“If you judge people, you have no time to love them.”
- Mother Theresa
As much as I adore updating about my progress in my own life, I feel the need to step outside of that this week. A big part of my life is the dance community, specifically the Chicago dance community. I decided that I would share my outlook that I believe in as an artist. With that said, here is my rant. Cue Prince's hit song 1999- " I was dreaming' when I wrote this, so sue me if it goes astray…"
A supportive attitude is a characteristic stemming from a place of love. Love is absolutely everything I live by. Every fiber of my being is made to give love, to accept love, to be in love, and nourish love. Love can come in many forms and is distinctively unique to each individual who is experiencing it. Love, to me begins from a place of acceptance for something or someone. Many people have lifestyles or careers where it isn't always easy to express love. I feel grateful that who I am as an artist is a full reflection of my love and passion for it. The entertainment world is capable of giving and nourishing love so easily, it's called support.
- Mother Theresa
As much as I adore updating about my progress in my own life, I feel the need to step outside of that this week. A big part of my life is the dance community, specifically the Chicago dance community. I decided that I would share my outlook that I believe in as an artist. With that said, here is my rant. Cue Prince's hit song 1999- " I was dreaming' when I wrote this, so sue me if it goes astray…"
A supportive attitude is a characteristic stemming from a place of love. Love is absolutely everything I live by. Every fiber of my being is made to give love, to accept love, to be in love, and nourish love. Love can come in many forms and is distinctively unique to each individual who is experiencing it. Love, to me begins from a place of acceptance for something or someone. Many people have lifestyles or careers where it isn't always easy to express love. I feel grateful that who I am as an artist is a full reflection of my love and passion for it. The entertainment world is capable of giving and nourishing love so easily, it's called support.
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Artists, to me, are not only defined by someone skilled in a particular craft, but are also passionate about it. In turn, an artist's mindset should always come from a place of love first. We have the ability to see a distinct beauty in everyone and everything around us. Artists can appreciate ALL forms of art and are supportive to ALL individual's passions. Artists know how to take a compliment as well as stay humble enough to know that the inspirational, learning, and growing process is a never-ending cycle.Something that distinguishes artists from just "talented people" is that they have zero room or time for judgement on other people's work. The day an artist allows themselves to do that is the day they need to turn in their "artist cards."
I want to give some backing to where my opinions come from based on a collection of my experiences in the dance community. Originally turned onto acting, I joined dance at the later age of 10. I fell in love with expanding to another way of expressing yourself. The ability to work hard at something unique and physically feeling progress in my body. I loved how easy it was to uplift and support one another through words, music, team comradery, or even just the energies that one another would exude in a room or on stage. Compared to other circuits, growing up on the Chicago competition dance circuit was very competitive. I would not be alone in saying it is often turned into a negative atmosphere for artists.
Instead of dancers driven by their own passion for growth and support, a lot of dancer's pursued a cardboard cutout perfection just to beat out other companies. Every season I would witness dancers who would hop around from company to company bad-mouthing wherever they were last in attempts to get themselves ahead. There was a consistent lack of loyalty to their dance families. All too often you would experience company rivalry get out of hand. When one company would beat another, the dancers would have too much pride to congratulate one another and find ways to publicly trash the winner's dancing, artistry, or talent. Don't get me wrong, I am all for a healthy competitive spirit and team pride. In the more recent years dancers replace motivating and challenging one another to push their limits and abilities to the next level with gossip, not supporting everyone, and a major lack of humility in their character.
What's even more disappointing, is that it is not only in children that we see this type of behavior. Like I stated in last week's blog, I had the opportunity to perform alongside several dance crews from the Chicago area in a hip hop showcase recently. I, personally, had the privilege of experiencing a lot of positive feedback and supportive comments. My favorite one was after viewing a video of the performance someone said, " Whoa, at 5:15 Amanda makes me feel like I don't have complete control of my life and I'm actually in someone else's palms!"
I want to give some backing to where my opinions come from based on a collection of my experiences in the dance community. Originally turned onto acting, I joined dance at the later age of 10. I fell in love with expanding to another way of expressing yourself. The ability to work hard at something unique and physically feeling progress in my body. I loved how easy it was to uplift and support one another through words, music, team comradery, or even just the energies that one another would exude in a room or on stage. Compared to other circuits, growing up on the Chicago competition dance circuit was very competitive. I would not be alone in saying it is often turned into a negative atmosphere for artists.
Instead of dancers driven by their own passion for growth and support, a lot of dancer's pursued a cardboard cutout perfection just to beat out other companies. Every season I would witness dancers who would hop around from company to company bad-mouthing wherever they were last in attempts to get themselves ahead. There was a consistent lack of loyalty to their dance families. All too often you would experience company rivalry get out of hand. When one company would beat another, the dancers would have too much pride to congratulate one another and find ways to publicly trash the winner's dancing, artistry, or talent. Don't get me wrong, I am all for a healthy competitive spirit and team pride. In the more recent years dancers replace motivating and challenging one another to push their limits and abilities to the next level with gossip, not supporting everyone, and a major lack of humility in their character.
What's even more disappointing, is that it is not only in children that we see this type of behavior. Like I stated in last week's blog, I had the opportunity to perform alongside several dance crews from the Chicago area in a hip hop showcase recently. I, personally, had the privilege of experiencing a lot of positive feedback and supportive comments. My favorite one was after viewing a video of the performance someone said, " Whoa, at 5:15 Amanda makes me feel like I don't have complete control of my life and I'm actually in someone else's palms!"
