One Year Closer to Balance

[mrissa]

Well, here we are. One Year Closer to Balance. I woke up from dreams of an out-of-control space station again, for the umpteenth time in the last year and a half. Just in case I was likely to forget what today is, I guess.

My balance-related plans today include:
--very light yoga, since I fell out of a couple of poses yesterday
--going over the credit card statement
--lunch out with friends/quiet dinner at home: balance time with friends and time with family, time with others and time by myself
--work on revisions and work on new fiction
--charitable donation and muffins for neighbors so I'm not spending it all thinking of myself

Are you observing my balance holiday with me? Let me know what you're thinking and doing towards balance in your own lives.

Comments

[txanne.livejournal.com]

I'm actively trying to find FTF friends here, instead of clinging to my invisible Internet friends.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That's a good one! So many of my in-person friends are on lj (and a substantial number of my lj friends are around Mpls in person) that I sometimes forget this one.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

I'm balancing up my work-week by taking today off; and I'm correcting something that has been dragging at me for months as an undone task by getting it done.

There may also be a post about yoga, balance poses and astigmatism. Once I have got Outstanding Obligations out of the way and the scales swing a bit more level.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Neat! Thanks. I was hoping somebody would get to balance things by taking today off, but "Hey, you should take off work and not get to see me or anybody else as far as I'm aware or do anything particularly fun unless you come up with it yourself," didn't seem like the best offer a person could make.

[panjianlien.livejournal.com]

The eternal balancing-act of work-work and domestic work.

Attempting to balance convenience and effective use of time, also convenience and environmental stewardship.

Trying to balance jam tarts. Achieving maximum jam with minimum potential for sogginess, you know.

And continuing to try to teach the Big Fluffy Dog to balance a dog treat on his nose. He wants to please me and do what I ask, but it's SO HARD when there is a dog treat RIGHT THERE.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Jam and sogginess are hard.

I was thinking of trying my great-grandmother's wondermous oatmeal sugar cookies as a jam conveyance one of these times. Hmmmm.

Poor Big Fluffy Dog. Monkeys come up with the strangest requests.

[clarentine]

Yesterday evening before I left work, I considered everyone's worries for the economy and jobs and the budget (national, state, local, and personal) and did a little graphic urban renewal with masking tape on the old, bubbled carpet. Not much - just a few simple line drawings with rays and arrows and sun symbols - so we see the art and not the ugly carpet. As an installation, it's pretty small, but as a statement, well, I guess we'll see. *g*

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Neat! I hope you get good responses.

[roane.livejournal.com]

This week I've embarked on a quest to balance sitting in front of the computer with moving my body in fun and energizing ways. And also, to find a balance in what I'm eating. So far, so good!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yay quest!

[p-j-cleary.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to bring creativity back into my life, to balance out work and exercise. This weekend, I'm recording three stories for a podcast and/or audiobook, which has the additional benefit of reaquainting me with a number of actor friends of mine.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Neat!

I have "record reading of story" on my list, but we'll need to time the recording carefully with other ambient noises minimized, and also I might hate doing it. So we'll see.

[jenett]

I woke up at 2:30 this morning, and could not get back to sleep, which is not the best way to start a celebration of balance.

I am about to go to work, to a day of professional development talking about racism, pluralism, and various other related topics. When I'm done with that, I am going to come home via the library and cat-sitting, and spend the evening taking care of myself. (I anticipate a long bath and bed, but it might just be fall into bed time.)

Tomorrow is my unscheduled day this week: it involves some catch-up housecleaning, but also napping, time rping with a friend, and other similar things that make me very happy.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yay unscheduled day!

[atdt1991.livejournal.com]

Playing less in the way of computer games. ;)

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

Putting down the computer NOW and going to bed.

