Chapter 98
Balance the Act (Kris)

For most of us, life has become so crazy that it might be called a balancing act. Many of us are speeded-up, frenetic, nervous, anxious about time, and accomplishing tasks and doing things at an alarming rate. Even technology doesn’t seem to help. Many of us have modern conveniences and time-saving gadgets, but few of us have enough time. This being the case, we must conclude that at least a portion of our inner turmoil must be coming from within ourselves and the way we are choosing to live.

It’s important to ask ourselves whether we really want to go through the rest of our life out of control, flying by the seat of our pants, and treating life as if it were an emergency. Wouldn’t it be nicer if we could calm down a little bit and regain our sense of perspective? One of the keys to regaining a feeling of peace and composure is creating at least some degree of balance in your life.

When we are out of balance, we often discover our health to be compromised, our family scrambling, and our relationships in turmoil. We end up always in a rush, forgetful, and extremely frustrated. Creating a sense of balance, however, seems to mitigate these sensations and replace them with feelings of peace and a sense that it’s good to be alive.

A nice way to think of balance is to see your life as a pendulum that swings back and forth. Its ideal location is dead center—perfectly balanced. As it swings too far to the left, you must make a few adjustments, enabling the pendulum to swing back to the right, and to find center again. The best monitor of how you are doing is the way you feel. Generally speaking, when you feel peaceful and contented, you’re probably relatively close to center, on track, and making good choices. On the other hand, when you feel scattered or overwhelmed, you’re probably off center, needing to make those adjustments.

Perhaps it’s best to use a commonsense approach to strive for more balance. If at all possible, try to avoid extremes. Eighteen hours of work is obviously too much. Three hours of sleep isn’t enough. You may not need excessive exercise every single day but, clearly, you do need some exercise on a regular basis. Again, think in terms of a balanced life. Make balanced decisions that support a healthy, happy lifestyle.

If you go on vacation and play hard for a week, you obviously may have to work longer hours to catch up when you return. That’s okay; just don’t overdo it. Conversely, if you are on a deadline that requires overtime, plan ahead. At the completion of the project, try to make it up by spending some extra time with your partner and family while spending a little less time working.

Also, stop rushing around. The feeling of the rush creates a great deal of anxiety for yourself and for the people around you, especially those you live with.

Years ago, we became aware of how out of balance and hurried our lives had become. It always seemed that we were running late, and as an infant and toddler Jazzy was always whining when we were getting ready to go somewhere. We realized that we were trying to do too much. We were cramming too many things into our days. We had to let a few things fall by the wayside in order to come back to balance. As soon as we began creating more balance, our lives became manageable once again.

Not too long ago, my best girlfriend and I were away for a weekend together. We overheard a conversation a woman was having about the experience she had had the day before. She was stuck in traffic for over two hours. She arrived at her destination and frantically parked the car. She was, of course, very late. To make matters worse, she had two screaming children in the backseat and couldn’t get the stroller to unfold. At that moment, her cell phone rang. Just hearing the story made both of us nervous. Unfortunately, we had both been there before.

How does imbalance affect your relationship? Richard and I were once in a restaurant in Los Angeles. We looked over and saw two people who had obviously met for lunch, each on their cell phones, talking to other people. A little out of balance, wouldn’t you say?

Choosing balance over chaos won’t make your life perfect, but it will give you a much higher quality of life and deeper, more satisfying relationships. So, while we may never reach a perfect balance, any efforts we make in this regard will be well worth the effort.