Hey y'all, it's yet another great day to get better. Becoming undone is a podcast for those who dare bravely risk myelite and grow relentlessly. Join me Toby Rucks as I invite a new guest each week to examine how high achievers can transform from falling apart to falling into place. If you've ever spent any time at all in the incredibly competitive world of travel sports, you know that it's not difficult to become so singular in purpose that every spare moment, every spare dollar, and every spare opportunity in NINCEM can be consumed with a pursuit of being seen, hopefully capturing the attention of a recruiter or a college coach. And sometimes, parents, coaches, and even the athletes themselves can feel the pressure to become great in this one aspect of life at the expense of all others. That can leave anyone, especially those with an artistic spirit, feeling unfulfilled, and unnecessarily painted into a performance corner. For Bridgett Rizillo, her love of sport actually came second in life behind a passion for dance. Cori are graphing for the first time at the age of six. She finally took her first formal dance class freshman year at Falbrook High School in San Diego, California. Meanwhile, the talented athlete slash artist also competed as a free sport athlete in soccer, softball, and field hockey. Ultimately, sport won out, at least for a while. The talented outfielder made her way to San Diego State and later Arizona State as a D1 softball player. But her love for dance continues to grow. After graduation, she went all in on dance, performing as a member of a number of different production companies. Ultimately, she took the plunge to form her own company, founding Cosadance in 2014. Working tirelessly to create and share her art and her lifelong love of dance, she, like so many, felt the effects of the global pandemic with full force when the world seemed to close for business. Most notably, the performing arts. Here Bridgett share her story of art and sport peacefully co-existing in her world, facing down the fear of entrepreneurship and overcoming the law season of the pandemic in episode 25. Dance. This week we're really fortunate to have a guest with a diverse background. And so far, we've kind of done either or. I've done more athletes than anything. And we've talked about kind of that transition from athletics to the rest of our lives and how that's hard for a lot of people. We've also looked at artists and they really go through very similar grieving processes as we leave that season of life. But Bridget Borzillo is joining us today. She has a great history as a student athlete competing in college, growing up, but also has a creative streak and is the founder and artistic director of Cosadance Theater. So Bridgett is great to have you today. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. You are a softball player. So I'll love a softball right in there. Who did Bridgett want to be when she grew up? So the first job that I wanted to have that I can remember, I think I was in like fourth or fifth grade. I always said I wanted to be a physical therapist. And I don't know if I really understood what that was when I was growing up. So yeah, I always wanted to do something with athletes. So that's what I wanted to be when I grew up. But then I went into high school and saw a Britney Spears concert on TV. And I went, that's what I have to do. I have to create or be a part of stuff like that. And so from, I think it was about my freshman year in high school, I was like, I'm going to play softball in college. I'm going to major in dance and have my own dance company and do all of that. That's so cool. Yeah. Very rare for people to have that kind of clarity and especially that kind of landmark moment where you could put your finger on kind of the birth, the genesis of that dream. So cool. So you grew up as a multi sport athlete, started at the beginning, wherever that was for you. I started in T-ball when I was about five and my parents to this day still left at me because I was dancing in the outfield, picking daisies and that's all I did was pick daisies and dance in the outfield because nobody hits a ball in the outfield when you're five years old. And then I went into softball at six, even though I think you were supposed to be like eight. But since I had T-ball, they were allowed me to go in. So I started playing ball at six and I started playing soccer first and at the time, so I've really bad as my chronic asthma, allergy and exercise induced. Yay! So I was on a lot of medications that made me a little bit heavier. So I had some weight issues. So they put me in the goal. You know, I couldn't run or anything. So I was a goalie from the time I started soccer all the way through high school. And then I started playing basketball. I believe in third grade, third or fourth grade played that all the way through junior high. And then I started field hockey in high school. So in high school, I played softball soccer in field hockey. I was on the varsity team and my high school for softball and soccer as freshmen, but not field hockey. And then that's the funny story is that my junior year, I told my dad, I had never done cheerleading before in my life. And I told my dad, I said, if I don't make varsity field hockey, my junior year, I'm going to quit. I'm going to do hockey and soccer and try out for cheerleading. And just concentrate on softball because that's what I was going to do in college. So I was like, I'm just going to do that. And I didn't make varsity field hockey. So I did, you know, varsity soccer