How does one devote their life to dance? It's a difficult question for many of us, as there exists no infrastructure dedicated to partner dancing. Many people choose their careers or paths, and there are set roads to follow. The differences mostly have to do with how hard you work and what your final intentions are. I think it's the same for me, but I lie in uncharted territory. There are very few partner dancers making a good living from their passion. I've come to realize that being a teacher of partner dance is not what I want to do right now. Put simply, it's a lot of work. It's a lot of sweat and not much payback. I'm hoping to create something on a large scale, so I'll just go ahead and lay out what I'm planning to do.
I don't really want to teach classes and workshops. I think that takes far more love than I have in me right now. Well, that is, to do it well. So that leaves me looking for a "muse" as Timothy Ferriss would call it, or actually a job that returns quite a bit of money and freedom to continue to dance. I'm not going to get into my businesses yet. Soon. But not yet.
It's better to start here, because this is where I started. First I created the idea of the end goal.
My goal is to have a business that is bringing in a fair amount of money. I intend to continue teaching private lessons in Portland as long as I'm here, and my rate will remain at a minimum of $20/ hour. This will allow anyone who wants to study the means to do so. I intend for my job to cover my living expenses, training expenses, and a few other things. After that I will take 20% of my post-tax income and dedicate it to a dance fund. This fund may eventually turn into a non-profit, and the intention is to promote dance in the Portland area. This means putting on workshops, dances, performances - anything that will promote dance - and using that money as a safety net. This way I will be able to put on the workshops that I want to without worrying about ultimate profit or loss. I will also be using these opportunities to study with all the teachers I bring to the area. This way I continue to build my skill.
After a few years in Portland, during which time I'll be training and working on my fundamentals of dance, I'll be ready to travel and study seriously. This means that the business will need to run itself, or I will sell my share of it. I will probably keep the dance fund going with a board or something. Essentially, it will be my time to travel the world retracing the African diaspora. Latin America, Europe, the Mississippi Delta, Africa. I plan to go on a world tour dancing until I'm ready to stop.
My family loves to ask me if I'm still planning to go to law school. My best guess is that I'll go around this time (let's guess I'm late 30s- 40 now). I want to go to Yale, so I'm already studying languages and thinking of things that will look good on an application.
After that, I think I'll be ready to really go after my goals. I was talking to Steve one day, and he asked me what I would do if I could do anything. I avoided responding, saying, "No, it's too big." Steve responded, "What if you were put on Earth to accomplish it?" I know I blogged about this already, but that floored me. In an instant, my sight cleared and I latched onto the idea. I want to create a dance center - the world's biggest and greatest. The model for this center will be based on many of the places I've been. It will have stages, studios, living quarters, kitchens, recreational space. It will be more like a University than anything else. It will have amazing food and quiet spaces like you would find in a meditation center. It will have quads and dorms like a University. It will offer students the ability to come and stay in exchange for work study. And it will attract the best talent in the world.
In an age of increased globalization and transfer of wealth - when America is bound to become relatively poorer - it will have an international focus - inciting the true disciples of dance to come study. It will become a place like Taize - behemoth - bigger and more powerful than anyone could have imagined.
