The long shadow of the ‘Natural Athlete’

We all know someone who seems to have been born with physical talents beyond the ordinary. These are the baseball stars, the swimmers who always win, the lanky runners who run barefoot, the guy who’s been skiing black diamond slopes with no poles since he was four, the high school volleyball player with the mean spike who goes pro. My mother called these specimens “Natural Athletes” (capitalized because that’s how I imagined them when I was a kid, they were truly set apart from the rest of us mortals). Any sport, of course, requires training and discipline in order to become very good. But Natural Athletes start way ahead of the pack.

My mother especially admired anyone who excelled at the patrician sports of her childhood – tennis and horseback riding. She put our whole family through endless summers of tennis lessons (we were all quite bad). I finally realized I could quit tennis when I was about 13. I couldn’t face another summer of Tennis 1 with little boys, some of whom were Natural Athletes.

I wasn’t sophisticated enough at the time to understand my mother was lamenting the fact that there were no Natural Athletes in our family – herself included. It always seemed she believed that if we just worked hard enough, we could ascend to the ranks of the naturally gifted, which is not how talent works. Later, my sister and I were in ballet, where my mother pronounced my sister a Natural Dancer and I was encouraged to drop out. My experience of being fired from ballet at age 6 exactly mirrors that of my character Ava’s in The Steps Between Us. Being told she is less-than at an early age propels Ava’s unshakeable commitment to learn ballroom dance, even though she suffers more bumps than most people.

That “Natural Dancer” has haunted my years of ballroom lessons. All around me are people who are exceptional dancers. It’s hard to imagine they did not begin with that secret sauce that made learning effortless. There is a young girl in our studio right now who is absolutely a Natural Dancer. Make no mistake, she’s a fiercely hard worker who has already logged hours and hours of lessons.  But her body just seems to know. It’s a treat to watch her. If she wants to, she’ll be pro before she’s out of high school. I hope she keeps many other things in her life, too.

In my experience, few people will cop to being natural dancers or athletes. I guess it’s the modesty of not wanting to admit to possessing God-given talent. Most impressive dancers say it’s just a matter of putting in the time. And, of course, as the levels get higher, the distinctions are harder to see. It’s in the early years of learning you can clearly see the presence (or absence!) of real talent.

But, as with Ava, the concept is always hovering in my mind – that I am not a Natural Dancer. Unfortunately, that means I often spend my mental bandwidth on feeling inferior rather than getting myself into an open-minded state where I can learn. Like Ava, I’m here to prove I’m good enough, that I deserve to be part of Ballroom World. I’m learning to ignore the specter of the Natural Dancer. Who cares if you’re a natural or not? Every kind of dancing is its own reward and a truly human joy.