Just One Dancer's Opinion
- Jenna
- Feb 16, 2021
- 2 min read
Has anyone ever heard of Eisoptrophobia? Well, if you have colour me impressed but for those who haven’t it is a fear of mirrors or your reflection in a mirror. From my experience, I can say that everyone has moments of insecurity, whether that be when you look at yourself in pictures or in the mirror right before you take a shower; I wish this wasn’t the reality for me but sadly it is. The good news however is that self-perception can change, and the biggest factor that instilled this change in my life was dance.
According to multiple different sources, the best activities for building confidence and positive body image are team sports and activities such as running and martial arts that demonstrate strength and power. This brings me to reason #1 that dance was so good for me, it gave me a support system. I had friends I could rely on and teammates who were having an equally hard time with insecurity. I don’t think it is emphasized enough how much social interaction matters for your mental well-being. Nobody focuses on your “flaws” as much as you do, which is why you sometimes need people to pull your focus to the good things about you that everyone else but you can see. Ok, reason #2 that dance was so good for me was that it was easy to see your growth. You can count the new skills you’ve learned and watch the visible change in performance quality that comes in just one year. A lot of articles you will read about self-improvement will tell you to “celebrate your successes”, and they’re absolutely right. I grew in confidence not because I was the best dancer in the group, but because I wanted to get there, and I knew that I was getting closer every day. Now I’m not going to lie to you there was one area of dance that I really struggled with, every room was covered wall to wall in mirrors. It’s easy to watch yourself succeed, it’s not easy to watch yourself learn and fail. If I’m being honest, I still struggle with mirrors, but I know I’m making progress because I don’t do my makeup in the dark anymore, and some days it’s not so hard to face myself. Long story short, I am so thankful to have been a dancer and I do truly believe it was the best thing for me. I hope anyone reading this can relate to some part of my story and can continue to love themselves more and more every day :)
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