Episode 15: Sherisse Bisram - The Healing Power of Dance

0:07 Hello, beautiful humans. Welcome to another episode of Role Models juicy conversations with beautiful humans. I'm Jennifer Norman the founder of the human Beauty movement and your host, today's guest is the very lovely Cherise V-Strom. Charisse is a professional dancer, a dance teacher. Now, an empowerment mentor and public speaker. Or her life is one of true Alchemy. She has taken pain and hardship transmuted them into power and she's here to talk about how she was able to break molds of childhood trauma and discrimination. So you can to welcome Cherise. Thank you for that lovely introduction. Yes, it's lovely to be here.

0:50 I'm so happy to have you and from the UK of all things, it's so exciting to have somebody from across the pond. Yes. Now, it's lovely to speak to you as well. I actually And to move to America in 2020. And because of the pandemic and clearly, I'm not there. Now, that didn't happen. So it's nice to just have a little touch base with yeah, American culture and my family. I've got family in America as well. Yeah, despite what's going on in America now? It's nice. Well, so once again, well, I don't want to move anymore to clarify that totally understandable but we'll get to that. I would love for you to start. From the beginning, let's hear all about you.

1:32 What was it like with your upbringing? And tell us anything that you'd like to share. Everyone's ghost stories to tell have an eye and I guess I've just found a way. Yes through mine. Now as an adult really so yeah, from the beginning. So where I live in Kent in England is a predominantly white area, and I was one of three people of color growing up in my schooling. And on top of that, I also had a parent that was an addict. So my home I went was very volatile, always, to be honest. So what that meant was with the way I was growing up outside of my home. It was like, obviously having to armor up to be brave to go out because I'd face a lot of racism and things like that.

2:14 But also in the home, having a lot of responsibility and pressure to I guess for me, I really feel like I was another parent in my household because my parent wasn't able to step up to the plate and I think because I just took it all in my stride. I didn't realize how much other A hardship that was really and now looking back. And when I actually spoke about my childhood with a lot of my friends, I think because I made it look so easy and fun and normal and fine, everyone just thought everything was fine and it was only when I started to say, oh yeah, I didn't really that didn't happen to me. Yeah. And I know my parents actually left me at school quite a few times and I didn't get picked up and the teachers have to wait until someone came back for me and my sister and that happened. Probably the whole time I was at primary school every single time, they're meant to pick me up. You know, little things like that. You know?

2:59 That's quite a nice The nice one really, to be fair in the grand scheme of things, but yeah, just realizing now as an adult, but that wasn't normal and then just carrying those layers of armor. As I got older that parent actually passed away. And then I had over series, of course, of years, I had more and more relatives passed away quite close together. Now, I feel like an ethnic families. We have large families anyway, so when I say the number 11 people every other and it was obviously a lot of people, but this was over like a 56 year span even so it's a Lot of people and I think in that process I just became numb. I think to feeling and just powering through every situation. And I really would say I adopted that toxic masculine energy, like I feel like because I didn't have a male role model in my life, growing up that was dependable and someone that I could surrender to and feel like a young girl to, I then became the mail of my household and that that male role model and that strong person that actually, my mom and my sister did look up to at times.

4:00 Advice and support and I just embodied everything that was in my life. All of this is going on and then on the other side of it is this love for performing and finding freedom in another space and I think for me really and truly, I can see now that performing and dance has really been my outlet and my coping mechanism, having a little root out of the craziness of what was going on in the outside world and my inner world and just being able to find something where I actually felt seen and heard and Is able to express all of my emotions. So everything I did just channeled into the Performing and it was dance to start off of when I was about three or four. And it's, you know what, to be honest I started off with the classical styles that ballet and I didn't really connect about a, to be honest, I think I just liked dancing, the moving to music and it was only when I got to about 11 and I went up into, I think it's high school for you guys, actually. So I went into high school and then I start to do Street dancing so it's like hip-hop, you know, but it's a watered-down version of Really, when I started that style, something inside of me, just came alive. Yeah, I just channeled everything into that. So while all this stuff's going on, you know, I was just focusing Tunnel Vision on darts in him. I don't know if I ever thought that I could be a dancer when I was younger, but I always knew that that was I wasn't going to have a conventional career, that that was just in me. That I said, I felt like I'm a Leo as well, as we don't know. If it's that claim, that feel that you fight for the spotlight.

