Words by Nikki G | Photographs by Mia Maraschino
This week, we decided to have a chat with Instructor Nikki G regarding her circus background and recovering after a knee injury. The road to recovery from an injury is tough, and the emotional impact is huge - especially when circus is your full time job. After going through this experience, Nikki chats about this struggle and also gives advice to those who may be going through something similar.
When I was 6, I was taken to see Cirque Du Soleil’s ‘Saltimbanco’. I clearly remember how in awe I was of the whole performance – the costumes, the music and of course, the acrobatics.
That was it for me – one day I would “run away and join the circus”
Fortunately, my parents understood and supported me in achieving my dream and enrolled me in artistic gymnastics. I reached a high enough skill level to represent Australia in the World Acrobatic championships. When I finished high school, I left for Melbourne to complete a Bachelor of Circus Art specialising in lyra and hand balancing. While it’s tough to leave family and friends and all that is familiar, I held onto my dream of performing and left Australia for the big wide world.
While it was hard work, I reveled in the glitz and glamour of it all.
I loved how the audiences were in awe of our performances just as I was when I was part of the audience. I drew energy from their applauses and praises and wanted to always improve and give my best. I developed extra skills like choreographing our acts, designing costumes and cutting and editing music to create a number of grand modern circus shows – I was living my dream.
Then one night it all came crashing down.
During a performance called “A million dreams”, the inconceivable happened. I was performing a front somersault, something I could virtually do in my sleep, and landed in a way that caused my right knee to completely dislocate from it’s socket, tearing ligaments, muscle and cartilage. Within the week I was flying back home to Sydney after being away for 8 years and not long after that I was having major knee surgery. My surgeon advised that I should expect recovery and rehabilitation to take about 12 months with no guarantee of returning to aerial and acrobatics performing.
Wow! How things can change without any warning. One minute you’re living your dream and the next it feels like you’re living a nightmare. What you think is your life’s path suddenly takes an unexpected diversion somewhere quite different. I knew I had to remain positive for my own mental, physical and emotional well being and most of all for my future. It’s easy to become negative about your capabilities after an injury if you allow it to be so.
Not only was there frequent visits to the physiotherapist and intense rehabilitation exercises but also constant re-training of the mindset to maintain positive throughout the journey. “I am stronger than ever before”, “I will perform again”, “I can do this”. I was so determined to get back up in the air to train, practice and perform again that I wasn’t going to let anything or anyone tell me otherwise. I slowly but surely eased my way back into training all-over-body muscle strengthening and conditioning exercises by the 3 month mark and by the 6 month mark I was employed as an aerial lyra and sling instructor.
Fortunately for me, Sky Sirens came into my life. Katia and Dahlia gave me the opportunity to join the Siren family as an aerial instructor. While this has given me the opportunity to relive my aerial performing dream, I have discovered an even greater joy – that of nurturing and encouraging others to fulfill their aerial skills and performing potential. To teach and share your knowledge and skills to the students of Sky Sirens is a privilege and has become my passion. To watch students grow in strength and confidence over the weeks to perform their own routines gives me great pride.
My top 3 tips for anyone else experiencing an injury or simply just wanting to execute a skill:
Design, create, imagine or picture yourself doing what it is that you want to achieve. For me, I was constantly watching old videos of myself, practicing teaching and performing and I was always imagining it happening again in the future.
Visualise yourself already accomplishing that goal or executing that skill and believing that you can do it and you will. Yes, it does take a lot of patience, practice and persistence but it’s so worth it.
Once you’ve achieved your goal, own it, be proud of it and realise how far you have come and powerful your thoughts and your feelings really are.