“True balance is a never ending story“
Lindsay Walter, Balanced Lifestylist
Here is something to remember: In order to reclaim balance in your life, we first need to understand that
True balance is a never ending story”, but there is an attainable, sustainable method that I created to use as a starting off point. Something that will help you to say yes to things in life, while keeping your ship afloat.
In September of 2019, through a long, serendipitous course of events, my husband and I purchased our first home together.
It came with a detached garage which Dan would turn into his woodworking shop, a small room attached to the garage which I named my Zen room. It was half barre/yoga studio, half meditation space, and wholly mine. Our teenager took over the entire upstairs of the house while my son took the primary bedroom downstairs and we turned a really cool 3 season room into our bedroom. It’s definitely 3 seasons proof as it gets very cold in the winter but for us it’s perfect.
A few weeks after we moved in, I was following a journal prompt in a social medial class I was taking that asked us to describe our perfect day. I wrote about waking up, meditating, taking the dog for a walk after getting my son ready for school, then working from home for the day before retiring for the night with light work and heavy family time. Little did I know that about 5 months later in the spring of 2020 my perfect day would come to frutition as the world shut down due to the global pandemic.
I took full advantage of the time at home. I got creative with “home-schooing” my son, something I never thought I’d do, and spent a lot of time in my zen room meditating.
At one point I, like many people joined tik Tok and had a video go viral, offering donation based Akashic Records Readings to anyone seeking guidance towards their future. Akashic Records readings in a nutshell are your very own soul’s guidance. By accessing your records I am able to give you past life information, guidance towards present situations, and even guidance for your future as well! My viral tik tok had me working from home, seeing about 5-7clients a day via zoom. It felt so good to use my skills to help people with thier next steps in life.
One day I had the most incredible A-ha moment: I was living my perfect day. Everything I wrote in my journal just 5 short months before then had come true. My dreams were coming true, my life purpose was in focus, and most importantly, I had found balance.
By the time my massage practice was cleared to re-open, I had transformed my zen room into my meditation/barre/yoga and massage studio! I changed my schedule a bit and now I see massage clients 3 days a week, and Akashic Records clients two days. People in my life, along with my clientel started noticing the change within me. They noticed how more even keeled my energy was, and started to ask what I did to acheive it.
By breaking down my own path to reclaiming balance in my life, I created my Four Pillar Method of Balanced Living. Wellness ,Self-Care, Personal Development Tools and Relationships make up the four pillars.
You see, being open to the continuation of your story will result in lifelng chapters of successfull balance.
Making the micro-shift in the way I reclaim balance in my life opened me up to new pathways of living. Those new pathways lead me to our home, the class homework journal entry, being honest with what I wanted to life to look like, and so many other things that resulted in me living my perfect day, almost every day.
Think of wellness as an equalateral triangle. Our physical, emotional, and mental wellness are all equally important and cannot be held up by only two sides.
While health simply means the absence of disease, wellness is the support system of your whole body, how you create and sustain homeostasis.
When reclaiming balance in life, wellness supports you through diet, exercise, spiritual wellness through prayer or meditation, mental exercises to keep your brain sharp, therapy for mental health and so much more.
Micro-shifts to focus on wellness could be anything from eating seasonally from your local farmers markets before hitting your local grocer’s produce aisle. Sipping on chamomile tea after a long day at work rather than reaching for a glass of wine. Meeting your girlfriends and their dogs on the hiking trails for a weekly catch up and doggie play date. Signing up for therapy, even when you feel your best, so you always have someone to talk to when things in life come up.
Wellness is more than just a catchphrase, it is the main pillar. The main character energy. Total wellness is true balance.
Self care includes taking care of mental and soul needs, not just physical. Creating time for yourself to try things that fill your cup and bring you joy can be just as important and soothing to your soul as a mani/pedi.
When it comes to reclaiming balance in your life, self-care is truly filling your own cup before filling others. This can be as simple as holding an energetic boundary, having a standing appointment for all personal services, or even having someone in the home to clean once a week or prepare a few healthy.
Self-care can be free, or worth every penny you spend because it’s the love and devotion you give yourself so you may do the same for others.
I remember the feeling I had during my gap year between when I left (read: failed out) of college, and started massage therapy school. I loved the idea that my peers were in class, writing papers, taking tests, and I was making my own money and shopping on 5th Avenue during my days off. By the end of that year, however, I noticed something. My peers had continued to evolve as people. They were learning critical information and skills that would lead them to careers and help them to attain their goals in life. I had learned some very valuable life lessons which I still hold onto today, but I hadn’t “furthered” myself in life.
The idea of personal development tools is exactly how it sounds. It’s the knowledge, lessons, tools, whatever you call it that you put into your personal tool box in order to add value to your life.
This can be anything from reading self-help books, to seeing a therapist. Taking a class to attending a retreat. The ways you learn don’t matter. The substance does. What can you do today to better your tomorrow? Those bits of knowledge are your personal development tools. Use the personal empowerment phrases you learned from a conference to more effectively communicate your needs at work and home, for example.
Humans are always evolving. At this day and age, you are in the drivers seat as to how you choose to evolve, and the person you want to become. Have fun with it!
There is a reason Relationships are the 4th pillar, and that is because strong, balanced relationships can be the foundation, or what holds up the other 3. The strength that keeps life together in time of weakness. Reaching out to friends and loved ones in a time of chaos can add calm to the storm. Digging deep and relying on your relationship with yourself can take you the last few steps in a long footrace as well.
Maintaining balance in all relationships in life takes time, but adds incredible value. Coffee dates with friends, phone conversations with a loved one while out running errands, attending a yoga or painting class with your kiddo, and date night with your partner are all ways you can nurture the relationships in your life.
Being mindful of holding boundaries in relationships is important too. Though it’s fun to celebrate date night with dinner and passionate lovemaking for dessert, your relationship with your partner might not stand the test of time if you aren’t balancing a roll in the hay with goal setting life planning.
Balance and substance go hand in hand in relationships, just like give and take.