How great of a feeling is it when you sense things are going your way? You’re hitting your stride. You have clarity on what you want to prioritize. You feel healthy and strong mentally and physically. You feel like you have great balance moving from moment to moment in life.
Then disruption enters. Some type of Decelerator (check out Battle with Decelerators) moves in to disturb this perceived balance you had.
It’s inevitable. We feel like we have things figured out, but balance can exist only be for a limited period. We can savor this balance all we want but to think this balance will be maintained indefinitely is being naïve to all the Decelerators out there ready to disrupt.
Well, that doesn’t sound like much of a motivational or optimistic type speech to start off 2025. It’s true it’s not the rah-rah type of message but it’s also true that many of us have fallen into this trap. Don’t get me wrong, optimism is something I’m a big believer in but just as important is being prepared (and bypassing the naive part).
For example, you may be starting the year off feeling great about where your 2025 is heading. Holiday break may have provided ample time to reflect, prioritize, and reset as you build momentum into the year. Just as you feel balanced moving from moment to moment, here comes disruption. You may be feeling great about your workout plan and then you get injured. Work may be progressing well and then you hit resource constraints. The family may be doing great until a winter stomach bug hits the house.
Balance is only momentary. And that’s okay. That’s what we need to come to expect. But just as balance is momentary, imbalance can be momentary as well. That depends on how we react to the disruption. If we get injured and give up exercising altogether, will we regain our balance? On the other hand, if I choose to rehab the injury along with exploring other ways to exercise, I may soon find that balance to effectively move from moment to moment. If I lose resources for something important at work, will I let that derail my project or will I be resourceful to find another route to success?
In good times, we have this great balance of effectively moving from moment to moment in life. When disruption creates imbalance, we are faced with a choice on the degree we’ll allow the disruption to impact us. If we are naïve and believe balance can be maintained indefinitely, chances are disruption will have a big impact in a negative way. If we maintain a mindset that balance is temporary and at some point, we’ll have to face disruption, mentally we’ll be more prepared to take on the disruptor and persevere.
Take your step: assess where you feel you’re at right now – either leaning more towards a state of balance or imbalance. If you’re in a state of balance, challenge yourself to be thankful for this period of balance but also understand disruption will at some point arrive. Prepare your mind for it to normalize that disruptions occur, but you are capable of persevering through the period of imbalance. If you feel a state of imbalance, the challenge will be how long the disruptions you’ve faced will keep you imbalanced. One of the best things you can do in a state of imbalance is to spend time reflecting. During this time, reevaluate what your priorities are. Assess whether the priorities you’ve identified are getting the time and energy they deserve. Assuming they aren’t, analyze where this time and energy is being diverted to. Challenge yourself to reallocate this time back to your priorities to get back on track with where you want to grow and develop. Check out The Most Misunderstood Phrase for more ideas on mentally getting back on track.