Blog 5

This week I have been busy with my work. And that was at the expense of ballet. 

There was no opportunity this week to do my warming up. So I was unprepared for the first lesson of the week. Which meant that I had to hold myself back while doing the exercises. That way I prevent a possible injury, especially of my calves. That kind of injury strikes you back, and recovery requires a lot of time and patience. So better prevent than cure. 

When I exercise at the barre, I usually have the most control over my body. I can hold on to myself and stay in balance when I get on the tips of my feet. To be in balance, you use almost all your muscles. And that is indeed the case when you perform your exercises au milieu

Therefore ballet is quite another way of training than fitness.

With ballet, you use various muscles instead of using one or two isolated ones, as is the custom in fitness or bodybuilding. You use everything, your arms, head, back, stomach and feet. And you rediscover some muscles you may have forgotten.

Ballet is about training and tuning your body, making it your instrument. That's the journey ahead of me.

I could not participate in my second class, due to my work. By exception, Lyda allowed me to join a lesson for advanced students. It was a lesson at an intermediate level. 

And that was very special! It gave me an outlook on how I could develop myself in ballet. 

I even practiced the grand jeté, a long horizontal jump, starting from one leg and landing on the other. Known as a front split in the air. The front leg brushes straight into the air in a grand battement, the back leg follows doing the splits in the air. One of those spectacular jumps Nureyev seemingly made so easy.

Really above my league, but so inspiring. No split in the air for me! And I console myself that even Nureyev was once a beginner!

And as Lyda points out after the lesson: with the variety of exercises and dances in ballet you can quickly fill up a lifetime. 

Well, let’s do it!