Finding Balance
Written by Invictus Athlete Josh Littauer
Have you ever been stand-up paddle boarding? Or gone out for spin in a canoe, kayak or any other small boat? What is the first thing you notice? It’s not steady. Right? You have to find the middle to get balanced and sometimes that’s not an easy task. There are hundreds of examples of this principle: tightrope walking, skiing, skateboarding, slacklining, cycling, and the list goes on. The point is, each of these things requires balance – no different than life.
Balance is one of those things that is hard to get and even harder to hold on to. Balance takes constant adjustment and readjustment over the course of life and has many ebbs and flows. And more often than not, just when you think you’ve found it, you lose it again.
The other morning, I was playing with on an Indoboard (look it up, super fun!), and was quickly reminded of the difficulty of finding your center and getting stable. As I was getting balanced, I could feel every move I made replicated in the way the board moved on the roller beneath it. One second I was in the middle and then, before I could blink, it would throw me off the side. Getting balanced takes focus and many small movements. Once found, staying there requires even further minute adjustments. These are simple analogies but very applicable to the balance of life.
What does balance look like?
Life is about balance. To be clear, “finding balance” is not just a cool way to package slacking off or taking the easy road. I don’t mean that you shouldn’t go hard after things you want or dedicate ample time to improving your work, fitness or relationships. To me, balance means finding what amount and combination of each element in your life works best for you to keep life in equilibrium. Take a minute to notice that small phrase, “what works best for you”. Everyone’s a little different and one combination won’t work for all. So what does balance look like? This will be based on the individual, but I think it lies where you can pursue, maintain, and grow in multiple areas without causing one to begin to suffer.
What effects can imbalance have?
Bottom line, can you give yourself fully to multiple tasks and see each grow or benefit? Let’s say you want to move forward in your career and you put in 60 hours a week at the office, plus a few on weekends. That’s fine. But does your relationship with your significant other or family suffer? Maybe you want to become more fit, so you spend an extra hour at the gym everyday. But does the extra stress on your body makes you less effective at work? In these examples we can see where an excess of one thing can lead to not enough of another, and somewhere between is where balance lies.
I can speak from experience on this one because I have been very imbalanced before. If one area of your life takes away from another, or possibly two, then there is an imbalance. For about three years, I trained as a competitive CrossFit athlete, and during that time I can say I was pretty imbalanced. I put so much mental and physical energy towards my training that any amount of work to make a living, and the relationships I needed to keep me balanced suffered because of it. I rarely got together with friends, was making little to no money, and my emotional state was often affected by my training. Needless to say, I was out of balance. It took lots of work and plenty of readjusting, but in the end balance has benefited all areas of my life.
How to Achieve BOTH Your Goals & Your Balance
Again, being balanced does not mean slacking off or holding back! By all means, when you decide you’re going to do something, get after it. Go all in. Just make sure that the other priorities in your life are ready to help you balance it out. Sometimes keeping balance doesn’t require putting ample amounts of additional time into something, it just means upping the intensity. Want to improve your business but not work 90 hours a week, try working 40 but eliminate the distractions to improve productivity. Want to improve your fitness but still get time with your significant other? Keep the same hour in the gym, but push your pace that much harder.
Balance is key, but so is getting the most out your days, weeks, even years. Priorities and situations in life will change, but don’t let that throw you off balance. Readjust, then prioritize and execute.
If you have questions about balance let me know! I am fascinated by this area and would love to help give some tactical points to help you keep things balanced.
As Always: Stay Humble. Stay Hungry.
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