- HubPages»
- Education and Science
What Does It Mean Being Balanced and Centered In Our Lives?
What Is Balance, Where Is Center?
We are constantly hearing about being balanced and sometimes centered is added in as well. What does it mean to be balanced? There are so many images that come to mind about what it is to be balanced. There is so much advise on how to accomplish and achieve balance in our lives. We need to be centered to be balanced, so we try first to center ourselves. What do we center ourselves on? Where is the center? Where is our center?
Traditional Balancing Perspective
Is Balance a Teeter Totter Act?
Typically the image that comes to mind when we speak of balance and of being centered is a mobile fixture that hangs a grain of sand away from being balanced at any time. Don't move, we have to maintain the solid center. Don't add or take anything away, I have finally achieved balance between my two sides.
Balance is a two sided aspect. Similar to black and white, or left and right. Like keeping a balance between two political parties so that no one becomes so powerful as to throw things out of balance. The center being the president or leader who makes the final deciding vote. This vote doesn't throw things out of balance, it is the center keeping things stable so that the fine balance is maintained.
Things We Balance
There are many things in life we talk about balancing. Places we feel a need to maintain balance. Everything that needs to be balanced, also needs to be maintained to keep it in balance.
Maintaining a balance in politics and world power is a common subject. Having our tires balanced is of high importance without it we wear everything else out on our car and have a rough ride through life. We have many discussions on balancing career and family, our personal lives and work lives. We balance our checkbooks and finances, sometimes we call it balancing the books. Then of course we need to have a balanced diet and balance the nutrients we take in.
Balance is obviously a very important part of our lives and needs to be maintained in all aspects. With so many scales and so many centers, where do we start?
The Center Of Something
A tire of course has a center and this is the pivotal point used to create balance, There is of course the center stand to a traditional non electronic balance scale. A person can be the center of attention as well as have the capacity to center our focus on something.
The center of something is pictured as a place, a specific point of reference. There is always one center, a pinpoint place with no variance. the center of something is considered absolute and non negotiable.
Another form of balancing
What If Balance Looked Like This?
Another way we can view balance is with an equalizer. Another play on words as equal seems to always signify two parts versus many. With an equalizer the selections can become as diverse as the things we try to keep in balance. The options and possible outcomes become almost unlimited.
Balancing can now become an act of fine tuning. We can be slightly off, but it is not so detrimental as a grain of sand and isn't so fragile a gentle breeze can knock it out of balance. We can sound balanced and feel balanced and be balanced while still having room for improvement. We can add more devices, and tune and re-balance thereby improving the quality of our experience.
Being Balanced and Centered Is A Harmonic Experience
To be balanced is not black and white or left and right. To be centered is not pinpoint specific. Try picturing yourself at the movie theatre, the sound experience is on surround sound, there are many places to get a balanced and centered affect.
Being centered is more a state of being, than a specific location. The center we are looking for is where the best acoustical experience happens. The place we can receive the best quality of sound and experience. We are always in the center (middle) of something, so it is not a matter of being centered so much as it is choosing to be at the center of something that creates harmony in our lives. Many people can be in the same center and have the same experience together, it is not always an individual experience.
Being balanced is an ever growing, every evolving process. We can be balanced with our current equipment and circumstances. As equipment and circumstances change and get added to our experience we also add fine tuning switches that need to be adjusted to intermingle in harmony with what already exists.
To be balanced and centered is a harmonic experience of receiving and sending with the ability to fine tune, and refine.
Articles On Achieving Balance and Being Centered
- Chi Energy Meditation Exercise - Increase Chi and Balance of Body and Mind
Ki , chi or charka energy is the energy of the universe. This energy is everywhere and is like the earths energy it surrounds us its there when we wake up and we are all one because of this energy that...