[caoilfhionn.livejournal.com]

I'm still looking for a sustainable basic balance between work and play after grad school crashed the scale. "Work" covers not only my job, but also things I do to maintain physical, mental, financial, and sometimes relationship health, and "play" covers work-like things like creating things on deadline and volunteering, as well as reading and catching up on four years of BSG and hanging out with loved ones. In my head, it's sort of a complex chemical equation. And even if I can balance that equation, it will go all out of whack any time something new shows up to steal atoms away from it or add to it, and I should be prepared for that. Life isn't sterile. Or maybe I should stick to string metaphors, because I haven't practiced chem in a long time.

I'm also trying to be a better employee, because I slacked a lot while my mind was on school. So I'm off to try to restore some balance by spending less time on LJ and more on layouts.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yes, oursin was writing about this, how balance is not static but dynamic.

Happy Day of Balance!

[careswen.livejournal.com]

I'm celebrating Valentine's Eve tonight, which represents a careful balance.

Re: Happy Day of Balance!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Have a happy!

[diatryma.livejournal.com]

I'm going to sort laundry, which is only a balance in the sense that all my laundry-sorting space has been eating by the sewing machine. Then do laundry, which really needed to be done last week, and go to the store to buy fruit snacks and bread (one is nutritious, the other is mostly sour grade-school nostalgia) for the ski trip tonight.
Skiing is definitely balance. It's also not always easy to stick with the friends one came with, especially if one of them has never skiied.

This weekend, I will balance 'writing the oh god thesis' and 'denying that work exists at all, with optional knitters' breakfast and aikido'.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Skiing and aikido, that's a lot of physical balance required!

one year closer to balance

[bplutchak.livejournal.com]

I hate house work and I am now working from home. I also have arthritis in my knees, which makes some movement painful. Today, I'm going to give up on the notion that since I'm self-employed I still have to work 8 to 5. I'm going to break-up the housework into small tasks and work them in between one hour segments of work. This will get me moving about and hopefully the knees wont't be as stiff at the end of the day, and my house will be a little cleaner. Good luck to you!

Re: one year closer to balance

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Oh, I hope this works! I am definitely not an 8 to 5 person myself--best work in mornings and evenings--so I hope you can figure out which schedule works best for your knees and the rest of you.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

I am observing! As you know, Marissa, I am in Texas with Amanda and Leah. I woke up, did some work on Shadow Unit, said goodbye to Amanda before she went to work, and now I am hanging out on a couch with a stinky sleepy puppy.

Later, there will be socializing, food, climbing, and possibly more work and reading.

Also, attempts to embrace serenity.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The stink is love. She is too full of love to keep it all in, so some of it comes out as stink.

Yah, I don't believe it either, but it was the nicest explanation I could come up with.

[daharyn.livejournal.com]

I think that my life generally tilts towards a feeling of "must", so I decided to observe today by thinking about "want" -- not so much what I want to do, but how I want to feel. Today I would like to feel successful and friendly and physically centered, so I started my day with a long walk, am doing a few things I find challenging (holding office hours, working on a fellowship application), am connecting with my friends (photo project, coffee this afternoon, and a meeting this evening), and doing some planning for the near future. Also, I'm excited because I'm going to have Chinese for lunch, which I've been thinking about doing for weeks but haven't yet managed.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yay long-delayed Chinese lunch!

Sometimes it's really good to keep in mind what we're doing the stuff we're doing for. Glad you could articulate that so clearly for yourself today.

[framefolly.livejournal.com]

My 2009 resolutions require me to find some balance. I'm glad I am reminded of that!

Basically I need to balance my very great joy in instant gratification, and my long term well being that comes from doing things that don't pay off right away.

Last year I gained 10+ pounds from changing my lifestyle after moving to a place where walking is not a part of my natural routine and where I can nonetheless find really yummy food! I have been trying to balance my need to have. s'mores. now. with my knowledge that if I went to take a walk, I'll actually enjoy it after a while.

Same with work -- it's been too easy to let deadlines slide, to do things that are the equivalent of mental junk food -- and I am looking to find some self-discipline to balance that out.

