Dance is Science

I am Biochemistry/Molecular Biology major with a minor in Dance. Actually, scratch that, I am a Biochemistry/Molecular Biology major who had to remove her dance minor because there was not enough space for the dance department to offer more classes so I could work around my lab schedule.

People say that we need more scientists.

People say that dance does not give as much as lab work.

However, I can say firsthand that Dance made me a better scientist.

Dance is a science.

When most people think of science, they think of beakers and lab coats and nerds sitting in a creepy old lab. They think of facts and figures and complex words that they had to memorize when they were younger. Science to most people in modern society is an entity filled with smart thoughts and details. What they do not realize is that science is not several concrete pieces.

Science is a process.

The beakers and lab coats and nerds are the people working on experiments that last for months and years on end. The day to day life of a scientist is filled with small tweaks and improvements in their experimental design to make the best of what they have.

The facts and figures and complex words that most people have to memorize in high school are not blips of inspiration. Each sentence in a scientific text was worth years of tweaks in experimental design. What many people do not realize is that people spend their entire life trying to prove that, yes, the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.

Dance is just like science.

Dance is a process.

Each rehearsal is like an experiment. The dancer is given a set of instructions, and they are expected to utilize these instructions to create a beautiful performance. No piece is perfect after the first rehearsal. In fact most performances are based on weeks to months of rehearsals focused on creating the best product with what the choreographer has.

Scientists also try to create the best product that they can with what they have. For most them, that means that they must be the best student they can be. In my Biochemistry/Molecular Biology major, I spend my days trying to become the most informed and adept person in the classroom. I study for hours each day, and I try my hardest to understand the techniques I learn in lab.

But I fail.

And I fail often.

Many students that face failure give up. They believe that failing is a sign that they are not meant to do the work they have been given. However, if a person were to give up everything they failed at, they would never be able to achieve their full potential.

Until I became more immersed in my dance courses, I found myself giving up far too quickly. I accepted that my lab work could fail because I was just in a teaching lab. I shrugged my shoulders at a C on a lab report. Failure was a part of life, and I would figure out what to do with my life after I got out of college.

Dance showed me that falling down is the only way to learn how to get up again. Dancers fall down in rehearsal several times, and if they stay on the ground, they will only be trampled. When a dancer makes a mistake, they have to adjust their movements and they have to seek a new pathway. Dance calls for alternate processes and improved technique.

Even though I could not complete my minor, I had the wonderful experience of learning technique from several wonderful choreographers. Each rehearsal presented with new challenges, and because I was inexperienced in many of the techniques I was exposed to, I often failed to express the ideas that they wanted me to convey.

I failed.

I failed because I cared more about the end product than I did about the process. Even though I knew that the only way to get an answer was by completing a process, I only focused on the end, and I failed because of it. When I learned that the only way to be successful was to understand the "how" instead of the "what," I became a better dancer.

And by understanding what made me a better dancer, I became a better scientist.

Because I had started to focus on the "how," I started to ask questions in class that brought a more complete understanding to my studies. My lab work started to relate more to my lectures, and I felt more well-rounded.

While my creative soul was expanding in the theater, my mind was expanding in the classroom.

Dance taught me how to fall down, and it taught me how to grow.

Without dance, I would be just another robotic premed without inspiration. I would not have thought about the experiments and processes that lead to the simple facts drawn out in my textbooks. I would have memorized facts, took exams, and kept moving forward. My mind would have stayed in its box, simply accepting what was in front of me without seeking for a higher understanding.

Thanks to my dance training, I have learned more about myself and the world around me.

I wish people would see dance as a science like biology, chemistry, and physics. While it might not answer the questions that people ask about medicine or gravity, dance can answer the little questions that we ask inside our hearts that no one else would ever know. The only way we can answer those questions is to dance.

So thank you to the Department of Theater and Dance at Belmont University for saving this scientist.

I believe in something greater in myself, and I owe a lot of that to dance.

I hope that more people at Belmont will get to experience the beauty of dance some day.