Keeping Balance in Your Life

The last few days I've been thinking about this, and as often happens I read a post by someone on a forum I frequent on this very same topic just this morning.

One of the reasons I've gone a couple of days without making a post is because it's been unseasonably warm here, about 80 degrees. So I cut the chains tying me to my computer and my husband and I took some time for ourselves. Sat in the hot tub in the middle of the day, took a nap, took the dog for a long walk on the beach. Shut down my constantly whirling brain for the majority of the last couple of days.

Am I a little more behind in all that I have to do? Yes, but I'm also feeling less frazzled and more in balance with life again. After all, what am I working so hard for if not ultimately to be able to enjoy life more. But on a day-to-day basis I'm defeating that purpose by not taking time every day to do things that I enjoy. Putting off until tomorrow...we only truly have today, so there needs to be a balance between working towards a goal and enjoying the fleeting moments that we know for certain we have in this life.

Just 6 months ago we lost our 12 year old dog, a beautiful Border Collie that absolutely craved human interaction. She could have cared less about the other dogs at the beach, she was interested in saying hello to their owners! As I would sit typing on my keyboard she would come over and start using her nose to push my arm off of the keyboard. "Hey, give me some attention!" she'd be saying. And all too often I would scold her and tell her I was busy and to lie down. Some days she'd comply, others she would literally push her way up onto my lap, all 50 pounds of her, in about 2 seconds. There was no ignoring her then! I would laugh and give her some attention and then tell her she had to get down.

She fell ill while we where on a trip back east, 3,000 miles away and although we managed to nurse her back from the edge we only got another 2 months with her. And I regret every moment she asked for my attention and I was too "busy" to give it to her.

And yet even with that experience so fresh in my mind I still find it difficult to find the right balance in life. I still find myself putting off until tomorrow. But I'm working on it...you should, too.