Body Positivity and How Our Environment Destroys It

“Body That Couldn’t Hold My Dream”

By Airin Ri

As a young and gullible girl, I succumbed to a socially constructed idea of the ideal body projected onto me and many other young dancers by the ballet industry. Before I was old enough to discern what is good and bad for my own body and well-being, I let the distorted and destructive image of how my body should look take over me and my dream to become the prima dancer. I was ingrained from a young age that my body needed to be thin. No fat, lean muscles, with skin draped over my bones like clothes on a hanger. My neckline, my dainty tall figure, and my arched legs constituted me as a perfect candidate for a prima ballet dancer of the world-class, so I was told.

As an award-winning ballet dancer, who dreamed of being admitted to the Royal Ballet Company in England, I was surrounded by eminently talented and physically gifted dancers who dedicated themselves to staying as thin as possible. This was on top of hours of grueling daily training. All my teenage years were, thus, spent in a training room 7 days a week, 7-8 hours per day in a zealous attempt to realize my dream. There was no time to rest. No time to think. In hindsight, I realized, my ability to think critically was incapacitated. I was vulnerable. I accepted the coveted image by the industry and I starved to carve it into the mold of perfection. Just like I learned to go through arduous training to perfect my techniques into a work of mastery, I learned to restrain my desire to eat. After all, I thought, nothing worthy can be accomplished without suffering.

Indeed, in the field of ballet, extreme thinness was equated with beauty. Our body, in turn, was the crux of the edifice that determines the quality of the artwork we were to perform on stages. I along with many young dancers fell prey to this lie, that we are worthless as dancers if we did not maintain our slim figure. We were lacking in serious discipline if our rib cages and backbones aren’t laid bare, they said. Our emaciated hollow cheekbones signified our determination to succeed in the highly competitive industry. Eating disorders were romanticized because the willingness to go through acute pain by giving up our carnal desire to eat in exchange for a successful ballet career, showed commitment to our aspirations.

It is true that as dancers in which our bodies are deemed monetized instruments, we were obligated – contracts and/or peer pressure - to maintain a sticklike physique as professionals who are paid by ballet companies. I was told from the age of 6 when I started dancing, that ballet is an art, not a sport and the dancers are artworks depicting a fantasy in which the audience is to be enchanted. Naturally, I became infatuated with keeping my weight low – all I wanted was to be successful at what I do best and what I was valued for. I believed staying thin was a small sacrifice I had to make to fulfill my big dream. Me, my coaches, and my parents were all convinced that I had what it takes to be a professional dancer. I had the discipline to famish myself into a bulimic anorexic. My love for the art of ballet drove my enervated body to train more than anyone in the room. I thought I was invincible, that I was destined to become a dancer. But as it turned out, I was sorely mistaken.

My body gave itself out. After competing in a series of national competitions, a physician explained to me and my mother the reason behind the sharp pain around my ankles that I tried to

practice it away for over 6 months. My coach insisted that taking a break from training or getting my legs checked up implied a lack of discipline. As a result, parts of the posterior malleolus and talus were cracked on both sides of my ankles. The physician announced that I no longer can wear my point shoes which meant I was no longer able to dance as a pro. These words were like bullets in my chest, causing me unsurmountable pain. There was no way out. No solution to resuscitate my career, to become the beautiful dancer I always fought for. I did not realize the extent to which ballet dictated my life until it was all taken away. The craft I perfected throughout most of my life deflated into nothingness, into a thin air like it never happened. What was left of me was a destroyed heart and skeletal body that was too weak to hold up my big dream.

However, just as there is an upturn for every downturn, this incident made me grow into a much stronger wiser self that knows how to protect my own body and my well-being that allows me to pursue my new dream to become a lawyer. I learned to love my body more than ever without starving myself because it has gone through with me the toughest heartaches of my life, knows all my deepest scars in which I survived, and allowed me to explore this world with the new conviction to live. I am no longer controlled by external forces that try to deprive me of who I am and who I strive to become - I have regained power over my own body and mind. My incident with ballet was not a story of failure but a lesson that taught me the importance of my physical and mental health. Our body and mind are what allow us to fully thrive in a life that we are given. That is, our body is precious as-is, and whether it fits the mold of perfection of our time or not does not determine our worth as a wonderfully unique individual.