Ballet is the sole aspect that my entire life has been planned around: leaving school early to get to classes, commuting two hours every day for the best possible training, moving half across the country to attend one of the top ballet undergraduate programs in the country. Throughout my life, I've also been a singer, a musician, appeared in numerous plays and musicals, and paint in my free time. Even my business degree has the word "art" in it. So it's absolutely ludicrous to me that most people on this Earth don't have art at all in their lives.

In fact, to most the arts aren't even considered an important aspect to life. It's been given the title of an "extra," something you might be interested in, considering multiple other factors and options first. In some scenarios, people are too scared to participate in the arts because of their exclusive and elite characteristics and participants. They're worried they don't know when is the right time to clap, or too scared they won't "get it." In the worst case scenario, people scoff at the arts and considering it a field not worthy enough to enter because of money. Artists are depicted as stupid, run-down, and always struggling to survive.

These stigmas need to be destroyed. In the world we live in today, with brutal wars, crime, an always-changing political landscape, and the pressures of modern-day life, the human mind is placed under too much stress. These emotions build and build, without a way of fully feeling and expressing them. We sit on these emotions for years, letting our personalities and psyches rot away, not knowing how or why we feel this way but just knowing we do. The answer is simple: the arts.

The arts exist and were created for the sole purpose of self-expression. While yes, there are specific techniques and curriculums behind each art, and many people build their lives around pursuing and perfecting these techniques, it doesn't mean that the arts are only for those people. No one is saying that you have to be a Monet or a Tchaikovsky or a Baryshnikov to paint or play or dance, and if they are, screw them. The best thing about the arts is that in their truest form, they are not about competition but about the individual performing the art. One does not heat up a microwavable pizza and consider oneself a 5-star chef; one does so to survive. Similarly, an artist does not create with the goal of being the best; they create because it's a life function as essential as breathing.

I’ve been both classically trained in some arts, and have been self-taught in others. Through both of these experiences I have learned that the arts are extremely personal to an individual, and carry different meanings for different situations. The arts can make you sad, can make you hate, can make you angry, can make you happy, can fill you with air, can set you free. In this fast-paced stress-driven world we live in, everyone deserves an outlet to express all of these emotions, therefore everyone needs the arts. It’s not just a fun hobby or something for children to do. The arts heal. Go pick up a canvas and some paint from the craft store. Google a quick scene from a ballet or a play. Put on the classics channel on the radio when you're stuck in traffic. Take 10 minutes out of your day to try something, to feel something, and I guarantee you those 10 minutes will be the best 10 minutes of your day.