Comments
This is great. I know out of been out of any sort of reasonable balance for months, but having an affinity for chaos, I've been ignoring it. A friend called me totally out on it in a way that made me pay attention. Normally I say things like, "I know right, I'm crazy," and continue doing whatever the heck I want. But his approach made me rethink that. There's crazy, and there's clinically crazy and I'd like to avoid clinically crazy. Thanks for the hub!
Very well done Hubpage! I just published a series on Balance and maintaining it. There are eight Hubs in the series, nice to see others take an interest in this I think very interesting topic. Love your illustrations here, and you have great advise and make sound common sense. Thanks!
Hi emohealer, I really enjoyed this hub and it really is a subject close to my own heart. You write very naturally and with sensitivity. I have had many 'happenings 'in my life and I think of them as 'an end to one era and the beginning of another.' I am voting this one up and bookarking it. I look forward to reading many more of your hubs. Take care and God Bless emohealer.
- Author
Thank you so much Kmadhav! It is my pleasure to share insights and I am grateful to know when they inspire others as well in whatever manner. I like the idea you present, balancing between brain and heart to break from the world of duality and indecision. Bless you as you fine tune your life and find that balance across all aspects in your life!
A very good thoughts about balance I read on this hub. We need Balance in every part of life, every day. If balance between heart and brain is good it will be wonderful.
- Author
poetlorraine,
Thanks for the kind words, yes is can be a challenge and is a continual process. Let your light shine and may you find harmony within your balance!
- Author
Pacal,
You are welcome! Life does not end, it changes into another plane of existence, ending is an illusion just like detachment. Find the joy and the balance and recognize the connections that bring the warmth of life...Love and Light to You!
balance certainly is not always easy to attain, in any thing in life,.,,,,nice hub
Sue - me knowledgeable? no lol. I'm a seeker who is trying to make sense of the world and survive. That's all.
Let me just tell you that I'm amazed at your depth. I'm very grateful to have found you and that you are talking to me.
People know no difference between knowing and recognizing others whilst actually there is a huge difference. For me knowing means having a concept in our minds of who the other person is while recognizing is when you take the time and effort to find out and really see who he or she really is. It's the difference between living in the past (or having died in the past) and living in the present (or having continued to live). It's all too easy and comfortable to decide we know who someone is because we have an image of them, but this is deceiving ourselves and blocking our way from true and deep relationships.
Unfortunately, I'm in the habit of talking abstractions like this. Also, I'm having the worst period of my life and find it would be such a relief to end it.
So thank you for this conversation.
- Author
Pacal
I am honored to be asked such a deep question, especially from such an inquisitive and knowledgeable person as yourself. You have arrived at an interesting point in your journey of realization, we are all indeed the same and even more so, we are all connected. We may have different perceptions of reality, but the pain is one and the same. It is time for our awakening into recognition of our connectivity and make joy our new universal reality. Thank you for being a seeker as well as a messenger. Love and Light to your journey and may your light shine ever so brightly that we may not only know but also re-cognize one another.
When I was younger I thought detachment is quite possible to achieve. And since I wanted to be in harmony with myself and the outside world I tried to achieve it. Zen Buddhists say, 'Although enlightenment is unachievable, we vow to achieve it.' I thought of enlightenment as something like a completely balanced state and I tried to get there through detachment (read: not attaching feelings or judgments to my experiences). Related to this for me was the Greek concept of ataraxia.
However, as I grew up I started realizing that detachment is indeed unachievable.
I believe everyone is the same, but we all have different perceptions of reality. So painfully different.
Thank you for your answer.
- Author
Pacal Votan:
Very thought provoking!!! Detachment has no essence and is impossible to achieve, only an illusion of detachment. Balance is not lost or found music and sound exists whether it is balanced or not. Any extreme as in fond or spiteful can be as balanced with one or even the other. Balance is a fine tuning process with much tweaking; requiring constant maintenance. Trust is a response attached to a choice, for one your depiction could bring total trust, for another it can bring total lack of trust. This analysis goes into pure perspective. Balance is individualized and perceptualized... what vibrates, harmonizes and resonates for each of us is unique for us alone. We become balanced and harmonic within ourselves as well as balanced and harmonized within each of our different relationships in life. Thank you for asking my opinion and recognizing it as just that...my opinion. I appreciate your provoking my thougth to deeper exploration. Love and Light to you as you achieve your balance and share your light with the world.
