Revealing her second secret, Srividya talks about a gadget that helps her flavor her dance form with a taste of dynamism that comes only from inner peace and calmness. Read on to know how her iPod got everyone ‘synced’ in!
Tip #1: What should I do when someone criticizes me?
Critics? Yes! We all have them. Most of us live with them.
- Know that nobody can be a better judge of your performance than you! You’re the only one who knows which beat you missed and where you went that extra mile.
- See what the nature of the feedback is. The best kind of criticism is the one that comes with a solution.
Use your iPod
iPod, to me, means Inner Peace and Outer Dynamism. When you are calm from within, the dynamism comes out in the most effective way.
Competitions are a part of a dancer’s journey. Unfortunately, today many contestants equate their skill with how aggressive they are. What we fail to understand is that aggression can bring you only to a certain point and then completely burn you out. A tired, angry mind will never help you focus on your recital!
So, it is very important that if you want to be successful in your art, or in life for that matter, you need to retain your inner calmness, which gradually brings out a lot of intensity in your performance. Meditation has been instrumental in helping me use my iPod most efficiently.
The beauty of meditation
Tip #2: What should I do if I have not rehearsed adequately before my performance?
- First, accept that you haven’t rehearsed. Many a times, the guilt of not doing something is so overbearing that you even lose the few precious hours that you do have with you!
- For choosing a routine in such crunch situations, you must do what you do best. Choose the piece you have practiced a thousand times over the years.
It is perceived that if you are peaceful, you cannot be dynamic and vice versa. Many of us misunderstand calmness to be inactivity. On the contrary, peace and dynamism are directly proportional!
Meditation is something that helps you placate the storms of your mind and keep you rested while you face the storms of competition outside. Even a few minutes devoted to meditation brings such dynamism and energy in the mind and body complex that your focus rarely waivers from the present moment, which is the field of all possibilities. Inner calm and focus means enhanced observation and expression, which essentially are at the root of a stupendous dance performance.
Take to a Sahaj meditation course and own your own iPod. Click here to find a course near your place.
Snippets from Srividya’s dancing career
As a meditator, I would take a few minutes to myself to meditate before going on-stage in competitions. In one such competition, I performed on a devotional song, and it brought the judges to tears. Their response made me realize how much meditation has added to the authenticity of my dance and expressions. The choreography simply flowed along, as if I had no part to play. It was just happening!
What a dancer must have is the inclination to learn. It will take one far and wide—not just on the stage s/he has to perform on, but on a much larger platform that the world has to offer. In the next article, hear about this platform from Srividya, who considers the whole of creation to be an institution of learning.
The author has written this article based on meditation inputs by Chinky Sen, Sahaj Samadhi Meditation Teacher
