Seeking Balance
Believin tagged me and said she wanted to know how I seek balance. And quite frankly it's not even a question I've ever asked myself, at least not in those terms. I recall a few years ago when I developed with the doctor diagnosed as benign positional vertigo. For few weeks I couldn't lay down, sit up, stand up without feeling that I would fall over. When the doctor made his diagnosis I asked him what to do to avoid the feelings. He said, "Don't put your head in those positions that make you dizzy." Thanks, Doc!
Generally speaking I am a happy guy, optimistic even when things around don't seem to make any sense or weigh so much I can carry them myself. And I am a people guy; I absorb energy from those around me. I go stir crazy when I am not able to be with people for long periods of time.
It's sort of funny in that while I generally think of the people around me as those who provide balance, I also realize that quite often they are the ones to throw me off balance. I have long believed that the proper way to conduct my life and discipleship to Christ is to love and serve other people. I try to do that; I even enjoy doing that, for the most part.
Sometimes I need to be apart from the masses and comforted by those that are truly close to me. There are times when Jesus took his closest disciples into places of quiet to be rejuvenated. For Jesus that included Peter, James, and John. For me sometimes that includes my immediate family, but most often it is only my wife that I need and want to be with. In a physical and emotional sense there is no other place that I turn for balance. When she is there I seldom stumble, but when something's wrong with her I am most insecure.
Of course there are some things that are neither physical nor emotional, they are spiritual. In those times when I'm dealing with personal spiritual imbalance, I have a few passages of Scripture that I go to as reminders of God's love and provision.
