The other day, in my daily report to my twelve-step sponsor, I included my daily affirmation:

Today, by God’s grace, I am living a balanced and healthy life all around—spiritually, relationally, mentally, work-wise, and physically.  Today, I am balance.

With a nod to one of our favorite musical groups, The Moody Blues (and their albumn “A Question of Balance”), Bob replied as follows:

“No Question of Balance?

Wishing you a well balanced day.”

Another twelve-step friend and I often pray for one another for balance.  Ironically, after my e mail exchange with my sponsor, another friend pointed out something obvious this morning.  It was, in fact, so obvious that I had never thought of.  “Sometimes, we pursue balance in a very unbalanced way.”

True that !

Aristotle and others have lauded “the golden mean” as the ideal for human virtue.  For example, go too far in the direction of courage, and you become reckless.  Go too far in the direction of caution, and you become cowardly.

But what if the golden mean—that is, balance itself—becomes an unbalanced obsession?  At this point, a body is in serious trouble.  Obsession with balance is not balance.  It is simply another obsession.

I doubt that anyone is born balanced.  My wife and I had four little creatures we helped to bring into the world.  I don’t remember that any of them were very balanced when they were learning to sit up.  The same when they were learning to walk.

And then there were the teen years, not a stage in life known for balance for any of us.

So, how do I—how do we—pursue balance in a balanced manner?  It is much easier for me to raise the question of balance than it is for me to answer it.  Perhaps that, in and of itself, is an important affirmation.  Perhaps my sponsor’s tongue-in-cheek allusion to The Moody Blues “A Question of Balance” is part of the answer to my dilemma concerning balance.  Balance will always be a questionable quest.

That said, one possible way of thinking about balance is in terms of riding a bike.  I came very late to riding a bike.  I was probably in the third or fourth grade before I learned to ride.

Why was I so late learning how to ride?  Now that I think about it, there were at least two reasons that were somewhat different and somewhat related.

First, I lived on a farm with uneven ground and a (sometimes) graveled driveway.  Such rough terrain is not natural bike country, especially for a beginner.

I have discovered that life itself is rough terrain.  There are lots of environmental realities that make balance a challenge.  It is best to recognize them.  As someone has said, “Just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean that people really aren’t out to get you.”  It is not always our fault that balance is often difficult to pursue in a balanced manner.

But the second reason I was late in learning to ride a bike is something that is more personal and harder to confess: I was afraid.  I was sure that I was going to fail, that I was going to fall.  Why start something when you know you’re going to fail?

Sure enough, I did fall—a lot.  However, in the process of processing numerous falls, I discovered something: Falling and failing are not the same thing.  And before long, I was riding a bike pretty well!

One further thought: Riding a bike is never a matter of perfect balance.  Rather, it is a matter of a lot of mid-course corrections.  You lean to the left, you lean to the right.  You lean forward, you lean back.  Balance is making a lot of small changes in what you’re doing.

And, of course, it is nigh on impossible to balance on a bicycle when I’m not in motion.  If I become obsessed with balance, I’m like a kid sitting on a bike, but not going anywhere.  If I am in motion in the direction I think God wants me to go, balance will still be a challenge.  But it will be possible.