There is so much talk in the world today about "finding balance."
Well, I'm just feeling so unbalanced lately... I really need to just even my life back out.
'My life will be so much better when I find a man who balances me.'
I need to find a balance with my job...
Blah blah blah blah...
Either I am way more like my father than I care to admit or "having a balanced life" is pretty much a load of garbage. Much like the load of garbage sold to young girls about there actually being a perfect man out there in the world. Or the load of garbage sold to teenage boys that Axe Body Spray makes beautiful women want you so much their clothes fall off when you walk by.
My life has never been "balanced." And I don't ever foresee it being that way. I am passionate. And I am a visionary. And I am an artist and a mother and a wife and a triathlete and a Christian and a friend and a sister and a professional presenter and a teacher (kind of) and a cook and a laundry-doer and a coupon-clipping grocery shopper and a DGL Coordinator and a...
And if I fit my definition of "balanced," I would be able to wake up at 4 am to write for 3 hours before the kids wake up, do a load of laundry every day (yes, get it into and out of the washer and dryer, folded, ironed, put away...), do the dishes directly after every meal, have the dishwasher unloaded and ready to have dishes put in it, have a healthy breakfast, lunch, and dinner, work out to train for a triathlon for 1.5 hours every day, play with my kids every day. Teach them something every day. Read every day. Clean every room of the house once a week. Volunteer at the nursing home once a week. Present for MOPS once a month. Present for CollegeBoard once a month. Spend time talking or participating in an activity with my husband every day. Call my mother, father, brothers, sisters-in-law once a week. Get Daniel to school on time with his hat and mittens and snowpants. Remember everyone's birthdays and send them cards on time. Plan ahead enough to take a decent family picture for Christmas cards before Christmas Day rolls around. Spend time with friends. Go to play dates a couple times a week. Go to church. Volunteer at church. Be in a book club. Be in a writer's group. Blog....
Balance, to me, means that I am able to do all of the things I love AND all of the things I have to do just to get by.
And, you know what?
There are 24 hours in a day. I am a raging lunatic if I don't sleep. And something's gotta give.
If I am going to ever finish this book, then my kids will wake up some days with no clean clothes; the dishes will sit in the sink until Jeff comes home; dinner will be something I can make in 15 minutes, the amount of time that I spend working out will be much less than the amount of time I spend drinking coffee and staring at a blank computer screen, and sometimes I will forget the Hershey Kiss roses we made for Danny's teacher.
And when the book is written, I will spend a large amount of time working out, training for a tri. And I won't write. And then it will be baseball season and Jeff will be gone lots of nights, and I'll drag the boys to a bunch of baseball games...And after the tri is done, then it will be August, and I will present for the CollegeBoard in Texas all August long. And then I won't have written for a couple of months and I'll feel all "unbalanced" because I'm not using my brain. So I'll seek out several groups of people to help me use my brain...
And this is just how life is. Season after season... Busy with everything, then bored and lonely with nothing. And chasing after balance just makes me feel like I'm doing it wrong.
But I don't think I'm doing it wrong. I am just doing my best to live the life that God gave me.
And that looks more like Ecclesiastes 3. 1-8 than as my friend, Matt Colley says, "a rolling ball of zen in a world of chaos."
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
With that, I will stop this pointless chasing after balance and just live trying to get the timing right... Healing when it is Healing's season, Laughing when it is Laughing's season... Writing when it is Writing's season... Playing when it is the Playing season... Last time I checked, none of those are listed on the calendar, so the beautiful thing is that I will only know what season it is when the season arrives.
And while I have a favorite season, I only love the Fall because it is so refreshing after a long hot summer, and I only love the winter because you can't ski without snow and it doesn't snow in the summer. And I only love Spring because it means the Winter is over....
While this season may be long and difficult, inspiring and insightful, it is a season, and unlike the dirty laundry and dishes, someday it will be done.
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