarinet down and go have fun. Everywhere I take my body, it's with me. And it's always top of mind.” So I think because our instrument is such a personal thing. And because we are in the business of critiquing it, I mean, that's part of getting better, it just kind of sets us up for those negative thoughts, as well as like ballet is never a finished thing where somebody's gonna be like, “Okay, you're done, you have nothing else to work on.”
“Our instrument is our body, so it’s not like we can go set it down at the end of the day. That’s something I used to always think about as a teenager, I was like, “It’s not fair, I can’t just put my clarinet down and go have fun. Everywhere I take my body, it’s with me. And it’s always top of mind.”
So I think because our instrument is such a personal thing. And because we are in the business of critiquing it, I mean, that’s part of getting better, it just kind of sets us up for those negative thoughts”
Julie: Well, and if they do say that, then generally you go find a new coach.
Elizabeth: Right? That's exactly right. Yeah. It's a never ending journey.
Julie: The idea that you're enough on your journey is just a super interesting one. And you and I have talked about a little bit on our Instagrams, independently and together. But I think there's a…. like I was saying a little bit with the idea that if you're not perfect, you're not doing it or you're not even part... And you've been talking about this recently, too, that if you are dancing, you're a dancer. You don't have to be finished to be a dancer. And I had someone comment on my Instagram once that was like, “Stop calling yourself a ballerina. You're not a ballerina.” And I was like, “Dude, like, I'm doing ballet. I'm gonna keep calling myself this”
Elizabeth: Like “Excuse me, who asked you?!”
Julie: Yeah, you're welcome to not look at my page if you don't like when you see. So it's like this, this weird judgment that we put on ourselves that unless you are at the top unless you are, to put in your words.. “at the top of the hierarchy,” you're not enough until you arrive there.
Elizabeth: Yeah, I just think i think that's so interesting that that whole journey of like claiming the title of being a dancer or being a ballet dancer, or being an artist, I've been talking about that a lot with different people in my membership. And I tell them, I struggled to claim that title until a couple years ago, and I did dance professionally. I got paid to dance like, and yet still, I didn't feel like I could say that. And if someone introduced me and said, “Oh, yeah, Elizabeth, she's dancer.” I'd be like, “Oh, well, let me clarify that statement. This is what I've done. And I'm not really doing a lot right now.” And I just think it's so funny, because why? Why do we hold ourselves back from that? Because I think we're worried that someone's going to come along and say, “No, you're not.” And that's just their opinion.
Julie: Yeah, they can think that, and it's irrelevant to the fact that I think something else.
Elizabeth: Right? Yeah.
Julie: It's funny when you're so like, my, my degree is in computer science. I started out of school as a web developer and your first day of your job, you're like, “I'm a web developer,” and you don't ever, you're never worried about calling yourself that. Like, I never was worried about calling myself that right. I wasn't never like “Oooo, what are they gonna say if they find out I'm a web developer?”
Elizabeth: That’s so funny.
Julie: It was very funny. Although now that I'm in this position. I don't even like to call myself a studio owner or a CEO or a leader or anything like that. I wouldn't use those words to describe myself. Maybe it's because I took this myself and no one gave it to me. And so it's weird to claim it myself. But that doesn't explain your thing where someone gave you the role of a dancer and you were like, “Well, no, not that.” So I don't know. It's very interesting. The parts in my life, in which I've agreed to terms very easily in the parts. And the parts where I'm like, “No, I mean, I wouldn't say that I'm a leader.
Elizabeth: That is hilarious. You wouldn't say you're a studio owner? Or a CEO
Julie: No, I wouldn't!
Elizabeth: Ha! You own your own business!
Julie: I know! I've been owning this business for over three years now.
Elizabeth: Yeah, that is so funny.
Julie: I wouldn't call myself that it's in my email signature, but I don't ever write it myself. It's just because it's written there. And I wrote it a long time ago. And I'm like, just leave it there.
Elizabeth: That is so funny. Our brains are so funny. I don't get it. So that's why I keep trying to call it funny and laugh at it. Because I'm like, so curious, these human behaviors like, “Why am I struggling with that? I don't know.”
