Balance
or
How I Learned to Stop Worrying
and Love the Bomb

by Honora Foah
Co-president & Creative Director — Mythic Imagination Institute

Photo by Anne Parke Photography

I am sitting in the window seat in a row with three seats. Have had to go to the bathroom for an hour and a half, but didn't want to wake up the woman on the aisle. Finally, I get up, so I stay up, twisting and stretching in the area at the rear of the plane, talking with the flight attendant. I say that I have no talent for sitting down, barely made it through elementary school. She's a little irritated that I'm in her working space. I explain apologetically that I was a dancer, I recently had back surgery, hence no good at sitting. She watches me for a while and then says, "I used to dance. I lived for dancing. I started when I was ten, I stopped when I was 20, but I lived for dance."

"Why did you stop?"

"There was so much competition, and my parents kept asking how I would earn a living, and I..."

I'm familiar with this line. What wasn't said to discourage me as well? And what about this discouragement isn't true?

Knowing from the get-go that poverty is part of life as a dancer, I used to say, "I am a nun for art." Being young and stupid, and having seen a fair amount of opera, and having been enamored of Knut Hamsun, Jack Keroac and other garret types, I wasn't aware of what year after year of the grind really meant. Good thing, too. So my parents blathered on about "How will you live?" and, God bless me, I didn't listen. Eventually, I created and directed a dance and theatre company in New York. I had no money, worked in restaurants, was a maid, a doctor's assistant, a sandwich board walker, and I had a glorious life of art, which is the only life I've ever wanted. God bless whoever planted that stubborn mule in my spine. When I hear the wistfulness in the flight attendant's voice, I want to cry. With dance, the window of possibility opens and closes so quickly. It's too late for her. That life is gone.

So, she has two daughters. "They hate ballet. I feel like they are against me. Whenever ballet comes to San Diego, I rearrange my whole schedule, so that I can go." Alone. Two daughters who have no comprehension of their mother's love of dance.

I read about a study which analyzed people of great achievement. To be Michael Jordan or Albert Einstein, one needs the blessings of an exceptional body or mind-coupled with great talent. What was most interesting about the study was that all of the great concert pianists, athletes, scientists, and artists also put in many more hours of practice and study than their peers. You may not be able to be Michael Jordan if you simply put in the same number of hours that he did, but you definitely cannot be Michael Jordan without his dedication.

'Discipline' is important, but where does the will come from?

It comes from love; it comes from desire.

Don't. Give. Up. Love and work are never wasted. Reaching the 'goal' (I will be a professional dancer / top doc / athlete / opera singer / literary lion) is not assured. But if you develop skill and discipline to work from love and devotion, whatever you end up doing will be full of love and devotion, discipline and skill.

Don't. Give. Up. Don't listen when they say you can't. You may not achieve the object of your desire, but you will become a being shaped by devotion and passion. You will be beautiful. As Don Quixote says in Man of La Mancha:

'... your arms
Will lie peaceful and calm
When you're laid to your rest'

Don Quixote is—alright, a bit mad—but beloved for following the truth of his own life as best he could understand what was being asked of him by the world. Though his apparent quest fails, the transformation of the world in the form of the people he meets is accomplished by his presence, his passion and devotion. We may need a goal, but the world only needs us to be alive, truly alive.

I have been trying for four weeks to write my column on 'Balance'. I know balance is important, but that word was so often used to shut me up, to stop, to discourage, and much too often it worked.

Thank God for the pounding heart, for desire that couldn't be soothed or frightened away, for the mule, for the heartbroken girl, for the arrogant bitch. God bless them every one.

Don't. Give. Up.

It's not that the ones with the discouraging words aren't right about 'life' and 'how it is' and 'balance', but they aren't right about your heart. Run it out. Who knows where it will end up? Mythic Journeys indeed. You coulda been a contenda!

Mythic Imagination is a quixotic enterprise that in some normal way does not entirely make sense. The Mythic Imagination team and Michael Karlin and I struggle to make our work sustainable, both financially and as a family. I've even started lifting weights. Really. Metaphor works in both directions.

I'm fond of quoting my friend Varindra Tarsi Vittachi whose door at the UN was adorned with this sign:

EVERYTHING IS ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE.

So, I don't pretend to know why making the world safe for mythology generates such passion. When we apply for grants, we say stuff like:

• 'Connection to the collective wisdom of humankind'
• 'Wellspring of imagination'
• 'Cultural literacy'

Coleman Barks read a poem of Rumi's during the Mythic Journeys '06 Big Conversation on 'Pain'. Here it is:

There is one thing in this world you must never forget to do.
Human beings come into this world to do particular work.
That work is their purpose, and each is specific to the person.
If you forget everything else and not this,
there's nothing to worry about.
If you remember everything else and forget your true work,
then you will have done nothing with your life.

— Jelalludin Rumi, from "The One Thing You Must Do",
The Soul of Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks

Coleman read this in response to a question from the audience about whether physical or spiritual pain was the greater. We all had been pretty softened up by then from the extraordinary readings by the young Mexican poet, Ekiwah, Coleman and Cheryl Sanders Sardello speaking about ways of being with pain. People cried when Coleman read that poem. I guess deep down, pretty much everyone must worry about the one thing.

How many stories exhort us to do the one thing no matter what? Iron Hans. The Lord of the Rings. Hell, Oedipus Rex. And in a different way, The Handless Maiden. Those we love, from Isadora Duncan to Jackie Robinson, from Mahatma Gandhi to Judy Garland, have all followed their hearts in a way considered 'off-balance'.

Maybe the true scale is what is 'off'. The balancing elements of the equation are not immediately visible. When the other end comes into view we say, "Oh hey, it turns out they're a genius." Genius schmenius. Do the one thing, and balance will take care of itself.

Don't. Give. Up.

"The One Thing You Must Do" © Coleman Barks and used with permission.
Photo compliments of Anne Parke

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