We all need a little bit of discipline but the journey has to be fun
Being born in Russia and as a child starting out in gymnastics, it’s hard to imagine how I now live between London and Los Angeles and am a teacher of mindfulness, yoga and dance. But that is life’s beauty… the journey.
It is easier to look back now appreciate all the things that have made me who I am today, but I think it is one of life’s great lessons to trust in your journey and look at everything as an experience with an opportunity to learn and grow.
After discovering I wasn’t very good at Gymnastics, I started ballroom dancing instead. Believe me, the journey wasn’t easy. I struggled to find a male partner for the first two years, so I had to dance with another girl which wasn’t the done thing in ballroom.
Whilst, dancing was my life, it wasn’t always clear what could come from it, so I went to study a law degree in Moscow, and whilst I made some great friends in Moscow that I still talk to today, it was clear my heart was still with my creative outlet of dance. It wasn’t until the second year of my degree, in 2001, I got the opportunity to make a life defining decision. Take a leap of faith and move to the United States with my professional partner Pasha Kovalev, to take up dancing professionally.
It wasn’t without discipline that this came about. Whilst studying, I was still dancing seven days a week to continue to learn all I could about dance and it was that combination of the fun and discipline that I believe has helped me on my journey through life. Ultimately, you have to enjoy what you do in order to be disciplined enough to put the time and effort in to master your craft.
My leap of faith, took my journey from leaving my law degree behind to being a finalist in the U.S Open Ballroom competition before one fateful day finding my self queuing on the streets of New York for the TV show So You Think You Can Dance. You never know where life will take you, but with fun and a little bit discipline, you can achieve anything.
See it. Know it. Feel it. Be it
