Motivation or the lack…

The last few months have been rather tough on my bellydance work ethic. Let me clarify this comment: my personal bellydance practice has been suffering…I still love teaching my classes and always work out lesson plans, sometimes months in advance (we are working on cane now incidentally…you should join me!), but when it came to personal practice…no motivation, no inspiration, no desire…

I thought perhaps, this is it, time to retire and move on to something new. I know some of that gut reaction was a back injury talking. I know much of it was also my side design work which demanded much of my creativity and attention, and which is also much more rewarding to me at the moment.

As a result, I have been gradually scaling back my involvement in bellydance and instead focusing on:

• eliminating back pain through regular physical therapy
• starting private pilates lessons to strengthen and tone and improve my carriage and posture
• restarting samba class which is simply a joy and drama free at the moment
• and trying to spend more time at home with the hubby and the cats.

I think in the end, burn out is burn out. It is your mind and body asking you for some relief, a change of pace. Although at times, I fear this really is it for bellydance for me, I know that it may be what I need. However, if this needed time to step back, reinvigorates me, then so be it! The main point is, you must take time to feed your soul!