and did the rest. And then I try out for cheerleading. And my dad was like, okay, yeah, just go ahead and do that. But he did not think I was going to make it. So I made varsity cheerleading my senior year and my school with never doing cheerleading because that's cool. I've long been a proponent of multi sport athletes. And softball is one of the worst where if you don't start and specialize early and you're doing the travel ball and the showcase tournaments and things like that, especially in this day and age, it's really hard to land a scholarship. Do you really feel like those that multi sport experience helped shape you into an athlete that would be better prepared for dance? Yes. I agree with that. I also agree that I think it's so important for kids to get different sports as well because as a softball player, it's such a mental sport that I feel like you need to have that mental break in order to be clear to start a season again. Because I always felt like I was better at softball when I had a break because I wasn't in my head. But yeah, I think that you learned so many different skills in each sport, not only about teen sports and different things that you learn in those or stamina or anything like that versus other sports. But I do think that it transferred the athletic ability, did transfer into the dance. If I didn't have the athletic ability, I couldn't do dance in my opinion because I basically faked it for a long time. Because people just thought I could, you know, I faked it. They're like, oh, you know the techniques, they didn't break things down for me a lot. So it's interesting. Yeah. So you end up at San Diego State University or D1 Athlete. How is that recruiting process? At that stage, were your dreams still centered on dance or was softball part of that dream? Or was it just something that you were doing to pave the way for that future as an artist? So dance was had become the dream overall. So with softball, it was like, I always wanted to play and be really good at it and go to the World Series and do all of those things. However, at San Diego State, so I was a recruited walk on at San Diego State. So let's go back a little bit because my dad, when he found out that I wanted to be, I wanted to major in dance and I wanted to do division one softball. They don't howl, I don't think they have these anymore, but they had a college catalog. It was a book that you shuffled through and you saw all the majors in each school. So we picked out every single school that had a D1 softball program with the dance program. And so we literally set letters to every single one of them. I think it was a softball in high school when we started that process. And then we sent letters out to everybody and we sent videos as well to the big ones. And then also sent out like, hey, I'm going to be at this tournament because I did travel ball too. Come and see me and all of that. So my recruiting process was actually really weird because I felt like they wanted me up. They loved me and all this stuff and then all of a sudden things would happen where I would get in my head. And so it was like they stopped playing me or something. So like, especially when I was on a team called the choppers, I hurt my shoulder on their team. And they were just such a negative influence. Like they just want fun to be around. And whenever we'd go to tournaments and I would tell them I have this, this, this person watching me, they would sit me. So it was like this really weird battle with my coaches. And I felt like I wasn't like having an attitude or anything. It was just like, I was hurt or like different things that were going on. So I kind of, I felt like I was getting shafted a lot when I was in my heightened recruiting process. I was almost offered a full-ride scholarship to Fordham University, which I was really excited about. However, my SATs weren't high enough. So because I'm not a test taker. So that was hard. But with San Diego State, I literally went to ASU on, I was basically committed to go to ASU just for school and I was going to walk on. Because of that chopper's team, I put a bad taste in my mouth for softball. So I actually was thinking about quitting softball. And just going to school for dance and doing all of that. So I was basically enrolled in ASU and on the, and after the orientation on the way home, we got a call from San Diego State saying, we're offering you a recruited walk on position at our school. So you don't have to try out your automatic loan team, but we just don't have money for you. So that's why I started there. But I really wanted to go to ASU. Right. So you end up at San Diego State. And this is where you really start to get a taste for true ballet and training as a dancer. You're not just a little girl spinning out in the daisies. You are. No. Introduced to the grind and the athleticism and the power of dance. Right. What was that process like for you? Was it exciting or was it terrifying or was it a little both? It wasn't it wasn't terrifying. I held my own. Like I said, however, my teacher's thought that I had like a solid background, but I didn't so they didn't really break things down. But I only took like one dance class as semester when I was there because of the, you know, the schedule for softball. And you know, we couldn't, I couldn't put it into the schedule. So I think I took ballet one semester, I took a modern class, which I was like, I hate modern, I hate modern dance because of that class. It was all like making noises and different things. And I was like, this is awful. And then I