Line Dancing with Life

When I was 12, my older sister tried to teach me some basic dance steps. Two-stepping with your adult sister or her husband is not really a girl's idea of fun - at least, it wasn't for me. I'm not a dancer.

I did learn the basics, however, and I can say I still remember the Texas Ten-step after all these years, even though I mixed it up for a minute there, this weekend.

The Ten-step is a partner's line dance, wherein the gentleman and lady perform the (slightly) complicated steps together, and then the gentleman twirls the lady around him, and a fun time is had. It requires an uptempo to dance to, and by golly, they played the Boot Scootin' Boogie just for me on Friday night.

I've never been the type to ask a man to dance, and Friday night was no exception.

I got up because I felt like it. I went out on the floor and started shuffling my feet in the Ten-step pattern.

It was a moment of revelation for me.

Life is what we make it, they say. That means that for all of us (I'm including myself hardcore in this) who gripe and complain about how much life sucks, we have no one but ourselves to blame for the state of things.

We tend to miss that important detail when the lights dim and it is time to dance.

I didn't dance for even a full minute, the pleasure was simply too much for me

Yes, pleasure. Yes, it was too much fun.

I have learned about myself that I am not naturally boring and depressing, but rather I have worked hard to be that way all my life. By now, 33 years in, the habit of self-punishment and the self-pity that follows has become pretty deeply ingrained.

I punish myself for being alive, for being blind, for the mistakes of my youth. Friday night I had a good time, I really enjoyed myself, and I thought "I want to come back next Friday too!" - even as I kept up my habit of repressing my joy and hiding my interest.

When my friends asked me if I wanted to join them next Friday, I said "no, I don't think I can...I can't afford it..." When in truth, I didn't have to spend a single penny.

Now, Saturday, I am a wreck. I'm angry, I'm sad, I'm flying off the handle and feeling so guilty I could self-harm. All because I had a good time at karaoke, when I'm supposed to be miserable.

It is as if I subconsciously consider it my responsibility to be grumpy, miserable, unhappy. As if I am under orders to dislike people and conversation.

The most complicated part of that little dance is that I don't know when I gave myself these orders, and what the circumstances were. I have no way of knowing when I will have fulfilled my atonement conditions.

We invent these scenarios for ourselves in our child-like minds. If-then statements in that mathematical part of our brain that we think is the smartest part. We let our math-mind take charge, not even realizing that mathematics is a construct, a tool invented by man, and the emotional mind came first. It is the emotional mind that finds joy despite sorrow.

I wanted to dance. I can confess to myself that much, now, 24 hours out from the event. I wanted to sing happy songs, not sad.

Dancing is fun, a pastime that we perform in celebration, in creation, in love and joy.

Still I understand now, it takes discipline to learn to dance. Genius only carries the body so far. A few extra steps each day, and writing new mental contracts, new If-then statements, are required by those of us who were born to be miserable.

Just think - what if we were made this way so that we could overturn the standard, and become the person we secretly admire, dancing and laughing across the floor.

With someone that they love.

I'd like to enjoy dancing with me ...