Keeping your passion

We all have things we are passionate about. Things that we love to do. If your work is your passion and you look forward to going to work every day, then you are very, very blessed. For others passion could be a hobby like reading or fishing or mountain climbing or movie watching. We all have our "thing".

For me it is dance and it has been for years. Dance makes me happy. No I probably don't move like I used to and I've put my love of dance into coaching. I have for 23 years. I have both fond and happy memories along some less than happy memories from those years. But I'd like to think that for those few tough times I've got 100+ times and memories that are happy, the good has always out weighted the bad 100-times over. The laughter and smiles I've seen from "my kids" make those tough times worthwhile.

But as we all know times, kids and parents have changed. We have a society of "experts" coming in the form of kids and parents or kids who have been told they are the experts by said parents. Those who think they know better and the parents who want to run the show. I will be the first to admit that the past couple of years have been tough. From very poor behavior coming from one of my athletes to girls and their mama's who are, well....just plain mean girls. The moms are still living in their high school years...and they act pretty poorly but that is their business. The sad thing is they are raising daughters who have no values or character and continue to act just like them as adults...follow the same path. This in turns make working in education and coaching tough.

And what my coaching future holds is my decision. Yes, I have a few people around me telling me what they think I should do. But honestly none of them have walked in my shoes. I'm not going to argue with them about their perspective. But it is easy to give someone your opinion. For me walking away is heartbreaking. With 20+ years of blood, sweat, tears, laughter, smiles and happy memories it would be a tough thing to let go. Letting someone win is not how I do things. I'm not in it to win anything but I'm also not in this to let a couple of "mean girls" get their way. Yes, it's a matter of pride but it's also for all those kids who have touched my life over the past 20+ years. The girls and boys who I still see and hear from. I'm not sure what I've taught all those athletes over the years, I hope they learned something from Dance Team. But it's just as much for me what I've learned from them. The smiles when they dance in front of home fans. The pride when they earn a trophy at state competition. Or the friendships they've formed from teammates they otherwise may have never gotten to know. All these kids have crossed my path and I've lived and learned from all of them. More from some, than others.

I'm honestly torn right now...my heart and head are saying one thing while a few around me say otherwise. The lack of support is disappointing and sad to say the least. My heart is sad because of the lack of support and the fact that where I go from here I will be doing alone without support-but lack of support in education is nothing new. I avoid the subject around a few choice people because they've made their feelings know and I know I don't have the support.

The phrase "one more year" rolls thought my mind. I'd rather have six good, hard working, good hearted dancers than lazy athletes who only make things a priority when they want to. I don't want the past year or two to define me, decide for me. I also don't want to give up just because the going has gotten tough.

When I took this program over 23 years ago it was a small program with a half dozen performances during basketball season. I've fought tooth and nail for respect and a ton of hard work and I've made it a little bit bigger. Has my program run it's course? Is this just a rough patch? I don't want to give it up and hand it over to someone who will destroy it and I leave because of a few bad apples. I feel like I'm running from a fight rather than standing strong. There will always be haters. That's life.

My lack of dance in my life has made me sad and has an affect on my creativity-big time. I'm one of those people who has to create every day. I mean every single day. This can range from organizing to creating something. I need it, I live for it, it's who I am. I still 8-count music and feel the tempo. I still envision moves in my mind with music as well....

The phrase "When the going gets tough, the tough get going" just keeps coming to mind. I'm pretty sure I'm tough as I've made it through every tough day that's came my way in life so far, so I've got a pretty good track record, but so does anyone who is still alive!