Hello,
I hope you’re well.
My name is Kane John Mills.
I’m a working-class, gay, Disabled man, a passionate advocate for inclusivity and accessibility, oh, and a dance and theatre artist too! Now I’m aware that can mean a lot of things to some people, and nothing to others, so I’ll be transparent and say that my version/experience of this is as a performer, facilitator, maker/choreographer, director and writer.

Right now, I’m at home, in Plymouth, Devon, UK. I’m sat on my sofa, fidgety, and flitting between trying to work out how to formulate, distil and articulate my thoughts so that I write something that hopefully might be useful to share, and doing some ‘contact improvisation’ with my dog, Coco.

From a young age, I always wanted to have a career in both dance and theatre. I was (and still am) a curious, bold creative who knew he wanted to make work as he definitely had stories to tell. I was always striving to better myself and was fortunate enough to have access to incredible training and opportunities that I loved so dearly, yet it soon became apparent to me that life can have a funny way of throwing you off-track…

When I was 14 in late 2010, I started to become unwell with what appeared to be some sort of viral infection, I was randomly falling asleep at times, and I have a distinct memory of being in rehearsals for a show and feeling completely out of it and hearing people talking as just sounds rather than words, like I was having some sort of bizarre out-of-body experience. I somehow stumbled my way through two performances of an eight night run and literally over-night suddenly became bedbound. I was frequently dizzy and nauseous, I completely lost any desire to eat, I couldn’t stay awake long enough to eat anyway, in the fleeting moments I was awake I was in constant full-body agony, my Mum would have to actively wake me up just to make sure I maintained a water intake, I felt so ill and clueless as to what was happening to me and my body that I honestly feared I may have been dying.

Obviously I didn’t know what on earth was happening back then, but I now know (after months of hospital appointments and tests) that this was the onset of a life-long Disability called Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (M.E for short).

Whilst it is a condition that you never fully ‘recover’ from, it can improve and if you’re lucky enough to have amazing medical support (in my case a fantastic paediatric psychologist) you can slowly but surely learn about self-managing your body’s varying state and the unpredictable symptoms (which can consistently shift) and knowing when to pull back, reduce, pause, rest or stop completely in order to maintain as ‘normal’ (whatever that means) a life as possible.

This experience massively impacted on a huge part of my academic life. It caused me to lose both 7 months of year 10: my second year of GCSEs (until I returned on a very reduced timetable), and almost a year of all of my dance training. I had to gradually re-introduce dance back into my life again and re-learn how to work with rather than against having such a changed body (and its limitations). This is something that is a constant battle to date, accepting that my body is no longer able to do what it used to, something that can be taken for granted if you are fortunate enough to experience ‘wellness’.
This loss is a kind of grief that I think many may face in their lives but is perhaps a lot less commonly experienced in childhood. I’ve always been grateful for what I can do and all of the amazing opportunities that have come my way over the years, but I think that whilst this has been hugely debilitating, it has also taught me an enormous amount about patience, passion/drive, autonomy, listening, acceptance, intuition, staying curious and about just how mercurial life can be. These are all things I am immensely grateful for.

Fast forward a few years (to 2014) and I start my BPA (Hons) Degree at Northern School of Contemporary Dance (NSCD). It’s a bit of a (okay, urm, A LOT of a) whirlwind, and pretty volatile at times largely in relation to my fluctuating health, multiple bereavements, injuries, personal issues and an additional diagnosis of Severe Dyspraxia to add to my growing list, but somehow I survive the experience and I would like to take this moment to say a huge thank you to all the support I received during my time there, especially from…

* My beautiful Mum, my rock.

* Alison Shorrock, my Specialist Mentor, who endlessly went above and beyond for me and literally kept me sane, I will forever be extremely grateful for everything she did for me, and will never forget her ongoing support even post-degree, even being so kind as to come and watch me perform in London in 2018 in Joelene English Dance Theatre’s ‘Alice: The Lost Chapter’. I was and still am heartbroken that she passed away last year. I’m not sure how I could re-pay her, yet she always said that seeing me succeed was more than enough.

* Abbie Lambert-Shenton, my counsellor, who listened and helped me to navigate the confusion, the ‘noise’ and the difficult ‘stuff’.

* And of course, my friends and fellow artists from back home.

…Whilst I don’t have first-hand experience of leaving a university, I do know that from a conservatoire route you can feel like you’ve been chewed up and spat out. Leaving those semi-automatic double doors for the last time and not knowing what’s next can feel scary.

I knew there were lots of things that I wanted to do but I didn’t know how in the hell I would do any of them. (And if you’re also feeling like this right now that is totally understandable, and please know you are not alone).

