A Fine Balance

A few years ago, I read a heart wrenching book entitled A Fine Balance. The book followed four characters in the recent past in India as they confronted life, its despair, injustice, and inhumanity in order to discover humanity and a continued search for hope.

While my life is far less unjust than any of the characters chronicled in the book, I still reflect upon the title. Some liken life to a juggling act and you pay attention to the ball in your hand at the given moment while the other orbs float precariously above your head, ready to come crashing down, hopefully not all at once. Lately, however, I've preferred the balancing act metaphor. I walk a tight rope and hold in my hands weights of responsibility. To stay on the rope sometimes I shift to the responsibilities in my right hand and other times to the left. I struggle to list them because lists denote priority. So, in no particular order I hold in my hands: a child, a marriage, my health, my spirituality, teaching, research, volunteer work, family, friends, maintaining a household (subcategories include laundry, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, picking up, putting away, organizing).

On this tightrope, and with these responsibilities, I have evenly distributed the weights, so that it feels like I can't give one up or I'd be off balance and fall. Sometimes, however, one responsibility takes on a new heaviness and the others all get moved to another side. (A sick child, for instance.) I know many mothers feel this way. I also know many graduate students who feel this way. I am both. This isn't a complaint. I have chosen both. I am living with my own decisions. Certainly, I do question them often. Dropping out is something I consider. Ignoring my health too. Or, feeling so busy and overwhelmed that I choose to let my spiritual connection languish. I have neglected friends and family (hopefully, not too egregiously.) On any given day the state of my house denotes delinquency in that arena. My responsibilities at church are sometimes very low on my list of things to do and I never quite get to them. Abandoning my family isn't on the table, but there are days when they don't get my best, or rather my best effort is quite meager.

I feel empowered when I realize that I am living the life that I choose to live. It somehow seems okay to let my own research and dissertation progress slide in light of the time I decide to dedicate to my family. Sometimes it isn't though. I don't regret the choices I am making. I just wish I were better able to balance it all. Life does seem like a fine balance. But, like most things, it isn't something that you figure out once and are done for good. Balance requires constant adjustment--that's what I am not so good at. Possibly because it requires energy and I am often tired. Really tired. A women I knew in NYC and admire a lot has started a blog on the topic of Work.Life.Balance. I find it interesting to read other people's stories. What I am learning is that everyone has a different balance that works for them. There isn't one a-hah answer for all situations.

So, while I have a husband and family and friends cheering me along the tightrope I'm walking, and while others are on tightropes of their own, I am going to have to discover what works for my situation (okay, OUR situation--the hubby is very much part of these decisions). And that will require constant monitoring. Knowing that and applying it are two very different beasts. Sigh.

To my friend who recently asked about my research progress, does this long-winded response answer your query? Not much to report on that front. Right now I choose family, teaching, and I'm even making modest efforts towards my spiritual and physical health. My house could use some work, but we do eat. My research is falling lowest on the totem pole these days. That does need to change some and there are two new developments to help.

Zoey starts two day a week day care next week. I have very mixed emotions about that decision, but Kevin and I both recognized I needed a little more time and we couldn't afford our one day a week babysitter on a two day schedule. The second development is a big unknown. I hope with a fellowship or two next year my own work of researching and writing will take the place of teaching in my balancing act. It is still my choice how to weight priorities, but the decisions I will have to make are very dependent on the circumstances that other people control. For now, I'm busy balancing on my tightrope to be too worried (although still worried) about the composition of the tightrope of the near future.