An Australian researcher has found an unexpected benefit of ballet, that it can give performers a ‘spiritual experience.’
Conducted by Lynda Flower at the University of Queensland, Flower wanted to look into “peak performance lived experiences,” the spiritual or religious states that are experienced during the peak performance of a sport.
Flower focused on ballet because not only are the performers elite athletes, but they are also performing artists.
For her study Flower interviewed seven former professional ballet dancers. Their reports not only confirmed previous research, but also gave Flower an insight into these experiences, with each ballerina describing them as extraordinary, “that is, it was different from the ordinary and the everyday.”
The interview results are also in line with reports from prima ballerinas Anna Pavlova and Margot Fonteyn, who also reported “spiritual” experiences during performance, with Flower adding, “Margot Fonteyn said that when she danced to the best of her ability, her soul was released and her spirit could shine forth.”
And this spiritual state entered during a peak performance also had other, longer-lasting benefits on performers’ well-being, “They all said that when they reach such a high state, it continued in a post-performance high,” reported Flower. “They felt it for hours afterwards, some even felt it for days. Being so uplifted during performance — it lasted for quite some time afterwards.”
Flower’s study is published in Performance Enhancement and Health.
Ballet boosts wisdom?
A recent study also found another unusual benefit of practising ballet, that it can increase wisdom.
Published last month in the journal PLOS ONE, a team from the University of Chicago not only confirmed the already held belief that meditation is associated with wisdom, but physical activities such as ballet may also increase wisdom.
In their study 298 participants were questioned on their experiences as a teacher or student of meditation, classical ballet, the Alexander Technique, and the Feldenkrais Method.
Ballet was only included for comparison purposes, however the surprising results showed that although those who practiced ballet had the lowest levels of wisdom — with those who practised meditation showing the highest — the more participants practised, the more their levels of wisdom increased.
Leading wisdom researcher Monika Ardelt commented on the results saying, “The finding that the practice of ballet is associated with increased wisdom is fascinating. I’m not going to rush out and sign up for ballet, but I think this study will lead to more research on this question.”
– Cover Image: lifenlesson.com
– Source: AFP Relaxnews
