Balance in the Bigger Picture

After dinner, I was downstairs with Luca in the playroom. We were painting and playing tools and building a racetrack. It was the most ordinary of nights—and I found myself feeling so grateful for it.

For coming home from work and cutting up sweet potatoes and chopping peppers and setting the table. For talking to John while Luca built a pile of stuffed animals and jumped into it, over and over. Even for the yelling when Luca threw the rest of his food on the floor, saying he was “all done.”

Our nights can sometimes be all over the place, and so often we’re tired and have to-do lists full of all the things that likely won’t ever even get done. Sometimes having a regular, old, plain, routine kind of night is exactly what you need.

Life feels so different sometimes these days. Things that I would have prioritized at one point, I just don’t now. Things that I would have jumped into full force feel like they just have to wait a little longer. Goals and thoughts sometimes have to hold on for a second while I find my footing—or instead they just have to be put on pause for more than a few seconds.

I wrote this whole thing a few days ago that wasn’t coming out right, but it was basically about how I’m learning about balance in a new way these days. Not balance in the loaded sense, of course—that awful word that gets dressed up in better work benefits and conversations about coming in an hour late and then staying at hour later. Not in flex time or time off.

Not in measured time, I guess.

I'm learning about balance in the bigger picture. That some things work right now, and some things will work better later on. It’s a fine art this balance—figuring out what to go for and what to hold off on. Figuring out what makes the most sense in this given moment, in this season. Will you regret, or will you not even bother looking back.

And, no matter what, it’s hard. It’s hard to remember that life isn’t linear. That this may be your season of racetrack building and construction paper coloring or your season of 60-hour work weeks or your season of loud music and late nights.

That it’s compromise, in the best sense of the word. It’s betting on yourself, really. 

And maybe that’s what these regular, old, plain, routine kind of nights help me remember.