Finding centre… and learning to balance…

July 26, 2013 by My Spoken Heart - Andrea Crowell 8 Comments

Have you ever watched a ballet dancer, as she slowly, gracefully lifts her leg, stretching it way up, all while standing up  on her toes on the other leg? That takes concentration, skill and balance. She must practice, maybe fall over a few times and try, try, try again in order to master that. It’s hard. But most importantly she has to learn to find her ‘centre’. It is the only way to do it. She has to know her centre of balance. She can’t think about balancing or focus on balancing or she will tremble and waver and likely fall over/stumble. Instead she has to focus far off and concentrate on her centre of being. Then she could stand like that for a very long time.

Ever walked across a thin balance beam? Can you go very far or do you always start to wiggle and waver and jump off? It’s tempting to look at where you are placing your feet and concentrate on balancing, but that is why you fall off. If you instead look to where you are heading, pull yourself up inside and find your ‘centre’ you make it across with out issue or even all that much effort. Maybe you even start to show off, hop about, balance on one foot… you know who you are!

Life is a lot like these moments…

It’s a balancing act… a set of scales…

“How?” You wonder. Well you see all the crap around you, and in your life and all the stuff from the world pressuring you, and all the stuff building up  inside you, all that stuff gets piled up on the scales of your life… and it’s up to you to sort through all that stuff and decide what you are keeping, and what you are tossing (yes it is your choice and no one else’s – sorry). And not only that but then you get the task of taking all the stuff you have decided to keep and you get to choose what goes where on the scale. Is it “bad” or is it “good” and the only way to keep your balance is through a lot of practice and finding your centre. You need to keep those scales even or you feel all tense and out of sorts.

So how do we choose what we keep, and what we throw away? How do we decide about the stuff we keep? Is it major? Is it moinor? Is is good or bad? Learning who you are, what you will put up with, taking responsibility for yourself, your actions, and all the stuff in your life, that’s how. It is all about choice. What is allowed in your life and what isn’t. Learning how to tap into your centre can be very hard, (especially if you have been lieing to yourself or playing the blame game). But in the end it is you who are responsible. Only you can decide what you stand for, so really concentrate on it, this is where you find the place of peace – even though getting to the place of peace can actually be very painful and chaotic. But without centre there is no balance, there is no peace, there is no harmony.

Then there is the deciding what really is good and bad… the first step is defining good and bad. Both in the end are actually good. There is the literally good stuff. The happy. The love. The precious moments we share with others. Our great memories. And the bad… well these are the lessons we learn. The things that made us stronger, even though they sometimes hurt like hell (which is why they are actually good even though they may seem bad). The heartaches. The lost friends. The lost loved ones. The mistakes we have made. The things that made us cry but perhaps now we can smile about them.

Some days it seems like there is just so much going on, like the scales are way off kilter. Funny how when things are ‘good’ and we are happy we do not necessarily feel off balance (even though we may very well be) but when things are not going well and we are stressed we definitely notice how off everything is. We can feel the inbalance deep inside, and sometimes we are off enough that others can see it too. Deep down you really do know when you are actually balanced in the calm, you will find it carries over and even though there may be a storm all around you, you will still remain balanced.

This is where I need to find myself. I am being tested in every way and today has been one trial after another. I have felt so off balance, so overwhelmed. I am reaching for peace. I am setting the boundaries and saying “enough”… I am not angry because some-else was a dick (although today some-one really was), I am angry because I am not in my centre. I am not listening to my heart. I am not in control, and I should be, I need to be. I have somewhere along the line chosen to give my control away. I need to gather it up reassess and find my peace.

I have allowed outside forces to stir the pot. In nature this does not happen. If you look at the surface of a pool when it is calm and the water is clear you can see debris lying on the floor of it. When a strong wind comes up it will disturb the surface of the pool. But the debris will still stay settled on the bottom. A few inches below the surface all is calm. The only way the debris can be stirred up is from inside the pool, a commotion along the pool’s floor, a current from within. A current often hidden below the surface that can’t been seen from above, only felt when you are in the water. Only seen if you know what you are looking for.

I am seeking to still the current. I don’t care about the wind blowing on the surface I want the deep to be calm. That is where I will find my centre. That is when I will be balanced.

I just want to say thanks to Tracy Fulks for her post “balance” it really got me thinking (such a dangerous thing most times) without her post this one might not have happened… well at least not right now anyways…