Following your dreams vs career

[Mikko Saks]

youre overthinking this one just watch the water flow into right direction and hear the birds singing, and you´ll be ok. meanwhile do whatever feel rights at the time!

[admonisher]

I talked with my conselor today and my teacher in the visual art field about whats happenning. Me personnally I wished I could take a break from school all together. But I am afraid to do so. If my hearts tell me to do this. I will take a break to do wathever I like. And find a part time job. If what I like to do is indeed to trainn/dance etc, I'll do this. If I am still interested in applying to circus school or dance school I will. But I need the break first to get my mind clear.

I realised a pattern I have

A)

1) OH I want to do this

2) hmm I am not sure if I should

3) hmm Dont do it keep doing what works and what youre doing now

4) Oups I should have tryed at least

B)

1)''

2)''

3) Try this new thing anyway

4) I am happy I tried best choice ever/I regret doing the choice but I learned from my lesson and I'm happy I tried

I need to do scenario B more often because scenario B is what bought me to were I am and scenario A is what makes me feel in a plateau since 3-4 years already

your right Mikko follow the bird hehe.

I always wanted to travel in another country and if I dont have money atleast try different town in canada, I never visited Halifax/toronto and quebec/vancouvert etc. I need to take at least one year off travelling and doing stuff I like, if its dance let it be dance, and stuff thinking of carreer all the time. This is probably the only way i'll be good to Apply in something I like is by doing it with passion. Like this I'll test my self and see how good am I training 4-5days a week. And Also I need to dedicate my time maybe to find a girlfriend or at least to be able to see and not be blind by my problems.

but anyway the post is pretty much about getting info on how to get prepared for the circus work

What Is my weak point now is acrobatique and strenght and flexibility but for my I feel its mostly strenght and flexibility and GB is probably a good formula

[Marlon]

When you apply to the school you have to apply with a particular discipline, and if you make it through to the end of the week without being cut you have to present an act in the discipline. After the auditions, if you are accepted they will tell you what disciplines they are willing to train you in, I think most people do the discipline they auditioned, and some people get to choose from quite a few.

I was 18 when I auditioned in hand balancing, but they were only willing to accept me as a base for hand to hand. I went to the school for 2 months, but dropped out after that time because I decided I would rather but able to focus my training on hand balancing.

Doing circus is plenty reasonable for your age, as for whether or not the you have a good chance of being accepted by the school I have absolutely no clue. You are a little bit older than they i think they like to accept students but there are quite a few people who are in their twenties who have been accepted. There are so many factors that I'm sure go into making the decision on who to accept there's no way I could assess your chances. One of the coaches who is doing the actual judging probably couldn't give much more than a guess without actually seeing you at the auditions and comparing you to the few hundred other people who will be applying this year.

It's a great school, the equipment is excellent, the coaches are nice, the students are all quite friendly. The school provides you with healthcare if you are accepted, and they have a physio guy on staff at all times. People are always getting injured, there are always people using ice packs. Injury is an accepted and frequent occurrence at the school (probably something that could be reduced quite a bit if they adopted a training methodology more akin to Coach Sommer's)

I barely speak french, (alot of the coaches are bilingual but everyone is expected to be communicating primarily in french by the second semester or so) but the gymnastics terminology is definitely the easiest thing to learn since it's so visual once you're immersed in it. I'll give my best shot at translating the phrases you had questions about but i may not be right.

montee groupee en appui tendu renverse

-from kneeling tuck up to handstand and return back to kneeling with both feet pointed and together the whole time.

appui tendu renversé, roulade avant,

demi tour, roulade arrière terminée

à l’appui tendu renversé

-handstand forward roll, jump half turn, back extension roll

rondade, flic flac (salto arriere)

- round off back handspring then some kind of back salto.

I'm not sure what your question is about the cartwheel, I haven't looked at the information online, but if they ask for a carthweel then by definition it'll be the basic two handed kind that passes through a handstand.

saut groupe sur place

-these are tuck jumps in place, I think you have the right idea.

how long it will take to increase flexibility is a totally person to person thing. it depends on how closed your shoulders are, how open you want them to be as well as how often you stretch them and how you stretch them. My shoulders are naturally open, and I never really have had to stretch them, but my hips are quite tight and i'm still quite a ways away from having my splits, for some people it's just the opposite.

[admonisher]

And what would be the best preparation you think?

Knowing that I wont get much hand balancing skills, and acrobatic skills wont go to far. I would be left with doing juggling because thats the one in which I would progress the fastest in 5 months. unless I can surprise myself, I never know. But if I do get accept in one discipline I suppose there are classes that are mandatory in other disciplinese anyway. So probably training there would be better then training on my own because of the quality of equipment, healthcare and good professionnal and other artist.

I see circus further then technical skills, My favorite aspect is creation. And I would say probably circus art can be a good base to start in dance if ever I switched again.

I am guessing they took you as base for handbalancing because of your height and strenght vs the lack of some flexibility but I am just guessing ?

Maybe they dont follow a coach sommers type of security to injury because 2-3 years is to short for people coming from different backgrounds to learn correct preventions ? and maybe to many student.

[admonisher]

so auditions is like a full 5 days ?

is it also a good thing to apply as generalists?

[admonisher]

since I have the occasion to have someone from here ill ask a few question more. So I believe its tru strenght and accrobatic are the most important in t he auditions?

What is by order the disciplines most people applyed for ?

I was checking the course list

1re année (session automne)

Introduction aux arts du cirque

Jeu d'acteur 1

Danse 1

Préparation physique 1

Acrobatie au sol 1

Équilibres 1

Jonglerie et manipulation

Acrobaties aériennes

Techniques principales (généraliste)

Techniques de spécialité 1 (spécialiste)

Français : communication écrite et orale

This mean you might have 45hours per semester for each of the courses except 60hours for your speciality ?so that means you would be training your speciality 2 days a week and the other day your doing dance,acting, aerial, equilibrium, juggling etc. and preparation physique is probably a course where its like a gymnastic bodie type things, you do workouts for general health strenght and flexibility. SO from checking this it means even if you put most of your time doing your main thing you still do everything a bit?

+you have one french class

and you told me the programs felt pretty full, like 8hours per day. DO they give you a lot of homeworks to do, like essays to right and things like that or its only physical stuff and not much to read or right ? I have been taking 10 courses per semester in my school and I can tell you its pretty painful and i must be drawing 6-8hours a day on drawing or computer or doing french/english

How is the dance class? thats the one I am actually the most interested in. Is it contemporary danse?