5:26 I don't know what if it's something to do with that may be, but I always I knew that I was going to be a performer, all or do something like that, creative and arts, because that was really who I was inside and I think it's nice because that was my feminine energy out there at the time. So, yeah. All of this was going on and then I actually pursue dancing. So I end up going to dance, schools and dance colleges the next level. And I've never been academic, but I knew what I needed to get to get into these spaces and I worked really hard to get them and I did, I always made it and actually, when I got to my dance course at the University, For you, dancing. To be honest, I always went through that feeling of not being good enough, you know, and having to that, push really hard. Now again, a really white dominating in England. I guess now the population is more diverse but it wasn't when I was growing up.

6:12 Someone said to me once when you're a person of color, you can't just be as good as all the other dancers in the room. You've got to be better than and I feel that that really did carry with me my whole life actually. Yeah, I face that as an extra layer so although I was following my passion and love and it would be great, I would go into these rooms of order. Asians with girls I'd say 500 girls have been the room and I would be the only person of color and I'd be the only person, that was a curvy body shape and I would be the only person that was maybe under 5:30 6:00 and I'll be that cool. So my whole life I've thought for this space to be in this room to be accepted and even the dance industry doesn't really want me so it was kind of like a bit of a slap in the face again of wow what am I doing?

6:57 And then I just yeah just kept going really I think in my nature is just this Strife or I'll show you I'll prove to you and I think with trauma especially in my own experience I found that things can either make you or break you and I always feel like it made me fight harder every time that I felt like, I always had something to prove. Yes, I kept pushing kept pushing for every level of where I was going to and then finally got to a job in Europe abroad and it wasn't what it's meant to be. And I had another one that was like, that, just a month before and like it came home, And I'd must have cried for like a solid month which is that what I was that working? And then I just kind of start to think to that point, what am I doing with my life for one and two? Why have I not processed things?

7:42 So at that point, then I started to look internally and realize that I wasn't doing any self-care I wasn't journaling. I wasn't meditating, I wasn't doing any of that stuff. And I've really kind of from that point on made a pact of myself to tune in. From then on I just start to unpack slowly all of these emotions. In these layers of armor. Now, these were just when I say layers of armor, I mean, like concrete walls and I was just taking like a, a little spatula and scraping the edge. So I wasn't even doing the Deep dive yet, but I was making some sort of a progress to try and I think the biggest thing that was in that situation, I ask myself, what am I good at and what do I enjoy doing? And it was always the street dance side of things. The more freedom that I had with the Styles and when I left my dance schools and universities and stuff they always said, you've got to do Ooh, we've got my traveling. You've got to do that kind of thing. So that was what I was going for. At the time, I was going through all these jobs that everyone told me to do when actually I should have been gone for the jobs that I wanted to do.

8:40 Then what I made that decision start going for the jobs that I wanted to do door started opening. And I was on, okay, because this is a thing, my whole life. I've never fit into a mold bright, you know, looks-wise physicality wise and I think, even when we look at patriarchy of the way the world is, I am not a woman that will Sit back and be quiet. Oh, I'm not going to be seen and not heard. I will always speak up and speak out and I think, primarily because that is all I've known in my household environment is that if you want to be heard, you have to shout. But also the fact that discrimination constantly, you know, as come my way and I always believed that it will stop with me.

9:20 So if someone decides to shout racial slur, I will make sure they don't say that to anyone else again. So I'm going to tell him actually, that's not okay, and it might not come out At polite either at the time of my mouth. Yeah, I kind of feel like I've always been very bold and brave in everything I do. But what I've realized now down the line it all starts at open, I start to find my way starts to find people and things that all connect with me and like different cultures within dance that I just adore different styles from around the world. And I've met these really talented people that are just kind of in their own journey of similarities in terms of culture, you know, like, I've not been appreciated and things like that. Also people that are allies to that, as well, you know, and just beauty within dance and then finding that connection of like a love for a passion. Again, these are the people that are found along the way. Now, on this journey of beautiful Discovery and the real authentic connection through the dance scene. I guess what I realized more than anything is that the minute I took my foot off the gas, I just flowed in those situations and I think I realize now even getting through. So I said to you at the beginning when I came on that my plan was to move to has so everything's got to go well in my career and I plan to move to America and then 2020 happened, the pandemic happened and I got stuck with this conversation again with myself.

