New Beginnings

The new year is here in full swing and in the pole community things have gotten off to a bitter start. Many situations have occurred that I will refrain from even mentioning. The overall effect of these multiple situations have left me feeling uneasy and noticing a shift towards a great divide in what has always been such a welcoming community. In light of recent events, I have been left to wonder what has happened to our community moral? Is the future of our existence to rest in a division amongst friends and enemies? How did our passion lead us down this path to our own self destruction?

Drama. There will always be drama no matter what. You can not have a group of strongly opinionated individuals get together without some one's opinion conflicting with another. Pole dancing is a performance activity that strives to create drama within the dance. Sometimes that energy we muster up to embrace in our performances becomes greater than our boundaries and takes on a life of it's own. The drama grows as our creativity creates conflict and before we realize it, we've created a monster that claims victim after victim in it's massive path of destruction. Leaving no one in it's path unharmed. People get hurt. Some forgive and move on and others never get past the injuries they sustained. It's an evil process with no winners in the end. Like a tornado that hits without warning, leaving the community survivors to piece together what little that was left. As a community of pole dancers, we are left to piece together what little we have left after a dramatic situation and start over, wounds and all.

It can be difficult to be a member of a community where everyone has grown so close only to be outcast within the society because in retrospect, you created or were part of a situation that erupted the devastation that ensued. Those around you affected, the nameless victims, are left having to make choices or remain silent until the storm has passed. No one wants to see someone beaten down because of the drama. In the heat of the moment, it's often difficult to see past the horizon and through the fog to the light in the whole matter. Through it all, the one thing that will always remain the most important aspect and root of every moment is and will always be pole dancing. Our passion. Our reason for those reasons. Pole dancing is the one commonality that brought us all together and it will always be the one thing that holds us together.

I hope that as we press on into this new year, that we as a community can come together and continue to dance. I truly hope that all that has happened within our community within the past can serve as a learning experience that makes us stronger. Just remember when drama creeps up trying to find it's place, that there is a reason for what we're fighting for and that reason is to just dance. Sometimes instead of the fight, maybe we truly just need to take it to the pole. Let your dance become your therapy.