A Look Back Before Looking Ahead: 2025 in Celebration

Written By Lynn Panting

I love setting intentions.

I love taking time to be mindful, to revise, to blue-sky, to zoom out and look at the big picture.

When you’re in the middle of things, it can be hard to see momentum. It can feel like you’re stuck. I find that there’s real clarity in pausing to look back at the year behind me.

Also, one of my resolutions in 2025 was to celebrate my wins. I struggle with that, preferring to move swiftly to the next project: to get to work. So here it goes.

A note:

Even though one of my core values is staying in my own lane, I’ll be the first to admit that comparison still sneaks in. If reading this is not helpful for you right now, or makes you feel some type of way, close the window. I’ll catch you on the next one!

Cheers to you and the year ahead.

Separating Identities, Strengthening Practice

One of the biggest shifts this year was formally separating my professional practice from my dance school. For a long time, those two worlds ran in tandem. They informed each other, but they also blurred together. In an effort to clarify my identities and to give people a clearer window into my work as a director, movement director, choreographer, and intimacy professional, I created a new Instagram account and this blog, Choreographing Connection.

That step felt both practical and personal.

In 2024, I was diagnosed with a text processing disorder, and the recommended tools and supports have genuinely changed my life. For the first time, getting my thoughts onto the page felt possible rather than exhausting. Creating Choreographing Connection has been a joy. It’s become a place where I can think out loud, reflect on process, and articulate values that have long lived in my body but not always in my words.

Deepening the Work: Ensemble Building

With support from ArtsNL, I was also able to take a meaningful deep dive into my ensemble-building practice: Responsive Ensemble Framework (working title). This work allowed me to slow down and formally examine the systems I use in rehearsal: how rooms are set up, how trust is built, and how to build worlds unique to the folks in the room.

Through workshops, “writing”, and reflection, I began articulating what has often been intuitive. That process has been incredibly affirming. It reminded me that the way we work matters just as much as what we make.

Projects That Shaped the Year

This year also brought some deeply impactful creative projects.

I worked as movement director and intimacy coordinator on There’s Nothing You Can Do by Cole Haley, produced by Resource Centre for the Arts Theatre Company. This was one of the most challenging pieces I’ve worked on, demanding high levels of movement literacy, stamina, and rigorous attention to safety. It pushed everyone involved, myself included. I’m incredibly proud of that work and grateful for the trust and commitment of such an extraordinary cast.

My biggest love of the year, though, was Love’s Labour’s Lost. Returning to a play I’d worked on before, this time leading a large ensemble through classic text, was a gift. Much of my directing work has been in original creation, so stepping fully into Shakespeare with a clear vision for how I wanted the room to function felt both new and deeply aligned. It was also scary. Who am I to direct Shakespeare, especially when my relationship to text is challenging? In the end, it more than worked out. What a joyful, generous, and talented group of artists. I had an absolute blast this summer.

I also said yes to:

  • New performance opportunities outside of my regular collaborators.

  • Dipping my toe into the film world as an intimacy coordinator for Netflix, where I learned so much and gained a deeper respect for the nuances of on-set dynamics.

  • Continuing the work of Ladies Who Lunch with our ninth Three Tales of Terror and a remount of SpookyChristmasTown.

  • Development of Mayflies VR produced by Untellable Movement Theatre.

  • Beginning development with Phil Goodridge and Jaimie Tait on The Station through Untellable’s Incubator program.

  • Debuting my short film The Dress which travelled to festivals, and screened at the Festival of New Dance.

  • Completing the Intimacy Professionals Accelerator Program though IDC.

  • Fostering LPD and creating a studio that feels like that one open class in Centre Stage where everyone dances to Higher Ground.

Ending the Year Grateful

When I step back and look at 2025, what I see most clearly is alignment:

  • More intentional rooms.

  • More trust in how I work and why.

So before racing ahead into what’s next, I’m letting myself stand here for a moment.

Cheers to 2025.

Here’s to 2026.

Lynn Panting
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Embracing Winter Solstice