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Balance! How do you keep the person you are in balance with the universe and with your environment? All those different aspects of “who you are” — they’re like pieces in a puzzle.

Some of those pieces are our work or our play — some of them might be our “happy” selves — some of them might be our “sad” selves. Still others might represent the way we rest — or the way we treat our bodies. It is when all those parts of “who we are” come together in harmony that we find ourselves in balance. While balance is necessary to have a satisfying, energetic, and joyful life, only you can determine what balance means to you.

In order to arrive at your place of balance, it is necessary to determine what makes your life important. So often the demands of life can cause us to make choices that push us off balance. Being off center can have a detrimental effect on our habits, relationships, health, and career.

How can we make those determinations? One way would be to take the various aspects of your life and decide which of them is the most important to you — and then what is the next most important, and so on. These aspects might include family, solitude, activites that help others, healthy eating, personal indulgences, exercise, your job, self-improvement activities, etc.

Perhaps some of these may be taking up more than their fair share of your life, leaving you short-changed on other aspects. Perhaps finding ways to spend less time and energy on these time-consuming, but less fulfilling aspects will give you more time and energy to devote to those that truly fulfill you.

A balanced lifestyle is simply a state of being in which one has time and energy for obligations as well as for pleasures. It is having the time and energy to live well and in a way that is gratifying to you. With its many nuances, balance can be a difficult concept to integrate into your life. Living a balanced existence, however, can help you attain a greater sense of happiness, health, and fulfillment.

~~~ DBL-R

As I was thinking about what I would write today, I realized that the decision-making process itself was a “next step” process. There were so many directions I could have chosen. Then I got to thinking that this process is something that we all go through, all the time, as it relates to our lives.

We are constantly facing a myriad of choices as we move from one phase of our life to another. Sometimes the choices are clear and well defined. Other times we face some of the most difficult decisions trying to figure out what to do next. Finding the most direct route to fulfillment and realization for your life isn’t always easy.

There are many ways to discover your “next step”. Many times your inner voice will be your best counsel. Let’s face it, when that voice is saying it’s time for a change, the chances are that you need to trust yourself and your intuition to know what’s best for you.

Perhaps it would work best if you take the time to review your own life experiences up to this point. This may often give you insight as to what hasn’t worked for you in the past as well as what you would like to pursue next. Maybe you’ll get a glimpse of your best path.

Another method that might work is to look at your own skills — or what will it take to satisfy your passions — and then think about what steps you might take to utilize those skills to fulfill those dreams and desires.

Using meditation, journal writing, studying something new, either on your own or taking a class, or embarking on a new creative activity that could provide even more insight as to what your next step might be.

So often we don’t take those next steps out of fear. Yet, beneath that fear is your own inner knowledge that always knows which step you need to take next. When you think about where your life is going — let it be as easy as putting one foot in front of the other. You’ll soon see that your next step is the one that was right in front of you all along. All you have to do is put one foot forward and take that next step.

~~~ DBL-R

Although the idea for this article came from one of my favorite newsletters, I have done quite a rework of it. However, since I’ll be quoting from it to some extent — I feel as though I’d better give credit where credit is due. It’s not really a reprint, but this is where I got the idea …

Reprinted with permission from Kickstart Today by Martin Avis www.kickstartdaily.com

How many things do you do a certain way today because your mother, or a friend, or a business associate taught you to do them that way?

Do you believe that doing those things that certain way is based on true fact, or is it just second-hand information that has been passed down to you?

In his newsletter, Martin tells this story … it’s a great story and one that I’ve heard several times before …

We humans are so easy to program. Those things that we learn over the years are so often accepted as gospel. All those little behavior patterns that we use in our lives, both in business and in our personal world are, for the most part, patterns we learned from someone else — and if we were to investigate further — the person we learned them from also learned them from someone else, and so on down the line.

As Martin points out in his article, one of the old “standbys” in the business world is “The customer is always right!” But is that true? Does that still apply today? Aren’t there times when the customer is absolutely dead wrong? Wouldn’t it be better to say, “The customer you want to keep is always right”? There are some people out there who will drive you nuts with their unreasonable demands on your time and patience. You would probably not want to keep them around.

When we adopt someone else’s habit or pattern without questioning whether it makes sense, we have allowed ourselves to be programmed. We truly didn’t learn anything.

Plus, as that story about the roast points out, it wastes an awful lot of meat!

Take a look at those things that you do because you’ve always done them — or because someone else has always done them. Analyze them to see if those ways are the best ways. Is there another way to tackle the same thing that might take less effort — or less time — or less money?

It could be that the way you were taught was the best way at some time in the past, but if it isn’t the “best” way today — if there is a “better” way and you choose not to adopt a change for yourself, you’re not only stuck in a rut — you’re probably stuck in someone else’s rut.

~~~ DBL-R