v.51 The Myth of Balance and the Performance of It All.
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Welcome to Life, Createdāa new [old school] blog for modern times. This twice-a-week(ish) dispatch is a space for us to dig deeper, share ideas, recognize microjoys and build community beyond the mindless scroll.
People love to talk about balance: work-life balance, finding balance, balanced meals, balanced expectations. Like the goal is to keep everything neat and proportional, as if life is a scale that just needs the right weight on each side. And of course, yoga preaches balance like itās the only thing that will save you from yourself. As a yogi, I started to value that above all else. When I felt āout of balance,ā I believed I was doing something wrong, because balance was supposed to be the only right way. For years, I bought into that idea. I thought balance was the thing that would finally steady me.
I donāt prioritize balance anymore but instead, I throw myself head-first into whatever matters most.
For a long time, I tried to keep things evenly measured. When I worked in fashion (which I left in 2012), I held together a career that looked amazing from the outside while quietly unraveling inside. My values no longer aligned with the work I was doing, though I didnāt yet have the language for that. I hadnāt fully understood, let alone accepted, the fullness of who I was or what I wanted. So I kept performing, holding tight to a version of success that looked impressive but felt emptier by the day. I told myself that if I could just find the right balance between ambition and fun, appearances and truth, I would finally feel steady. But instead, I felt further away from myself. Later, when I shifted into personal development, I thought balance might save me again. If I could manage scarcity and joy with equal measure, if I could carry ambition in one hand and rest in the other, maybe Iād finally land in that mythical sweet spot of doing good in the world while also being financially secure. But balance always felt like performance. It was about keeping the appearance of steadiness, even when I was contorting myself to keep the scales from tipping.
And then life happened and those fucking scales did tip. (Because at some point, they always do.)
When my nephew and mother died just months apart, there was no balance. When my brothers and I gathered, laughing and crying over childhood memories, there was no balance. When I left New York City after twenty years and watched the life I had built there collapse overnight, there was no balance. When I moved to Montclair and realized Iād have to build community all over again, there was no balance. When Iāve had to travel back and forth between east and west coasts twice in the same week to give keynote talks, zero balance. These seasons were messy, lopsided, and full of contradictions. But they were honest in a way that no ābalancedā version of my life ever was.
The older I get, the more I trust that wholeness has nothing to do with balance. It has everything to do with alignment. Do my choices feel honest? Do they reflect what matters to me right now, in this exact season? That answer is rarely neat. Sometimes it looks like repainting an entire wall in my living room marigold yellow because I needed joy on the days when grief felt louder than anything else. Sometimes it looks like gathering strangers around my table for Dinner with Strangers, because conversation matters more to me than keeping the house perfectly orderly. And sometimes it looks like challenging my brother to a bake-off with our momās recipe, even when he said no, because holding on to her memory is worth the effortāpie or no pie.
Balance asks me to portion joy like itās a ration, to schedule grief so it doesnāt spill into āproductiveā hours, to treat creativity as something that belongs only after the laundry is folded. That isnāt life, and Iām not interested in living like an accountant of my own existence.
A life that feels like mine doesnāt require me to keep the scales even. It asks me to stay present in whatever is here. To notice the microjoys when they show up. To choose what feels most alive, even when itās messy, lopsided, or completely out of sync with what the world tells me I should want.
Because balance may look good from the outside, but aliveness feels better on the inside. And Iād rather live a life that is unbalanced and deeply mine than one that is perfectly balanced and doesnāt belong to me at all.
This weekās microjoy: Standing in front of an audience to speak about resilience and joy is both a privilege and an honor. Each time Iām there, I feel an overwhelming gratitude that, somehow against all odds, this became my lifeās workāthat I get to share hard-earned wisdom, connect with strangers, and witness a room shift together. It never stops feeling like the greatest of microjoys, even alongside life as it is.
P.S. Per usual, if this resonated with you- PLEASE repost, comment, share and spread the word.
Welcome to Life, Created.
With love, wisdom [and small mercies] from Montclair. xx
