Learning Balance

In September, this blog will be 5 years old. Since I appear to be out of new ideas, it seems like a good time for a retrospective of the last 5 years. (Incidentally, this is my 792nd post. So I don't feel too bad that the inspiration is waning!)

In my first post (which is so bad, I can't even bring myself to link to it), I mentioned why it's all about balance. That seems worthy of a first retrospective post.

For most of my life, I was not good at balance. I was often accused of being too tunnel-visioned, too emotional, just generally too much.

I certainly did learn that too much anything was usually a bad thing.

It's great to have passion, ambition, to give of yourself, but after much trial and error, I aim for balance. (Which is not to say I succeed, of course, but at least the blinders are off now.)

From the time I was 6, I devoted my life to theatre. I was always in rehearsal or performing (or both). My dream was everything. Until it wasn't.

It wasn't that I stopped wanting it, but wanting it and getting what you want aren't always the same thing. And certainly not in show biz.

There's a great song called "A Way Back to Then" from Title of Show that describes this:

But the mundane sets in
We play by the rules
And plow through the days
The years take us miles away
From the time we wondered when
We'd find a way back to then

Then came marriage(s), and those babies in their carriage(s). Then came divorce.

When you're a single parent, you simply cannot be tunnel-visioned anymore. I had to strive for balance.

I couldn't stop being me completely, of course. My girls have grown up listening to musical theatre from the womb. I have shared with them my passions. I show them by example by being involved in my community, by spending time with friends and family, by juggling our wants and needs, that there is a way to have it all by having it in smaller increments. 

While seeing the value of balance may seem elementary to most, it wasn't for me. 

Balance is something I wish I'd learned to want at a much younger age, and I hope the girls have taken in these lessons.