Choices
the “right” one
“There are three constants in life… change, choice and principles.”
— Stephen Covey

When I was about to graduate from college, there was a burning question constantly at the back of my mind.
Where do I go from here?
I had been in school my entire life. I was about to step from the cocoon of education into the adult world. I needed a job. I needed a place to live. I also knew I wasn’t going to find happiness with a humdrum existence. I needed to decide what was going to consume my life next.
I had struggled with depression and anxiety all through college and barely graduated. I was tired of underachieving. I wanted to be excellent at something. I wanted to pursue a craft, and I wanted to become a master at it.
I was going to pursue a career in Latin DanceSport (competitive ballroom). I wanted to move to either Los Angeles or San Francisco — two of the best hubs of dancing on the West Coast. I’d been to LA a lot and liked it, but in the summer of 2016, I attended a bachata festival in San Francisco… and fell in love.

In September, the stars seemed to be aligning perfectly. One of my good friends had found an apartment there and needed a roommate. But I couldn’t find a job after graduation. I ended up living at my parents’ house in my deadbeat hometown for four months, my depression worsened day by day, and San Francisco seemed like a far-away and fading dream.
I couldn’t take it anymore. In January, I told my parents, “I have to go.”
They had been watching me steadily grow worse and spin my wheels, and they agreed to help me. They would shell out for my January rent. I had until February to find a job.
I took off for the big city.
At first I was ecstatic. I had wanted to be there for so long.
But as time went on, I started to have doubts.
It took me two months to find a job. I ended up going through three: they were all part-time, and I was not making close to enough to support myself. Latin lessons were draining my wallet and I couldn’t find a good fit for a competition partner. I watched from the sidelines as the competitions that I had been anticipating for a year swept by me.
Everyone kept telling me to be patient and wait to adjust, but every moment I was supremely conscious of every penny I spent and even more aware of the aching, empty place where my goals had been.
Now… life is good, but it’s not at all what I expected.
I’m now employed full-time, but still barely making ends meet. I’ve momentarily abandoned the possibility of competing. I’m on a bachata performance team, but I hardly dance anything but zouk now — it’s taken over my life and I’m working my way towards being a professional. I moved to a new place, and friends that I thought would never grow distant have gradually fallen away.
My training in zouk requires regular trips down to LA on weekends for privates… Long, 6-hour drives (often alone), expensive lessons, and coping with the resulting sleep deprivation throughout the following week. I’ve missed my LA friends far more than I thought I would. The social dance scene there is bigger, more developed, and more diverse.
I often find myself weighing the pros and cons of both cities and wondering if I made the right choice. Sometimes, when I’m feeling particularly anxious and irrational, I’m convinced I made the wrong one. I cried about it once. I told my mom, “I made the wrong choice, and now I’m stuck.” The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.
But over the last few weeks, I have reached a better conclusion.
I didn’t make the wrong choice. I simply made a choice.
“Be brave. Take risks. Nothing can substitute experience.”
— Paulo Coehlo
I don’t have a crystal ball, and I don’t know how things would have gone if I had moved to Los Angeles instead.
But I do know what happened when I moved to San Francisco.
I grew. I am a different person than the woman who left her tiny little hometown for city life.
Not only different, but… better. That’s priceless. And I’ve earned it.
I’ve been depressed and in dark places. Anxious. Incredibly lonely. Sad. I’ve lost friends. I’ve had panic attacks. I’ve wasted a lot of time wrestling with indecision and a lack of confidence. I’ve made stupid mistakes. I’ve shed countless tears. I’ve felt emotionally stretched so thin that all it would take is a tap for me to break in two.
And I have come away with so much. My roommate has become a sister to me. Someone who gets me like no one else, who makes me laugh, who fills up my life with positive energy just with her presence, and who makes me want to be a better person every day. I’ve made great strides in my mental and physical health that I never would have thought I was capable of making. I’ve grown immense amounts as a dancer and forged wonderful new friendships. I’ve earned the respect of people whom I look up to and idolize.
Nothing is permanent. I am in control of my future. If I truly believe something could be better, I have the power to change it.
Every experience, both negative and positive, is temporary and deserves appreciation.
“By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.”
— Confucius
Nothing is gained without difficulty. I’m placing my achievements on a pedestal. And I’m placing my difficulties on their own pedestal, as trophies of struggles that I have weathered and survived.
I don’t know yet where my journey will take me. But I’m slowly learning to appreciate all of it, without judgments and without regrets.
See you on the dance floor. ❤
— Elena “The Rhinestone” Rovito

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