Julie: It's it's very complicated. I think within the dance world, and something that I've been really trying to dig into with what we've been experiencing this year, specifically, with not being able to do what we've all been used to doing is just struggling with our collective expectations around what we expect of ourselves, and what we expect of ballet and what we expect of our lives. And just how all of that and just how the expectation itself is actually detrimental to your ability to continue working towards your goal.
Elizabeth: Right, right. And balancing having expectations, because I think it is a good thing to plan and make goals and have expectations, but then not being so closely tied to those expectations that if you don't meet it, or it doesn't come out exactly the way you thought that you get derailed from continuing that movement forward. That's something I've been struggling with. I mean, I think everyone's been struggling with this year because everything's been flipped on its head. And it's like, “Well, if I'm not doing this this way, then there's no way that I'm gonna get here.” But that's not necessarily true. That's what we're really learning. Wow, the potential is limitless, almost. It's like, “What could be possible?”
“I think it is a good thing to plan and make goals and have expectations, but then not being so closely tied to those expectations that if you don’t meet it, or it doesn’t come out exactly the way you thought that you get derailed from continuing that movement forward.
That’s something I’ve been struggling with. I think everyone’s been struggling with this year because everything’s been flipped on its head. And it’s like, “Well, if I’m not doing it this way, then there’s no way that I’m gonna get here.”
But that’s not necessarily true. That’s what we’re really learning.”
Julie: Totally. I think I'm maybe starting to think about it as a difference between a vision and goals. And if you have a vision, you know what you want your life to look like, you have a goal in your life, you know what you want to leave behind in your life, you know what impact you want to make on people and on the world, right? I want to help people find their love of ballet inspire them to overcome their fears, inspire them to be the best person they can be, and that can be done in any way. So if you think about the vision of that, maybe in the future won't even include ballet, and it could still be my vision, right? So it will be that, but then you can set micro goals along the way. But like ultimately when the whole applecart gets flipped over, you have to put aside those specific goals like a triple pirouette consistently is no longer one of my specific goals, because I have nowhere to practice that. But continuing to work, continuing to focus, continuing to work on things can still be one of my new new goals, new specific goals along that vision? So I think it's very hard to think about the the more flexible overarching vision and not get stuck in the specifics of the next thing you're trying to reach.
Elizabeth: Right. I think that is such a good word, the “vision,” I like that a lot. I've been talking a lot about how it's really interesting how our brains try to decipher a path forward for us by what they've seen, either in our past or in other people's past. And so we'll make a goal. And be like, “Okay, to get there, I have to do this. Because this is what this person did, or this is what worked in the past.”
And I've just been learning so much over the whole lockdown, like, “Wow, there's other ways to get there that I never ever would have thought of,” but the more that I can focus on the moment, though, like right now, like, what is the next step that I'm going to do? And you know what? Like, that doesn't feel like it's going to get me to my goal. But I really feel like this is what I'm supposed to do. I've been getting to goals by not doing what I ever would have thought would have happened. And I think that is, that's a great word: “vision.” I like that.
Julie: So what is your vision?
Elizabeth: My big vision, is that I really want to help build a better ballet culture in whatever way I can. So right now that looks like just talking about all these ideas I have, and thoughts I have everywhere that I can to anyone who will listen, and inviting other people to kind of experiment with it and just be open to the possibility that it's not as narrow and strict as we’ve thought. And I have the Beyond Ballet community where I'm just really working on diving into that overlap of life and ballet, because I think, as adults, and like me, I'm a mom, homeschooling young kids, and still teaching at a studio. And so it feels like a lot of times, if you can't do XYZ, take this many classes a week and be doing this, then I can't be a dancer, I can't be expanding my love of the art form. And I'm just playing a lot with like, “What is possible if we mesh life in ballet, and don't keep it so separate?” Like, this is my life? This is my ballet practice.
