Joy of dance.

A friend of mine asked today what is the difference between striving for righteousness and desiring righteousness and walking like Christ. In this statement "striving" is trying really really really hard to be righteous... And knowing me, my mind goes instantly to dancing.

So... Here is the picture.

While I am dancing there are things that I do wrong, things that I learned wrong, bad habits, poor posture and so on. Ironically the more I learn about dancing, the more I dance and as I get better... there are more things that I do wrong. The better I get the more I can see that I am doing wrong. When I first started dancing I would never have noticed that I shift my weight slightly backwards past my feet on a swingout. I never noticed that before.

Now the second part is I have a teacher who is also who I love to dance with the most, he is my most loved lead and he is telling me what I am doing wrong. He is making me a better dancer, showing me the little things and big things that I am not doing right.

Now with this introduction I have come to my point what is the difference between Trying really really hard, or abiding in Christ? In dance, when am I trying really really hard to do it right and when am I just trusting my lead?

Now when dancing with a lead that I trust and that challenges me, and especially when I'm dancing with my teacher, I have noted that if I begin to think about what I need to do, if I try really hard to do something right, I do not follow well. I mess up more. Why? Because I have taken my attention away from the one I am with. I am not focusing on HIM I am thinking about myself. Given, I am trying very hard to do what he has told me to do, but I can't DANCE while I am trying to make myself dance properly. If I just surrender my mind, body and heart to him and let him lead me we can be so beautiful. Will we be perfect? No. But will we enjoy the dance? Yes.

Now, do I leave my short coming unattended? By no means. 1st Cor 9:27 applies here. "But I discipline my body and keep it under control lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified." I do indeed discipline my body and the most literal sense I practice, train, do everything I can to form the muscles and the muscle memory to be able to become a better dancer. I work very hard to fix my short comings and to get stronger. Why? So I can do everything right -- I would love to be a perfect dancer -- but no. I work so hard because I LOVE to dance. That is it, I love it and I want to be better at it. So am I 'striving for striving's sake? nope. I am disciplining my body and mind to dance and dance well because I love the dance and the one I am dancing with. My focus is not getting the moves right, or even doing the posture and frame right (which are very important) My focus is following him, being with being with him, my focus is HIM -- not myself.

My friend asked me after I gave a slightly shorter spill about dance, "What do you do when you mess up?"
My answer was, "We keep dancing. He is able to dance with me no matter how bad I am, he is that good." and after further contemplation -- He will catch me when I fall, help me back on track when I've missed a step. He isn't concerned with how good or bad I am he just wants to dance with me. yes he wants me to get better, but never at the sacrifice of the Joy of dance.