RHG MagazineTM - September 2021 © All rights reserved.
manage to do all those jumps and flips on something that is only four inches wide? Practice? I’m sure it’s much, much more than just practice. It takes hours and hours at the gym to learn the basics and progressing to more complicated maneuvers. It takes discipline, conviction, confidence, pride, persistence, perseverance, determination, guts, and gumption. And those are qualities we all have to have to realize any of our goals.
The question is, what do we do when we fall off our balance beam in our daily life? I recently missed a couple of zoom appointments and was very disappointed in my juggling skills. I had to take a step back and revisit my priorities. I had to address my boundaries and why I wasn’t holding firm to them. I had to ask myself was I saying “yes” too often so that I didn’t disappoint anyone, or did I honestly believe agreeing to that call was the right thing to do?
Does that sound like familiar territory?
It’s that “good girl” syndrome again. Our wanting to be nice and wanting to be fair. However, not at our expense.
After apologizing and rescheduling the missed appointments, I sat down with myself and looked at how I could make an Olympic-minded agreement around priorities and boundaries.
“Balance is not better time management,” businesswoman Betsy Jacobson tells us, “but better boundary management. Balance means making choices and enjoying those choices.”
I vow to pay close attention to my choices and hold firm my boundaries. I want to enjoy my choices. To do just that, I’ve come up with a strategy where I give myself permission to check in with me before committing to anything in my life, from an invitation to speak to a fun girlfriend getaway.
Here’s how I check in:
I will…
1. Be sure that I have all the specifics when I’m responding to a request.
2. Allow time to assess whether this is a should do, must do, a maybe, or not right now.
3. Examine my current commitments to be sure I’m not overscheduling myself.
4. Have compassion for myself and remember that I can’t comply with every request, and
sometimes the only answer I can give is no.
5. Review electronic and paper calendars daily to track all my commitments.
Over the years, I’ve taken course after course and signed up with various coaches to learn writing techniques and best business practices. Despite the level of skill and the variety of tools at the disposal of anyone I sought help from, it came down to what I alone was willing to do to help myself. What was I willing to do to empower me?
I can only imagine the discipline
it takes to become an Olympic
athlete.
I know what it takes to empower
me to have an Olympic mindset and
strive for balance in all my choices.
I hope I have given you a suggestion
to help you find balance and to live
a life unleashed.
Mary E. Knippel, best selling author, your writing mentor, and inspirational speaker uses her 30-years experience as a journalist to support you to take pen in hand to unleash your story worth writing. Visit Mary's website at https://yourwritingmentor.com.
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