17th Mindful Monday Word-Balance
“If your life was a pie, how big are the pieces devoted to work, family, friends and self-care? If one piece of the pie is taking too much of your energy away from the others, this may be the perfect time to seek balance” This week, Characters of Character chose to focus on the word balance.
What comes to mind when you think of balance? A child might think of the balance beam in a gym class, or putting the book on top of ones head to walk steadily and in balance. These are types of balance for sure. However, today we’re talking about balancing our life, even our choices. The choices we make help put our lives, our decision that we make in balance. So many times I need to stop to give myself a tune up! I ask myself if what I’m doing with my time is beneficial for the day, the week and the future? You see, sometimes I choose to be busy rather than productive. Sometimes I make poor choices and waste my time, only sometimes though! I’ve become much more aware of who I am, and better yet, who I want to be. This takes balance!
It seems that our society has become more ‘obsessed” with material possessions rather than time spent getting what is important. Mind you, this varies for all of us, but for me, balance means to be able to spend time with my family first. For me, and this did take me some time, but, I did not need to keep up with the Jone’s. I confess that I may have looked with envy to somebody who drove a nice car, but, I was grateful that I had a car. I may have been filled with envy at another person’s beautifully furnished home, but, I was grateful we had a home to furnish. One friend called it ‘eclectic” meaning there was a little bit of everything, quite the variety if you will! And she was right! I had an end table that was my grandmas, a chair from a friend, etc. No particular style, just a lot of ‘stuff’ that meant something from someone. To this day, I don’t have a particular style of furnishings?! The point that I’m trying to make is that even though things were ‘out of place’ to another person, they were in balance to me. The balance of having great memories and ‘things’ from those I care about. It’s important to remind ourselves that our balance is much different from somebody else’s. There are people who prefer material possessions, it’s what they work hard for. There are people who do without so that they may not have to work so hard. There is a balance, you just need to know yours. Mind you, you also must be aware that you’re out of balance, that something is missing, or something just isn’t right, there isn’t an alignment per say.
What are some things you can do to balance your life? I’d like to start small by balancing our day to start, which turns into days, weeks, months and years.
Be fully present with who you’re with, if it’s family, co-workers, a classroom, etc.
Begin your day with a good mindset, for this will follow you during the day
Know your ‘happy place’ be it a walk, singing, dancing, art, etc. for this will help balance your emotions
Write it down! Use the old fashioned Pro vs. Con approach to find your balance
As an adult, we can usually feel when we are off. When we are stressed with work, family, commitments, etc. Then, we can figure out what we’re off balance about. For example, not spending enough time on our self to just rest and take care of us is one, and when we feel this we can begin to eliminate what is taking the life out of us and find a balance. In human nature, we all have our ‘crabby’ days, but what cause us to be crabby? Something is off balance is usually the reason, and we can work on this and find solutions to feel better and be better. But, how does a child find their balance? I think when we expose our children to as much as we can in this life, allows them to figure things out. It’s important that they understand that everything is not funny, everything is not always the right choice and that there is a right way and a wrong way. While we are there when they are young to pick them up when they fall, when they fail and when they need support, this is not always the case as they grow into adulthood. Therefore, we need to teach them about balance. These are a few simple suggestions:
Cook with your children! Yes, cook! Show them that when you don’t measure the proper ingredients, the outcome is much different. Show them that when there is not a balance, the results will be much different.
Play games with your children! Yes, play games! An example might be Jenga where you take a peg out and place it elsewhere to find the balance. Show them that when things are not balanced, again, the outcome is always different.
Talk about the roles in your own family. Everyone plays an important role to help balance the family. For example, when a parent is under the weather, the balance is off because there are extra duties put on someone else in the family. We find the balance to get things done because we love our family and want things to be back to ‘normal.’
Allow your child to feel the differences when things are balanced or not. When we feel the ‘unbalance’ in our lives and can understand that something is off, we are more likely to work on a solution to find balance.
TELL me and I forget, TEACH me and I remember, INVOLVE me and I learn. Benjamin Franklin
Click on the image below and share it with your children, or, work on it for yourself! Balance is so important, take the time to reflect on what balances your life and if you need a tune up, or are you balanced. Starting your day off in balance is much more productive and tends to lead to a more balanced week, which turns into a balanced month, year and you get it….life. It’s all about balance in order to move forward in relationships, work, health, friends and even adventures! Click here to print out the template below.
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