The essence of balance is detachment.
To embrace a cause, to grow fond or spiteful,
is to lose one's balance,
after which, no action can be trusted.
what's your opinion?
- Author
Lisa Colorado:
From my experience a Scorpio tends to be very well centered and avoid the deep end. Thanks for replying to the irony of so many mentioning astrological signs in relation to this hub. I hope you found useful information as to the harmonics of balance as well. Thanks for sharing!
I'm a Scorpio. I've gone off the deep end a few times! :)
- Author
Wow, e-Marketing Whiz,
You're insight and thought provoking commentary is greatly appreciated. Thank you so much for visiting, appreciating and adding huge volumes to this page.
As you say, these feelings are occuring in larger waves, and individual is becoming collective. Joy and well-being is the future and has already taken strong root in the now. You are welcome, and Thank You!
Great hub! Well written and insightful...bookmarked.
For me, being balanced or centered has more to do with acceptance of something Larger than oneself...the life energy or God Force which exists in all things, visible and invisible.
I agree that being balanced is an ever growing and evolving process. Also, in my experience, I am centered when I let go of what I believe to be true (letting go of mind and ego) in favor of being a conduit for a Larger Design (of which I am a part) which I have little or no ability to comprehend. While it defies logic, it remains part of a Universal Law which remains as scientifically accurate and precise as laws governing gravity or electricity.
This "harmonic experience" provides "the wind beneath my wings" which I know as joy and well-being. This feeling seems to be occuring in larger and larger waves, both individually and collectively. Thanks a million!
- Author
Thank You ripplemaker, I am interested now to learn more about middle path. Always nice to have additional insight.
Hi emohealer, I loved reading your hub about balance and finding our center. There is another term that came to my mind while reading this, in Buddhism they call it the middle path. :-) Thumbs up!
- Author
DynamicS: I appreciate your visit and your additional input. You're welcome, glad you enjoyed it.
emohealer, I like the contrasts that you give for balance and centre. I also like the way you develop the ideas. Very methodical and clear.
I agree balancing and centering are dynamic and ever evolving. We have to constantly work at being balanced and centred with harmony the ultimate outcome.
Thanks for such an insightful hub.
- Author
Hi Jen, I have read your hubs as you strive to stay in balance and they are always inspiring. So nice for you to know where your equalizer is so you can make the adjutments when you need them. Thanks for your contributions and visits. Continue to let your light shine.
Hi emohealer, I constantly strive for balance, and I have chosen my spiritual life as my measuring scale. When times are good, balance is easy, when times are bad I rely on my core spiritual beliefs to keep things in perspective so that the negatives do not trump the positives. They serve as my equalizer, helping me to make minor attitude adjustments to endure. I love the equalizer illustration in this hub, I totally relate to it!
Thanks,
Jen
- Author
Thank you so much Tony, I appreciate your visit to this hub
Great Hub - thanks. Bookmarked!
Love and peace
Tony
- Author
Tatjana: Excellent summation, I appreciate it. Libras definitely welcome here, he he :-). Any other signs?
He, he, one more Libra is here....
Brilliant Hub - difficult topic to explain...
The best thought is:
"Being balanced is an ever growing, every evolving process."
Thumbs up!
- Author
Universal: Thanks once again for visiting and sharing. Libra signs tend to see the typical counter balance scale as the identifier, being as they are shown this as a symbol to identify themselves by. I know this why? Me too.
I love the "harmonic experience of receiving and sending..."
Im a libra sun sign so I have done a lot of re-balancing in my life!
namaste
29