think I took a like a modalities class, it was like Pilates and yoga and like Feldenkris and all these different types of genre. And I think I took another ballet class. But it wasn't that much that I took there. The majority of my training happened when I transferred to ASU. So it wasn't scary or anything. It was just, you know, but I was tired all the time because we'd have all the conditioning in the morning. And then we'd have my dance classes and then I'd go straight to practice and then study hall. Plus I would stay after practice a lot of the times to do extra hitting and stuff so that I can get into the lineup and, you know, improve and all of that. Right. So eventually you do end up transferring to ASU, your first choice. What precipitated that decision? There was a lot of things that went down that year. One was I got mono. So I was at like the peak. It was very disappointing because I had trained all summer with our speed coach, coach O, who I love, shout out to him. And I worked with him all summer on speed training girls. So I got really fast, like really fast. And everything was going great. I was maxing out at like the best weight that I could and all of that. And then I got mono. And so I literally couldn't do anything for like three months. And having mono with asthma is not fun. And literally you just sleep for like 20 hours a day. I couldn't do any of my finals. I couldn't do any of that. And then right after that there was like huge fires in San Diego. Again, not great for asthma. I think the school was like shut down for like two weeks. And like it was crazy. So I, and then I hurt my shoulder again. And it was just like a snowball effect, very emotionally year for me. And the coach, my coach basically was like, we're taking your scholarship away. I had a scholarship. I had tuition paid for my second year and my coach was like, we're taking your scholarship away because we think the freshmen are better than you coming in. In two seasons at San Diego State, Bridget had gone from walk on to scholarship athlete. However, after battling through illness, injury, and seemingly one setback after another, on the field and off, she felt a sting of having that hard earned reward taken back. She decided then and there that that was the sign she needed, that it was time to go elsewhere. And the lure of Tempe Arizona and Arizona State University, originally her first choice in pursuing her goals and dance, one out. It was a decision that would change the course of her life forever. I transferred to ASU and walked on. I think there was about 50 people who auditioned, tried out for the team and myself. And then my previous teammate at San Diego State, Bianca Cruz, she also made the team. But unfortunately for her, our coach did not give her her release until basically the day that we started the season. So Bianca actually came on the team the following year. So it's kind of interesting because we played three years together but we started together, which was kind of fun. So. So you find yourself in Tempe, you're at ASU. I'm an Arizona Wildcat, so we'll just agree to this. Yeah, but you're there and I can't help but wonder because softball certainly performance oriented, dance certainly aesthetically oriented and the pressures are different in those two fields. And it's not to say that that a young female athlete doesn't feel pressure to look a certain way. But you're kind of operating in these parallel universes and those pressures collide at times. What was I like navigating that junior and that senior year with those kind of tensions between how you looked and how you performed? Right. I feel like dance is also performance based. You do have to perform as well, not only just look good, you have to also perform. So and you look at yourself in the mirror 24 or 7. So you're constantly nitpicking at your body. However, being an athlete helps because you're constantly working out. It's good and it's also bad because at ASU we had conditioning 60s a week from like 7 to about 8. And then I would literally go to dance classes like dance technique classes from like 940 to 110 and then go straight to practice. So for me it was more I had to save my energy for softball because that's what was paying for school. And so that was difficult because I felt like I didn't get all the training that I needed to in the dance side because I wasn't especially with the traveling schedule. I missed a lot of that. But so that was for me it was just more physically dreaming than anything. But I was loving it because I was doing both things that I love and I had almost all of my general education credits out of the way. So literally it was like all dance classes. So it was great. But it's hard because as an athlete you're more, you're bulkier. So you look a lot bigger than everyone else. So there's a lot of this weird like psychological like body that starts to happen. And so you're just like I'm so much bigger than everyone else and then everybody else thinks of you that way because you're an athlete. I don't know if that makes any sense. So as you're closing in on graduation your dreams of being in dance they're forming. And so it's a big difference between being in a company and running a company. In your life were you dreaming of entrepreneurship in this space or were you just looking at the artistry side of things? No I wanted to own like have my own professional dance company. I know I wanted that. There is a little story that I'll tell you that kind of crushed my dreams. So I did do five years in college. So after my fourth year with softball I you know I had one more year left. I took 43 credits that year. 43. 