“Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”
—from Memoriam A.H.H., by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

A friend and fellow writer recently blogged about dancing, taking the reader from her granddaughter’s dance recital to the Biblical account of King David dancing for joy as the Ark of the Covenant was returned to Jerusalem.

Dancing with nothing on but a skimpy ephod, David withstood the criticism of his people, especially Saul’s daughter. He was excited for the return of the Ark, and he didn’t mind showing it.

Don’t we do the same? Don’t we express our emotions openly when we are excited or celebrating? Especially when we take a chance and succeed? In David’s case, one man had already lost his life when the Ark was being moved. The importance of its return to the Jews prompted David to take that chance. The Ark was returned and David danced for joy. Great story!

Had I been there, I would not have danced. I am not a good dancer. Actually, that might be the understatement of the year. I don’t even try, but I do love the way musical lyricists, especially of the country genre, use “dance” as a metaphor for opportunities in our lives. Tony Arata’s “The Dance,” made famous by singer Garth Brooks, is a perfect example.

Arata’s inspiration for the lyrics was the movie, Peggy Sue Got Married. In the film, the characters played by Kathleen Turner and Nicholas Cage are in a dumpster fire of a marriage and are about to be divorced. She faints at her twenty-five-year, high-school reunion and wakes up as a teenager again. Knowing how her future marriage will play out, she decides not to marry the guy . . . until she opens her locket where she keeps pictures of her children. Catch the drift?

No one knows how the choices in life we make will turn out. Some succeed, some fail. We lose a loved one unexpectedly; a career choice doesn’t pan out and we pivot; a marriage ends in divorce; a dream’s almost reached, but then it’s vanquished. Yes, there’s pain. It’s called life.

But what if we hadn’t tried—what if we’d sat it out, so to speak? We’d have missed all those precious moments with our loved one. We might have never discovered a new talent, a new career. Those children from the marriage would have never been born to us. And the dream not realized? Often, it’s more noble to try and fail; the pursuit can be more exhilarating and fulfilling than the end result.

When our time draws near, will we celebrate the efforts, the reaches, the risks and rewards, or will we rue the fact that we sat it out and didn’t take a chance. Will we regret that we failed to dance?

Aratas’s and Garth’s iconic song includes these lyrics:
“Our lives are better left to chance
I could’ve missed the pain
But I’d have had to miss the dance.”

Let’s dance, shall we?