Finding the Balance...

This photo of me was taken a few years ago when I was doing a zine for breast cancer fundraising.  It was all about being a "superhero" and of course, superheroes can fly so an image of me, getting ready for take off seemed appropriate.

I look at this photograph now and I see "balance".  Balance is something that I've never been good with.  That I am still standing upright on that retaining wall speaks volumes...it's just as easy to look forward into the next few seconds from this being "snapped" and I might have begun to sway and fallen off that wall.

I excuse my physical issues with balance on inner ear issues and a lack of significant hearing in my left ear (since I was 3 1/2).  I have nothing on which to lay excuses for my lack of balance in other areas of my life.  When I am out of balance I feel it in so many ways from the physical to the emotional.  And when I am out of balance it is usually because I've put myself in that situation.

I've struggled my whole life with thinking I need to be "this" or "that"; one or the other; happy or sad; up or down...you get the idea.  When I try and force myself to be "this" or "that" I rule out all the in between...all that space that you see up there between my hands.  One hand is left, one hand is right and then there is all that glorious empty space in the middle...

If I stood there with just my right arm extended I would surely lose my balance.  If I stood there with just my left arm extended I might be able to stand still for a few seconds before losing my balance (all about that inner ear again).  Can't stand on just one foot either...it's rather comical.

I'm focusing on all that space in the middle.  I don't need to be "this" or "that".  I'm changing my thinking. Why can't I be this and that and a few others things as well?  I can fill up that empty space so that there is something to bolster each side of who I am.  

So here I am, looking at the possibilities and...finding my balance.