43. Yeah. I was a professor and 23 the next 22 to next so that I can graduate. So I and I thought that was a breeze because I didn't have softball. Which I think a lot of people would go what? But so during that year my friends and I decided to go to the city can dance audition in LA. And we went there and at the time that was when they had people on it was a new season. And he was for season two or three and at that time they would choose people to make fun of them. Right? So I'm just letting you know. And we went there and the auditions and myself and another guy. Another one of our friends made it through to the route that you actually see on TV. And so I did my solo for the judges and the person that was the judge was Wade Robinson. And he was like the special judge and I don't know if you know anything about Wade Robinson. But he was the choreographer, the creator of all of the in sync performances and Britney Spears. Which is who I was inspired to do. Like he was like why I wanted to do dance. So I was so excited that he was there and I choreographed the routine that I performed. And after I was done all of the judges were like. So what are you doing school? I'm like I'm a dance major and they all looked at me like I should not be a dance major. And Wade Robinson was like did you choreograph that? And I was like yeah. And he was like well you've got a lot of issues in this and timing and like just literally like arrested apart. I was destroyed after that. Ouch. The excitement of getting to compete and be judged by a choreographer who had actually inspired her to pursue dance to begin with was quickly, painfully and publicly dashed by the man himself who pretty much told Bridget not to quit her day job. Except dance was her day job. It had been the thing she'd studied and performed and pursued. First informally, first informally in T-Ball Outfields but eventually as a dance major at a major university. It was humbling and crushing all at the same time. And while she can laugh about it now, it shook her confidence. But as we've learned so many times before on becoming a done, setbacks can be set ups for success if we're willing to take the lessons from the losses and learn from them. When I graduated school, I know I wanted to go into dance and different things. I didn't have the confidence that I once had because of all the negative feedback that I got from my work. So that was hard. So originally after college, I was going to go into massage therapy, so that's part of the physical therapy side. And I was thinking of going into like cruise lines and dancing in cruise lines or moving to Seattle because they have a really big dad scene up there and doing massage to make enough money but still have time to like do my dance stuff. So that's where that goes into what you're talking about. Because I was always planning on having my own like performance dance company. And when I, yeah, so I didn't know about a studio yet at that point. I don't think so no doubt your confidence had to have been shaken. But I know the end of the story I've read your bio somehow you went from that seminal moment to having a company of your own and finding your voice as an artist. What did you tell yourself to keep going in that time? It's a lot of growing up because you have to kind of put your ego to the side and just be like, I know I can do this and do it. I still struggle with our dance community with feeling like I fit in because they're all abstract artists and I feel like I'm more of an entertainer. I like to entertain the audience with my shows instead of like having them guess on what like I'm trying to say. Like I want them to know exactly what I'm trying to say. So I struggle a little bit here because it's not like that. But yeah, for me, I just, it took a while to build that confidence. I joined Scorpio Dance Theater in 2010 and there's another tenacity for you because I audition three times to get into that company. I didn't give up. I train really hard. I'm one of those people. If I make a plan, I will do my best to make it happen. So I auditioned for them and then so I was in their company from 2010 to 2017 but through that they had some showcases where we could choreograph pieces and audition them and stuff. So I got a few pieces into those showcases and that's where my fire came back because I got some feedback from people like, wow, that was really cool. You know, just doing what I wanted to do and just said screw it. You know, instead of trying to be fitted in the box and trying to fit into that box, I just said screw it. I'm going to have my own voice and you know, if you don't like it, you don't like it. I feel like that's really hard to do sometimes. You know, because a lot of people want to fit into the green. I don't. And that's that artsy street coming out of you. No doubt about it. Right. So you find yourself as a performer. You're probably learning some of the inner workings and how to operate a company of your own, although you're not there yet. When did you decide to make the jump, the transition and launch out into your own? I basically felt like I wasn't being utilized in the dance company that I was in and one of my friends encouraged me, you know, to just make the leap and create Caso. So I really owe it to her. Her name is Lindsay Larson. If you're listening and she was really like, because she knows my work and she worked with me in the past and she was actually in one of the pieces that I was telling you about in Scorpius' show. So