"What's Your Day Job?"

We should be so lucky.

(Courtesy of diyphotography.net)

This question was posed to a friend of mine, a professional dancer and dance/fitness teacher, right before she was due to make a dance performance. It was an innocent question from one of the production staff people in charge of getting information from the performers.

It puzzled her because she was doing what she loved doing, it just so happened to also put food on the table.

Pressed for a reason why a professional dancer would need a "day job", the staff person replied, "I have to introduce you as _________ (fill in "accepted" occupations like doctor, chef, etc.) and that dancing is just a hobby."

The infantile in me would have easily blurted back, "Jealous much?"

It brought one thing to focus: there is a notion (I don't think it is limited to the Philippines) that you can have something you're passionate about, and you can have work that pays the bills, but you can't have both.

People who write, dance, take photographs, anyone who is in the arts, feel this viewpoint more acutely. There seems to be a belief that once you mention that you are an artist, it must be qualified by the word "starving". Or more accurately, the qualifier isn't needed, it is implied and understood. Hence, the question asked of my friend.

The underlying message being, you don't expect me to believe that you actually make a living doing that?!?


It also explains the following scenarios:

People expecting you to take their pictures because you have a camera in tow all the time as a photographer. Gratis.


People expecting you to "show us a dance or two". For fun.

People telling you to teach a movement based class. For an hour. For free.

People making pakiusap (asking a favor) to do their graphic design needs, anyway "it's very simple only."

All the while, everyone else is making a profit out of your art, the one they insist on pooh-pooing. The one that parents like to remind their kids of as "useless" and something that "will be a dead-end." The one that is seen as a "lowly" job, one that credit card companies would perennially raise their eyebrows on.

I am reminded of one of those posters in Facebook that reads: Do something that you love, and you'll never work for a day in your life.


You see, the one thing artists have is passion. What artists do tends to be personal, because a part of them is invariably stamped on their "work". Whether it is a composition, a recital, a mural, a feature article. It isn't a job where you can "copy and paste" from somebody else - well, you can, but they're called plagiarists, and something very much frowned upon in a field that prides itself as having practitioners who can claim the word unique in everything they do.

And, I would wager, artists have a work ethic that can be described as intense. Rethinking a sentence over and over to properly convey a thought, doing a pirouette so many times the dancer's toes start to bleed but having to do it to give a perfect performance, I personally know of so many artists who are almost obsessively perfectionist in the way they approach what they do. It runs counter to some of the portrayals in media of artists who are shiftless bums with no aim in life.

I wish we had a better appreciation of the arts and how it speaks to our inner lives. Until such a time comes to pass, this view that the arts are something to "pass the time away" while slaving at your "day job" will prevail. The changing of the current viewpoint should be started by parents and schools, who should nurture talent when it manifests. Children shouldn't be given negative messages like "your talent is worth nothing", unless one was a sadist. They should be encouraged.

And I wish to differentiate it from the current obsession of young people to become artistas (celebrities). Yes, they dance, sing, act, but the companies that mold and train them do so in the view that these people are products, and are doing the "training" in order to sell records, movie tickets, etc. The prevalence of reality shows that are supposed to showcase budding actors and singers worries me, as most of the time, the "winners" are determined by text-voting, a clear cut indication that their "appeal" is more important than the actual talent they supposedly bring to the table. The siren song of fame proves to be irresistible, judging by the number of young people who line up to be part of these shows.

Back to my friend who was asked the title of this post. She declared that dancing was her day job, much to the wonder of the person soliciting the information from her.

If only everyone was so fortunate to be doing what they love best for a living.