Map or Maze?

 As a Professional ballet dancer my practice can be moulded into any number of different things. Through looking at my practice from a wider angle I notice that one of the greatest things about classical ballet is the vast amount transferable skills you learn through your unusual education and career. This is something I have always been very grateful for as it has always been apparent to me that one day I will retire from performing professionally and move on to an entirely different career in another industry. 

Working through module 1 and beginning to try to construct a "map" of my practice has almost made me resent how broad my practice is for the first time in my life. My initial thought was to create a mind map including all of the different things my practice involves and significant artists or experiences that have shaped my personal practice and identity. The problem with this is that my mind map became a kind of colourful maze linking all of the different aspects of my practice together with no clear areas of learning standing out.

In order to pick my areas of learning I then created a separate mind map containing a few specific aspects of my practice that easily link to the three lenses discussed in this module and that stick out to me as being the most important. Doing this I finally felt like I was making good progress until now when I am actually writing my essay and am finding that since there are so many crossovers in every aspect of my practice it is really difficult for me to focus in on specific areas of learning and avoid going off on tangents. 

Although this is extremely frustrating as I would like to be able to finish my essay in a timely fashion and within the word count it has helped me realise just how passionate I am about what I do. There are so many aspects of my practice that I barely give a minutes thought to in my day-to-day life that are an inherent part of me and what I do and it has helped me appreciate my work in a different way. 

My practice has always been about expressing myself and pushing the boundaries of my own limitations but I now see how much of my work is about challenging the norm and advocating for the movement of my industry away from toxic traditionalism towards a more healthy, inclusive environment.