I was just like, let's just do it. And I took a lot of the answers that I dance within Scorpius that I wanted to work with and some other people. And we just created the first show and it was about my grandparents. My grandmother had just passed away. So it was kind of like my way of mourning her in a way. But I just went for the leaks. That was in 2014 when we started the professional company and we struggled. I think that leads well into my next question. So you faced fear at every step, whether that's launching out and going to San Diego State and pursuing a dream there, transferring midstream to ASU, pursuing dance after your athletic career was over. How do you think fear played a role in your growth as a human? That's hard. That's not our question. I don't fear a lot of things. I think that comes from being a softball player because softball is a game of failure. You just get used to failing all the time. I've never failed at anything more than dance, to be honest. I have a really good sports system in my family and in my husband. So feeling for me is like, I already feel like I have a safety net if I do. I don't know if that makes sense. It absolutely makes sense. It's been said that fear has killed more dreams than lack of talent, lack of resources, or lack of will ever have. The thing is, we have a group of friends and family who speak life into us and provide that safety net beneath our feet. Those terrifying thoughts and worries and doubts suddenly look so much less threatening. And they help us stare that fear in its lying eyes and it allows us to head full speed ahead faced with the very real concerns about how hard it might be to start a dance company from scratch, bridge it relied upon the confidence she'd honed on the softball field, and the support of her husband and others to stop dreaming and start building. So you're moving full steam ahead in this dance career. You've left competitive team sport behind. Was that central to your identity or were you so wrapped up in what was ahead you weren't lamenting what was behind? You know, I think I think I did it by myself as an athlete for a very long time. And then it was hard. I did go through a big depression stay after softball was over, but I was and after actually after college was over because I was like, I can make my own decisions on what I do. Like it was just very weird because everybody always told me when I need to be there for reversals practice and class. And so that was a really weird transition. I moved on my last year playing softball 2006. So I moved on. I feel like I move on pretty well because I always had my blinders on and being, you know, the other goal of the dancer side. So I miss softball. It's hard for me to kind of go back to ASU and watch a game. You know, because I just love, I love the game. And I like playing it. I don't necessarily like watching. It pains me a little bit like I did have a really great time. But yeah, I feel like I run my dance company like a softball team. So it's still a part of me. If that makes sense, I'm like a coach and not like a director. It absolutely does. So what do you days look like today? Well, like today I taught in the morning. I taught a class in the morning. Then drove to a different high school, taught a class. Now I'm talking to you. And then I'm going back to the studio and teaching to work on it. So typically a regular day for me, like a regular week, let's say, is like teaching for about six hours or having rehearsals six or seven hours in a day about six days a week. For me, I'm always going, going, going, going. I always bid that way, especially being a tricep for athlete and being involved in youth groups and different clubs. I've always been that regimented and like never home. I just have to keep going. I opened the studio in 2020 during the pandemic. Crazy, because I'm like, hey, if I can make it work during a pandemic, I can make it work anytime. That was very hard because there was so much unknown with the pandemic. But literally, since we opened the studio, I produced four full-length shows a year, which is very hard to for the professional company and to for the studio. So it's like non-stop promoting and doing calendar submissions and talking to press. So it's a lot. But it's good. It keeps you busy. You see how to trouble. For sure. So hindsight's always 2020. If you had a chance to speak words of wisdom into the younger bridging that then 12-year-old who's just, well, that's not true. You played people at four or five. Yeah, a chance to go back in time and deliver that sage advice. What would you tell her? Oh, that's a good question. What would I tell my little self to not be insecure and let your brain get in the way? And to ask for my parents, ask my parents for dad's lessons earlier. Because I always kept my mouth shut about it and play with the high school. But I just, when I was growing up, I had a lot of self-esteem issues because I was, because of my asthma. So here's another little story for you. I had such a severe asthma attack when I was about in fifth grade that I almost, I stopped breathing and almost died. And so when that happened, they put me on like four or five different asthma inhalers. They put me on singular. They put me on prednisone for a year, which you're not supposed to do, I find out. And then that year, I was like severely sick all the time. Because if you don't know, people that are listening, steroids, if you take any steroids, they actually lowers your immune system. But you are more susceptible to getting sick. So I was on so many