Progress on my direction for my Inquiry

After having a Skype chat with Paula last week, I have been hitting the books and trawling the internet for inspiration and waiting for my lightbulb moment! This actually struck me whilst at work, I was talking to some colleagues about teaching and how their path to this career. Some of them have always wanted to teach, their parents were teachers, so the decision came very naturally to them. However, some, like myself, had thought of an alternative career and fell into teaching almost by accident – but they love it!

This, again, made me revisit the career rainbow that I touched upon in a previous blog.

Some people do indeed have one career that they start when they leave school, college or university, my dad, for example worked for a bank from 18 until he retired at 58.  But, some of us change our minds, moving from one job to another – career transition. This is especially true for dancers, performers, actors, artists ect.

I began to read anything I could find about career development and transition and stumbled upon a Radio 4 documentary entitled “Why do dancers die twice?” http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/1fkwdll6ZscvQtHMz4HCYYr/why-do-dancers-die-twice This was a really interesting listen and if you have any spare time maybe whilst your cooking or baking, give it a listen!

During the article, it highlights how the dancer can lose sight of who and what they are. It also states that “Typically, a dancer’s career transition can be incredibly lonely, isolating, often because you might be leaving a world where everyone’s continuing.” This got me thinking about the negative connotations to career transition. Another quote from the article states, “It can feel - because that’s all you’ve done - that you don’t know who you are outside of a dance studio, you don’t know what you’re good at, you don’t know what you’re interested in… it can be a very frightening place.” These made me look into transition theories and the emotions that people experience during this time.

I found William Bridges, “Process of Transition” and “Transition Curve”. This shows all the stages involved when transitioning, these are, denial, anger, acceptance, exploration and finally, new beginnings. This is particularly true when a performer leaves the industry and to seek a new career. When I left the theatre industry, I was very lost found it quite difficult to deal with, the Martha Graham quote jumps to mind, “A dancer dies twice – once when they stop dancing. The first death is more painful.” I find it very relatable, even though I consider myself a performer not a dancer. When you have trained for something and planned a certain career since shortly after learning to walk, it’s hard to say goodbye to that part of your life. It made me think about how having a plan B is important. I raised this in a discussion with my colleagues and I got a very interesting response for one colleague in particular, one of her sons wants to be a musician his response was, “Mum if I focus on having a plan B then I’ll never achieve plan A”.

When do you start to think about career transitions and how can you make it more positive?

Danni Austen, a fellow BAPPER, had designed a double career rainbow. Whilst interesting, it wasn’t quite accurate for my circumstances. Using her double career rainbow as a base, I added in a “wobble” or transition curve in the middle of the two rainbows – this, I feel, reflects a more accurate representation of my journey so far.

It looks like this:

 

The part between the grey lines is really what I want to focus on during my inquiry.

I feel I have had a small breakthrough and the direction I wish to pursue has become clearer! I have been working on my questions so need to crack on and conduct my interviews J