10:39 I've hit a wall, I had to ask myself, what do I love doing and what do I want to do? And actually helping people was the top priority and I think like I said, because I've started to do like a little bit of the work, I kind of understood, you know, the importance of journaling and meditating and all these things and that all deep and throughout the pandemic because obviously I was a With my feelings in. I was able to Deep dive into my soul. Finally, find the core of what these things are. And actually, my inner self, like I find a chiseled away at that wall, that I built up for so many years of my life. And yeah, it's crumbled and I feel like now, I'm actually finally standing there in front of the world realizing that I've been trying to knock down doors, my whole life and I was just going to the wrong rooms. Now I realized that people actually want to just be around authenticity, don't They are honest, I feel like all this time that I was trying to push forward and like be something and be someone that actually who I was in myself was enough and the right things will always going to come at the right time. I just needed to surrender a little bit more. So yeah.

11:44 Now I just focus on accepting me as I am loving myself fully and helping other people do the same thing and it's obviously a continuous Journey. We're always going to be met with our traumas and our demons and all these stuff, dark stuff that will always come. The surface. But every time they do now identify it, and I'm like, hey, I see you. Thanks for coming and then I can have a chat if it's my inner child. I can just nurture myself again and. Yeah, come out the other side. Just a little bit more refined, and clearer and aligned amazing. Wow, you've been through a lot of life already, and it's amazing that you've been able to, you know, take the opportunity.

12:25 I think a lot of people have really gone introspective during the pandemic to really figure. Figure out what makes their souls saying and some are still trying to figure that out. Why? And it's okay. But you couldn't exactly right when you sell, once you stopped resisting and once you let that flow, begin, that's when the law of attraction is so definitively obvious in your life. Is that, you know, once you start releasing and feeling more yourself and that you're okay with yourself, releasing all those inhibitions and those insecurities all of those false beliefs All of those things that we get concerned about that, might be other opinions, or societal Norms.

13:05 Anything that's cultural that we brought up. When you're able to, just let all of that go and slip into your true self and let your true self Shine. That's when you resonate the strongest and that's when you start to attract all of the things that are right for you into your life. On the contrary. What a lot of us do is that we do put those Shields up, we put those guardrails up as you were mentioning, you know, you get bold, you get More into that toxic masculinity because we feel like we have to create order. We have to push our way through and that's exactly what we don't want to do. Because then you start to attract all the things that you really don't want into your life based upon that energy and then you become overwhelmed and that leads to all sorts of dysfunction.

13:48 And you just don't know why. Because you feel like you're trying to do your best, the operative word, trying, we shouldn't really have to try so hard and I love that you had started in to dance and you And this freedom in the type of dance that you enjoy to, we have so many similarities, I have to tell you because I too started dancing. When I was young and then it was, you know, going into the more technical aspect of it which was Allah and point, I didn't find joy and I felt that it almost stripped the joy out because it became so much work and so much perfectionism. And then there's a looseness and a casualness of Street dancing that I can definitely identify with.

14:29 That gives you that kind of expression and freedom that you were looking for. Hmm. Absolutely than just personality as well. I think it's really lovely and Street dance that when I teach people I'm like it's about who you are and just showcasing that and I think that a lot of the classical Styles obviously it's about formation and monotone and just blending in whereas Street, gun as you get a chance to just celebrate who you are as a person. And yeah, that's what I love about it. Wow, when you were going through this Soldier, Need during the pandemic, where there are a few things that you might be able to point. To that said, I'll this helps to release this particular good energy or this. Help me to turn back and walk away from who I was in the past. And suddenly realized that this is the me that I really need to be.