medications, I blew up like a balloon, I got teased all the time, my teeth were bad. So if that affected, you know, the one thing that I had that I knew I was good at and that I felt confidence was athletics. So I very much held on to the athletic side going through those tribulations. And my doctors told me that I need to stop playing soccer, all the sports running sports and that had grass because I was so allergic to grass. And then what did I do? I played sports on grass. So I'm a screw you, I'm going to do what I want. But I would just, I would tell my younger self, like just keep pushing forward and, you know, try to love yourself. I'm just looking for most and just because you only, you live in your body for the rest of your life. So take care of your body, start doing more research on medications earlier and help you with that because the being on those medications all the way up and plus 24 really lowered my immune system, which is I feel like if I wasn't on those earlier, I wouldn't have like struggled so much with getting sick and like interfering with the softball, like my college career so much. I would just say like stay focused and don't let anyone put you down. So I'm a musician myself, I'm a drummer. My daughter is a vocal performance major at Texas Tech. I love music and I love the emotions that it can represent. If they were to do a 30 for 30 or a documentary about Bridget, what song would you pick as the lead song for your life? That is a great question. I don't know. I don't want to be cheesy and be like, I have the tiger or any of those, but something about tenacity, like I get knocked down, I get up again. I don't know, something along those legs because I feel like that's what happens to me a lot. Getting knocked down and I had to bring myself out. So maybe that one, maybe, is it Chumbo Wumba? Yeah, I think you're right. Yeah. Because pissing the night away. So last question, I ask of all my guests. What for Bridget remains undone? Our next big goal for Casadam's theater is to get an agent and potentially travel our shows from around the world. We would just want to bring our entertainment not just locally but to international. So that's the big goal starting right now. We're in our ninth season and we do more story-based full-length dance shows. We do a show called Once Upon a Bachelor that is what it sounds like. It's a full season of the Bachelor or told through dance. And it has fairy-tale characters as like the contestants. So it's hilarious. And the audience gets to choose who gets final roses and rose ceremonies, who gets, you know, to go on one-on-one. The one-on-ones to get proposed to in the end, there's like 50 different outcomes per show. So fully interactive. We actually do a live stream. So if you are listening to this and want to get more information, go on our website, casadance.com. And we live stream it and you can actually vote. We do shows like that that I would like to travel around. And yeah, so that's like the big picture for Casadam's theater is to travel. So we'll see. That's the undone part for me. That's something I haven't achieved yet. But we have the studio going. It's going really well. So when I originally started Casadam's theater, we, I wanted to implore dancers as our teachers as well. So when we open the studio, like all of the members are our teachers. So that's been great to like give jobs to artists as well. So that's been complete. We're still growing. But the traveling aspect is what we're trying to get to now. Yeah, we just opened a magnificent performing arts center here in Lubbock. The Buddy Holly Hall is spectacular. And it's a real gym for our city. And it's brought a lot of like off Broadway and orchestra and dance and musical theater. It's sad to admit. But before my daughter came into my world, I probably would have just kept driving by it. But she is all about it. And so it's become something I love to. So good. It's typical. So you mentioned the website. How else might listeners be able to follow and connect with what you're doing? You can find us on Facebook. It's Caso Dico. And then Instagram is Casadam's theater. Or you can go on our website, casadets.com. Well, Bridget, I certainly appreciate your time. I just started working that music question in recently. So if I had the rights that would play on the way out, I'd like to have the rights to people who just step and advocate too. Super fun. I really appreciate you taking the time and applaud what you're doing. Keep it up. And I appreciate your tenacity. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. For a wide tour and continued growth for our company, now performing for Nilean Decay, remain the objectives left undone for Bridget and Caso Dance. Big dreams to be sure. But a life lived well and with an unflinching rebel spirit has prepared to take big swings and go all in on the pursuit of what makes her heart sing. Or in Bridget's case, what makes her mind and body move to the melodies and harmonies of her dreams of making the world a better, more beautiful place through dance. Becoming undone is a nitro-hyde creative production written and produced by me Toby Brooks. Few or someone you know has a story of resilience, victory, to share for Becoming undone. Please contact me at undonepodcast.com where you can also sign up for a mailing list to be notified of new episode drops and exclusive team undone benefits. Becoming undone can be heard on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, I Heart Radio or wherever you get your podcasts. Till next time everybody, keep getting better.