CONIECTO

After 3 x 12h per day spent in the office, I decided to take a morning off and go to the final performance of the MA in Irish Traditional Dance. I really needed a break!

I had the chance to meet Catherine Foley, who's leading the programme, in several other occasions. And I've seen her students last December, performing on the same stage with "The Chieftains". I knew it was going to be worth it!
The performance took place in the Daghda space, an old church in St.John's Square that was transformed in a space for cultural events by a few enthusiasts.

Joelle Sheppard and Patrick Coyne, the two young students performing, were fantastic! Not only that they were excellent dancers, but it is pretty rare that you can see such a large spectrum of ideas communicated through dance!

There was Irish dancing on French cancan, Brazilian and jazz music. There were duets, solos and group dances. Although Joelle danced a solo from "Feet of Flames", "King of the Fairies" which was excellent, my preferate was a "Rhapsody of Squares and Boundaries", who tried to demonstrate how, through training, rules of particular activities become ingrained in an individual. We work very hard to acquire the skills of a profession, to become accepted in particular circles, we draw squares and boundaries around us to better comply with the requirements, and one day we discover ourselves emprisoned. You try to relax, but your foot continues to dance, you try to give up work, but can't live without the blue screen, and it becomes more and more difficult to get "out of the box".

In my lunch break, I went to a "Work-life balance" seminar on "disengagement". Part for myself, part thinking of my project, the high level of stress and the low numbers of women working in software development. The University organises one every month and the last I attended was on music therapy. This time, Sarah Moore started by asking our opinions on the total absence of men from the audience. Are their lives perfect? don't they feel a need for balancing their lives? I assumed they just didn't have time:-) (not that I'd be any better!)
The talk was about flow, play, and disengagement as a way of restauring the balance between Yin and Yang...

I guess we women tend to feel responsible for too many things. Our capacity of multitasking makes us think we can solve all the problems and keep everything under control. This might be our worse enemy, preventing us from focusing and getting into the flow when working. We simply don't turn the email and the phone off when we have to focus on something important, because we think we can deal with the interruptions and do our work. And... god forbids, something bad could happen at home and our beloved have to be able to reach us!

Men don't seem to give any thoughts to the content of the fridge at home or to the kid's running nose when working. But we are!

Looking back in time, I realise once more how lucky I am to be given this second chance to do a work I am passionate about after my kids became adults! I had some very hectic periods in my life, sometimes I even wonder how I survived the early 90's...