Feel the wobble? Is something important about to topple?

I think God’s going to come down and pull civilization over for speeding.

— Steven Wright

Sometimes we overdo.  Sometimes we have too many plates spinning, too many demands stuffed into too little time and, the next thing we know, we’ve slipped into mindless busyness and something important is on the verge of toppling.  Maybe we got into the swing of something, doing and doing until we lapsed into a workaholic-trance. Maybe the abyss of our To-Do-List’s administrivia kept us working, working working.  Perhaps deadlines loomed large… Or, perhaps we actually fell under the thrall of an awesome condition known as Flow:

Flow is being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz.

— Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

But, regardless of what’s brought us to this brink, we owe it to ourselves to intervene before something important takes a topple! Bloggist Zorka Hereford underscores the risks of OD-ing:

…if you were to exercise too much (hard to imagine) and not take time to rest and replenish, you would injure yourself. If you read or do too much mental work your body would lack proper circulation and fitness level.

If you spend too much time meditating or relaxing, your brain waves slow down and you would lack mental agility. Whenever you overdo it in any aspect of your life you lose perspective and balance.

Thankfully, there’s a really easy remedy:

Push yourself to be 100 percent “on” all the time and you’ll wear out fast. Give your brain a break by splitting up your focus into two-hour chunks with 15 minutes of goofing off in between. You’ll keep your creativity and mental acuity sharper than if you powered through.

— Jim Loehr
The Power of Full Engagement

Interesting.  Doable.  Beneficial.  So why do we resist?  Habit.  Mindless autopilot.  What can we do about it?  We often hear that balance is the answer…

But Is Balance the Answer?

Here are two coaches who don’t think so: The late Thomas J. Leonard Founder, CoachVille/School of Coaching who is quoted as saying “Balance is overrated,” and life coach, Robert Pagliarini, who recently wrote an article that supports Leonard’s claim. In A Balanced Life is for Losers, Pagliarini cautions:

This is not to say you are a loser if you have a balanced life, but that the act of spreading your resources across several areas means that there isn’t one area of your life that is benefiting from the extra time and attention.  For example, what if famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma decided to balance his time and training across the cello, guitar, drums, and bagpipe? My guess is that he would have been great at each of these, but not exceptional at any of them. Yo-Yo Ma would be Yo-Yo who?

He helpfully goes on to explain how to effectively balance our lives:

You have a limited amount of time and energy to invest…You can’t do everything you want. If you start this hobby, it means you will have less time for that hobby. If you go out with your friends tonight, it means less time with your family. If you start a business in the other 8 hours, it will mean less time for TV.  Since you have a limited amount of time and energy to invest, how can you best invest these resources to have the strongest impact? … Get good across the key areas of your life, and then get great in one… [by following] these four steps:

1. Identify key life areas.
2. Assign current rating. Rate each area of your life between 1 (miserable) and 100 (perfection) to see where you stand currently.
3. Prioritize top area. In which area do you want to focus more intensely over the next quarter or year?
4. Allocate time/energy. Once you’ve identified your priority area, should you disregard the other areas of your life? My recommendation is to work on getting to 75 or 85 in as many areas of your life as possible, but overweight your priority area — whatever area is most important to you.

So it would seem that balance is, indeed, the answer but even balancing must be tempered.

Balance is not better time management, but better boundary management. Balance means making choices and enjoying those choices.

— Betsy Jacobson

Topple Proofing 101

Two experts, two ways to topple-proof your doings:

1. Get good across the key areas of your life, and then get great in one. – Pagliarini
2. Split your focus into two-hour chunks with 15 minutes of goofing off in between. – Loehr

I’ll add this one, last little lesson: when toppling seems imminent, don’t get discouraged, simply recognize it for signal that is: it’s your very own warning system telling you that, once again, you need to do your two-step-topple-proofing routine.  And always remember:

…there are times when achieving balance may not be possible. For instance, you may have a family or career crisis that needs your immediate and undivided attention. It may require an exceptional amount of your time and resources. When that happens, do whatever it takes and when things go back to normal take time to refresh and rejuvenate yourself.

— Zorka Hereford

When the wobbles threaten, remember your Topple-Proofing Lessons: goof off while you go for great and when you must, go with the flow…