Balance Through Purpose
Date Posted: December 22nd, 2008
Something I often struggle with is striking balance in my life. I want to have a passionate fulfilling career AND a passionate fulfilling family life. Not a simple thing since both tend to take hold of me at the most inopportune times. Like when I’m snuggling with Aaron I get some ideas for a post and when I have an afternoon set aside for writing, I’ll start thinking about all the chores that need to be done. Inevitably I have no inspiration then. From what I can tell, it’s virtually impossible to tell my creative side when to turn on and when not to turn on. And when I tell it to turn leave me alone, it’s less likely to turn on in the first place.
A simple solution is to just listen to my creative side, but then I run into the risk of becoming obsessed with my career, which is definitely not something I want. It wouldn’t be so bad if I didn’t intend to have kids, but when Aaron and I do one day have kids, splitting attention between creativity and needy little ones is not something I want to have to struggle with. So right now, whenever the urge to write strikes at an inconvenient moment I feel a tremendous surge of negative feelings like guilt and fear no matter what I choose to do. Not exactly stuff I want to be experiencing.
This morning I came up with a solution that I’ll be experimenting with: find a purpose that encompasses all essential aspects of your life. Then the different parts of your life will work in synergy instead of against each other.
How to Use Purpose for Balance: An Example
If I could only use one word to describe my purpose it would be “clarity”. LVC is a pretty obvious expression of this. But what about other parts of my life? The more I think about it, the more I find that clarity applies to more than just my blog. It applies to my relationship, it will apply to raising children, and It even applies to my early music endeavors. How can you clearly appreciate the beauty of life if you’ve never been exposed to something as wonderful as Monteverdi’s Lamento D’Arriana? 
Practically everything I do is in the service of developing greater clarity for myself and inspiring greater clarity in others.
So how does this help me with balance? Basically everything I do is toward the same end, so there’s no guilt if I follow my inspiration. Nothing is inconvenient. If I get strongly inspired to write whilst I’m spending time with someone I care about, both options, staying with the person or disengaging and taking the time to write, are aligned with my purpose. It doesn’t matter which I choose, I’m still serving my purpose.
I have a sneaking suspicion that purpose driven creativity can be tamed as long as whatever it is you’re doing instead of acting on your creativity is in service of your purpose. It certainly works in interpersonal relationships. If a friend has to cancel a get-together, I don’t mind if she has a good excuse, but if there isn’t an excuse (or a bad excuse) I feel less happy about it.
How to use Purpose for Balance: Things to Think About
The first step, of course, is to find a guiding purpose… which is easier said than done… and deserves its own post. 
As a way to test if the purpose you’ve come up with is to try applying it to important aspects of your life. Does it genuinely fit into your career, your family, your hobbies? If something you do isn’t in service of your purpose, do you mind choosing your purpose inspired creativity over it? If you have negative feelings about choosing your purpose over it, explore the feeling more. It may signal that your purpose isn’t quite right or it may signal an unhealthy attachment to whatever it is you’d have to say no to or it may be something else entirely. Whatever it is, it’s something you need to consider.
Once you have a purpose that you think fits well actually apply it to your life. When you’re about to spend a chunk of your day on something, ask yourself “Is this in service of my purpose?”. Let that guide your actions. That doesn’t mean that everything you do must be directly aligned with purpose (eating, sleeping, and getting dressed in the morning are only indirectly supporting my purpose) but it does mean that we should be aware of what is and what isn’t. After a while, if the purpose you’ve come up with is actually your purpose, you’ll naturally start to align with it. It’s you, after all.
Methinks that when we’re living in alignment with our values and purpose, the idea of “balance” changes. It’s no longer about choosing between mutually exclusive actions, but about making sure your life has enough variety to make it interesting. For the next couple weeks I’m going to very consciously apply this idea to my life. Expect a report from me in around the new year.
