The Gift That Kept Me Alive: How God Used Dance to Keep Me Connected Through It All

Faith, Movement, and Choosing the Light After Darkness

There are seasons of the year when my heart naturally turns inward.

Times when reflection feels unavoidable. When gratitude rises up alongside grief. When I look back over the years, not with bitterness, but with a quiet awe, and recognize just how faithfully God has walked with me, even when I didn’t yet have the words for what was happening.

This time of year always brings me back to one truth:

God gave me dance.

Not as a hobby.

Not as an achievement.

But as a lifeline.

Before I had language for trauma…

Before I understood what satanic ritual abuse was…

Before I knew how to ask for help…

God placed something in my body that could carry me through.

And that gift, movement, rhythm, expression, kept me alive.

When Words Were Not Safe, the Body Still Knew

As a child, there were parts of my world that were confusing, frightening, and deeply unsafe.

I didn’t have the capacity to name what was happening. I didn’t have the power to stop it. And I didn’t always have a place where my voice felt protected.

But my body knew.

And somehow, only by the grace of God, it also knew how to stay connected.

Dance became the place where I could still feel.

It was where joy could exist alongside pain.

Where aliveness could coexist with fear.

Where my spirit could breathe, even when my circumstances felt suffocating.

I didn’t know it then, but God was gently anchoring me to something holy.

A Passion Planted by God Himself: The Gift of Dance

Looking back now, I see it so clearly.

The passion I felt for dance was not accidental.

It wasn’t random.

It wasn’t indulgent.

It wasn’t something I “used” to escape.

It was something God gave me, a sacred thread of connection that tethered me to life, to beauty, to hope.

Dance kept my nervous system from collapsing under the weight of what I was carrying. It gave me a way to release without understanding. A way to express without explaining.

Most importantly, it preserved a recognition of joy.

Even in the midst of darkness, joy still existed in my body. And that joy became proof that light was not gone.

Joy as a Holy Resistance

Joy is often misunderstood.

We sometimes think joy means ignoring pain, minimizing suffering, or pretending everything is fine.

But the joy God placed in me through dance was not denial.

It was resistance.

It was a refusal to let evil have the final word,

It was a declaration, spoken through movement, that I was still alive.

Still worthy.

Still held.

That joy did not erase what happened to me. But it kept my spirit from being destroyed by it.

And for that, I will forever be grateful.

Jesus Christ: The Anchor of My Healing

My relationship with Jesus Christ is deeply personal.

He is not an abstract idea to me. He is not distant. He is not theoretical.

He is my Lord and Savior, present, gentle, steady.

There are moments now, as an adult, when I look back and realize: He was there the whole time.

When I felt unseen, He saw me.

When I felt unprotected, He covered me.

When I felt alone, He stayed.

Even when I did not yet know how to call His name, He was guiding my steps, quite literally, through movement.

Without Him, I am not sure where I would be today.

That is not something I say lightly.

How God Uses Our Experiences for Connection

One of the most profound truths I’ve learned through both faith and healing is this:

God does not waste our experiences.

Even the painful ones.

Even the ones we would never choose.

Our experiences shape us, not to harden us, but to soften us. To deepen our compassion. To expand our capacity to understand and hold others.

The very things that once caused us pain can become bridges of connection.

Because when we have walked through darkness, we recognize it in others.

When we have survived fear, we know how to offer safety.

When we have tasted sorrow, we cherish joy more fully.

This is how God redeems.

Choice, Light, and Responsibility

There is no denying it: there is real evil in the world.

But one of the greatest gifts God gives us is choice.

We get to choose what we do with what we’ve been handed.

We get to choose how we respond.

We get to choose the light we shine.

My choice, again and again, has been to let my experiences shape me into someone who brings connection rather than harm, presence rather than fear, love rather than control.

That choice is not always easy. But it is sacred.

Dance as a Ministry of Presence

Today, dance is no longer just something I do.

It is part of how I serve.

When I teach, I am not just teaching steps.

I am teaching people how to stay connected to themselves.

How to listen to their bodies.

How to trust again.

I see it every week, people who have lived full lives, carrying invisible stories, finding safety in movement.

I recognize it because I have lived it.

Dance becomes a meeting place, between body and spirit, between past and present, between human experience and divine grace.

Strength, Understanding, and Compassion

Our experiences don’t just make us stronger.

They make us more understanding.

More patient.

More compassionate.

More capable of holding complexity.

This doesn’t mean we are grateful for the harm that was done. It means we trust God’s ability to bring beauty out of ashes.

My strength today is not because I avoided hardship.

It is because God walked me through it, often quietly, gently, through the rhythm of movement.

Staying Connected Through the Years

Dance kept me connected when dissociation would have been easier.

It kept me grounded in my body when leaving it felt safer.

It kept joy alive when despair could have taken over.

I believe with my whole heart that this was divine intervention.

God knew what I would need before I did.

An Invitation to Choose the Light

If you are reading this and you have lived through your own pain, named or unnamed, I want you to know this:

Your story is not over.

Your experiences are not meaningless.

And your light matters.

We do not heal in isolation. We heal through connection, with God, with our bodies, and with each other.

And sometimes, that healing begins not with words…But with movement.

Closing Gratitude

Lord, thank You.

For the gift of dance.

For the gift of joy.

For the gift of staying connected when everything else felt uncertain.

Thank You for walking with me through every season, seen and unseen.

For redeeming what was broken.

For choosing me, again and again, even when I didn’t yet know how to choose myself.

May the light You placed in me continue to shine outward, bringing hope, connection, and healing to others.

Amen.