15:17 Yeah, I think of what comes up for me, a lot is realizing now that I'm exactly who I needed when I was younger and I think that's a really powerful space to be in because a lot of the time I'm we've when my soul searching and we're diving deep. We think we need to be something other than we are. Whereas actually if we look back at what we needed then and it for actually every stage of my life, I feel like if there was someone that I could have gone to at that time to support me, it would have just lifted the burden a little bit. And I think just actually look at myself in the mirror even before I made that choice to do the empowerment journey and just thinking, gosh, like everything you've done has led you to where you are now and you are so enough.

15:59 You are and I think that's the key point is when I made that realization that I was enough and then started to set a firm ations for myself that I just repeated every single day until I believe them fully. And in fact, at one point, I woke up in the middle of the night saying the affirmations in my head and it was at that point that I realized that I'm doing the work. Like I'm actually doing the work, because I think a lot of it, when it comes to the Deep, dive into the soul, it is uncomfortable, isn't it? When we're doing the journaling and everything's coming out and we might SOB Up through like meditations and all this stuff. It is uncomfortable hurtful, and the fact that we feel trauma and pain on a cellular level that gets re experience when we are diving deeper few times, I've been like, physically held over feeling things that I never let myself feel years ago for like, Decades of time. Yeah, it was hard, but when I realized that actually right here, as I am, is beautiful, he's strong is brave. Is powerful is enough.

16:59 And is The of everything I've ever wanted when I made that realization, it's just something clicked and everything, just felt light and actually, I do our bit to an incredible breadth work session. I've never done breathwork before and it was all about healing, your inner child and they didn't even know that when it came up, it was just a friend of mine. She collabed with another friend. And yet, I did the session. I'm so glad they said, turn your camera off because honestly, I was in absolute hysterics, but as a form of trauma, as I said, we fit on a cellular level. For as you probably know but in the body as well and it causes Almont Sam I Almont was IBS. So I had IBS severely for about four years for five years.

17:39 It was got crippling at times. I've been in so much pain, bearable, obviously, but I think again, that's probably my toxic masculine being like I'm fine when I wasn't. But yeah, after that session, and I cried for me the whole way through again, I'm a Keeling over with pain and I got out of the session and it just went It's gone and I feel like something unlocked in me. So I feel like it probably was a combination of doing the journal limbs meditating doing the breast work and the affirmations together as a combination and then everything in my body and my soul and I feel like my spirit just kind of said there you are, you know, after through that all their Cloudy murkiness of my whole life and constantly putting layers on myself. I'm not kind of creating like a bit of a cage. I would say a cage of Like trauma. And then finally I just every day was breaking out a bit of little bit little bit little bit and I kind of broke free. And then that was when yeah, my meditations got rich started to see more colors and things and you know, my spirituality is deep and so much more sense that. So I do urge everyone to do the work, and it is so funny because so many of my friends I talked about it. I'm like, you know, when they're telling me about their staff and what they're going for a month, D Journal, do you meditate? And then I owe, you know, not really all about well you know, I know you don't want to but it does. And then when you're ready, you will and that's what I believe for everyone.

19:03 I think when you're ready to do the dive and again, you know, like journaling might not work for someone, it might be talking to a friend or being open and honest speaking to a counselor therapist you know, there are other routes as not just the set ones that I did. But I owe so much to those practices because without doing them I just can't imagine what I would have been doing with my life at this point, you know, just following the wrong law, not even the wrong but you know, the old Narrative of having to fight to be the best or to be seen and probably being in the wrong room of what I wanted to go for in terms of dance and just maybe again, going through Seas of people in these rooms and feeling not enough and I don't want anyone to feel like that anymore ever again.

19:46 Yeah, it's so wonderful that you were able to find modalities that did work for you. I know that for me, it was quite similar. I was going through a period of time, that was quite Difficult about four years ago. And luckily I had a friend Stay with me, who was very much further along on her spiritual journey, then I was, and she asked me about, because I think that at the time when people start feeling anxious, or they feel depressed, or they feel overwhelm all of these things and then they're lacking Clarity. It's hard to really drum up with those true emotions are because they're so jumbled up inside. And she suggested to me, have you ever tried free-writing which is a little bit different than journaling that I was like, no, I've never done that before. I mean, I've written, I write all the time. I write copy for marketing, I break Very precise copy, but it's very different from just writing from the mines. Like, a stream of thought I got big pieces of paper of 18 by 24, and I just started writing writing, writing at at first, it just seemed like gobbledygook, but then it just started to flow and just starting to flow.

