Looking forward to looking back on these days...

I've been pretty sick this weekend, with a wicked cold that has been passing around school. It's migrated from the head, to the neck, and now to the lungs. I should have used the weekend as a chance to rejuvenate, relax, and refill my soul... Instead, I have watched a lot of bad television and eaten a lot of crappy food.

Indeed, I'm a little bit disappointed in myself. This cold has knocked a realization into me -- I seem to have lost a lot of the balance that I found last year. It's been a slowly dawning realization, starting with the loss of patience that I have been feeling at work. And now sick? I haven't been sick in a year, which is quite the accomplishment for me.

And I don't think it's simply because a bad virus has been passing around the school, leaving numerous victims in its wake. I think it's because my mind has been laser-focused on one thing at a time, overwhelming myself and taking all of my attention. First, it was graduate school and doing well in that. Then it was changing the curriculum and direction of school -- hours at night.

Last Spring, I felt really good. I felt like myself. I felt like more than myself -- I felt connected, meaningful.

It was because of balance. I had balance between work and leisure, between mental activity and physical activity, between every sphere of my life in which there could be balance. I did not laze around on the couch all night, but I also did not work like a crazy person. I spent time doing all the things I love...

The problem is that I'm not entirely sure how I got there, nor how I lost that. I know that I felt amazing, and that I want to feel amazing and balanced again. I was contemplating this last night -- and realizing that we only have this one life, this one day, this one moment. Am I spending it in the way that I want to spend it? Am I doing the things that I want to do? Am I making the memories that I want to make?

The question, of course, is how do I get back to that? Perhaps I'll look through my journals, and remember the things that I wrote, the things that I read, the things that I ate. What can I do to ensure that I am LIVING each moment, not letting moments pass me by? When I am doing something, I should ask -- is this what I really want to be doing right now? If not, what is it that I want to do? How can I make that happen?

All of it adds together, the building blocks of a balanced life.