Former ballerina-turned-actress Mia Wasikowska recently opened up about the pressures of being thin as a dancer, stating that Hollywood’s body image obsession is nothing in comparison.  “I feel like the dance world was so hardcore in terms of image and body, and physicality, and I know that a lot of people find the film world similar, but I’ve found it so much more chilled out that I’m like ‘Meh! Whatever!’ Try experiencing prima ballerina land – it’s crazy,” she told Britain’s Guardian newspaper.  Wasikowska trained until she was 14 and then quit because of the pressures to be physically perfect.  Although dancing is so freeing, the industry side of it was too oppressive, according to the actress.  “You’d spend 35 hours a week staring at yourself in the mirror, and start to really fixate on things that, I guess, if you have a proper perspective, are not that big of a deal ... Things you only really see if you’re in that world; the curve of your ankle, how big your wrist is. Ridiculous things, but when you’re a dancer, they’re serious.” We all know a dancer or two (or four, for that matter) who has negative body image, self-esteem issues and has had to struggle with eating disorders.  I was discussing this article with a friend who is not a dancer (she is a lawyer at a big, white-shoe firm), and she asked if it would ever be possible to change that reality.  Surely, she said, some things can be improved to make the situation better, but the reality of the ballet world’s aesthetic and practices in some way will always pressure the dancers to aim for that physical perfection which inevitably will lead to unhealthy body culture and lifestyle.  She said it was akin to trying to find that elusive “work/life” balance at a corporate law firm.  One can implement policies and benefits to make the life a bit better for the attorneys, but, at the end of the day, it is a service industry and the attorneys are at a whim of a client.  There is only so much that can be done because of the specific demands of the profession.  Further equating it to dance, when the clients say jump, attorneys typically ask how high. Most of the major companies and schools have education programs about nutrition and body image.  “But do you think they listen?” Joffrey school’s former director, Edith d’Addario, once commented.  “They sit there eating yogurt all day.”  Studies have shown that such education, though beneficial, is inadequate.  Dancers typically continue to take short cuts, regardless of advice, in order to meet their ideal in that highly competitive, high-pressure and physically demanding profession. This is not to say that everyone in the dance world has a body image issue or an eating disorder.  However, the cases of eating disorders are higher for professions where one’s body is one’s tool, i.e. dancers, athletes, models.  Which brings us to this question: Given the realities of the dance world, and ballet in particular, what, if anything, can be done to improve its body culture and practices? We welcome your thoughts…