When you are dancing with a partner, you both have to be in sync with each other. Sometimes when you first dance with someone you have never danced with before, you have some trouble finding the togetherness two people should have while dancing. Finding the perfect pull against each other and the synchronization takes practice. Though you may dance well with multiple people, there is always one person who you can dance almost perfectly with (at least most of the time ;-)). You know each their strengths and weaknesses in certain dance moves, how the other person moves around the room, how big of steps they take, and so on. If you cannot become one unit as dancers, but remain two individuals, the beautiful gracefulness and flow of the dance cannot be enjoyed by an audience or the dancers themselves. Another point of good dancing is to have complete trust in your partner. If you don't trust your partner, your dancing will only be mediocre. Of course, every dancer falls out of sync or flubs a move every now and again, even the best of the best. But they can recover and go on as if nothing had happened, because they trust their partner to lift them up again.
Dancing can be related to our relationship with God. When we start developing our relationship with God, we find that we don't know all that we should about Him. We aren't in "sync" with God. Even though we don't realize it, He is leading us and trying to tell us how we should move through the dance of life. As someone progresses in the spiritual life, they hopefully learn how to "dance" with God. It can be shaky at first, but how can you be good at anything without practice? It takes hard work to perfect something, and it is especially hard to perfect our relationship with God. God has so much hope in us, yet we forget to trust Him, the most perfect of partners. He knows all the moves and it is up to us to humble ourselves and let Him lead us. As in dancing, one partner must lead, while the other follows. If two wills fight against each other, the outcome will be disaster. God is the leader, we must be the follower. Sometimes the music changes and throws us off the beat. We misstep, stumble and fall, and sometimes make horrible mistakes. But if we have a good partner, they will encourage us to keep going. In life we make mistakes, forget that someone greater than us is there, and rely entirely on ourselves. This forgetfulness of God can lead us into self pity and sometimes despair. We lose touch with God. Everyone goes through dry spells in the spiritual life. God doesn't seem to be there for us, everything seems to be going horribly wrong, and we don't know what to do. Our prayers don't seem to make a but of difference. But there is someone who is listening and constantly there for us: God is there, our ever faithful partner. Like in dancing, we have pick ourselves up, and with the help our partner, keep going until the end. The ultimate prize? Heaven. If we can find a way do dance perfectly with God, how can we fail to win the prize? St. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 9: 24-27 “ Do you not know that the runners in the stadium all run in the race, but only one wins the prize? Run so as to win. Every athlete exercises discipline in every way. They do it to win a perishable crown, but we an imperishable one. Thus I do not run aimlessly; I do not fight as if I were shadowboxing. No, I drive my body and train it, for fear that, after having preached to others, I myself should be disqualified”.
Dancing is a race, a race of gracefulness and telling a story through music and body. If our dance with God is helping us toward our final goal, let us share this joy and love of dancing with God with others, so that they too can enjoy a dance with the most wonderful, perfect dance partner.
(Please forgive me if this post is all a ramble. Sometimes my thoughts do not get organized and end up being muddled. If you have any thoughts, please share! I'd like to hear your opinion on the post. =) )
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