What's going through my head right now #4

Versatility, flexibility and the necessary tools of the trade

‘There is so much I would like to learn, experience and try out ... but to commit?’

I've heard this sentence a lot in recent years. Mostly from young people who are just starting out in adult life. Who have started their first apprenticeship or degree programme. This is fundamentally a really positive approach. It shows openness, a willingness to learn and curiosity.

What I have noticed is that there are many who don't follow this path to the end, who drop out of the training they have started in the middle of it or are forced to complete it ‘somehow’. They usually even have other, new ideas straight away, want to start them without waiting ... and don't finish them there either.

Sure, if the fire isn't burning, then that certainly makes sense. And nothing is worse than being trapped in a situation that doesn't satisfy you, that doesn't make you happy and seems more like a heavy burden.

But I've also noticed how people throw in the towel at the slightest resistance, criticism or obstacle. Alibis are sought that justify throwing in the towel prematurely, taking a step back and looking for something new. Interestingly enough, these people will always do the same thing: at the slightest dip or negative experience, they'll throw in the towel and look for new terrain.

And every day the marble greets ...

Very few people will really learn or develop in the process.

In my opinion and life experience, you have to have experienced something in depth and worked your way through it, with all its highs and lows. You learn your lessons, reflect and analyse what didn't work and why, or what led to success. Face up to criticism, but also celebrate moments of success and know (or at least sense) what you have achieved and what has not yet reached the point of realisation.

Only then can you speak of a foundation. A basis on which further development and expansion can take place. Because once you have understood certain fundamentals and integrated them into your actions and thinking, some principles can be applied to other areas, allowing you to gain access to new ideas, concepts or structures more quickly.

However, this requires time, perseverance, resilience and a certain amount of humility in the face of what lies ahead. In my dance work over the years (and I'm talking about almost forty years), I have always been able and allowed to combine this on many levels. Whether I have incorporated what I experience as a dancer in my daily training into my own teaching. Whether I have repeatedly analysed what I have seen and experienced in rehearsals with other choreographers or in performances, and prepared and tried it out for my own creativity. I have always tried to penetrate it. To understand it to a certain extent, or at least to get closer to it. And then to find my own way with it.

After my novel was published, the question kept coming up: What aren't you doing? Or why are you doing so many different things? Dance is so complex and takes up so much space, energy and time in your life?

Well, it's curiosity that drives me. To discover new things, to get to the bottom of things. And to discover again and again that the foundations I've built up over the years give me a solid base.

And yet every pillar, every supporting element has to be rebuilt. And in order for it to continue to support me in the future and for me to be able to rely on it, I need a strong and solid construction.

Versatility and flexibility at the price of superficiality, of quick success without the necessary tools of the trade, will never last in the long term, but will always be a house of cards that collapses or flies away with the next gust of wind.

Everything takes time and the continuous and constant use of one's own resources. Mentally, physically and above all emotionally - with all your senses.

With this in mind, I wish you a relaxing spring Sunday.

Yours Jochen, sincerely