Balance, It's Complicated
“Okay, he’s never going to set the world on fire, but he’s very balanced.”?I heard that said about a colleague and realised how often the word balanced is used as anything but a compliment. Balanced?! How boring! Like steady. Certainly not exciting like the photo above.
I used to have an inner picture of balance as a tightrope-like walk along a sharp ridge, where it was excruciatingly easy to fall down one side or the other. “Oh Judy, you’re too sensitive, toughen up!” “For goodness sake, Judy, be more aware, consider people’s feelings!”
It felt that you couldn’t win. I thought there must be a kind of sweet spot at a precise point between too sensitive and not sensitive enough. So, did that mean a compromise? Did I need to be quite sensitive, but not too sensitive? Middling? It made sense, but it didn’t feel like a satisfactory answer.
I’ve just finished Regenesis by George Monbiot (a brilliant vision of a new future for food and for humanity). In it, he mentions a balance that he personally finds hard:
“One of the most difficult life balances is summoning enough
self-confidence to carry on, however many times you’re knocked back,
but sustaining enough self-doubt to listen to criticism and
change course when necessary. p 127
It struck me that he wasn’t talking about any half-way place, but about having the availability of two seemingly incompatible things at the same time. Both-And!
It’s not a new concept. I explore the idea in The Art of Communication . For instance, take our eyes. Each eye sees a slightly but distinctly different image. How illogical, how bizarre. Yet, of course, we use this important difference to be able to see in three dimensions and get a perspective on what we see. This is no small advantage, and it comes about because of differences.
But we don’t live in times that cope very well with this concept of both-and. Instead, people increasingly prefer to take sides. For instance, TV and radio exchanges are set up between people with opposing points of view, with the intention of keeping the argument polarized. Nice and simple, combative,?but prevents anything unexpected from developing. And we’re so used to it, we don’t notice how much is missing.
For example, taking sides, we follow a linear process: this because of this or that - b) follows a). If I have the opinion that you are selfish, my brain comes up with various confirmations: I’ll decide that you are selfish because: because you forgot an important appointment; because you grabbed a work opportunity that everyone wanted; because you never thanked me for help I’d given you – I’ll compile a mental list, working backwards from the original thought, and the weight of different examples might seem to prove my point. But I could instead develop my thinking by adding contrary examples - you were selfish today, and also you showed generosity on other occasions; or I’ve witnessed you being selfish and I’ve also seen how much you care for your children. This way will leave the issue less cut and dried but will offer me a richer portrait of you and maybe an opening to new thinking.?The mind has to stretch to something radically different to embrace this kind of thinking. All deep thinking requires the conjunction of irreconcilables.
For instance:
This way of operating allows you to do the impossible - like music, which is neither the notes nor the silence between the notes nor even both together, but what comes about from the union of notes and silence. In other words, it explores relationship.
Brian Cox’s interview with James O’Brien last month is relevant here. (Full Disclosure 8 Aug 2022 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PM20qZ5YXE&ab_channel=LBC – my link is to a 5 minute excerpt, but the whole interview is worth listening to). Cox talks about how running a country has become so adversarial, and suggests that we’ve forgotten what we’re supposed to be doing, which is to understand what it means to be human, and find ways to ‘get along’. “We’re not supposed to be winning the argument actually – putting forward a vision of society and winning - as much as making sure this wide mixture of opinion we naturally have in a country of 60, 70, 80 million people is accommodated.”
He goes on to use the electron as an analogy. (Ah, the shapeshifting electron!) “Oppenheimer in his Reith lectures talked about quantum mechanics,” explains Cox. “Think about an electron, a single particle, a point-like object, a grain of sand. Or, in some circumstances an extended wavy thing, that fills the space that it’s in. So, you’ve got these two things that look contradictory: point-like object/ extended wavy thing. The truth is it’s neither of those two things; it’s a very complex behaviour that this thing has; these are two good analogies to think about it, and they’re applicable in different circumstances. They look like ideas that are completely at right-angles to each other, mutually contradictory, but you have to hold them both in your head – that’s the skill. And nature forces you to hold those two things in your head simultaneously in order to get a better picture of the system.”
And Openheimer said, “So it is with politics.” You have to understand that human beings have individual needs etc. but also human beings have a social life. They look like they’re pulling in different directions, but it’s never either/or; you have to hold both in your head simultaneously. It’s complicated.
So, balance - work/life balance for instance – a life that makes room for everything that’s important to us without pushing us over the edge: it isn’t about either/or. It’s more complex than that.
He drew a circle that shut me out,
Heretic, a rebel, a thing to flout.?
??????????????????????(You or me, scoundrel, life or death! Populism.)
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!?
?????????????????????(You and me, celebrating our differences! Pluralism)
Edwin Markham
You can breathe in and feel there’s not enough air for you and me in your tight little space. Or you can breathe in and open to the whole world and the sky and realise that you can have it all for yourself and have it all there for everyone else. And that’s just a single balanced breath in the story of your moment, and your hour, and our day, and the world’s year and the universe’s eons of time.
Breathing’s never a bad start.
Go well,
Judy
PS Well! Another reference to balance by the author of “The Web of Meaning”. (another great read!):
“The principle of balance would accordingly be crucial?to an ecological civilization. Competition would be balanced by collaboration; disparities in income and wealth would remain within much narrower bands, and would fairly reflect the contributions people make to society. And crucially, growth would become just one part of a natural life cycle, slowing down once it reaches its healthy limits—leading to a steady-state, self-sustaining economy designed for well-being rather than consumption.”
Jeremy Lent: What Does An Ecological Civilisation Look Like?
AND MORE:
Coaching or Therapy?
When you are looking for personal help, where do you go? So often, we only reach out for help when we are well and truly stuck. But reaching out at any time can give us valuable and powerful resources that would be hard to gain on our own.
A coach – I am a coach – can help you in many vital ways to move forward – in relationships, in your career, in your personal confidence and sense of self.
But when your issues run deep and trace right back to childhood? Then I’d contact Juliet Grayson, and in particular the Pesson Boyden method that she often uses.
“It’s the only thing that I feel really works, and that’s the stuff I learned from Al Pesson, to actually give people a visceral experience of what it would have been like as a small kid to have people be there for you. It’s absolutely transformative, says Bessel van der Kolk, about the method Pesso Boyden System of Psychotherapy (PBSP), when talking about Trauma and Abandonment in his book The Body Keeps the Score.
More information on PBSP including upcoming courses here .
I continue to promote my TEDx Talk, as it’s more relevant than ever in today’s black or white, “for us or against us” world.
Your voice is full of meaning and tells people a lot about you. Yet, we all change our voice at times to project an image, and when we do, we don’t quite reach people. When you dare to show up for real your genuine voice conveys far more than words alone. The vibration of your sound tunes into something genuine within the other person and they respond with real connection and trust – vital for solving our human problems today.
Books
The Art of Communication – “The authenticity of our relationships depends on our willingness and ability to truly communicate and not only to converse.?The Art of Communication?is a wise, compassionate and enormously helpful guide in how to do so.” Dr. Jude Currivan, cosmologist, author of?The Cosmic Hologram.
The Art of Conversation – highly practical help with the whole business of how to interact successfully and confidently with other people.
Voice and Speaking Skills For Dummies – Everything you wanted to know about voice and speaking in a book that’s easy to dip into to answer all your questions.
Voice of Influence – The book that became the name of my company, and which has remained popular, translated into 9 different languages. How to get people to love to listen to you.
Butterflies and Sweaty Palms – The book for you if you ever suffer from performance anxiety. Get rid of your nerves now! The information is tried and tested, and highly practical.