Today we’d like to introduce you to Tonatiuh Gómez.
Hi Tonatiuh, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I was born in Mexico City, and I remember my mom telling me that since I was in the womb I was already super energetic and hyperactive. I grew up in a family of dancers and entrepreneurs, so much so that from a very early age both my parents and I began to to account for the facility that I had with my body for activities that require physical dexterity, but specifically dance and music. So pretty earlt in my childhood I began to take music classes and some dance classes.
My entrepreneurial journey started when I was 6 years old. I opened my first business, a small store in an abandoned room that my mother had in her dance academy, in which she sold everything from hydrating drinks to snacks at the end of dance classes. I put my youngest sister to dispatch, to the median to check that nobody took things without permission and I charged.
Since I can remember I have always liked to help in different ways from participating in foundations, associations, to simply helping my friends or family whenever it is in my possibilities. These are the things that have always been present in my life, dance and leading business projects or organizations and seeking to leave the world better than I found it.
As I was growing up, I practiced various sports and activities from Ice Hockey to Soccer, in which I managed to play professionally in different basic forces teams and second division in Mexico, at 15 years old I was selected to participate with the Mexican Under 17 team. to go to participate in the World Cup, due to an injury I couldn’t go but I had the opportunity to share the field with some of the best.
I have always been a super curious person and hungry to learn and absorb new knowledge. I have been a fan of reading thanks to my grandfather who was one of the people who has most influenced my taste for the learning and the curiosity to ask and question everything, absolutely everything.
In my artistic career, I always enjoyed dance very much but when I was 13 years old I remember that my parents took me and my sisters to see the Nutcracker ballet in Mexico City. At that moment I fell in love with ballet. That’s where I discovered that I really wanted to do that.
My mom didn’t want me to dedicate myself to dancing because of many issues and difficulties that exist in the middle, so she didn’t let me do it and I kept focusing on school and getting a university degree. This a path led me to studying different things from medicine to finance, and ended up studying the Career in Marketing from which I graduated.
At the age of 17 I started a sales agency project that was very successful, in collaboration with some friends we created a healthy food brand that we turned into a franchise and managed to open more than 32 restaurants throughout the Mexican Republic, this project left a lot of experience to be able to lead more projects, among them the opening of a company called Funny drinks where we sold non-alcoholic beverages that the people themselves personalized looking to play with the senses. Throughout my adolescence I stayed close to dance, not necessarily professional, but at least I danced salsas, cumbias and reggaeton at parties with my friends (hahah).
At the age of 20, I suffered a serious accident in an artistic gymnastics competition that caused a ligament rupture in my foot, a situation that kept me from any physical activity for almost 2 years. In these years I had the opportunity to grow my company and when I turned 22, I remember I was sitting in one of the restaurants and it was raining and I was asking myself if I was happy and satisfied with what I was doing or if I just thought I was going in the right direction. My feeling was that I had a void, even though we were doing well, I didn’t feel fulfilled or happy with what I was doing, so I decided to go for 3 days by myself to a small magical town in Mexico called Valle de Bravo, one of my favorite places in Mexico. The place where I realized that what I really wanted to do was dance ballet professionally. When I made that decision the whole world came to me, how was I going to leave everything I had built, was I crazy, etc. I received a lot of criticism but I was extremely certain that this decision I had made was what I wanted in my life, no matter what people told me that I was not going to be able to live on this or that I was too old to dance ballet, it didn’t matter to me. I started the search for solutions to achieve this dream.
At that moment an opportunity arose to go take an summer intensive in Albuquerque, from which I gained a lot of experience. A teacher in Mexico adopted me and began to teach me all the basics and technique of ballet, similar to the film Billy Elliott.
I got ready to join him in a school in the north of Mexico in a city called Monterrey. This school is called the Superior School of Music and Dance of Monterrey, which I consider to be one of the best in Mexico and belongs to the National Institute of Fine Arts. It was difficult emotionally because these schools do not normally accept people over 13 years of age, but they have a special plan for boys and normally it is up to 19 years of age, but I was already 22 years old. For some reason, just that year they opened the call at 23 years of age on the first of September, and that’s when I realized that when an opportunity calls for you, it’s yours to take. My birthday is the first of September and just by that date I would be 23.
