How Saying “Yes” to a Tough Moment Changed My Life
“You should take a pole dance class with me,” a friend once told me. My stomach churned as if it were preforming backflips. I never thought of myself as the kind of woman who could move as salaciously as the women in Hustlers. The thought of it was mortifying; I felt like I’d rather stand at the DMV for three hours on a Friday afternoon than subject myself to such embarrassment. She sensed my hesitation and followed up, “Natalie, when was the last time you did something that scared you?” I tried to pull an example from recent memory… any example. I had nothing. “Fuck it, I’m in,” I said. “Let’s get uncomfortable.”
I walked into my first class with the same apprehension as a shy kid on the first day of school, nervously taking the room in. I expected a room full of scantily clad women, the kind who look like Instagram models. What I saw was nothing out of the ordinary: students, mothers, neighbors, businesswomen — and yes, even grandmothers.
We took a slow walk around the room. I felt like a baby giraffe learning how to walk. I was unsteady. Uncoordinated. Unsure. These women, all different colors, shapes, and sizes, each moved in their own beauty and truth. Watching them, I realized something was missing inside me. I wanted to feel that comfortable in my body.