“I have the Beyond Ballet community where I’m really working on diving into that overlap of life and ballet, because I think, as adults, and like me, I’m a mom, homeschooling young kids, and still teaching at a studio.
And so it feels like a lot of times, if I can’t do XYZ, take this many classes a week and be doing this, then I can’t be a dancer, I can’t be expanding my love of the art form.
And I’m just playing with the idea, ‘What is possible if we mesh life in ballet, and don’t keep it so separate?’”
Julie: What does that look like?
Elizabeth: So, for me, like, that looks like a lot of journaling. And like with meditation, which I've really fallen in love with this year, it's brought me back to visualization, which is something I used to do, when I was performing professionally is like, anytime I had a show, I would spend a lot of time doing the performances in my head. And there's so much science now around that. So like, even though I don't get to take class very often, I dance a lot in my dreams, I fall asleep dancing all of the time. And I really think that does a lot more than we think. Then also like, “How can I fit in little exercises here and there throughout my day where I'm putting all of my intention into it? I'm really focused on like, the muscle or whatever it is that I'm trying to activate?” And is that going to progress me the same or better than if I was taking a class in my living room with my kids running around being like, “oh, blah, blah, blah.” It's just kind of experimenting with that. And what does it look like to take the experiences from life and put them into ballet, and then take everything that we're learning in ballet and like just diffuse it all over the place?
Julie: Yeah, I mean, if you if you don't have 90 minutes at once, maybe you have 90 minutes over time. If you think about spreading… you know, maybe you take one or two classes a week. I know personally, I used to take about one class a week. So that's what the 90 minutes that we're spreading across the week. If you take 90 minutes into seven days, you really don't need that much time every day to add up to 90 minutes of time. So if you do 20 minutes a day, 10 minutes a day, you know, you've gotten your 90 minutes a week, and it's a lot different than… it's a different experience than 90 minutes a week, right? You don't get the you don't get the like building to the 90th minute right? The the numbers 75 through 90 are the hardest because you're exhausted right? You don't have that experience. But you also don't have the experience of forgetting everything week to week because it's been a week since you last picked it up. So you have a lot more consistency. And that I think then then the other way, but it's its fascinating.
Elizabeth: It's a totally different experience. Yeah, I miss class a lot. I took my first class of since quarantine last week and I… you know, I just I miss it so much. But at the same time, I've had to be really realistic about my situation at home and my life and everything like that. So I think it's always important, especially for everyone who's in love with ballet and wants to keep with it for their life is realizing that it's gonna be seasons, right I've had so many reintroductions to ballet, like, I think every time I've had a kid, I've been like, “Well, that's that's it, it's over.” And then you come back, right? And how many adults have we talked to that? Come back after being gone for a long time or being gone for a little time. And I think if you can realize that it's a long game, you're in love with this, you want to do it forever, and you're just going to keep it part of your life and you're going to go up and ramp up when you can. And when you can't, you can still get it in there and it's still part of you. I think that's so important.
“So I think it’s always important, especially for everyone who’s in love with ballet and wants to keep with it for their life is realizing that it’s gonna be seasons. I’ve had so many reintroductions to ballet. I think every time I’ve had a kid, I’ve been like, “Well, that’s that’s it, it’s over.”
But then you come back, right? And how many adults have we talked to that come back after being gone for a long time or being gone for a little time?
If you can realize that it’s a long game: you’re in love with this, you want to do it forever, and you’re just going to keep it part of your life, then you’re going to go up and ramp up when you can, and when you can’t, you can still get it in there and it’s still part of you.”
Julie: Yeah. And the fact is, like how you say if you can, even if you ramp it down, you can still fit it in, right? Like it's not like right up to, we tend to think in black and white. And we're like, if we can't do the 90 minutes to 10 minutes isn't worth it. It's easy to think that =, but I think as you say, if you're in love with it, you can watch a video about it, you can read a book about it, you can stand in fifth position for two minutes, you can do a few rélevés. And all of it is all of it is better than nothing, right? Because you're still able to think it and breathe it and feel it and experience it. And all of it is infinitely better than zero.