20:44 And that really was the start of my release and helps me to get onto a greater journey of understanding, getting Clarity and developing more of a meditation practice for myself. The friends that I have over like, I don't have time to meditate. I was like, oh, then you It's a reserve. Double the time it was. Absolutely. You didn't have Mike time for that. Now, what's really lovely about what you said about the right in the free writing? I remember listening to author that wrote The Alchemist Paulo Coelho is it and he did a podcast of the typewriter and he said that when he wrote that book, he felt like the universe. The sauce was writing through him and I almost feel like when you're free, right? And you have that our YouTube channel. Yeah.

21:26 And that's just so beautiful, that sounds. Yeah. Yeah, really lovely. And actually I think now without realizing I do, do that sometimes. And yeah, just it's a lovely way, isn't it really feminine energy as well? That is so it absolutely is and I believe that we are coming into more divine feminine timeline where as it starts to seem now though, of course in the United States, it seems like that might have been set back a little bit. Truly, there had been this sense of order and organization and rigidity and I'll call it professional. Symbolism, which just is more of a masculine type trait and the free-flowing and the spirit and the essence of creativity.

22:07 Which also equals chaos is really the time that we're at because when there is a change in a transition, there's always chaos. Mmm. So we start to feel all this bubbling up of this energy and a lot of these things that need to be resolved, they need to be surfaced in order to be resolved and then cleared. So a lot of people like what else is gonna happen? Until that Morgan absolutely happened. They wake up and they feel like, you know, the world is changing and they've lost their footing that causes a lot of people to feel, but we call the Ascension pains, right? Like oh my gosh, so much. So I think you know what I find is a real overall arching statement for everyone is that things are going to happen. Always, you know, that this going to be disruptions, are going to be unlevel ground.

22:52 There's going to be maybe rocks, falling at you and metaphorically but you how you deal with those issues. Is what defines you? You know, and there is a way to surrender through it and make it work. And at some point you might need to take a bit of a masculine energy through it. But as long as you know yourself Ali, you'll always find your way through it and I think at that self-trust is just I think the most important thing. So I think my real age for everyone is to just get to know yourself. Really 100% like know what your triggers are, what your floors are, what your strengths are and what your weaknesses are because That in itself is so much power. So much awareness for yourself to know how you'll navigate through and what the best decision to make is because that's almost. Yeah.

23:37 I guess maybe that's taking their bit of a polarity between the masculine and feminine energy and one is if you have the ability to be all these things and feel them when the time is right, but being aware of them, you know. Maybe that's as a combination, I don't know, but I feel like that's where now when things do go awry in my life, I know exactly what I need to do to get For it. And I'll have a little moment of panic. I might be like that. And then I'll be like, I breathe, breathe and then, let's put it into boxes or if we can, you know, let's say, for example, I've got to start my week next week or what choreographed like five different routines. But then I'm also delivering to talks and I've got presentation to do and then also doing some research. So that it's like, okay, what's the priority what needs to be done first?

24:23 And what can we hold off that and actually do I feel inspired to dance right now? Yeah, I do. Okay, put the music on Let's work out to routines. You know it's just kind of calm is where it's not really calm list in chaos is actually just surrendering. Yeah, trust yeah, yeah. Are there any particular breathwork techniques that you seem to go back to more often to help you get into that calmness or that sense of control. So to speak author? Walk my like go to Everyday. Staple is a box breath, you know, like no matter what I just give a give a good Faster. While I do love to do is like a visualization breath where I just start off with my normal breath, and then I make it deeper and deeper.

25:07 And then, I imagine connecting right up to the very highest point. I possibly can. And I focus on maybe a star at the tip of the universe. So it goes on and on and on. And then I take that breath all the way down through my body. Through my spine, all the way down to the core of the universe. And I just collect it back up and back down. And I make the brush smaller and smaller as Laura, and I feel connected. In my space again to whatever realm of spiritual, you practice, you know, whether it's a God or anything like that, whoever you want to feel like you're connecting to in that time, I just end up feeling present. And I think that's the best space we can be in. Right. Present. Because, you know, when we're thinking too much for too much in our head and I'm like right now, and at, this is another thing I do, when I'm feeling overwhelmed, I just say to myself be here now.

