I really think balance is the key to everything. So much of life is on a spectrum. Be pure, but don’t get too crazy or you could be puritanical. Feel your feelings, but don’t where your heart on your sleeve.
The tricky part not knowing where that tipping point exactly is or doing the quick step to keep it from tilting too far one way or the other.
It’s the same in the physical world. You’re doing just fine on your bike and then someone decides (maybe even you!) that it’s time for the training wheels to come off. You have suspended moments of greatness and then wobble-wobble-crash. My knee was skinned for most of the 70’s as the training wheels came off and the bikes got bigger. There was roller skating, ice skating, swimming “on top” of the water and all those other things that take so much practice.
And then you get good enough you are brave enough to try something new (no hands! backwards! jumps! breaststroke!) that it means learning balance all over again. Or something unexpected happens and the thing you’ve done a million times goes awry.
And your balance goes more than just awry.
It goes more like awhack.
A WHACK on the knee, bum or head. I had stitches from a swimming accident, broken teeth from the same, a broken wrist from skateboarding and a broken tailbone from horsebackriding.
Emotionally, it’s much the same. Losing my balance is sudden, unexpected and painful. But the scars and broken places don’t show. Physically it seems pretty easy to tell if you’ve got balance or not. Mentally, I don’t find it as straightforward.
When am I good judge of character and when am I judgmental?
When am I a quick learner of the lessons people teach me about who they are and whem am I holding a grudge?
Where did that line go between friendly and flirting?
When am I giving up and when does it become moving on?
When it comes to my kids, when do I get to butt in and when do I keep quiet?
When is it helpful advice and when is it bossy?
Where do I stay on this side of determined and not get to that side of stubborn?
How many hours in a day am I a hardworker before I become a workaholic?
At what point am I enjoying my solitude and what point am I just scared?
At what point am I going to answer these questions?
Hmm, all intriguing questions.
Just to make it easier for you, I have exceptional character, so don’t question me. 😉
I have struggled with balance most of my life. Physically I was “clutsy”. But as I have got older I am trying to be more aware of my surroundings because I don’t want broken bones. But the real balance struggle for me is always “family” and to some extent “friend” related. As children in my life have grown and are now adults (and I’m not just referring to my children) when do you step in and speak your mind and when do you hold back? As for the rest of my balance that is a work in progress. Balancing my new life with a child and work, balancing the same with the rest of my family and my friends. I think as long as we are aware of “balance” then we are striving for it. It’s when people are not aware that they are too involved in something that I worry.