Elizabeth: Right. And especially I think, for most dancers, since we are perfectionist, and we think in that black and white, when we do zero, it gets us further and further into that hole of being like depressed being like, “I'm not a dancer,” afraid to come back. There's just so many different emotions that come up when a dancer has to take a break, or decides to take a break. And yeah, I just think that the potential again is limited to what we've put around it. And the more that we can play with it and get curious about it and just be like, “How am I going to fit in this love of ballet? See what happens?”
Julie: So performances are obviously a little bit weird. Right now you have done some virtual choreography and some various little video type things. What is your take on where it's all headed?
Elizabeth: Yes, I think this is so great. Okay, so where I think it's headed or where I wanted to head?
Julie: I'm happy to hear both!
Elizabeth: Yeah, yeah, I think it's gonna be really interesting to watch, right? We've already seen a, an explosion of creativity, in just the way that companies and dancers are performing and bringing things online, I think that'll be really interesting to watch it to continue to develop. It’s a totally different experience performing online learning, choreography, online, all of that. But what I'm hoping and what I think could happen is that we're starting to open up ballet, again, kind of coming back to that value hierarchy, to bring it to where our culture is right now and open it for other people to enjoy it and connect with it. Ballet performances historically, having been in big theaters, where you have to buy the expensive tickets, and you have to dress up and go and everything is great. And I love that. I mean, that's magical. Yeah, um, but I'm also really excited to see more open performances and just really accessible things and really, more of an interpretation of our current culture. And, yeah, I'm excited about it.
“[On online performances & closed theaters] But what I’m hoping and what I think could happen is that we’re starting to open up ballet, again, kind of coming back to that ballet hierarchy, to bring it to where our culture is right now and open it for other people to enjoy it and connect with it. Ballet performances historically, having been in big theaters, where you have to buy the expensive tickets, and you have to dress up and go and everything is great. And I love that. I mean, that’s magical. But I’m also really excited to see more open performances and really accessible things and really, more of an interpretation of our current culture.”
Julie: Honestly, I am, too, I think it's going to be great. I'm, in so many ways, like, obviously, it's going to be extremely painful as changes happen, right? Change is always super painful. And many things that we're used to having, we won't have anymore. Many, many things will…. we don't even know what things which things will survive, we don't know which things will make in which things won't, right, we have no idea, right? So there'll be extremely painful things throughout this process as things come and go.
But I think if we look five years down the line at where we will end up, I think it's going to be cooler than it ever was. Because as of now, it's really hard to even get access to full length ballets. And even watch people doing it. Instagram has helped quite a bit where you can kind of see what people are doing and watch dancers at a professional level very closely and have a chance to actually study them. And to have some of that opened up, and have creativity not be so expensive, because you no longer need to put on a big production in order for people to see your stuff. And so then, therefore, regular people can make stuff. And people who aren't at the top can put their voices out there. And so it's going to be, I think, much more of a democratization of performances, because now a video will be an acceptable performance, and people will be used to it and you'll be able to make a video of you and your friends who look like regular people who dance like regular people, but who are doing something really, really cool. And that's going to be awesome.
Elizabeth: Yeah, I agree. I just think it'll be really interesting to watch everything unfold. I loved watching your end of year performance at Broche, was it in May? That was so fun. And and yeah, you had so many people that weren't even part of the studio that were able to put their pieces in. I love that. I think that just goes to show like it's not over right? There's so much possibility.
On Lost Motivation
Julie: Right, right. I think just one of the things that breaks my heart the most that I hear people say is losing motivation. Because “If I can't be in a studio, what's the point?” Or “If I can't do XYZ What's the point?” And it just kills me. It makes me super sad every time I get it. I totally get it. I totally get it. But I feel like it just, it really makes me super sad when I hear that statement.