At that time I filled out my application for school auditions, I had already left everything and I was financially broke, all I had left was 250 pesos, the plane flight cost me 150, and the exam lasted a full week. I started asking friends if anyone could help support me and a friend in Monterrey let me stay on his sofa to sleep. With the money I had left over I used to buy tuna and water. So I packed my suitcase with some clothes , many little bags of tuna and dreams, but dreams that were everything.
The first day I came to the audition there were more than 300 people in total. I literally felt that I had bought a lottery ticket and said keep participating, but it was not like that, after 2 months of the exam the results came out and I had been accepted, And here the whole dream begins.
I attended school in Monterrey for a year and then they offered me a full scholarship to go to study in Philadelphia at The Rock School for Dance Education, a well-known school in the world of ballet. From there I had the opportunity to take several classes and courses in New York. And now I had come to the most important part after training, which is the step to becoming a professional dancer.
I began the whole audition process and started to receive several job offers from different ballet companies in the world. I wanted to continue in the United States so I began to speak to the companies that had responded to me from the US, but now the next difficulty arose , which was to obtain access to a work visa.
Normally the companies do not want to cover these expenses when you are a new dancer, because they don’t know exactly how you will fit in to the company once arriving or simply because the visa process costs a lot of money and is a big investment.
I had already lost a little hope of being able to dance in the United States. I was going to return from Philadelphia to Mexico when a friend of mine from school told me his father is an immigration lawyer and that he had found out about offers from different Ballet companies, and that as a gift for my first professional contract he wanted to be my sponsor to process my work visa in the United States. For me, it was realizing that there really are those people with a good heart who manage to change your life and your opportunities, thanks to them I had the opportunity to come to the United States to dance professionally.
When I was making the decision of where I wanted to dance, one of the opportunities was the San Diego Ballet, which the moment I had the opportunity to speak on the phone with the director of the Javier Velasco company, I realized that it was the place. I am a person who follows his hunches a lot and just talking to him was what made me feel that this was the place and then I began to investigate more about San Diego and I fell completely in love and I remembered that I had family in San Diego who from the beginning They gave me a lot of support. My dream was to be part of a place that allows me to do what I love the most and that the environment in that place is not toxic and also allows me to continue enjoying and falling more in love with this art that is dancing.
So I came to the San Diego ballet and from the moment I arrived, all the members of the company welcomed me with open arms and from the beginning the director gave me opportunities that at first made me nervous because he began to give me roles, main roles such as Mowgli in the Jungle Book or the Knight in the Nutcracker, roles that demand a high technical and artistic level from the dancer. I am very grateful for those opportunities that continue to be offered to me in ballet as a dancer and as principle artist. I love the environment, I get along with and appreciate my co-workers very much, I consider them to be extraordinary people and my wife is my dance partner, what more could I ask for.
Derived from all these opportunities, the secretary of culture of the state of Mexico, in Mexico appointed me ambassador of the performing arts in 2019 and from this opportunity a foundation was created that bears my name: Fundación Tonatiuh Gómez which we have led with great success not only me but a whole team that I love and consider to be extraordinary and we have achieved extraordinary results in less than 4 years. More than 600 financial support and scholarships have already been awarded to artists, we have directly impacted more than 9000 people and we have had a presence in more than 143 cities, and built more than 150 international alliances to improve the opportunities and realities not only of artists but of all the people who can benefit from art and creativity and precisely from these initiatives different projects have been derived, such as the Encounter 540 where we bring together star teachers and dancers from different parts of the world in a magical and immersive experience full of opportunities, Males on Pointe which is a ballet company for men on pointe and we started the first program in the world aimed at training men who want to dance on pointe, it is a movement that has become international and through this movement we support a lot to the LGBTQ+ community.