Unfortunately, not everyone got feedback like that. In fact, earlier this week there was an "outbreak" of negative gossip regarding the Vicious family. A lot of hurtful words and rumors were said from other dance crews that are in Chicago. Needless to say, it was disappointing to know that grown "artists" have the time to act from a place of hate. The judgmental and analytically based remarks truly baffled me. I am proud, however, to be a part of a small intimate dance family that is Vicious. We have two things in our mind at all times- our passion for this, and our drive to be legendary.
No one who became legendary got there without having some backtalk, being gossiped about, or hated on. The only thing we as a family can do is what we already have done: stay humble, love every second of what we do/experience together, and work our butts off. Passionate people come with the price of having extreme emotions- that includes ALL emotions negative and positive. If people don't understand that without that sort of passion in our work and in our livelihood, that we wouldn't be Vicious at all. The reason we are a collective is not because we have the same dance ability, not because we all are the same body type, and not because we have the same strengths. It's because every single one of us has fought some sort of battle in our life, small or large, that has tested our character and tenacity. And because of that struggle or journey that we went through individually, it gave us the ability to come together and share the gifts that we were given, no matter how different, and support one another. And that's Vicious. There's nothing more to it. We dance. We work hard. We feel. -- and love every minute of it!
Back to my point of love. I find it a lot less difficult to accept someone as they are without reason behind it and love them. Love them unconditionally in hopes of watching who they are molded into, and be a part of someone's life in a positive way. On the other hand, I don't comprehend why so many individuals have the energy or time to judge and give reason behind their judgments, or "hate" someone. I can only continue loving the way I know how and hope it rubs off. With the recent drama and disturbances within the chicago dance scene, I find myself at a loss for words. Art is so beautiful when supported, accepted, and motivated. I cannot see how judging others helps our community and this facet of sharing passion grow. Maybe it's my lack of reason and overly accepting nature that is blinding me. But then again, love is blind. Conveniently, I came across this article backing my idea on love/hate. Feel free to check it out.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/scientists-prove-it-really-is-a-thin-line-between-love-and-hate-976901.html
In conclusion, CHECK YOURSELF! If you consider yourself an artist and read through this, reflect on how you reacted internally to this. If you were rebelling my opinion then you already have proved my point and I thank you. I am in no way saying this is the right way to think, or the only way to think. I am simply stating my opinion and hoping to give insight. I would choose standing up for an opinion and vulnerably sharing it, over keeping quiet and never developing a sense of self. Consequently, you as readers are more than entitled to your own opinion on all of this. Please share it! I encourage you to. I will never expect everyone I encounter to think, feel, believe, or do what I do. Most importantly, I am always willing to embrace your perspective from a nonjudgmental place. I am very passionate in thinking the entertainment world could better itself as a community if we all just took the time we used to judge others and spend it accepting instead.
Till next time….
No one who became legendary got there without having some backtalk, being gossiped about, or hated on. The only thing we as a family can do is what we already have done: stay humble, love every second of what we do/experience together, and work our butts off. Passionate people come with the price of having extreme emotions- that includes ALL emotions negative and positive. If people don't understand that without that sort of passion in our work and in our livelihood, that we wouldn't be Vicious at all. The reason we are a collective is not because we have the same dance ability, not because we all are the same body type, and not because we have the same strengths. It's because every single one of us has fought some sort of battle in our life, small or large, that has tested our character and tenacity. And because of that struggle or journey that we went through individually, it gave us the ability to come together and share the gifts that we were given, no matter how different, and support one another. And that's Vicious. There's nothing more to it. We dance. We work hard. We feel. -- and love every minute of it!
Back to my point of love. I find it a lot less difficult to accept someone as they are without reason behind it and love them. Love them unconditionally in hopes of watching who they are molded into, and be a part of someone's life in a positive way. On the other hand, I don't comprehend why so many individuals have the energy or time to judge and give reason behind their judgments, or "hate" someone. I can only continue loving the way I know how and hope it rubs off. With the recent drama and disturbances within the chicago dance scene, I find myself at a loss for words. Art is so beautiful when supported, accepted, and motivated. I cannot see how judging others helps our community and this facet of sharing passion grow. Maybe it's my lack of reason and overly accepting nature that is blinding me. But then again, love is blind. Conveniently, I came across this article backing my idea on love/hate. Feel free to check it out.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/scientists-prove-it-really-is-a-thin-line-between-love-and-hate-976901.html
In conclusion, CHECK YOURSELF! If you consider yourself an artist and read through this, reflect on how you reacted internally to this. If you were rebelling my opinion then you already have proved my point and I thank you. I am in no way saying this is the right way to think, or the only way to think. I am simply stating my opinion and hoping to give insight. I would choose standing up for an opinion and vulnerably sharing it, over keeping quiet and never developing a sense of self. Consequently, you as readers are more than entitled to your own opinion on all of this. Please share it! I encourage you to. I will never expect everyone I encounter to think, feel, believe, or do what I do. Most importantly, I am always willing to embrace your perspective from a nonjudgmental place. I am very passionate in thinking the entertainment world could better itself as a community if we all just took the time we used to judge others and spend it accepting instead.
Till next time….
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