Elizabeth: I yeah, that is something that has been coming up over and over again, people just talking about loss of motivation. I think that makes total sense. Right now with everything that's been going on in the world, there's been the perfect storm for increased depression, anxiety, so loss of motivation to do ballet is totally understandable. Like you said, it breaks my heart too. And I, I understand not wanting to take class at home. It's part of the reason that I haven't, as well as other reasons, but that’s why I keep bringing up things like journaling, like getting in a community, like talking to someone watching someone, like you don't have to take the class, right? There's been all these online classes available now for free, you don't have to take the class, you can just watch the class. You can get a lot from that. And just all of these, like little experimentations of trying different things in your everyday life. To me, they really are motivating, because it's like, “Oh, yeah, I love this. Like, I do want to do that.” And I think everyone has to find for themselves where is that line between feeling motivated before you do the activity? Or just knowing that like, this is what you want to be doing and just doing it and then allowing that motivation to come.
“Everyone has to find for themselves where is that line between feeling motivated before you do the activity, or just knowing that this is what you want to be doing, and just doing it and then allowing that motivation to come.”
Julie: That is a very wise point.
Elizabeth: We've all been there.
Julie: Yeah. The old chicken and egg problem.
Elizabeth: Right? Oh, man. I feel you. I do. You've been motivating me? Can I just say that really quick? Every day on your Instagram stories, doing your classes and exercises. I'm like, “Man, gettin’ it every day. I love it.”
Julie: Every day, I think it just happens where I'm just like, a little bit fed up with myself with not with not taking time for myself. I'm like, “Dude, every time you do anything, you go way too hardcore. And you forget about yourself every time.” And then I'm just finally like,
No, I'm not going to do that. I want to exercise every day. People say you shouldn't. So I'll just do different kinds of things every day to make it so that I'm not killing my body and make it so that I can do something I really enjoy every day.” And I'm just over it. I'm over not being there for myself.
Elizabeth: And with you showing up for yourself. It motivates me and I'm sure hundreds of thousands of other people.
Julie: Hopefully, I mean, if anything, if anything comes with me sweating on my balcony every day other than my neighbors thinking I’m a Bizarro person, I’ll take it. I think that this whole experience has been super eye-opening for so many of us in so many unexpected ways. And I think you just are able to see your past self a little bit more clearly. Because you're… at least I am so distanced from my past self, because everything is different. I live in a different place. I'm in a totally different environment. Everything was just removed in the same day. I closed the studios on June 30, and moved on July 3, so everything closed on the same day. And so for me, I'm like this massive transplant of just everything ending at the same time… I mean I planned it that way because everything was just sort of closing up at the same time. But it's it allowed me to have perspective on the way I was treating myself in the past. Because when you're in it, you can't see it. When you're in it, you forget to ask like, “Are you? What are you doing? What are you? Are you like still taking care of yourself? are you right now? Are you putting yourself anywhere on the list of things that matter? Like even on the list, anywhere?” And yeah, being in a totally different environment, I think has just enabled me to see the world in a very, very different way. And just like a little bit of a wake up call, like life is not guaranteed tomorrow is not guaranteed. And it really isn't. Like I took the studios for granted. I took my team for granted, I took my dancers for granted because I just figured they were they're going to be there. I didn't never occurred to me it wouldn't be there. It never crossed my mind.
Elizabeth: Right.
Julie: And so I think a huge change of perspective. And I'm just like, “No, I've been wanting my entire life to have the discipline to exercise every day.” My entire life. I've always wanted this ability to read and exercise and take care of myself and like, tomorrow may not come. So this is this is just got to be done.
Elizabeth: I think that's been probably one of the biggest gifts for those who have been open to it for this experience. I had a similar thing of just being like, oh, like yeah, it's not all going to continue the same way I think it is. And there's so many things that I was putting off, or waiting until I felt ready or someone invited me or whatever, right or worried about what someone was going to say or whatever. And then being like, Wait a second. Now that's not even possible. Like I was waiting. And now it's gone. So why am I waiting again?