25:52 Mmm, so be here. Now, I always think about Ram Dass whenever I think of that phrase, Is he was missing his book be here. Now, I tend to lean towards the Uday pranayama breath when I need to calm down and sort of those that are listening in, aren't familiar with that. It's really like this. Dragging of the breadth across the back of the throat, almost constricting the throat, so that you sound like the waves of an ocean. So it's like, Not only does it create that. Auditory essence of the waves in the ocean. It tends to help to calm the vagus nerve, which is the nerve that manages your cortisol levels. And so it does have this instant ability to provide calm all the while you're getting this oxygenation.

26:36 And so it's getting you that energy and helping you feel refreshed and calm at the same time, which I find pretty powerful if I'm in a little bit of a state of A to Z and that also doing some reframing of things. Notice that if I think about a number of people that are like, oh my gosh, I'm anxious or a and the fact that they say that about themselves into itself creates even more anxiousness or panning. But if you can say, instead I'm really excited, you know, just frame your nervousness or your anxiousness your anxiety as excitement and eagerness it tends to flip you into a more positive way of being able to go into it with a sense of eagerness and joy rather than Station or fear mmm trust as well.

27:22 You know, not know that every situation you're always supported and you will make the right decision or Choice, you're always supposed I think knowing that takes a little bit of pressure off, it does it does. And knowing that there are no mistakes, everything happens and you either learn from it or you get a reward from it or there's a lesson there. So be no, just framing everything that happens as like instead of saying. What's the worse that can happen? I like, Say what's the best? I can happen like that, just changes things up. So tell me what it's like because you said that you're now a dance teacher. And so you have students, what kind of students are you often teaching?

28:02 Well, I was teaching a lot through just the Performing stages as well because I still perform now but I taught primarily I would say from 11 to kind of 18 year, olds more so and also adults within that space as well. But it was mainly those kind of age groups there and that goes for like everyone as well. You know, like not just one gender is very mixed and that's really come in handy now because whenever you connect with people, I feel like to meet them on their level is always the best way and I feel like maybe because I still have quite a playful nature of me. I do connect really well with young people but also adults as well. I feel like I can just be myself and I think in every situation or scenario I am just showing up as me. I don't put on a teacher voice.

28:47 I don't do any of that. Let's young Filly, just me in the space and I think especially young people, they really resonate with that so much more. I think if you come and you're like, right guys, they're all up. Who is this? Look at me. So just be myself has really worked my favorite. I love teaching young people for so long, but I'm really realizing now that the way the world has changed and the fact that technology is taken over and their priorities have changed, you know, like I said, being in that space in after-school clubs and like extracurricular activities and things like that. That they used to be so excited to be there. And now, there's so much disconnect. So what I'm actually doing is at the end of this term is that I'm stopping my regular classes that I go to and I'm just focusing on doing workshops with young people now, but I actually teach in London adults and it's an Open Class. I mean as a adults anyone can attend and yeah I've been really connecting in that space a lot more. I find that people that are actually paying to be in your space and learn from you in an adult setting. You know young people Parents to send them there or whatever their carers, whereas adults are want to learn from you, no matter what their ability is that for me is a real fulfillment because they're connected in that space and their present.

30:00 Whereas, yeah, I guess, you know, you're there because you have to be there is completely different energy and I feel like in everything that I do, I just give a hundred percent, you know, I give my whole self to the space and what I'm finding is that I end up feeling drained now from those rooms because I know they'd rather be on their phone message. Jin their friends or whatever and I can hold their attention for that time. I can and I make it work, but I know that before the pandemic, they were so much more engaged. There's so much more wanted to be there and I can't give anymore and I literally say that. Someone might, guys, I can give you all of the moves, but if you're not dancing them, I can't jump in your body and do it for you. You have to actually try a little bit. And I feel like, I'm probably I'd say eight months into that mentality of them giving that back to me. And that's when I know, I can't changes need to be made and that's okay because I've given ten years of my time to continuously, do that?

