I was thinking today about finding balance in life. I’ve probably mentioned it before but it always appears to be something that alludes me. In one moment I’m dropping everything and running off on an adventure, and the next I’m craving the stability offered from a home that if I’m honest I’ll struggle to create because I’m always running off on the adventures I yearn for after too long in a stable home like environment. Now either that’s an inability to find balance between the two or it’s an example of someone not being happy with what they’ve got and always believing the green happiness grass is just around the other corner. It’s also just an example of someone who wants it all, and probably another few examples of all sorts of things. For the sake of this though lets stick to the idea that I am unable to find the required level of balance.
There once was a time in life that like everyone else I believed that if I just did, saw, bought, met, went to x, y, z then happiness would be sure to follow. I was not conscious of that belief but certainly it was unconsciously there playing a part in my decision making. I am not suggesting for a second I’m some enlightened being who has managed to rise above such things because I still crave all those things in my own little pursuit of happiness but am aware that with their receipt I won’t be taken around some magical corner that happiness was simply hiding behind. It is also probably most likely that accepting this will bring me closer, as well as not actually looking for it in the first place, but as I love missing the point in the moment and clearly only know it intellectually I’ll continue this self-defeating quest.
By not constantly imagining the answer is around some instant corner nobody has ever seen let alone looked around, we must surely stop craving these extreme changes in life, such as finding the answer in some foreign land or by the hearth. Importantly also it takes away from the present, in that you’re neither in the foreign land or at home if your mind is always looking out for some hypothetical feeling of happiness it imagines it should be experiencing. You forget to actually enjoy the place you’ve made the effort to go to or the contentment and security of home when you take the time to relax. I suspect were we to enjoy these things properly we may stop craving them so much when we don’t have them anymore. Have you ever drunk that last mouthful of coffee without realising before looking in the cup to find there is no more and feeling unsatisfied. Compare that to really taking the time to enjoy and appreciate that last mouthful; you are content with what you’ve had, you feel satisfied. Why would life on a larger scale be any different.
Observations and Misunderstandings 