“It’s not all going to continue the same way I think it is. There’s so many things that I was putting off, or waiting until I felt ready or someone invited me or whatever, right or worried about what someone was going to say or whatever. And then being like, Wait a second. Now that’s not even possible. Like I was waiting. And now it’s gone. So why am I waiting again? ”
Julie: Right? Yeah, I totally it's like, right before everything shut down. I had been thinking like, Well, you know, we haven't really been going out too much, so I started making like a list of restaurants I want to go to because we had gone a while and then, like two weeks later everything closed. And I was like, “Dude, Well, clearly, you waited way too long for that. So let's just stop waiting for the future.” Because it's like, we're literally in the future. So I think it's one of those things where this time around… I know, it's easy to say it's different. But I feel like it's different. I feel like I'm not fighting myself to exercise every day. It's not even a fight. I'm not even like, “Do I want to do it?” It's more like, “what do I want to do today?” It's not a question of if I will, it's just like, “What do you what are you curious about? What do you what? what feels good? What do you want to explore? What do you which instructor do you want to be motivated by today?” It's not a matter of will I do it today, it's a matter of what I prefer to do today with my time.
Elizabeth: I love that so much. Yeah, that's something that I have gone back to again, and again, I usually tell people… because I am not a Type A organized person, even though I'm a perfectionist, a little weird, but I love for me what works so well is having a menu so that it's not like scheduled and it has to be this or nothing. Because I've tried that so many times and failed. That menu like we're talking about throwing in rélevés while I'm brushing my teeth, or just doing a port de bras, or dancing with my kids like to a song like, I have a long menu and whatever it is that day, whatever it fits in, it gets to happen.
“For me what works so well is having a menu so that it’s not like scheduled and it has to be this or nothing. Because I’ve tried that so many times and failed. That menu like we’re talking about throwing in rélevés while I’m brushing my teeth, or just doing a port de bras, or dancing with my kids like to a song like, I have a long menu and whatever it is that day, whatever it fits in, it gets to happen.”
How to Know What Interests You?
Julie: I think one one question I wanted to ask you in when you were talking about this, I'm glad the conversation circled back around to it. When when I started exercising every day and kind of doing things I was curious about, I found it really hard to actually know what I was curious about. And I found that I was I would wake up and be like, why do you want to reach that? I'm like, I don't know. I'm like you have no interest. You have no interest.
Elizabeth: Oh my gosh.
Julie: And when I was a kid when I started well… I guess I call 17 a kid I think that's very young... When I was 17 and started ballet, the teacher would be like stretch, do whatever you need for stretch. And I'm like, how would I know what I need?
Elizabeth: Right, right.
Julie: Do you have? Um, I mean, I think I have figured it out, but I'm always curious on people's perspectives about this who are in this boat?
Elizabeth: Oh, totally, totally. First of all, I just want to say I love how you are narrating that other voice? Because I do that all the time. And sometimes I'm like, “Don't you have that person who's like talking to you from the outside watching and being like, what do you doing? What do you mean, you don't know?”
Julie: Totally well, and I always joke about that voice. Sometimes it gets kind of rude up there. I'm always like, no one who feeds you like this could all end. I am the one who gives you your lunch. So like be nicer to me.
Elizabeth: So yeah, this is this is such a great topic, because that is something that I'm trying to…. through the journaling and meditation and visualizing is guide people back to that knowledge that they have, actually, inside of themselves. That's like intuitive eating, intuitive movement. We get so detached from ourselves, and for some people at a very young age, but I think most dancers are in some regards detaching themselves, which is funny because we are so in our bodies moving. But we're so used to someone telling us exactly what to do and and what it should feel like and what it should look like and what we should eat and stuff like that. So it's like making space to get to know yourself again, and to trust and believe that you do have the answer.
“Through journaling and meditation and visualizing, [I’m trying to] guide people back to that knowledge that they have, actually, inside of themselves. That’s like intuitive eating, intuitive movement. We get so detached from ourselves, and for some people at a very young age, but I think most dancers are in some regards detaching themselves, which is funny because we are so in our bodies moving. But we’re so used to someone telling us exactly what to do and what it should feel like and what it should look like and what we should eat, etc.