I was lucky and thankful for having a fairly smooth transition into the working world, so to speak, and I think this was helped enormously by my interest in lots of artistic areas/disciplines. I have found work in so many areas that I am passionate about, and am always making sure it is work that is driven by care, joy, representation, empathy, awareness and equality, and I love how no two days will necessarily be the same.
I sometimes pinch myself when I think about how a week may look something like… Dance for a company, be in a primary school facilitating theatre workshops as Willy Wonka, act in a piece of forum theatre that demonstrates the impact of parental conflict for counsellors, teachers, safeguarding officers and the police, co-direct a play for an SEN-specialist college, choreograph a youth company work or my own independent work, support a young person with creative writing, facilitate a movement improvisation class, etc. etc. I really do love it all.

Something that has always kept me going has been my mantra, a quote from a poem I once wrote to my future self, that is simply ‘don’t follow in others’ footsteps, pave your own pathway’.

There really isn’t a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ way of working in the industry, no matter how many people tell you otherwise. Your career is yours to make and whilst that can feel daunting, it can also be incredibly exciting too!

Please find below some advice and thoughts I would like to share…

• Remember you’re a human being as well as an artist, we can often forget that if you peel back all the layers, you are skin and bone just like everyone else.
  

• Making comparisons is unnecessary and can be detrimental, just focus on you and supporting others.
  

• Trust and love yourself. I think the trusting I’ve managed to grasp fairly well, the loving not so much, but I’m learning, and it can only help you to develop as both an artist and a person.
  

• Be humble, which sounds obvious, but no matter how talented you may be, if you’ve got a big ego many will (understandably) steer clear.
  

• Take your time. Everybody moves at a different pace, and that is okay.
  

• Similarly, things take time. That can sound/seem frustrating, but it is important to recognise that growth isn’t instantaneous. After all, Rome wasn’t built in a day, eh?
  

• Don’t be afraid to ask for things to change/adapt if you need things to be more accommodating of your needs. My younger self felt ashamed/scared of discussing ‘access needs’, nobody should feel embarrassed about this or fear it makes them less employable.
  

• ‘Success’/’successes’ are unique terms and experiences for everyone. Celebrate them, and don’t be too hard on yourself if things start to veer off-course as a different journey may be a more interesting one that still may lead you to the same destination (or an even better one)!
  

• Don’t expect everything to come to you.
  

• It’s okay to make mistakes, it’s very likely you will make them, and you will learn from them. Just know that if you make a mistake, people will value you/view you much more positively if you genuinely apologise than if you just try to pretend it didn’t happen.
  

• Talk to people. So many people will be willing to help/support you, but they can’t if they don’t know that that is what you are looking for.
  

• Be a sponge and soak things up, absorb everything you can. I especially attribute this to the fab Emily Alden (who also wrote an Understory chat) who was my first contemporary dance teacher (when I was really young), and I’m so thankful for her encouragement, advice and teachings.
  

• Don’t be afraid to take things with a pinch of salt if you feel it does not serve you. Please know that you are so much more than any assessment, mark, grade, bit of writing on a piece of paper.
  

• Know your worth! Consider your values, they will help you so much to make decisions. And if your gut suggests to do (or not do) something, I’d really recommend listening to it… Saying no is very important but it is something we can feel afraid to do, especially out of fear of the consequences of doing so. I know now that if things don’t align themselves with my values, I can politely decline and say why. Nobody can question/dispute your values & morals; they are yours and yours alone.
  

• If your dance work or any other form of art you’re involved in is supplemented by any other kind of work, that doesn’t make you any less a creative. Everybody has to do what they’ve got to do.
  

• Learn about what your rights are. Some people can try and take you for a fool but if you know what you are entitled to/what is and isn’t allowed, you can make more informed decisions along the way.
  

• Don’t be afraid to walk away from any toxic workplace environments. Life is too short to be made to feel small, unhappy, undervalued and disrespected.
  

• And lastly, remember your ‘why’/your ‘whys’. These can change and you can always come back to them, they are a powerful tool you can always use to help you make your decisions. And also, don’t be afraid to tell people why you do what you do, it reminds you of your motivations, and helps others know a bit more about you too.

…I hope this was all useful/interesting to read and I know times can feel pretty unpredictable as of late. I really hope that 2020 can be a wake-up call for so many that dance and the arts are so vital and have provided many with much-needed respite & joy in a pretty hopeless time.

And I’d just like to say that if you ever would like to have a chat, I’m more than happy for you to drop me an email at kane.john.mills@gmail.com

I’ll leave you with one of my favourite quotes that feels especially pertinent in current times…

“So, I guess we are who we are for a lot of reasons. And maybe we’ll never know most of them. But even if we don’t have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there. We can still do things. And we can try to feel okay about them.”
 – Stephen Chbosky (‘The Perks of Being A Wallflower’)

I wish you the very best for your future and I’m sending love, luck & happiness your way.
Take care,
Kane
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