In a brief chapter about perfectionism, she offers this – helpful to writers, visual artists, actors, musicians, chefs…whatever your art form!

“Prefectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane your whole life…I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won’t have to die. The truth is that you will die anyway and that a lot of people who aren’t even looking at their feet are going to do a whole lot better than you, and have a lot more fun while they’re doing it.

Besides, perfectionism will ruin your writing, blocking inventiveness and playfulness and life force…Perfectionism means that you try desperately not to leave so much mess to clean up. But clutter is wonderfully fertile ground…Tidiness suggests that something is as good as it’s going to get. Tidiness makes me think of held breath, of suspended animation, while writing needs to breathe and move.

. . .

What people somehow (inadvertently, I’m sure) forgot to mention when we were children was that we need to make messes in order to find out who we are and why we are here – and, by extension, what we’re supposed to be writing.”

Learn more about (or buy!) the book HERE.

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In New York, Limon quickly came to believe that he could not make anything of value by painting because the medium had been mined out. Disillusioned with his fantasy, it was by chance that a girlfriend took him to see the dancer Harald Kreutzberg perform. Limon was stunned. “Suddenly, onto the stage, borne on the impetus of the heroic rhapsody, bounded an ineffable creature and his partner. Instantly and irrevocably, I was transformed. I knew with shocking suddenness that until then I had not been alive or, rather, that I had yet been unborn…now I did not want to remain on this earth unless I learned to do what this man was doing.”

In a panic, Limon began studying all the dance he could. He studied with Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman in their Humphrey-Weidman school. From Doris Humphrey, he learned his base for technique and from Weidman he learned pantomime and expression. In later years, Limon would attribute his primary stylistic influences to Isadora Duncan and Harald Kreutzberg.

Ten years after he began dancing, Limon premiered his first major choreographic work, Danzas Mexicanas. He was drafted in April 1943. Between 1943 and when he was discharged in 1945, he choreographed several works for the US Army Special Services. While on leave during this time, he returned to NYC to pursue serious choreography with Doris Humphrey.

Jose Limon was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1967. He continued to work and choreograph through his illness until he died on December 2, 1972, at the age of 64.

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Drum workshop / 2:00-3:30pm
Dance workshop / 4:00-5:30pm
(Workshops take place at 700 1st Street)

Performance and Drum Circle Social from 6-8pm at the Plateau Espresso Coffee House on North Scenic Drive (just past the hospital, on the right).

For more information, call: 575-682-4663