Testing The Waters

When Martha Graham said:  "Great dancers are not great because of their technique, they are great because of their passion"  I believe she was referring to dancers like Kiki Lucas; the subject of this months "Testing The Waters" Feature Story. I  had the distinct pleasure of becoming friends and working with Kiki Lucas while she was living in Los Angeles.   She being a fellow Aries woman we hit it off instantly.   To this day I continue to feel incredibly blessed to have known and worked with her. At the time, I was performing in and producing cabaret shows and she  graciously agreed to choreograph a couple of numbers for a few of my productions.                                                                                      ...

                                              Photo Credit: DawnMarie Ferrara I was walking around my neighborhood and suddenly noticed the trees along the streets are sprouting buds and some flowers are even beginning to blossom. What a lovely indication that the cold, dormant season of Winter is coming to a close and Spring will soon be upon us. Photo Credit: DawnMarie Ferrara I've always found February to be an interesting month. We are all still basking in the afterglow of the Holiday Season and the promise of the New Year remains in the abstract - mostly because we haven't placed both feet firmly into 2013 yet. This is an ideal time of year to hit the RESET BUTTON. Photo Credit: DawnMarie Ferrara There are times in our lives when the reset button is hit for us (or maybe it hits us in the head) . Think back to a time when...

"Its not love that should be depicted as blind, but self-love."  ~ Voltaire So true, so true.  We spend our entire lives with one person -  ourselves  and so why is it ingrained in us that loving ourself is not only selfish but also arrogant?   Society casts men and women in quite different roles.  There are some exceptions but typically at an early age men are given military toys to play with and are nurtured to become leaders and to aggressively pursue their passions. Us women, on the other hand, are given Barbi's, tea sets and taught to clean and keep house. We women are cultivated to be   'care givers' and subsequently we learn that our aspirations are secondary to that of a man. What ever your childhood experience, if a love of one self is not cultivated self-hatred is inevitable. "I now see how owning our story and loving ourselves  through that process is the bravest thing that we will ever do."  ~ Brené Br...

                                                                                    Photo Credit:  Trust Your Journey When life hands you lemons (let's say it all together now) --  make lemonade! This is what we are instructed to do in times of crisis - you know those times when life hits so hard you fall to the ground with a loud thud and the pain from that hurl reverberates throughout every bone in your body. Admittedly, there are some hits that can leave you so incapacitated that, while writhing on the floor from the pain, you begin to entertain the idea of living the rest of your life face down on the asphalt. GETTING BACK UP I've always prided myself on being someone who could be body slammed onto the mat of life and still have the abil...

I've always subscribed to the notion that we are each here for one reason... "to live OUR lives."  This goal sounds simple enough but sadly many people are not living their lives. Many are living the lives their families want them to live, the lives society deems "correct"-- afraid to step out of the box and listen to their soul's cry for expression. Everyone has a purpose and in order to live our life's purpose we each have to courageously step forward, put one foot in front of the other and allow our individual path to reveal itself to us.  FIND WHAT INTERESTS YOU There are many occupations in this great, big, beautiful world of ours -- as  Confucius  said "Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life." I can say from personal experience there is no profession  more challenging (and at the same time rewarding) than that of being an artist. Many people sit in judgement of others pursuing artistic endea...

There are so many unusual shows on television these days. If you flip through the channels on any given day or night you will undoubtedly stumble across a show about a group of people, from a major city in America, living their lives in front of cameras - why? Well, they do get paid, they do attain some kind of celebrity from the show and if they are really business savvy they can parlay their new found success and money into an empire. It may sound like I have an aversion to Reality Shows but I don't. I sit down and watch like everybody else (personal favorites are Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and Real Housewives of New Jersey) NEWS FOR ENTERTAINMENT What I take offense to are the shows and publications that are masquerading as "News" sources.  To my knowledge the "News" is supposed to supply the public with impartial information not salacious stories, half-truths and unsubstantiated "facts." I recently read an article that accused Beyonce ...

Horses are majestic creatures and deserving of our appreciation for their enduring legacy - a legacy that includes their service to our world and culture. SOME HORSE 4-1-1 The horse's earliest known ancestor was the Dawn Horse - they were roughly the size of Labrador retrievers. They roamed North America and Europe an estimated 50 Million years ago (yes, million). Mustang is a term that derives from the Spanish word: "Mesteno" which translates to a horse that has escaped; an ownerless and stray horse. The Mustangs (Wild Horses) that continue to run free in Nevada are believed to be descendants of the original horses brought here by Spanish explorers Coranado and DeSoto in the late 16th century.   By the early 17th century horses became crucial members of our civilization, Native American tribes and American settlers began to use horses for transportation, hauling, and as barter items. The invention of the automobile changed our society forever - this ...