Reflect : Tuning into One's Self

There are always moments in life where you face an unexpected situation and need to suddenly cope with it. I am not talking of those big troublesome situations, but those short moments, which need quick reactions, but makes an impact on your friends, family .. but later when you reflect on them, you realize what a profound impact it has been on you too.. A learning moment, a leadership moment..

You know by now, my favourite topic is dance and my learnings. Sharing one such instance here. 

A few years back, me and my friends were to present a dance choreographed by me on stage. And now, coming to this friends group. Except for my regular dance partner, the rest were either new to classical dance, or were totally new to dancing in itself. And learning classical dance , for someone who has never danced in life and are now in their late 20s (competing with their daughters 😃 ) , is not very easy. And these ladies had put in the most effort to learn the basics for more than a year, before we put together the dance to motivate them more. 

We were now just 5 mins away from going on stage to perform. 

I am leading 2 of the ladies who had never been on stage before. They are all nervous, jittery. Their fear was understandable. 

But now, one of them climbs up the steps leading to the stage, peeps out to see the crowd, and BOOMMM..  and just drops down the steps.. all cold and numb out of fear. 

The other goes into shock seeing her friends reaction. 

The other 3 ladies are on the other side of the stage, all set to make their entry not knowing our situation. What do I do now?       

In an instant reaction, I just held their hands tight, and told them :

"Why did you learn dance? Why do you want to go there on stage? You did it because you wanted to dance. You want to do something you have always loved, but never had the chance to learn. You wanted to go up there and enjoy the feel of just being on stage. 

Then just do it. Dance for yourselves. Dance for the joy you want to feel. Dance for your sake, not for the audience. Forget someone is watching you. Dance and fulfil your dreams."

And the next minute I knew they were ready.

We went on stage to give a totally perfect performance, and these 2 ladies had the broadest smiles on their face on stage. No one would ever know what happened 5 minutes before. I was so proud of them.

But when I reflect back, I realize how important those words were for my own life. 

Know your people: You are successful, when your people are successful. And for them to be successful, you need to know what they cherish. Your people could be your friends, your family, your team mates, your team members, all those without whom you could not have grown. I could probably motivate them with those few words, because i knew what they cherished. It meant so much to them to learn and go up there and fulfil their dreams. 

Do things for yourself:  The more I reflect, I realize more that this has always been something I followed in my career too.  

To really step back and do things that you would love to do, and not because some one is watching  you. Or someone is asking you to do. 

Enjoy what you do. Add your "self" into it. Unless your flavor, your value-add doesn't come into what you do, you would not enjoy it.  But when you do add your "self", 

The accolades follow automatically.

PS: You may watch here: