Balance Defined

 I've been looking for balance for a good long while now.  Some days are better than others, of course, but I'm always trying to get closer to finding that balance.  Other people are looking for balance too.  I've even seen some posts on Twitter and other blogs about seeking "anti-balance".  That stopped me in my tracks.  Why on earth, I wondered, would a person want to live an anti-balanced life?

Well, if you know me, you know that just made me defensive about my search for balance, so I went to check more into it. What I found was very thought provoking.  It made me realize that not everyone defines balance in the same way.  Huh.  Never occurred to me that there could be more than one way to view the idea of finding balance in your life.  It made me think more about what exactly I mean when I say I'm on a quest for balance.  

For me, balance is not equal time for every aspect of my life.  It's absolutely not possible.  But what I am seeking, is to combine all the little things and big things together, so that at the end of the day everything is in harmony, everything is balanced.

The picture I have in my head is of a great teeter-totter.  On one side is the person that I believe God wants me to be, and on the other side are all the little things and big things in my life, added together, trying to achieve balance.  Not enough of something let's that side go up and let's God down.  Too much of something else weighs that side down, weighs me down, so that all the blessings God is giving me can't be fully enjoyed.  It's not a quest for equality in all areas, but more like a grand recipe of time & effort that ultimately seeks to equal out and balance with what my life is intended to be.  Five minutes of quick kitchen clean up added to half an hour of bedtime stories and snuggling.  Throw in an hour or two of paperwork, a little menu planning and prepping/cooking dinner, some time to workout and take care of my body, time spent with my husband.  All of those things are interconnected, and touched by one another.  In seeking balance, I am seeking to find a way to mesh them all together to the best result, so that no one thing is getting neglected, and everything is getting not equal time, but the time that it needs and deserves.

Just as all things do not need or deserve equal time, not all days are the same.  Some days the mom part of the equation needs to take the largest share of my time, and the paperwork and cleaning have to wait.  Other days, I'm not needed so much as a mom, and I can give the housework and job the attention they need.  Each day is interconnected with the next... trying to achieve overall balance and live the life God intends me to.

How about you?  How do you look for or define balance in your life?

May you have a blessed, balanced, and thoughtful day!

If you're curious about the anti-balance thing, do a twitter search for the hashtag #antibalance.  And, by the way, I think we're aiming for the same results, but just looking at it differently.

In Memory

To My Dear, Dear Friend,

I wish today could just be a happy day to celebrate my little one's 4th birthday.
I wish it wasn't also the day we lost you eleven years ago.
I wish my heart didn't break at the memory of seeing the grief on R's face.
I wish your beautiful daughter had you to hug and to hold, her necklace with your picture is a poor substitute.
I wish your son had been given the chance to get to know and remember you.
I wish you had been here to go to my wedding, and become my sister-in-love.
I wish it were all a bad dream.
I wish I couldn't remember the song that was playing on the radio as I drove home to find out what had gone horribly wrong.
I wish your mama's heart wasn't forever broken.

I hope, up in heaven, you know how much you are still loved and remembered.
I hope you can see how much fun our boys (they're cousins, isn't that awesome?!!) have together.
I hope you smile, and your heart melts like mine does, when you see how they've become best friends too.
I hope you're proud of the beautiful, kind daughter you have.  She rocks.
I hope you know that I hate not having you here to celebrate milestones ahead of me!
I hope you can see how awesome your kids are, and how well they are doing.
I hope you know how thankful I am that you introduced me to my hubby. 
I hope you know that you are deeply missed.
I hope you are at peace.

 I wish you were here.

All my love,
Shell

The Really Bad, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Okay, well I really wanted to title this
The Really Bad, Horrible, No Good, Almost No Good, Very Bad Day
but I couldn't do the strike through text, so....whatever.


I had another great weekend, but haven't been motivated to blog.  I've been enjoying life too much, which is good. I've been thinking who cares about the blog anyway, whatever.  But things were really great, besides that, and then three nights in a row of very little sleep (for various un-fun reasons) caught up with me yesterday and I crashed hard.  Headache bad enough to make me want to cry all day, asthma making it very hard to catch my breath, and I just couldn't deal.

It wasn't a fun day.  But one bright sunny spot, was a blog I read by a new friend, someone I've yet to meet for real, but she's great.  She did a post of lists of ten, and on her ten websites/blogs I visit list, she had this blog listed.  That really made my day.  And made me want to write something, and pull myself out of the funk I was in, blog-writing wise.  Thanks, JamieAnn!

Now, my day still stunk, but at least my head was in the right place a little bit!  So, as the afternoon hour approached where I needed to go pick my oldest up from school, I searched for a way to stay a little balanced in spite of how badly I felt physically.  I could either:

A) take the boys home, turn them loose with a snack and go lay down (AKA letting them destroy the house while I wasn't looking)
     -OR-
B) take them home and try to get them to do chores and homework (AKA ending up yelling at them to do what I've asked for the 9th time while they fight with each other about why it's not done)
     -OR-
C) Keep them out of the house, and entertained until dinner.

Now, I have to be honest, choice A was by far my first choice, but seeing that I had worked ALL DAY Sunday to get the house picked up and a little bit clean, I just couldn't bring myself to let it get destroyed so soon.  Choice B wasn't really even an option, because my head hurt so much.  I needed to find a way to make choice C work.  I needed to sit quietly somewhere while also keeping them entertained and out of the house until dinner.  Hmmm... how do you do that?  The park? Too bright (and it was getting ready to storm).  Indoor playarea?  Too LOUD.  Ah-HA!  We'll go to a matinee.

We went to see the 4:20 showing of Furry Vengeance.  Perfect timing.  Enough time to get our stuff from Target and head to the theater.  We got there just before the storm hit too, and although we almost got blown away trying to buy tickets, we made it in without getting soaked.

It was a brilliant choice.  While I fully expected it to be a horrible movie, the boys loved it.  Apparently, it was "slap-yourself-in-the-face-with-both-hands-funny" according to my three year old, because that's what he did at the funniest part.  My oldest loved it too, and you'd have thought he had already seen it from the way he could say what was going to happen next (from watching all the good parts on the previews, I think).  I have to admit, it was pretty bad, but I also laughed out loud more than once.  It was so bad it was funny, I guess.  But worth every penny for being able to sit still in a mostly dark room for 90 minutes with two boys who didn't argue or make any messes!  And, when we got out the storm had passed, and we literally walked in the house 5 minutes before daddy, just in time for dinner.  Total Success.

It's called making the best of a bad situation, I guess.   Finding a little balance.  Making lemonade when life gives you lemons.... 

Whatever you want to call it, 

I hope you find a little of it next time you're having 

a rough day too.