It’s hard to do. No, I can’t do that. Look!
[Chuckles. I’d never seen anyone else laugh at that one.]
So, she started to cry. After that, and despite me getting mad and getting her to repeat herself, I just said, “Okay, okay. All good. She’s your friend, but you have control over your own body. You do with it what you want.”
That’s what I’m supposed to be saying to your friend when your friend says, “All right, all of me. All of you.” But she couldn’t tell me what to do, or how to move her hips. She just tried to do whatever she could to be normal while still getting up in front of me.
It was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. I told my friend that it was a compliment. It’s not a compliment if it makes you feel like you can’t move or that you can’t take criticism or be comfortable. It’s a compliment if the fact that your friend sees you have the ability to move your hips and talk means that they’re more accepted in that room. It’s a compliment if your friend sees that you have a better grasp of how to move than they do. It’s a compliment if they see that after six months of being here I’m still the best dancer in the gym.
So I started walking down the hallway with her to the corner of the room and said, “See? All right, then. What do you say we’re going for dinner?” I was so proud of her, but I knew she still had a lot to learn. I couldn’t teach her much. But she didn’t let it get to her. She didn’t try to walk down the hallway like I walked down the hallway with her. Instead, she went back to the dance studio, and her face lit up, excited for dinner.
And she did get home right after we went to dinner to celebrate my friendship.
Do you know what that meant for us? It meant that it never occurred to us that she could move her hips and speak.
It means the only thing you have to do with your body is to be comfortable in it. And to be that comfortable, there have got to be certain things you can do—not just with your body, but with every part of you—to make it easier.
This is not something people often think about, but it’s
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