Balance, The Magic Word

There is a word that has been coming back to me again and again lately.

Balance.

One of those words we use all the time and that seems incredibly simple, until we actually stop and ask ourselves what it really means.

Does being balanced mean always being calm? Never getting angry? Never being afraid? Being able to keep everything under control? I don’t think so. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I become convinced that balance has very little to do with stillness. Perhaps it has much more to do with our ability to return.

For years I have followed with great interest the work of researchers and authors such as Dr Joe Dispenza and Dr John Demartini, and one of the concepts that has always fascinated me is homeostasis: the extraordinary tendency of living systems to continuously seek a state of balance.

Your body does this every moment of every day. It regulates temperature, blood pressure, blood sugar, hormones, sleep and energy. Your autonomic nervous system itself moves in a continuous dance between activation and recovery: the sympathetic nervous system prepares you for action, while the parasympathetic system supports rest, digestion and restoration. You don’t need to choose one or the other. You need both.

The problem begins when you lose your ability to move between them. When being on alert becomes your normality. When you keep running even when there is nothing left to chase. When your body remains prepared to fight a battle that, outside of you, may have ended a long time ago. Chronic stress is perhaps the most obvious example. Remaining in a prolonged state of activation can interfere with sleep, digestion, mood and concentration and, over time, affect many aspects of your wellbeing.

But this is where, for me, the most interesting question begins. What takes us out of balance?

Life, of course.

Things happen. People hurt you. Things don’t go the way you imagined. You lose, you desire, you fail, you fall in love, you become afraid. But you don’t only respond to what happens. You also and often primarily, respond to the meaning you give to what happens: your beliefs; your memories; your expectations; your fears. The story you build, almost instantaneously, around an event.

Two people can experience the same situation and live through two completely different inner realities. And this is where I believe the concept of balance stops being merely physiological and becomes something much greater. It becomes a practice of awareness.

It reminds me of one of the oldest and most fascinating teachings in the Buddhist tradition: the Middle Way. The Buddha arrived at this insight after experiencing two extremes: first a life of privilege and pleasure, and later years of severe asceticism and deprivation. He discovered that neither led to liberation. The way was not to be found in either extreme. It was in the middle.

But I think there is something important to clarify here: the Middle Way does not mean living life halfway. It doesn’t mean being less passionate, less engaged or less alive. It doesn’t mean refusing to choose. And it certainly doesn’t mean becoming indifferent. It means not becoming a prisoner of either extreme. Not living permanently in action, nor constantly retreating into stillness. Not identifying completely with success, nor being destroyed by failure. Not desperately clinging to what you desire, nor endlessly fighting what you fear.

Perhaps this is what balance really is: being able to remain fully inside life without constantly being swept away by it.

And when I look at it this way, I begin to see our relationship with the body differently too. Perhaps many of its signals are not enemies to fight, but messages to listen to. Sometimes the body seems to be saying: "Look here. Something is asking too much of you. Something is keeping you constantly on alert. Perhaps there is another way to look at this story..."

This does not mean, of course, that every physical symptom has an emotional origin, or that awareness can replace medicine. It simply means recognising that body and mind are in constant conversation, and that the way you live and interpret your experiences also plays a part in your wellbeing.

And this is where, for me, a completely different relationship with yourself can begin. No longer a relationship of struggle but, instead, a relationship of collaboration.

You can learn to notice what activates you before you react. You can become aware of the stories you tell yourself. You can question beliefs you have considered truths for years. You can ask yourself whether what you are seeing is really all there is to see.

Because one of the things I continue to learn is this: my perception is not necessarily wrong. Very often, it is simply incomplete.

When you are hurt, you mainly see what you have lost. When you are angry, you mainly see the injustice. When you are afraid, you mainly see the danger. When you desperately want something, you mainly see what is missing. And perhaps finding your balance again simply means widening your perspective. Not denying what you see, but allowing your mind to see what, in that moment, it cannot yet see. Making room for another piece of information, another interpretation, another possibility. Perhaps even another question.

So today, I would like to leave you with one. Where in your life have you been living at one extreme for too long? Where are you fighting when you could be listening? Where are you controlling when you could be trusting? Where are you running when perhaps it is time to stop? And where, instead, have you remained still when life is asking you to move?

Perhaps we are not meant to find balance once and for all.

I think of a tightrope walker crossing a wire suspended high above the ground. They don’t stay balanced because they have found the perfect position and somehow manage to hold it. They stay balanced because they keep moving. An almost imperceptible shift to the right, a tiny correction to the left. They listen to their body, they feel the movement. They respond, they adjust, they continue.

Balance is not the absence of movement. It is the ability to notice the movement and adjust your step.

Perhaps it is the same for you. You don’t need to learn how never to lose your balance. You need to learn how to recognise when you have. To listen, to adjust and, each time, to know a little better the way back to your centre.

Because perhaps a balanced life is not a life that never wavers.

It is a life that has learnt the art of returning to the centre.

(Pic credits Charles Elizondo for Unsplash)