THE BALLET OF BECOMING: Gracefully navigating life's pitfalls

Sometimes staying grounded and dancing with the system can transform even our hardest moments...

- By SARAH CRETEGNY

Ballet season is here, and last night I had the gift of watching Swan Lake, performed by the Grand International Classic Ballet, who visited Lausanne, near where I live in Switzerland. It was a hauntingly beautiful performance, and it stirred something deep inside me.

As I sat in the velvet-dark theatre with my daughter, watching the dancers move with both fragility and force, one truth became crystal clear: this wasn't just a ballet. It was a mirror. A metaphor for what it means to live inside systems that don't always see our full truth — and to still find a way to stay connected to ourselves.

As a team coach, currently completing my training, it was a particularly helpful space for reflection. Coaching asks us to hold presence and truth within complex systems—both our clients’ and our own. Swan Lake held that tension in motion for me.

In case you don’t know the story, it tells The tale of Prince Siegfried, who falls in love with Odette, a princess who is cursed to live as her true self at night but as a swan by day, but then the prince is tricked by the wicked sorcerer.