Finding Balance: Now and When

I wrote this personal piece a year ago, however, I did not feel it was appropriate to post until now. Not because I believe I embody balance a year later, but because I have put into practice more habits to address my needs and priorities and situate me in the present. The practices that help root you in the present look different for everyone, but feel free to reach out if you are curious about some of the tools that have helped me. Additionally, if there is any practice/book/podcast/quote/etc that has aided you with mindfulness and/or a more purpose-filled life, please share!

We have all suffered the experience of a long-anticipated goal being met, the short-lived thrill, and then the abrupt return to status quo. For many years I thought that once I could quit running and high school had ended, I would be happy and free. The bliss that marked the end of those chapters lasted about as long as it took for me to recover from a bad race or a bombed test. This is especially disheartening given that I spend so much time fearing failure when it seems to take as much time to bounce back from as a great success. The worst possible result? A life spent worrying over and anticipating future triumphs and dreading the slip-ups along the way.

Especially online, where everyone’s triumphs are made public, a great pressure befalls on us to do something important with our lives or to be in a constant state of “happiness”. Where is the balance between striving to perfect our future and living fully in this moment, which is the only guarantee after all?

The first mindset is to shirk responsibility, live fully and embrace the consequences of that freedom. If you’re like me, and you need the promise of the future to keep you motivated to go forward, then you’ll probably find that kind of mentality unsettling after a few days. The opposite mentality is to sacrifice the present and the joy that it may hold for future happiness and security. This has been historically easy for me to fall into because it masks unhappiness and fear with productivity. Instead of addressing my current dissatisfaction, I was working toward a future.

Between these two extremes, as with all things, you can choose balance. Most mentalities are good in moderation and this is certainly no exception, but balance in this way is particularly difficult because it requires an awareness that you are potentially compromising happiness and a future, albeit in radically smaller ways. It requires that you redefine fun and happiness. Are you ever really having fun if your whole life is about satisfying the now? Can you only be happy when you are having fun or when you’re striving toward a bigger, better life? The answer to these questions may seem like an obvious “of course not”, but I cannot imagine that I am the only person that finds living this balance to be challenging and much more nuanced.

I don’t claim to have answers or a secret way to achieve this balance. I have ideas and practices that help tip the scale, but I know something for sure: you will not live your life purpose(and)fully until you are aware of its temporality. Train your senses to the joy of the mundane as well as the exciting, take joy in the labor that your dreams require instead of anticipating only those final moments of triumph, and know when you need to put your dreams on hold to live the only moment you are guaranteed.

Annalise