Death and Dancing
An ode to 2025 - Emerging from the cave
As 2025 closes there’s something irresistible about a clean slate of a new calendar year.
Upon first reflection I thought this year sucked, filled with devastation and death. Fires ragging and new realities. Like an unpleasant taste in my mouth of dryness or burnt tea. Daily news of worldly insanity. This can’t be. My eyes fatigued I can’t witness and bear more. Boo 2025 please end.
But looking back, sifting through the smokey haze of dark thoughts that first appeared… I realized that it wasn’t all tragic. This wasn’t my theme for the year. But it was a layer to rise from.
What happened in my life this year? Change, shedding, wisdom and loss. Memories of paint and hot glue on my hands. Endless glass mirrors that glimmer in golden hour. Hands dirty, hair bouncing and hugs you hold so long you don’t realized how much time has passed.
I don’t know what else to do but chase my dreams or creative pursuits. My dreams of art that move the world to joy and connection. I don’t know how to do anything but act upon these impulses. Create. Feel. Share.
So when grief, tragedy or boredom come I do what I know, express myself and make something. In other words move my body and build something with my hands.
This was the year we doula Disco Cart into the world. Testing out ideas of what could this be? How can we bring joy to the streets? Is this a fantasy or could this be something more? Something that gives and receives resources?
Tingles of happiness are returning. Eeeeeeeeeeee!
This lead me to reconnect with my deepest passion, dancing again and to come at it from a new embodiment.
A pure expression. A reconnection. A way to experience joy with myself again but also it was time. Time to be a teacher.
Time to share the wisdom I’ve held for years. Kept a secret to myself and the world for the last 8 years since I “retired” professionally from dancing in the entertainment industry.
So I started to hold space and teach a dance class once a month.
While there were moments to breakthrough and fears around this to dismantle. I kept having the thoughts that I just have to keep going. Keep showing up. Keep dancing. Keep holding space.
It’s hard, messy and not perfect that first year. It’s not what I want it to be. It could be so much more. But thats the process of anything. It’s not perfect. But keep going. Magic comes. You know this.
This was hard, because as u get older. You do think about discovering other dreams or paths to try. Risks come in mind. I understood cycles and time differently as I reached the age for 40 this year. Thoughts of I should be somewhere else in my life. All this while dealing with the insanity of the world. It’s madding. You feel upside down. Trying and failing trying and failing. Nothing was clicking. I ventured on other paths tried new things. Developed new skills. All which lead me back home to me and my most master wisdom. Movement. Creativity.
I just did what I needed to do for myself. Dance and make the space for others to dance. To feel again. Feel our bodies. Connect to ourselves. Express and explore what’s inside. Play!
This year brought be back to dance. While I still struggle with poverty, the thing that brings me joy is doing my creative acts of expression. Building and movement. If I can’t feel resourced then I will feel joy from my actions.
“We need to getting touch with our deepest grief an also out deepest Love as they are the only emotions that have the power to heal humanity right now.” - Divine Harmony
So while this year started with a tragic family death and raging fires in LA, it was my ashes to rise from. I’ve had handfuls of visions from my meditations of standing in the middle of a fiery circle and slowly rising, dirt across my hands and body. I feel like a warrior and it’s finally here. Bambi legs and scares from the previous years. 6 family members passed within those 6 years. A failed start up during covid. Jumping into a new industry that wasn’t truly who I was. I lost my self confidence, my self love, I lost myself and went other places to find it only to get burned. But those scares eventually turned into knowledge that I am so grateful to receive. It took years, space and boundaries. Now I know more of what I want, the values I want to live by and I truly see my power and gifts to offer the world.
You learn so much when you venture off your path, well was I actually off? Maybe this was all apart of it all along. A bridge to walk across and see what’s possible what’s out there. Past your comfort zone. Deeper into the cave of darkness to find what is my light? My truest gift and wisdom at this point in my life.
I know hardships are ahead but I also know ecstasy and laughter are ahead.
Step by step from the ashes. Tears to smiles.
Something has changed inside. A shake off of the last 7 years. A sliding out of the skin I was cocooned in. While I feel this every year, this reflection, this cycle, this new year feels hopefully and different. I’m standing at the entrance of the cave, but I am facing out staring at the glimmering stars. Mystify.
I’m emerging.
I’m ready to be witnessed and held. Valued and seen.
Stuck in a culture with no culture, no ritual for initiation. I declare it for myself. I dance for myself.
It could be a long game but I’m daring myself to craft beauty back in my life. Moment by moment. Ritual by ritual. Dance by dance.
I’m daring to Love myself again.
So, 2026 I welcome you with a sword on my back and an open heart to follow.
I bow to you.
For those reading I hope you also love yourself so deeply you giggle when u know you're back home in ur body. In ur craft, in your art. In your heart.
I hope 2026 welcomes you to a journey of loving yourself fully in your body, mind and heart. I hope you journey out of the cave, shed your limiting thoughts like the skin of a snake and see how the vibrate light of who you really are
and if you need to find yourself again…
if you need to move your body…
come find me dancing in the streets, i’ll be waiting under the disco ball.
Love,
Kelley