Balance - Mindfulness Focus Word Experiment Week 12 * Mindfulness Garden Games

Balance is the Mindfulness Focus this week.

Spring arrives at 4:28 AM Mountain Time on Monday March 20th.(1) And although spring can represent newness to many people, it’s very much about balance.

Consider this – As we circle around the sun, the two equinoxes (spring and fall) are the counterpoints to the winter and summer solstices when we experience the shortest and longest days of the year. At equinox, night and day are in almost perfect balance. The word equinox comes from the Latin equi and nox meaning equal night. (2) So the concept of balance is manifesting celestially this week and seems a perfect choice for my mindfulness focus.

Garden in Balance

Just picturing a garden in balance makes me smile, as my garden often teeters on the edge of chaos. Each year as gardening season unfolds, I vow to do better but I am challenged by a number of conflicting desires.

I start with a garden plan but then volunteers pop up throughout the plots. I love my original plan but I also love the volunteers that have self seeded themselves in the garden. They are usually hardy and resilient and in the scorching Denver summer those are important qualities. It makes me sad to pull them out, but if I let them all stay, there is no room for my original plants. I need to find a mid-point between holding to my original garden plan and letting some volunteers thrive.

It is also challenging to balance everything I’d like to grow with the time and energy it would take to accomplish that. Until I manifest a team of elves to assist in the yard, finding balance between what I’d like to do and what is possible will be an important consideration. It can be summed up with the question “how many varieties of eggplant does one person need in a back yard?”

Life in Balance

And life beyond the garden is the same. Knowing that balance is important is one thing. Finding balance is another. Finding the equilibrium between personal and work time is difficult in a world that is ON 24/7. And that is just the start. How do we calibrate screen time and not screen time, rest and play, vegetables versus desserts, watching enough news to be a competent citizen but not so much that we are overwhelmed? And one of my biggest challenges: How do I spend time with with people I love, including those that are far away, and still get on with the rest of my life?

I know that we all make constant adjustments throughout the day, often unconsciously, to bring ourselves back into a state of equilibrium. This week I want to bring that into focus and be aware of balance in all of its manifestations, big and small, in my life and in the world around me.