Failing Gracefully or Failing to be Graceful?

Ah, precious blogging time. Who am I kidding? I have no time, but time I have made, for I am eager to divulge of the adventures of this week.

Last night, I started dance class. I was consistently terrified on our trek out west to the Lou Conte Dance School and I feared I was getting myself into a mess. Afraid that I would be asked to make a fool of myself or worse, make a fool of myself when I was asked to perform.

And with unexpected accuracy, I found myself fuddling through dance moves I had never learned, merely mimicked. I dougied — or attempted to at least. I lunged left, I waved imaginary dirt off my hand, I leaned back and drove my imaginary car and I thought, "I look ridiculous."

Twenty minutes into class, I was ready to be done. I leaned over to Danica and informed her that I would have more fun, and get more exercise in, if I simply ran laps around the building.

An hour into the class, I had given up on the learning the steps, realizing that their definition of "beginner" and my own were worlds apart. I chose a few favorites — the side lunge to high kick, the shoulder pops, the wheelchair. I performed my version of my favorite moves and laughed the whole way through, deciding resiliently, that I would not step foot into another beginner dance class without more basic help. At which point, Danica leaned over and said, "We came. We saw. We did not conquer."

With smiles on our faces and laughter pouring out of our mouths, we headed home — the long way — and decided to try again the next day.

Tonight, we knew we would look foolish. We knew we were far behind the class, and we knew that this was our last hope of succeeding in our pre-purchased dance classes.

We didn't get the steps right consistently. We didn't know how to prance. We turned the wrong direction on our solitary spin and we did our pikes seconds after the count. But we had fun and we learned something. We sighed with relief as we watched our fellow classmates make the same errors and we knew that this was going to be a good course for us.

One thing our teacher told us tonight, came as no surprise, but was nevertheless enlightening: "You have to let go. Modern dance is about freeing yourself and dancing like no one is watching and letting your body move without restraint."

Another friend of mine is in improv classes and is consistently learning that she must loosen up and have fun. She has to be herself and be freed from expectations for the second your humor becomes about response, is the second it falls.

Step out. Do something you'll fail at, and love every moment of it.

I could spend hours telling you about how rare it is for me to do something which I might fail at. I could tell you hundreds of stories of giving up on things that were hard or that I had a low chance of success in. But there is something for me in this next season of life. There are a lot of limbs I must step out on and a lot of places where failure is imminent. And I have never been more excited.

To failing along the way, to knowing that this journey won't end in fame or glory, to freeing myself from the expectations of those around me — here is a big sigh of relief, followed by a gasp of fear.

Let's do this.