I’m spinning and can’t seem to stop. I see a flash of my face in the mirror with every turn and should feel happy that I’ve finally mastered fouettés on pointe shoes. But I still feel dread. I have a gut feeling that something is going to happen, and something does. As my leg whips to make the last turn, I fall. I wake up just before my head hits the ground and realize that it was all a dream. My eyes dart around the room before I recognize where I am and finally relax. As I try to fall back asleep, I think about why ballet haunts my dreams but can’t come up with anything. Later, I realize that dancing is a strange addiction: I can’t go a day without it but feel constant pressure from its demands.  

The benefits I receive from dancing encourage me to feed my addiction to ballet. Whenever I come home from class, I feel accomplished and even carefree. The ability to forget the stress of life for a few hours in order to dance lets me feel a sort of high that nothing else can provide. Even if I’m not at the studio, I often find myself mindlessly dancing around the house. I also get to share my passion for ballet with my friends. I have danced with the same group of fifteen girls for the past five years, and we share in the joys and pains of ballet together although we come from differing backgrounds. I have gotten to know people from all parts of the city, people from different economic backgrounds, and people from schools very different from my own because of ballet.  We spend hours at the dance studio together and sometimes even bond over our black and broken toenails. Altogether, dance lets me feel free and build strong, long-lasting relationships with people whom I never thought could become my closest friends.

Although I love ballet, its demands can make me feel pressured to change myself in order to be better.  For instance, most of the dancers in my class have a similar body type, and sometimes I feel that I don’t fit the mold of the typical ballerina.  Even the teachers sometimes tell us to change our bodies, or “tune our instruments,” to be better dancers. I remember some points in my life where I have had low self-esteem because I felt like I wasn’t enough or didn’t have the right body.  It has been a struggle for me to overcome the pressure that ballet puts on me about my body, but I have learned to dance while having a healthy relationship with myself and my body. Overall, ballet puts certain pressures on my self-esteem, but I have learned to persevere through my struggles in order to continue to dance.

Dancing has been my passion for almost fifteen years now. Although I have had many short-lived hobbies throughout my life, I could never let go of ballet. I have faced challenges and personal hardships in my relationship with dance, but I feel like I have to continue, as I love the exhilaration I feel whenever I practice or step on a stage. I now realize why ballet haunts my dreams: My passion has become an addiction, an addiction that continues to help me grow and feel.