Work too hard and your relationships suffer. Play too much and you can’t pay your bills. Exercise too much and your body doesn’t have time to recover. “Try” too hard and spontaneity suffer. Yeah…..you know what I’m talking about.
BALANCE – the ever-elusive but MOTHER of all practices! And it’s never ending – and I would say that it’s not something that is “achieved” but rather something you continually strive for or at the very least, strive to make peace with.
But even if you did achieve it, LIFE would come along and throw something at you that would mess it up! There is no state of motionlessness for a bike rider – it is constant motion or fall on your face (I did that once – first time with my new ‘clip ins”)
[quote author=”- Albert Einstein”]Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.[/quote]Here’s another little metaphor for Life and Balance. It’s like baking a loaf of bread. If you want to get it right, everything needs to be roughly in the proper proportions. For bread you measure volume – like cups and tablespoons. For LIFE, you measure your time!
The secret to the previous dilemmas of work versus relationships and play versus money is that it’s not solved by choosing one or the other, but by making the right allotments of time.
Ok – enough poetic philosophy (which I don’t mind writing a paragraph or two) but now it’s time to get down to the brass tacks!
What do you do to make your life work …. in terms of balance?
It’s a question I ask many friends, family, clients and business associates.
And it won’t be surprising to read that I’m going to recommend Ideal Lifevision as a great tool for helping you keep focused on the things that matter most to you. When you focus on what’s really important in your life – I would imagine (if you’re fairly normal) that you will find there are things from all areas of your life.
- Your family is important.
- Your relationship with God is important.
- Your health is important.
- Having enough money to enjoy life is important.
- Being fulfilled in your career is important!
Now does Balance mean equal portions of time ? Remember back to the bread analogy and consider making your bread with 1 cup of flour, 1 cup of salt, 1 cup of water, 1 cup of yeast and 1 cup of oil – YUCK!! It wouldn’t look pretty and it wouldn’t taste pretty.
So for me – balance simply means working on at least 1 goal in each of the Life Areas. I typically try to work on more – but it’s important for my balance that I have at least one. And then it’s time to be realistic with your time. Use a calendar or a piece of paper and start blocking out the time to read to your son, mediate and connect with God, 30 minutes of exercise a day etc.
Because what you’re ultimately after – with the bread or with our LIFE is that quality experience!