This post was originally published in 2015 · Jacob M Hansen

A few months ago I competed at the GEM State national ballroom dance competition.  My team did well, and we had a blast. But I have to share with you the story of my buddy, Lachlan.  Lachlan has been ballroom dancing for a few years, and is pretty skilled, but this last year he started something new: cabaret. 

Cabaret is a type of dance that essentially consists of large, buff guys lifting girls into the air.  It requires a great amount of physical strength. Lachlan is a great friend, but to put it bluntly, his strength is dominantly non-physical.  He’s a few inches taller than me, but weighs a lot less (and I consider myself to be a pretty fit person). Genetically, he just isn’t cut out to be the stereotypical cabaret dancer. The logical conclusion drawn by our coaches, team members, and (I must admit) myself, was that Lachlan would not succeed in the cabaret field.

Boy, were we wrong. 

All we could focus on was Lachlan’s physical attributes.  We overlooked a far more important attribute. Lachlan had a passionate goal.  And when almost everyone told him he wasn’t good enough, he chose not to listen.  Instead, he chose to work his hardest and believe in himself.

l remember his competition vividly.  I was with my studio, perched on the second level of the packed bleachers in Skyline High School, Idaho Falls.  As Lachlan and his partner, Rachel (who’s story may be told another day), walked out onto the gym floor I was apprehensive to say the least.  I needn’t have worried though, because their performance was the best they had ever had. And what Lachlan lacked in strength, he made up for in passion and skill.

As you might expect, third place went to a big polynesian guy (who probably weighed 100 pounds more than Lachlan) and his partner.  Second place went similarly. Then, against all expectations, I heard Lachlan’s number called. Our studio exploded! Coaches and students alike screamed and cheered as Lachlan and Rachel accepted their first place trophy.  

Thus, the kid who everyone told wasn’t good enough became a national champion.  

There are times in life when we must listen to the wisdom of others, but we must be careful to distinguish between the wise and the naysayers.  We can never know the extent of our potential until we have push ourselves toward goals that defy “common sense” expectations.  

In Lachlan’s words, “That’s kinda how I imagine life…Give everything you’ve got because you won’t know how far you can go until you’ve done it.”

For Lachlan’s story of preparation, and his full insights into the topic, feel free to view the transcript of our interview below.

An Interview with Lachlan Robinette

After GEM State, I had to know more of his story, so on April 4, 2015, I got Lachlan to join me at the local library for the following conversation.*

*edited and abridged for clarity and length

ME: When did you set your goal to do cabaret?

LACHLAN: Okay.  So at GEM state of 2014—last year—I was watching Broken Angels [a group cabaret routine] at the competition, and I was just sitting there and I decided that was what I wanted to do.  And I had talked with some people and a lot of them told me I couldn’t and so I got supper emotional and I cried.

ME: Really?

LACHLAN: I’m not going into any more details, but yeah.

ME: And people just told you that you couldn’t?

LACHLAN: Yeah!  Everyone always told me I couldn’t. I was like “what if I did this?” and “what if I did that?” and “what if I worked out?” and “what if I did this?”  And I started working out and I did a lot of stuff, and they just told me no.  In all seriousness I asked Tricia [our dance coach] after GEM state…and she kind of legitimately chuckled when I mentioned the idea and said “Dude, you’re not ready for it.” 

ME: In preparation for Cabaret, you did a lot of working out and practicing, didn’t you?

LACHLAN: Yeah, I actually started out working out in the wrong way, building the wrong muscles.  I’m not very good at knowing how to work out—I’m very bad at that. I did the sit-ups, push-ups, pull-ups kind of thing, and that was it because that’s all I knew how to do. 

ME: Aside from lift camp and working out, were you doing anything to help you prepare for cabaret?

LACHLAN: I found myself watching tons and tons of YouTube videos, anywhere from music to cabaret videos from BYU ballroom.  And Sumner has this like, three hour long playlist on his YouTube channel of just non-stop cabarets, so I was just looking at those, getting ideas; like “oh, what if we did this?”—and this was before I had a partner.  

ME: Alright.  So when did you find a partner?

LACHLAN: Well, at lift camp Tricia told all of us that we couldn’t choose partners until after the camp was over—which turned out to be a lie, because by the third week out of six, [almost everyone else had partners].  And so I saw Rachel, and every week I was like “hey Rachel, do you want to do cabaret?” and she was like “no. …Weirdo! I barely know you.” So it was 2-3 weeks of me just saying “do you want to do cabaret? Come on let do cabaret!” and she was like “No, nope, not at all”, and then finally decided that she wanted to do it—after all my begging and pleading.

ME: When did you start practicing with her? 

LACHLAN: It was the beginning of September, I like to think.  We got about three to four, maybe five weeks of practice in before the dance year officially started. 

ME: When you started practicing with her, all in all, how much time did you spend per week?

LACHLAN: Six to seven hours a week at the start.  There was a period of about two weeks when I spent three to four hours a day just looking up songs and cabarets.  Because if you look hard enough there is a cabaret to just about every song you can imagine.

ME: When you started cabaret, what was your goal?

LACHLAN: It was to prove that I could do anything that Sumner could do (Sumner is a very strong, very skilled cabaret dancer in our studio).  And not to let my strength bear me down because I’ve always felt that whenever I wanted to do something cool, it was always either my fear and my own cowardice, or my physical fitness that kept me from doing things.  I didn’t want to let my inability to bench-press a set amount detriment what I wanted to do.

ME: That’s pretty epic!  As the dance year progressed and you kept practicing, do you feel that you met your goal?

LACHLAN: Yeah.  I’ve gotten so much stronger: beyond what I had initially imagined.  And I can do so many cool things. There are so many things that I’ve always imagined doing that I can do.  And so I feel like I’ve met it.

ME: Obviously other people think you’ve met it too, so let’s talk about this last GEM state.  For the purpose of this interview, will you explain what happened there?

LACHLAN: When we went up there and competed we had the best performance of our lives… Although we were saying we were going to get first on the outside, on the inside we were prepared to get third.  When we went up to awards it was super exciting. They called the third place person, and it wasn’t us, so we were like “yeah! We got second at least!” And then they called second, and I just remember Rachel started attacking me with this giant hug once the second place was called and it wasn’t us, because that meant we knew we were first.  They called us first, and I had a tear in my eye—I think only like one or two, and then it was gone—Of “wow.” A year ago I was watching someone else do an amazing cabaret that got first, and the fact that I could do the same just a year later was…pretty awesome.

ME: That is very awesome. Do you have any last words about your entire journey?

LACHLAN: I’ve totally learned a lot, and cabaret has been the biggest life lesson ever.  And nobody realizes what they can do until they have pushed themselves so far that they don’t know where it is going to send them.  It’s like throwing a stick: you don’t know how far it is going to go until you finally throw it. That’s kinda how I imagine life: you’ve got to take the first step.  Give everything you’ve got because you won’t know how far you can go until you’ve done it. You can’t just rely on what other people say, or what “science” or “common sense” might say, because common sense would say a year ago that I would never take first place in cabaret.  But now I’m here because I took that first step.