30:52 And I'm not saying I'm not doing it again. I'm just saying that it looks different. Now, I feel great about what's going to happen next because I feel like everyone will benefit from it doing a short Workshop. Every couple of weeks will benefit them more because they'll be more engaged in that amount of time. I mean as in yellow an hour and a half set in or two hours or even if three hours at once every couple of weeks. And then I get a mutual exchange back because I think at the moment it's all me giving I love to see people Express themselves, have fun, and have a good Good time and when I don't get that back for everything, I'm giving that's what it becomes a bit hard. And I think, I don't want to be in that space anymore. I want us all to elevate the room so much more. And with my adult classes, it's just at the space is phenomenal. Even though there's only three dancers in the room, everyone leaves and a high.

31:35 And now I get lovely compliments about how. Yeah, they just felt really seen in the class and they just they haven't danced in a while but it made them but fall in love with it again. You know, that all these lovely things that we all strive for. Yes, I feel like that's really Everything's looking like the me now is that? Yeah little and often or small doses of but in more impactful I think I love that. I love that and you're exactly right. I remember when I was growing up, my mom bought this, antique, baby grand, piano, and was like somebody in the family needs to learn how to play piano Jennifer, you're learning how to play piano and I was like, I didn't want to learn how to play and so for nine years I took these lessons that I really dreaded, absolutely?

32:16 Right? And I could have in nine years. I should be fantastic. I should be amazing, but I stink because I just put no effort into it and it wasn't something that I was inspired to do from my own soul. It was something that I was forced to do and told to do and there's such a difference. There's such a difference with kids. It's a difference between inspiration and motivation. Even at work. It's like if you can find people who are self inspired, they've got that Vigor in that passion for wanting to be in the room wanting to do it. Wanted to go the extra mile, they can feel it and it feels just like flow. Yeah, for everyone on a morning person so it is like getting up on a Saturday morning when I could be out with my friends or is sleep and you're not giving me anything.

33:03 No sir. I'm done. Thank you. Who are some of your favorite dancers today? Oh wow, gosh. There's so many. I feel like, I don't even know if I could name any one of the top of my head, but I resonate with more with dances Is that when there's a story behind what they're doing, you know, a connection and real UT between making a statement, not the dots needs to be political, but I do feel like we have not an obligation, but a way to make art with our bodies but also for a purpose. And of course and I feel like if we can do that then that's just beautiful and there's so many really incredible dance companies in the UK that are actually like contemporary based as well is never really been my thing to look at but I'm enjoying that. And then we've got a couple of Of hip-hop companies are making movements as well in the UK.

33:52 And also in America, obviously, you have such a grand scale and that was really one of the reasons why I wanted to go to America because there's such a huge platform for dancers and there's so much more work available. But, yeah, I did, you know what of this of my head, I couldn't give you a name because I feel like there's just so much of it. There's a lot of richness coming through, and I think, because of the pandemic as well, we've all been cooking, everyone. All of these choreographies have been stuck inside for a long time. Is everyone's like, starting to Amazing connect and just move together and get create more which is yet kind of how I see dance moving is two more people that way. You know it's a make a statement and be bold and and not even bold you know sometimes you don't have to be bold about it but maybe I think in the UK don't about in America but a lot of the adverts now feature a lot of dance and stuff like that in which is great because it just gets other people see him. You know that Dallas isn't just for a wax or whatever, you know or they start.

34:49 Old school at crossover Street out smooth everyone. And now a lot of it is on Tick-Tock. Yeah, well, this is another thing that I kind of battle with actually. It's the love and hate for tiptoe is a very much much of Duality actually about that because I know that it creates so much opportunity for people and it's great platform for people to go viral and all this lovely stuff. But then it is that the downside to it is that my dancers in my class, there are 15 years old. That do not want to learn how to point their toes, are attempting to do a little Tick, Tock dance in the mirror. And I'm like, guys, you don't even know the basic foundations of what dance is yet. Let's not do that part, okay.

