Home | Business News | Browse by Publication | D | Dance Magazine

I'm just not good enough: how one dancer fell into the black hole of self-criticism, and climbed out--and learned a thing or two about technique.

Article Excerpt
I was sinking in Spain ... not from the sharp July sun, or the pitchers of sangria, or the tire-sized pans of paella at midnight, but from my own quicksand of insecurities. It was the summer of 2002, and I was in Barcelona, in the middle of a three-city tour with Mikhail Baryshnikov's White Oak Dance Project. It was a small gem of a tour. Barcelona woke me out of bed with its nightlife pebbling my hotel room window, Valencia was last week's quaint memory, and Las Palmas beckoned with promises of equatorial sun and a beach-front hotel. I felt painfully unworthy of being there.

I had been in the company for two and a half years and was a six-year veteran of the rigorous Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company. Yet I dreaded the thought of having to perform each night. My confidence was that of a struggling student. What was the cause of my low self-esteem?

When I was invited to join White Oak five years before, I was hopping with both excitement and fear. I was thrilled about the chance to work alongside one of the greatest dancers who ever lived, but coupled with that thrill was...