The Illusion of Balance

Let's talk about the illusion of ‘balance’ – and why you need to see past it

There’s this elusive concept we have in this life, of ‘balance’. It’s what everybody wants, but nobody actually gets. It’s like the mythical lochness monster – you think you might have seen it one day a few years ago, and so you return to the spot faithfully waiting, searching, hoping to get another glimpse only to end up disappointed. Every. Single. Time.

I’m here to tell you, dear reader, that balance – between work life and home life, between a career and a family, between concerned and obsessed, is not what you really need to strive for. Balance will happen naturally and your course will correct just as soon as you start to do those things that we should all be doing in our lives. Carving out time for career, spirituality, relationships and health and putting into place at least some of those great sounding suggestions those self-help gurus are always going on about in their books. A big part of that means being fully present, and devoting however much time is needed in any particular moment to what you have to do. If you know you’ve been doing too much of something, giving too much attention to something, then you already know that all you need to do is apply a little bit of effort doing the opposite of that, or giving the antidote until whatever the big problem is has been resolved, the challenge overcome, the thing done.

That really could mean that one week you have to work extra hours, but the next week you are upfront and committed to leaving work on time every day and getting enough sleep to make up for it. Being ‘balanced’ could mean skipping a hardcore workout in favour of a short walk because it is what you need in that particular moment. You ride the waves of feeling, of activity and inactivity that life throws at you like both sides of a see-saw. What goes up must come down – and the motion is constant. Guess what that means? Yes, that’s right, your life is never really in this state of ‘balance’ because if it was everything would have stopped and you’d be standing still. We humans do NOT do stillness well, and neither does the universe. So instead of asking for the motion to stop, all we have to do is ride the waves and not fight against them.

It will happen naturally no matter what you do anyway, in time. That’s also one of the natural laws of the universe that you can’t argue with. The difference is when you are aware, when you accept and when you ride the waves you don’t need to suffer as your course is being constantly corrected and life throws twists and turns and new waves come along to ride.

So, here’s the real message in all of this: this talk about ‘balance’ that you read about in magazines, books and online, is really only asking us all to notice what’s happening and be ok with it. Understand that life is constantly in motion – yours and everyone else’s. Ride the waves and don’t try to fight them and you’ll get where you need to be so much faster – and learn to enjoy the ride at the same time. It’s really just a matter of being aware. Life flows. Balance is never meant to be a permanent state. Eye-opening, isn’t it?


#_flow
#_acceptance
#_wellbeing

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