Balance

Spent a lot of time the last few weeks struggling with too many things at one time. Some I brought on myself, others I had to do to get where I want to be, and some just came out of nowhere. End result, however, is that now I have way too many irons in the fire and too many things pulling me in too many directions at once.

I had a plan, once upon a time, and it was a good one. But I've gotten sidetracked recently, and it's time to get things back into focus. Problem is, I'm overwhelmed with all this other stuff that pretty much is keeping me from devoting my full attention (read: time and energy) to what I really need to do.

It would be like carrying a really heavy backpack. If you keep adding more weight while you're standing on solid ground, feet planted, you could carry a tremendous amount of weight. The load could be stacked above your head with heavy weights, and as long as you keep your balance, you're fine. But the minute you get off-balance, lose your footing, slip to one side... the load shifts, and everything comes tumbling down. And once that happens and you're off-balance, you just can't carry the same amount of weight, and you can't get your balance back without first lightening the load.

So I've started cutting some of the extra things out of my life. Some of them I won't miss at all; others have been very hard to let go. But until I can get my focus back - my balance, as it were - I need to pare down to the bare minimum and get moving again so I can eventually pick up all the things I can't carry right now.

I know this is all kind of philosophical and obscure, but I guess I'm in one of those moods. Bottom line, on a practical level, is that I have to focus on just a few critical things in life for now until I get back on track and know for a certainty that I'm headed where I want to go.

Something's gotta give. Something will give one way or another. So I need to decide what, before everything collapses without me having a say in it.