Last Monday I was 15 minutes from home, driving through Seattle’s morning traffic on my way to a dentist appointment when that small part of my brain that notices discrepancies kicked in.  “This is the wrong day,” I thought.  I pulled off the freeway, merged with a mess of traffic on Pill Hill, and labored up the hill until I found a place to pull over.  I called the dentist’s office and got a recording telling me the office was closed for the day.  Proof positive of my mistake.  So I turned around and made my way home, but not before becoming stuck in construction traffic.

 

That was Monday.  On Tuesday, the first day of my summer course, the overhead projector didn’t work.  On Wednesday I got confused driving a mile from my home, taking the wrong route to get somewhere I know well.  So much for the calm, peaceful life I imagined for myself.

 

Actually, it’s been like this for several weeks, an accumulation of stressors and missed connections and things “just not quite right.”  Work has gotten bigger, small pleasures have become even smaller.  I’m suddenly preparing a class syllabus, struggling with scheduling confusions, racing to keep pace with therapy preparations.  My life is looking suspiciously like a working person’s life, and I am out of balance.

 

How did this happen? Not that long ago I was starting up this blog, writing about seeking a new balance in my life.  I delighted in long stretches of unfilled time, and I gratefully put aside the kind of schedule associated with work demands.  I imagined myself a new woman (remember--I was “re-drawing” my life).  Apparently this new woman was still attracted to work, because I agreed to teach lectures in a former course, and I began seeing children in private speech therapy.  Then I took on a summer teaching, because I wasn’t ready to give up my beloved counseling course.

  

If this sounds like someone leaving retirement and returning to work, there was an element of truth to that.   I wasn’t working anything close to full- or even half-time, but I suddenly had work demands in my life, and as most people know, work has a way of laying claim to time.  Add in laundry (so you have something to wear to work) and lunch preparation (so you have something to eat during the day) and the extra fatigue that comes from getting up earlier, and suddenly you have a life tilted toward work and away from the expansive life envisioned.  There is the balance gone, along with regular trips to the gym and time for writing website entries.

 

So here I am, facing a summer with more commitments than are wise.  I have had a few moments of being horrified at what lies ahead for the next few months, but all is not lost.  I may have lost my balance, but I have not lost a skill that serves me well:  the ability to self-correct.  I am paring down to essentials, and I have my eyes wide open as new choices come my way.  This summer I am cultivating my skill in saying “no,” because without that skill at critical moments, I will always end up overcommitted and weary.

 

If I’ve learned anything, it is that balance is an elusive goal.  It is not a skill mastered early on and retained through life, like writing cursive or riding a bike. It is a way of being, an attitude toward life and its priorities, and a mental awareness that you maintain as you make decisions and take action each day.  It is keeping in mind your limits and being willing to act in a way that respects those limits.  And it is something that must be searched for and found each day.

 

Not surprisingly, I find that creating a balanced life is not a one-time event with a permanent outcome. The world is full of riches for me, offering many enticing opportunities.  My old self is lurking there, ready to get me overcommitted, forgetting that my new life requires unfilled time and a slower pace.  I am sure I will have to draw and re-draw this new life of mine many times, that I will find and lose and then find again the balance I am seeking.  I can only trust that the days when I feel balanced will eventually outnumber the days when I feel lost, and that if I find myself driving along the wrong road, I will simply return home and start again.