Without that thick skin and a clear vision of what it is you want to do, what it is you know you want to do, it can be really easy to get out here and get lost and swept away in whatever is going on. You really have to be steadfast in the mind for sure.

It's been part of my signature to incorporate my humor with my dance, or even just how I'm feeling. If I'm feeling humorous, which I am, most of the day, I tend to incorporate that. If I'm dancing freestyle, if I feel like I've gotten too serious, while I'm moving, I'll think, "All right, it's time to lighten up a little bit," and I do. It just feels good.

Dancing is so physical and so athletic. I think it rings to the boy that is in my soul because you get to run and jump and climb and act as aggressively as you'd like.

Dancing is still, for me, one of those things that no matter when I do it and it sounds corny and cliche, but time stands still. I could literally dance for hours and hours on end and not realize that I've been dancing for hours and hours on end. In the right setting, I could literally dance all day and have a blast. It seems like one moment to me. There's nothing else going on, and it's the ultimate release.

People can stand around and share movement with each other, whether it's professional or not. That's how it grows. That's what dance does. It's its own language.

Dance removes you from this construct of the world that you have, and it's a conversation that you're having with people. That's how dance grew, as an art form.

The life of a dancer is not for everyone. You really have to have some thick skin. You really have to know what you're going into and how competitive the field is.