My life has been a cascade of incredible amounts of joy and pain. I have found that dance is one of the only things that keeps the joy flowing over the pain. In a few months, I will be dancing in front of a large group of fellow dancers, family and friends in the dance competition I have been training for. I can feel the pain of my grief and fear falling away each time I see this picture above. When you are so used to pain and sadness, feeling good can cause a major rift with that self stuck in those emotions. It sounds strange, but growing up, fear and sadness were my normal and so marrying my husband who is steady and happy, going to dance class again, feeling peace is unfamiliar to me. Last night I spent 80 minutes dancing hard and fast and when I left the studio I felt a peace that almost made me go to sleep right there in my car. I drove home with joy flowing from deep within. My husband was so happy to see me smiling. Within a few hours, I felt dread fill me up and I looked at him with tears ready to flow and asked what happened. He said, “Melissa, you told me you are used to feeling badly, so feeling good is unfamiliar. When it’s unfamiliar, you do what you can to get you back to feeling the familiar, which for you is feeling badly. So, you are okay, everything will be okay, and you don’t need to make yourself feel bad. It’s okay to feel good.” Immediately the dread left, only to come back 30 minutes later. I just kept telling myself I was okay, and that I could start getting used to feeling good without guilt. It is hard to break habits, especially when the habits have been formed as a small child, but I found what will break them. DANCE! So, I shall keep on dancing and keep on talking and keep on writing. Life is hard, but no matter what, I now am able to dance again and I will keep on keeping on.