Thank you for showing me where my passions lie. Thank you for allowing me to embrace who I was without telling me what I was doing wasn't meant for a girl. Thank you for teaching me to take my differences and use them to my advantage. Thank you for showing me that women can show the same even more power in their dancing than men, something I had always been told wasn't true.

Without you, my love for dance and art wouldn't exist.

Without you, I wouldn't have the motivation to do what I do today.

Without you, I wouldn't be where I am today.

Without you, I wouldn't even be half the person I am right now.

I started dancing at an actual studio when I was 10 years old. It was a late start and I was told that I would never actually be able to dance professionally. Because of that, a lot of the time I spent in that studio was spent hiding away.

Because I had been told that dancing was not in my future, I didn't see a point in actually trying hard enough to make myself known. For two years I went to classes, dreaded agreeing to attend with my friends, and absorbed all of the hateful energy that my old dance instructor threw at me. I was a little girl who loved to dance, but didn't know it because I had been told that was something that I couldn't do.

Then I met someone new, someone special, and she changed my life for the better.

She was my dance instructor, and also my friend.

After a year off, I finally went back to the studio and decided to take a class I had attempted before. Hip-hop. Not necessarily the most womanly style of dance according to several people that I met along my journey.

For the first time in years, I found myself enjoying myself in class. My teacher told us how well we were doing, she gave us tips on how to improve and told us how she made a living doing what she loved. Over the years, I learned, I improved, and I got thrown even deeper into the arts and dance.

From one hip-hop class when I was 13 to seven different classes when I was a senior in high school. Three of those classes in my final year centering around hip-hop.

I developed my skills, I auditioned for dance roles in shows at my school, showed people that I was more than just the shy girl in the back of the classroom, and eventually got the opportunity to actually assistant coach a team at my studio.

I assistant coached a hip-hop team that competed locally and was made up of the same girls that I had watched grow up at the studio. I performed with them as well as coached them, and through months and months of hard work, I finally saw my talents come together and show something in response. That response was in the form of one shiny plaque for a first place overall routine.

I continued to teach, I continued to choreograph and show people what I could do, and I still do that to this day.

My dance instructor showed me that I could be whoever I wanted to be, it would just take a lot of hard work. She encouraged me to think out of the box, to take technique classes as well as classes that interested me. This very obviously showed my junior year when I signed up for a technique class paired with a break dancing class, but she told me that was what was going to make me a great dancer. She told me that because I was so willing to try both sides that I had the ability to really make an impact on my own life and others.

Because of her, I found myself, hidden under a life time of hateful comments and gender stereotypes.

So, to my dance instructor, thank you.

Thank you for showing me me.