So it’s like making space to get to know yourself again, and to trust and believe that you do have the answer. ”
Elizabeth: I heard this thing and I can't remember where but it said that “I don't know” is a limiting belief. And that like it, like smacked me because I say I have always said I don't know, there's probably my entire life. I've looked to other people to make choices for me. Because like, I don't know, I don't know what the right answer is like, I don't know where to hang that picture. I don't know. And so, that has been a big journey for me in the last year too of being like, “Oh, actually, you do know, you're just afraid that it's gonna be the wrong answer or like, some weird thing like that.” And so I think it's a journey, right? But it's a process of making the space to actually hear what you're thinking. Have you ever read the book, “The Artists Way” by Julia Cameron,
Julie: I have it on my shelf. But I'm only just now recently reading as a human being so hope to incorporate.
Elizabeth: Yes, I love reading, that's been a huge part of my journey. So she has a practice in there that I talk about a lot with my journaling students, called Morning Pages. And it's where you write stream of conscious for three pages, and you have to commit to those three pages. And it's kind of like the whole idea of that if you commit to continue writing for those three pages, you'll make it past those surface thoughts of like, “I don't know what to write, this is stupid. I'm not a writer, I don't have anything to say, I gotta go do this.” And then you'll actually start to like, get to the deeper thoughts of what you're thinking and feeling and stuff like that. And I think, even just wider than ballet as a culture, we're so disconnected from our senses, and from our feelings and emotions, that it's that work, right? It's that work of like… when I started meditating at the beginning of lockdown without a guided voice, it was so hard.
Julie: Yikes, I’m not there yet!
Elizabeth: Like, it's okay. It's okay! Because for the longest time, I meditated with the guide, I needed the guided voice. And so I read this book, another one… what was called? Stress Less Accomplish More, I think, by Emily Fletcher.
Julie: Sounds good!
Elizabeth: Yeah, it’s great. So she would have you start the meditations by going through your five senses and like, thinking of like, what's the, you know, most strong taste? And what's the least strong taste? And when I first started doing it, I was like, “tastes like tongue like, I don't know, what, what do you want me to say?” With smell, too. I was like, “I don't smell anything.” And I was like, sitting there being like, “this is the stupidest thing ever.” Like, I can't, I don't have any words. And it really took time. But now I feel like I can detect and like put words to different tastes and different smells, and those tiny sensations of feeling. So I think it just is deciding that you want to reconnect to yourself and all of the knowledge that you actually already have.
Julie: Why did you keep trying?
Elizabeth: So if you read the book, she just talks so much about the benefits of meditation, and like any other perfectionist, it was like, “I'm gonna get this!”
Julie: Ha, “I’m going to NAIL meditation!”
Elizabeth: It was like “I am going to check this off, I can do it!” But yeah, it was such an interesting journey. Because I always thought of meditation without the guided meditation of like, you have to not think and I was like, I can't do that. And in that book, she talks so much about how telling your brain not to think would be like telling your heart not to beat, it's just not going to happen. You just got to get comfortable with the thoughts and just them being there and coming in and out and whatever. And that's like hard, right? We're just constantly judging everything like, but can you imagine if we were like, “Man, my heart is just like, it's not beating, right. Like, I just can't get this thing.”
“I always thought of meditation without the guided meditation meant you have to not think and I was like, ‘I can’t do that.’ And in that book, she talks so much about how telling your brain not to think would be like telling your heart not to beat, it’s just not going to happen. You just got to get comfortable with the thoughts and just them being there and coming in and out. And that’s hard, right?”
Julie: Yeah, I always, I always wonder why we're so hard on our brains in in a different way than the rest of our body. Like, my brain is just doing its thing, right? It's doing its thing up there. Like, I'm like, ‘Meh….’
Elizabeth: Exactly. It's just like, it's just doing what it's supposed to be doing.
Julie: Oh, man, so funny.
Julie: Well, to wrap up, I guess we have gone so many places with this conversation, there's no way to even wrap it up into a single point. So let's make a new one. Okay, if we had if you wanted to leave our listeners today with something to inspire them for their day, if let's say plus picture someone listening over their morning coffee, if you wanted to give them something to inspire the rest of their day, what might you give them?
