Humor me. If you are able, stand up and stand on one foot for a moment. You are balancing, right? Now, pay very close attention to what the foot you are standing on is doing. Feel it? Feel that wobble? The balance isn’t static. It is very dynamic. Now, take a few seconds and try as hard as you can to remove the wobble. How does that feel? What does that do to your balance? The effort to stop the wobble that allows you to balance creates a physical and mental strain that makes balancing that much harder.
Think about how you try and achieve balance in your life. Do you let the wobble happen, or do you do everything in your power to be in balance every day? I believe achieving balance in our lives is different than most of us think. It is not about every day, every week, or even every month being in perfect balance. There are periods of time where we are going to sway more heavily in one direction than another. We might have a big project due at work this week and need to spend a lot of time on that, but we follow it up with some time off. We may be traveling and not eat the best or get all of our workouts in for a few days, but then be totally on top of those things for a while after that. As a friend of mine once said, when you are trying to do everything simultaneously what you are really doing is not being totally present for anything.
So, how can we change the way we bring our lives into balance?
- Be Aware – You can’t change what you are not aware of. If you are feeling tension and overwhelm in your life, take some time to explore where that might be coming from. Often we don’t do this because we are afraid of what we will find. So, this takes a bit of courage. You can handle it. This is where change starts.
- Decide Where to Start – Don’t try and do a complete overhaul of the rhythms of your life. That will be too overwhelming, which will thwart any effort at making a change. Start with something small. Think about where you can achieve a small win that would make you feel better and start there. Momentum will come from the small win.
- Take the First Steps – Making any change is uncertain. With uncertainty comes fear. What if it doesn’t work? Well, what if it does? When we start small the risk is low. If it doesn’t work you can try something different. However, it won’t get better unless you are willing to take a risk and make some type of change.
- Reflect – How did that process work? Did you have some success making a small change? If so, keep going. If not, think about why it didn’t work and then make some tweaks before trying again, but try again.
Do you need some guidance to find your balance? If so, reach out to me and we’ll chat about it.