Balance. For me it means trying to be in the present. Not focusing on who I used to be, or what life was like previous to today. Not anxiously awaiting the future and all that is coming. Instead, balance, right now, means being okay with the day, and who you are in the day. I absolutely love yoga. I've been going to yoga on and off for years. Over the last several weeks, and long time friend and myself have been going to a fairly gentle yoga class. Absolutely being in the moment, focusing on breaths, focusing entirely on myself and the position I'm in, is balance. A peace that brings balance.
Several things happened at once for me this year, that brought the idea of balance into my mind. First, I wanted to realistically lose weight this year. One of the things that I did was begin looking at the successful journeys of those that had weight loss surgery. For some reason, that sent me into an absolute anxious and fragile state of mind. Literally for a week I was hypersensitive and cried daily, while is not like me at all. It was after that fog lifted that I realized that road was not for me, and the best way to move forward would be to leave that option and obsessed mindset in the past. From there, I began to work out and focus on tracking what I was eating.
Next, I became a bleeding heart. Well... more so than the normal. I wanted to save everyone, in every place on Earth. I thought about wars, refugees past, present, and future. I became very obsessed with the question "How do I make the biggest impact?". I thought about specific ways to donate/volunteer/etc. I began obsessing, once again. Soon I had realized that I was obsessing over micromanaging potential donations to challenge myself to help the most people. I stopped. Then I acted. I set aside funds for this year to be used towards donations. I broke my year into 4 parts: Goodwill for clothes, Food Pantry, The Call (foster care), and Angel Tree Children. For me, this is what spoke to my heart most. I let go of all other worries, and dedicated focus to spending less on myself and budgeting more. Which was also helped because of this:
I watched a documentary called The Minimalists. Basically, it was exactly what it sounded like. Variations of people who were doing more with less. Specifically, within the documentary it was said "if it doesn't add value to your life, let it go". Well this was in the middle of purging through my house, so could not have came at a better time. Basically I rid my 1 bedroom apartment of 10 bags of clothes, shoes, and misc. items. Then I did it for my mom, who also purged her closet and home of approx. 10 bags. Then I offered to do this for my granny, who got rid of at least 12 bags.
3 people, at lease 32 bags of unneeded items.
I was very proud of myself and my family for getting on board with giving to others, granted this is something that has never been hard for my family, as we used to (and occassionally still do) swap trash bags of clothes. When I was younger this was so huge, because we did not have money to go buy just any outfit we wanted. Trash Bag Swaps were awesome and I feel like I'm in a place to give unto others.
So with everything that has happened over the past 3-4 months, I have found myself obsessing less, and focusing more. Is it a perfect balance? Of course not. But, I know that I have changed my perspective and my process. I feel much more peaceful and grounded. I'm thankful to be myself, love myself, and now have a healthy mindset of what it means to make healthy decisions to move myself forward.
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