And most recently The Golden Door Center project was developed, which is a center for the arts and creativity. We are forming an international community, where it does not matter where you come from, or what you do. We are creating an artistic and creative lifestyle in which everyone can benefit from, it is an ambitious project where we are currently looking for investors to expand this project internationally.
In October the first face-to-face center was opened in the center of Mexico, but we seek to open 17 centers in the American continent in the next 6 years. The cities we are planning to open Golden Door locations are the following:
Ontario, San Francisco, New York, San Diego, in Mexico, we will open them in Monterrey, Guadalajara, Queretaro, Mexico City, MEtepec, Merida, and in South America in Guatemala, Colombia, Ecuador, Chile, Uruguay and Argentina.
In this project we seek innovation and at the same time a center will be built virtually through virtual reality in the metaverse, to know more details of the project or if they are interested If you are interested in investing or donating to these projects, I invite you to write to me on my social networks as @tonatiuhgomezoficial on instagram and Facebook or in my email as tonatiuh@fundaciontonatiuhgomez.org.
Currently, while I continue developing these projects, I also dedicate myself to producing different festivals and shows all while dancing dancing as a principle dancer with San Diego Ballet.
One of my philosophies that I promote through conferences that I give in different events is to live and build a extraordinary life. It really is just as the word says if you divide it Extra / ordinary give extra to ordinary people every day one or two years from now you will become that person you aspire or yearn to be.
Do not forget that there are many hearts and people who are part of this process, it is important not to lose ground and remember that no one who manages to build or do something extraordinary did it alone, everything that is worth building on a team of extraordinary people with unwavering values.
I went to the audition, by then after entering I realized that I was living my dream despite how difficult and hard it was for my body, it was what I wanted to do and what made me happy, after a year studying
Short Resume
Social Entrepreneur and International Dancer.
Degree in Marketing from the EBC, Certifications as community manager and self-marketing on digital platforms
He began his professional studies in dance with the Superior School of Music and Dance of Monterrey (ESMDM), in the Bachelor of Classical Dance, Special Plan for Men. Later he moved to Philadelphia to continue his training at The Rock School for Dance Education. He attended different courses in New York, Albuquerque, Los Angeles, New Jersey to complement his studies in Dance.
Upon finishing his studies, he auditioned for different companies worldwide, receiving offers from some of them such as Orlando Ballet, Sarasota Ballet, New Jersey Ballet, London Ballet, Compañía Nacional de Danza de México, San Antonio Ballet, San Diego Ballet, among others.
He joined San Diego Ballet in 2018, where he is currently Principal Dancer, which is the highest rank obtainable within a classical ballet company.
Winner of 1st place in Playa del Carmen Ballet and Contemporary Dance Competition, finalist in Korea International Ballet Competition in Seoul, and semifinalist in Beijing IBCC in China and invited to participate in Varna IBC in Bulgaria, which are one of the most prestigious competitions in the history of ballet
In 2019 he was named “Ambassador of the Performing Arts of the State of Mexico” by the “Secretariat of Culture of the State of Mexico”.
He has served as a speaker, coach, teacher, and international dancer in different countries such as the USA, Korea, Mexico, Guatemala seeking to inspire new generations of artists and entrepreneurs to tell an extraordinary story of their lives.
He has been the creator and founder of different enterprises, organizations and initiatives in different industries, among which he created the Fundación Tonatiuh Gómez A.C., which seeks to create and promote extraordinary stories in the creative industries. Recently The Golden Door, center for Dance, Performing Arts and Creativity.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I already put everything in the story,
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Principal dancer at the San Diego Ballet, Social Entrepreneur, Marketer and producer.
Do you any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
I already put everything in the story,
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.tonatiuhgomez.me/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tonatiuhgomezoficial/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tonatiuhgomezoficial
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCddk8LwNjadUkOHDcU-JIPA
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@tonatiuhgomezoficial
Image Credits
-Canela Photography -Carlos Quezada
