Monday Inspiration - Joy Womack

This week's inspiration comes from an Amazon Prime documentary called The American. Joy Womack studied ballet in Santa Monica, CA until the age of twelve when her family moved to Austin, Texas. There they found a Russian ballet teacher where Joy learned some basic Russian and became obsessed with becoming a prima ballerina, focusing on Russian ballerina Natalia Osipova as her idol.

In 2009, at the age of 15, she moved to Russia to join the Bolshoi Ballet Academy, becoming the first American to to ever graduate from the Academy's main training program with a red diploma.

Now I've always felt that ballet had to be one of the toughest disciplines that man has ever invented. The hours and hours of practice, the jumping, the perfect execution, and the incredible dancing on their toes is like nothing else. I am inspired every time I see ballet. Now take this required work ethic and apply it as an American in Russia. Add in constant verbal abuse, jealousy and competition that has no limits, broken glass in your dance shoes, and ballet "patrons" that could further your career if you accommodated their wishes and desires. Not an easy career under the best of conditions.

In 2013 Joy left the Bolshoi Ballet, claiming she could not deal with the corruption. She was labelled a "traitor" to Russia, and her coach lost her status as well for having supported a traitor. The next year, at the age of 19, she became a principal dancer of the Kremlin Ballet Theatre of Moscow, where she danced until 2017. In 2018 she a principal dancer with the Universal Ballet in Seoul, South Korea, and over the next few years made numerous appearances around the world.

So the next time I feel a bit tired and/or sore, I might just take a deep breath and soldier on. And be thankful that I don't have dancer's feet.

See you on the courts.
Michael Gauthier
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