• Glynn Scott
    Glynn Scott
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There comes a time in all of our lives when we pause to reconsider the choices we’ve made or the direction we’ve taken. But such a time can be fraught with emotion.

Being a professional dancer is a vocation that requires passion, talent and commitment. So we don’t often consider assessing it in the way we assess other potential careers. Yet there are elements to consider that can inform your thinking about whether it is the right career for you.

Perhaps you’ve studied dance all your life and never really thought that there were other careers that you could do. Maybe you’re already studying full-time to be a dancer and it isn’t quite what you expected, or perhaps you have a history of injuries and are wondering whether being a dancer is going to be sustainable.

Making the decision not to pursue dance as a career often presents new challenges. Throughout years of dance training we are encouraged to believe that if we just work hard enough we will succeed. For some, choosing a different career path can feel like not having tried hard enough. While making the decision can be an overwhelming and emotional process, having some tools and a framework can help clarify your thoughts.

Glyn Scott, brother of Australian Ballet principal Amber Scott, was one who had to make such a change of plans.

After graduating from the Australian Ballet School, he went on to dance with American Ballet Theatre (US) and the Birmingham Royal Ballet (UK). But at the age of 21, after landing badly from a jump, he realised he was going need to find a new career. Grieving for his career in dance, he knew it would need to be something he was passionate about.

At the Australian Ballet School psychologist Lucinda Sharp had spoken of the importance of having interests outside dance. “She asked us to look at ourselves as though we were a pie.  If we divided the pie up, how much of it was dance and what would happen if we took dance away?”

Scott had been interested in flying and soon after began working part-time at a cinema to pay for flying lessons. He loved it and ultimately this was to become his new career.

Despite his parent’s concerns that he would need tocomplete the last two years of high school, Scot pursued his ambition, believing that his brain could be trained just like the rest of his body. Discovering that he would need maths and physics to attend flight school, he found his year 10 maths teacher and began studying hard.

After successfully completing his VCE and then his commercial pilot training, Scot now flies for a career. He is still passionate about dance and enjoys watching his sister and his friends perform with the Australian Ballet.

This is an extract from an article by careers counsellor Kym King, herself a former dancer. Read the full article in the April/May issue of Dance Australia.


Below: Glyn Scott

Glynn Scott

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