A Question of Balance

This week I have been reading "Improv Wisdom" by Patricia Madson which is full of ideas about taking the notion of improvisation into every day life. As I spend most of my working life improvising but the rest planning, making "to do" lists and fitting everything into the day I thought it an interesting concept to explore.

It has got me thinking about the question of balance. We seem to always be striving for the balance in our lives, becoming aware that we are tipping too much one way or another and trying to get back to balance as if balance is the Holy Grail and static. But it seems to me balance is dynamic and that the forces that pull us each and every way are a dance in themselves. Just as the small dance of the muscles in the standing position keeps us upright and ready to move (imagine if the muscles were totally held with tension in the standing balance- it would be so hard to respond) the forces that pull us this way and that keep us alive to the present.

So to my week. My daughter is back from New York with a terrible chest infection so she has returned home to be nurtured by her Mummy and Daddy not what I had expected to fit in with my normal schedule, a friend forgot she was coming to visit and I had put off doing other things to see her, someone changes another appointment, I have a problem with my front tooth and need to see the dentist straight away and I am going on holidays and want all my work done so I wont need to be thinking of it while I am away. The demands on my time keep mounting...Aaaagh! All I can do is, like any improviser, face the situation as it comes to me, respond in the best way possible and keep going a moment at a time. Did I succeed....mmmmm. Anybody else in a similar situation? I would love to hear from you.