HeyJaredKicking It Real
Life lately — the highs, the plot twists, and everything in between.I’m Gabby, a former Rockette turned big-dream believer, sharing the real, unfiltered side of chasing what’s next.
- Indexed episodes, last 90 days
- 12
- Latest publication
- Sep 23, 2026
- Audience
- Checking…
- Earliest in this view
- Jul 8, 2026
Latest episodes
51. from Chicago Bulls dance captain to Squid Game contestant with Julia Pontarelli (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Julia Pontarelli packed her car, said goodbye to the only city she had ever called home, and moved to Seattle with two weeks to spare between the end of one dance career and the start of another. Losing the thing your whole life was built around rarely comes with a ceremony, most of the time it just quietly asks you who you are now that it is gone. Julia spent five years dancing for the Chicago Bulls, working her way up to head captain, before that move to Seattle put her on an NFL dance team fo
50. Rockette secret retirement to future therapist with Natalie Butt (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Natalie is back on Kicking It Real, and this conversation is proof that you're allowed to walk away from the thing you built your whole identity around and come out the other side more yourself, not less. She spent multiple seasons dancing with the Radio City Rockettes, performed on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and at a Madison Square Garden halftime show, and this past season quietly juggled full Rockette rehearsals with her first year of an online graduate program, all while telling
49. building a successful career in LA, financial literacy for dancers and knowing your worth with Bella Bernath (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Bella Bernath will tell you that talent gets you in the room, but knowing your worth is what actually keeps you working, and keeps you sane while you are doing it. She started dancing at four years old, was teaching by fourteen, and graduated high school early just to buy herself more time before her move to LA. Within a few years she booked a six year run touring the world as a dancer for Maluma, including his 11:11 World Tour, and somewhere in the middle of all that she landed a Vegas producti
48. stop being so perfect: breaking the desperation mindset & learning to trust yourself as a freelance dancer with Sam Assemany (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Two years into taking his class, Mike Esperanza pulled Sam Assemany aside and told her to stop being so perfect, to mess it up a little. That is the fear underneath most desperation, the belief that if you are not flawless or constantly visible, someone is going to forget you exist, when usually the opposite is true. A Western Michigan University dance grad, Sam moved to New York in September of 2015 and took her first class with choreographer Mike Esperanza a month later, a class she still call
47. redefining what winning actually means as a dance adjudicator after years of chasing titles and national crowns with Clara Eaton Ribeiro (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Clara Eaton Ribeiro used to stand on the podium wondering why she was the only one of her friends walking away with silver instead of gold. That is the trap of chasing recognition, the belief that a medal color could actually tell you how much you were worth, when it never really could. Clara spent six years performing professionally on cruise ships, training as an aerialist and dancing inside a scuba certified aqua show alongside Olympic divers and Red Bull athletes before she ever sat on the o
Publishing over time
Last 90 days. Choose a month to open its work.
Recurring subjects
Named in the text we hold. One piece can cover several.
Audience
No verified audience measurement yet.
About this data
Counts cover the work we have indexed. Tone needs enough text and a confident classification. Excerpts and episode notes are not full articles or transcripts.
Identity or attribution wrong? Suggest a correction.