Any advice would be most welcome and appreciated ;) .

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I am fascinated with the "once I start doing this, I'll enjoy it" phenomenon: why do our brains do that to us? Silly brains!

[toadnae.livejournal.com]

Today, I'm accepting that I may need to go on medication for my diabetes and it isn't failure. It's part of getting my own balance back.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Definitely not a failure. Sometimes our bodies are recalcitrant about various things. Taking care of yourself is a success condition, not a failure.

[arkuat]

I posted about it.

[rosefox]

I wrote about having a million acquaintances and few friends and not knowing how to bridge the gap between the two, and someone I don't know at all responded with some really helpful advice. I'm hoping to use it to create a little more social balance in my life over time.

On the physical side, today is day three of viscous tickly ear drops, which will presumably eventually restore me to a binaural state, and day one of antibiotics and fluconazole, which should restore the proper proportions of various of my bodily humours. It's not how I wanted to observe the day, but it's appropriate!

EDIT: Oh, and I'm waiting for my boss to respond to my strongly-worded suggestion that PW publish more stories (which is to say, any at all) about race and racism in books and in the publishing industry. It's a long slow road between here and balanced coverage, but I really want to get us started down it.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry that the humours are acting up, but I'm glad you've got a good grasp on rebalancing them! Thank you for doing this with me.

[pameladean]

I posted about it too.

P.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I tried Tree pose again, even though I hate it. And I was, in fact, thinking of you.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The hateful thing about Tree pose is that falling out of it hurts. If you fall out of Crow, you have done a somersault; you may be lying there dizzy after, but somersaults are at least safe. But there are a dozen ways to fall out of Tree that pull something funny.

Possibly the second person was inappropriate here. Hmmm.

[pnkrokhockeymom.livejournal.com]

I'm observing your balance holiday with you. That was my plan, before. Things happened, though, all manner of things, and I'm officially out of cope.

--morning at hospital with MIL, FIL, ex, bf, doctors, case managers, therapists, and phone calls with lawyers;
--afternoon at office, working for our lawyer and working for my clients,
--pick up Pupster and take him to doctor's with me to deal with newly acquired surprise UTI;
--home to cook Pupster dinner, play some Rockband with him, and then fall asleep over the deposition prep outline;
--bf returning by 11 to provide balance and watch TIVO'd Top Chef.

I would like to bake some cookies, too! I have ingredients but I don't think I can move anything else.

[marydell.livejournal.com]

hugs for you! Balancing the needs of our parents with the needs of our children is one of the tricksier things about being middle-aged, innit? With our own needs in the middle. Sounds like your day is right on target.

[seagrit.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately today I am balancing the work with the sick and trying to get stuff done while also trying to stay/become well.

We will work with Amber tonight on standing on one foot. :)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

What an adorable thought for me to keep in my head, gleeful niece on one foot!

[jbru.livejournal.com]

I'm doing a delicate balance act between remaining hopeful that I'll get some sort of gainful employment soon and despairing that I have no current gainful employment. I'm doing some traditional job searching, but I'm also branching out and learning some new things that might bring me income in other ways.

On the relationship front, I'm having a nice balance of new relationship and nesting. Going out, staying in, and reclaiming parts of the house that have slipped into chaos.

Overall, it feels pretty balanced and I hope that you're closer to balance than even you realize!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I hope that some of the job things work, whatever the balance of traditional and non- turns out to be!

[lotusice.livejournal.com]

Being in this new job has balanced out my life unbelievably. I get to be creative for a living, and that's amazing, and has been great.

One of the big stumbling blocks I have here is being surrounded by highly technical men. It's very easy for me to dub myself "creative" and slack my way out of the more technically challenging tasks.

To balance both their view of me and mine, plus to balance my skills more in general, today I took on the entire development of a tool/method, not a creative aspect of the game.