Hi...my name is Sharon, but when I dance I become "Sharayah".

I began dancing when I was about six years old, and continued with ballet, tap, jazz, modern, ballroom and Latin American dance throughout my life. In 1997, I took my first "belly dance" class, and it instantly became a passion to me. Unlike some of the other forms of dance that I've studied, belly dance is friendly to my body as I age, yet it continues to offer fresh challenges and new ways to reap the rewards of being a woman.

I make my living in the legal field, which by its very nature can be cold and unfeeling. So it is only natural that, in order to bring balance back into my life, I would gravitate to the warmth and emotion of the Dance. I am blessed to have as my husband, a wonderful man that encourages my growth, personally and professionally. It is due to his support that, in addition to my education in legal insurance, business, and health care, I am currently earning a degree in holistic nutrition, and because he is so supportive I am able to devote much of my "free time" to the pursuit of happiness...which for me includes the care and companionship of my two shih-tzu "kids", my relationships with my friends, family, and the Most High, my study of alternative medicine, and my passion for the Dance. I have so much to be grateful for, and often, my gratitude is best expressed by dancing.

To me, the Dance is a holistic art, being beneficial to the body, mind, and spirit of the practitioner. It is a source of expression unlike any other that I have found; able to bear joy, sorrow, love, anger, and a multitude of nameless emotions on its broad shoulders. It allows the dancer to turn inward, to the depths of her own soul, to examine the secret stillness within, and it also encourages her to reach out beyond the heavens in worship to the Creator of all things created. This is more than a hobby, more than bodily exercise, and more than therapy. It is pure art, ever expanding, always evolving. It satisfies the dancer while at the same time inspiring her to reach further and grow taller.

This Dance has grown beyond the boundaries of it's mother culture, gaining wisdom and beauty from each woman who enters into it, regardless of her heritage or her language, for the Dance itself becomes her heritage and her language, her destiny and her legacy.

The Dance belongs to none of us, yet to all of us.
 

Back