Being a male growing up I felt I was expected to play sports. And I did. As soon as I could I picked up a ball and threw it around with my dad. At the age of four I was put on my first team – the El Paso Yankees – and played T-ball for three years. At the age of seven I joined a football team named the El Paso Cowboys, I played with them for five years.
At that point I was faced with choosing between continuing my career in football or quit to be a dancer. I ultimately chose to begin my dance career and began dancing with Ballet Folklorico Orgullo de mi Tierra. From then on I fell in love with performing and my life changed forever.
Choosing dance over sports was a decision that many would find weird, And to me, it was for a while. I had the longing to play sports as many young boys do, but ultimately dance gave me once-in-a-lifetime opportunities. With my dance company Orgullo de mi Tierra, I got the opportunity to perform alongside the Grammy award winning Mariachi Vargas. This moment in my life is when I decided I was meant to be a performer.
Throughout my career as a dancer, which came to an end in 2021, I had many unforgettable experiences and even won a national championship at the Texas Folklorico Competition in 2019 in the senior duet division.
While I was dancing, I also made the decision to join cheerleading. I joined my high school cheer team my sophomore year and also had an extraordinary cheer career. It was my love for sports that pushed me to join cheer and ultimately this decision was one of the best that I made.
In high school we participated in UTEP Cheer camps and competitions where I developed a relationship with both athletes and the coaches of the team. My senior year of high school I was approached my UTEP and was recruited to attend a tryout. This tryout would be virtual because of COVID-19. Despite this, I made the team and most of my rookie year was spent through a computer screen.
When lockdown restrictions lifted my collegiate cheer experience took off. Through this experience again I was given once in a lifetime opportunities my most memorable being when UTEP Cheer and Dance got the opportunity to be in the largest Thanksgiving day parade. My team traveled to New York City in November of 2021 to be in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade truly a dream come true.
Through all these experiences I knew I was bound to be a performer as I spent a majority of my life as one. These experiences were all great but a new adventure is on the horizon. All this time as a dancer and a cheerleader prepared me for the biggest entertainer dream job. In 2023 I had the opportunity to work at Walt DIsney World, not as a performer but it did give me the idea to try to be a performer there.
In spring of this year I was able to travel to Austin to attend a Disney character performer audition. I had never officially gone through a professional audition like this one but through my journey I was prepared for this moment.
This audition was demanding and frankly very intimidating, but I was able to push through and I made it to the very end. They sent us home and said look in your emails in three weeks you will get an answer. Three weeks passed and others that attended the audition with me had started to get an answer. I had not, my anxiety shit through the roof but ultimately the email came and I am proud to say that I will be a performer at Disney World Starting this fall.
Throughout this journey I learned one thing: do not let your early decisions dictate your life. I could very easily given up wanting to be a performer especially with the bullying that came along with it. I have reached my dreams of being a professional performer and it is all because I decided to quit football to pursue dance when I was 12 years old.