35:31 But they're like, okay, it doesn't matter. I don't need to learn. I don't need to learn any technique because I'm just going to be a tick. Tock are, and I'm up. Yeah. Okay. That's my love-hate relationship for is actually exactly. I see that. And it's funny when you see the ones that do the dual screens and it's like, okay this is what a tick tock. Sir will do with the moves and this is when an actual dancer. Whoops. Yeah, exactly. It's fabulous. And I put some, it's the actual dancers that there are no, quite a few dancers that are using Tick-Tock on their platform, they're using their own choreography, incredible, way to Showcase what you can do. But then, yeah, the fact that some random person will just repeat that dance and go viral and maybe make lots of money from it. I'm a, yeah, I didn't just train my whole life for you to do that if I were you Maybe it's me being jealous, I don't know. But I know I know it's so funny because it is a battle for us. I'm sure that it is for so many people who are really skilled and trained and educated in a specific way and then just to see somebody seemingly go viral overnight, I get famous or powerful overnight just because they were able to copy a couple of Dances into something like that. It is a lot to take.

36:42 It is a lesson in flow for us as well, right? Absolutely. And I do believe as well that everything happens for a reason. So I think you know, Well, if that's their way to win, then good for them and they'll be another part. Another way we all feel like the life of constant lessons, I think, I / in her book. What happened to you? It's post-traumatic wisdom, you know, so like the more you go through in your last and well, wisdom you game, and the more you can help other people. So the and the realization of make it that. Yeah. Yeah. That one is on my reading list to, I haven't gotten to it yet. I highly recommend it. It was life-changing that book. That was actually when I was in the pandemic and I was doing my deep dive. I read that book. Book. And I was like, wow, that's me.

37:22 Yep, that's me. I'll take that. Now, I've do I put that under my email signature up. Maybe she's different MMA, post-traumatic wisdom. Yeah, I think that a lot of us is so nice to be able to connect with people who do have these shared experiences. If you were alive today, you are a Survivor because we've all been through some trauma. It's been very, very difficult and there's been a lot of loss you've had so much loss even before the pandemic and You're still here smiling about it, which isn't even strengthened she was Dumb and for us just knowing that there's going to be better tomorrow's. Absolutely connecting with people as well. You know, like that's what I think this space is given us always that. We were isolated for so long.

38:05 That now it is about coming together. It is about sharing our experiences and yeah, bonding and just creating more love. And I think like you said about this feminine energy shift, it's like even with what's going on in America and the laws and stuff I do. Leave that this one thing will make Womanhood stronger and togetherness stronger and even hopefully create more Ally ships from it. Because yeah, I do believe that there is going to be so much strength from this and overturn and that beautiful outcomes in the end. I do believe that this is just a stepping stone. It's not a full stop, it stuck a comma, I love that. You just mentioned that too, because I remember so much competitiveness and talk about dance being competitive, you know? 2L how competitive dancers, and this whole kind of mean, girl mentality.

38:53 And I want to win at the sake or it's like a zero-sum game. Somebody else has to fail in order for me to succeed and that old Paradigm is just not working, it's just not working for anybody and so I really am so pleased to see that there is so much more a lordship more, vulnerability more. It's okay to let off your guard to have a meltdown to feel like you need to cry it out to talk to somebody about what's going on. You don't have to put up this facade of strength if it's not real, because it's debilitating. And that's part of the reason why I love this podcast so much that we get to have conversations. There's not debate, there's not US versus them, it's us having conversations that bring us together and we can really Bond over our shared experiences, our Joys and struggles that have defined some of the parts of our lives, but don't Define us.

39:47 Mmm, hundred percent, man. It's really beautiful that you have this space as well and thank you for yeah, having me here to share because it has been so lovely and beautiful and I completely agree. I think us as people, but especially as women, you know, we're changing the narrative here, then that's going to be that drop in the ocean and it's going to create a ripple effect of more togetherness more, beautiful connection, more Divinity, more divine feminine and just get all of that lovely. Beautiful thing, the world needs, more of the lovely. Well, should we say it was such a joy to have you on good? Put all of your contact information in the show notes to people know where to find you, but in the meantime, stay beautiful stay well and we'll see you next time. Thank you.