Life Balance is a Juggling Act

Tim Sanders—former chief solutions officer at Yahoo! and author of Love Is the Killer App—shares the following thought about establishing priorities: 

Take your life and all the things that you think are important, and put them in one of three categories. These three categories are represented by three items: glass, metal, and rubber.

The things that are made of rubber, when you drop them, will bounce back. Nothing really happens when these kinds of things get dropped. Things that are made of metal, when they get dropped, create a lot of noise. But you can recover from the drop. Then there are things made of glass. And when you drop one of these, it will shatter into pieces and never be the same. Even though you can piece it back together, it will still be missing some pieces – Glass issues ultimately are your marriage, your family, your friends…God.

I love this illustration. It's one of my favorite stories shared by a pastor friend, and it's written in the back of my Bible for reference. You see, there have been times in my life when juggling the metal items...those that make the most noise when dropped...were the ones that took priority in my life, even if it meant I was in danger of dropping a glass one. Over and over, there was a direct correlation between the number of people potentially affected by my possible failure and how hard I worked to ensure success. If asked, I'm sure I'd have said that my children, my husband and my own self-expectations were far more important, but my actions spoke differently. Glass issues dropped in private didn't hold the same fear for me as the noisy public metals ones.

I'm glad for the heart check, as uncomfortable as it was.  Looking at oneself in the mirror isn't always easy, but to walk away transformed makes it worth the effort.  

So, what are the rubber, metal, and glass objects in your life? If you were forced to choose between catching a noisy metal issue and a glass one, what would happen? Take a moment to look in the mirror. I'd love to hear your feedback on this subject.

To Better Life Balance,

Steph

(Catch Tim's fascinating blog at http://www.sanderssays.typepad.com.)

A special thanks to pastor Bruce Smilie at CrossPointe Church for researching the source of this illustration.