Have you ever wanted to dance for absolute no good reason? This feeling has been creeping up on me a lot recently.
Sometimes I feel trapped in my adult body and my grown-up brain. Part of me wants to break free from my stiff ankles and sore lower back and just do a silly dance. Part of me wants to let go of my dignity and decorum and run the risk of being seen to “show off.”
Is this childish or just childlike?
There’s a part of me that’s always been a bit of a rebel, albeit a law-abiding rebel. And lately that rebel inside wants to throw off the mantle of respectability, discard expectations of middle age, ignore the assessing eyes of the well-behaved and the socially compliant.
If I was a parent I would have to be socially compliant; I’d have to be well-behaved. Yes, there are many badly-behaved parents in the world, but nobody thinks much of them. Parents are supposed to be good.
But I’m not a parent, so do I have to behave?
That rebel inside me wants to dance. It wants be a little bit naughty. My rebellious inner child wants to come out to play again, and I’m not sure there’s any reason she shouldn’t.
My inner rebel wants to feel the syncopated rhythm of a life well-lived.
What about you? Does your inner child want to come out to play?
I have caught myself doing exactly this a few times lately. Not in public yet, but in front of my cats and husband. They tend to give me a look of “really?” and then I laugh at them. The other day, I got a running start and slid across the kitchen in my socks. And then laughed hysterically because it was insanely fun, and I had the thought “should I have outgrown this behavior?” I think not having kids allows me to never have to outgrow anything!
So I fully encourage your inner rebel. 🙂
There are behaviours adults should grow out of, but dancing around your house (or even in public) with exuberance is NOT one of them. My dad still dances and sings his silly nonsense songs, and I’ve noticed I do, too. I find it fun and freeing.
I dance. I sing. The cats used to look at me oddly, but I don’t have them anymore, so no-one judges me. And I am certainly not going to judge!
And no, there’s certainly no reason not to rebel. In fact, the fact we don’t have to be role models almost frees us up to rebel. Obliges us even?
I love the freedom to eat popcorn and not be a role model. I was at a toddler birthday party at a community centre and the parents were more thrilled to be playing around making goofy noises than the kids were.
I love that I can cuss like a sailor in my own home, I don’t have to eat vegetables unless I want to, I don’t have to hide candy from anyone except myself, FREEDOM!
I had some great dance moves going today with Carried Away by Passion Pit — saw them on SNL. (Yes I watch late night TV and get up whenever I want on the weekend, oh yeah, and most days that don’t require an early yoga wake time 😉 …!)