I meant to do that...

Over the weekend, I got to see some amazing dance performances and a few that were less amazing.  In trying to sort out what made the difference between amazing and not, I realized that the magic ingredient, as far as I could tell from the outside, was intention.

All of the dancers spent hours training and rehearsing.  They all had developed muscles and methods of controlling those muscles.  Body type was not an indicator—some of the most transcendent dancers were older or heavier than what we, societally, think of as dancers.

The ones who moved me, as I sat there in my moderately uncomfortable chair, were the ones who knew why they were there and what they were doing at every second.  There were no body parts unaccounted for, no movements sketched when they could be deeply drawn.  It was an integrated, flowing whole, that kind of dance.

Not all of us are cut out to be dancers.  But all of us can strive, from time to time, for the clarity of mind as we move our bodies that creates beauty out of strength and purpose.  Maybe we’re just doing curls, maybe it’s the third set and we’re tired and we’d rather be on a beach somewhere.  Maybe it’s time to check our hearts and invest in being where we are, doing what we are doing with full intention.  They could be the most beautiful curls ever.