Elizabeth: Oh, that's a hard one. I would encourage them to take a moment. Maybe if there's a bunch of other people, maybe they could go in the bathroom, I hide in the bathroom a lot, or my closet. Take like a couple of deep breaths. And listen for that voice. Not the one that's like up here. But like the one that's a little bit lower, maybe in the heart or the gut of like, “What is something that I would love to do today?” and then go with whatever the first thing is that comes up and be open to how that could be interpreted, right? Maybe it's like, I want to go back to bed and you can't do that, but maybe somewhere in your day. You could just like lay down for a few minutes. Right before this call, I laid down for 10 minutes because I was so tired, and I was like, well, there's no way I could take a nap, but the more that I can be open to like, well, how could I honor that desire that just popped up? I don't know. I think the more you follow those breadcrumbs, the more that you do connect back to yourself.
Julie: That's really powerful. That's really powerful. I feel like what came into my head was I could go for some pasta. So I feel like that means that should happen soon.
Elizabeth: I think that's next on your agenda!
Julie: I think so the body I think, yeah, I think it's true. I think the body knows what it wants. And I think we just tell it, that it's wrong. And we tell it to quiet down and we tell it that there's no way it could possibly want that. And we tell it all kinds of things that realistically, you know, the answers are already there. You already have them all. You already already already know it yet. And you just have to be open to, as you say, Be open to it. Honor it, be open to the possibilities that come your way.
Elizabeth: Yeah. And then maybe you'll get more pasta and naps, I mean who doesn’t want that?
Julie: Oh that’s awesome. Well, thank you so much for being on the show. If you guys don't already follow Elizabeth, go check her out on Instagram @thewholepointe. Check her out on YouTube, The Whole Pointe, consider joining her Beyond Ballet community the next time she has enrollment open to hear her thoughts and be a part of that community exploring all of this. It really does help to work on your mind as much as you work on your body if not a three to one ratio. So thank you so much for being on the show.
Elizabeth: Yeah, thank you!
Julie: Thank you very much.
“Don’t forget to just enjoy dance. Don’t forget to do the things that feel a little scary, like choreographing to be with very little dance experience is…. Like someone could be like, “Why are you choreograph, you want to already you have no skill in this?” “Oh, I okay. I don’t have very much skill in it. It doesn’t mean I can’t do it. It doesn’t mean I can’t have benefit out of it.” And some of those scary things that I’ve jumped into, which I actually think dance was at the beginning was one of those scary things I’ve just jumped right into, have turned out to be some of the most meaningful aspects and communities that I found in my life.”
Julie: Yeah, it's really true. All those, all those things that we think people will tell us why we shouldn't do things that we should be more experienced before we do things or once you're better, you'll be allowed to do this or whatever it is. It's just so not true. Those aren't the reasons we're doing it. We're doing it because it's fun, because it's healing because it's, like you said, community… for all the reasons other than that, right? It's not about that. It's about so much more.
Kelsey: Yes.
Julie: Well, this was so fun to chat with you, Kelsey. I really appreciate having you on the show and your time and your genuine ability to talk through some really, really challenging things that I know will be really beneficial to our listeners, even if they haven't gone through these things themselves to just understand more and just be able to see the kinds of things that dance can do for people and help them empathize with maybe some of their classmates who might be going through something similar and coming to dance for these reasons.
Kelsey: Yes, yeah. And if anyone listens to this and wants to reach out to me Feel free to reach out on Instagram, or Facebook. I think you can just search my name. If not Julie can tell you how to get to me
Julie: That’s right. We’ll put all of these details in, in the description on the various platforms where this is. So just look there to find Kelsey and follow her story she posts on she posts as she said, not every day but a good amount on social media about her story and her journey and and it's really fun to watch the evolution because as we can tell from today, you've really been through a lot and have taken the time to take care of yourself through and taking the time to figure out how you can live with joy and positivity and all of that through all of the trauma, which is really inspiring.
Kelsey: Thank you.
Julie: So thank you so much.
