Is life balance really possible?

I have been struggling for a while with the desire to as good as a man can be. Constantly looking to be a better version of myself, always looking into the future, and here I was, thinking that I have accomplished nothing, feeling demotivated, loosing to minor obstacles etc. All of this both in my personal and professional life were happening in such a way that I was putting more pressure on myself to be that better person all over again, so that I could fix…myslef.

I was wondering how is it possible to be so much aware of the fact that you are doing something wrong and yet continue to fail over and over again o fix what was wrong.

One day I decided to take a look on how my days had been going for the past few months and I discovered something: I was terribly unbalanced, from a body-mind energy point of view. The thing is: I never realised how unbalanced I really was until I looked at how I used to react to stress and pressure, most of which I had put upon myself. The problem? no matter how keen I was to have a healthy lifestyle I used to cheat everytime I needed an extra bump of energy to get me going. If I had a stressful day, my eating style would get unorganized, I would eat more sugary stuff, and so on. I would postpone some activities and they would become urgent the very next day, or I would shut myself up for a bit of quietness, sometimes ignoring very important people in my life.

One of the things I learned was that the vital energy that keeps us going through hard times comes from so many different sources that you can easily get fooled to think that a you can fix yourself with coffee every now and then and it will be perfectly fine. But it isn’t. Every time you cheat, you get more and more unbalanced.

Balance comes from mind and body. We have been told as kids that you can do everything you want if you set your mind to it. I think that is profoundly wrong. Here’s why: most of the feelings you get come from your body, even if it’s love, anger, have, or sense of accomplishment. Your body is always aware on your surroundings, it gets all the information about the world to your brain. Your mind interprets what your body gives to it. A healthy, energized body would always give you a better image of the world around you. Your body needs vitality, nutrients, movement, excitement, as much as your mind needs. You would be wrong to think that food alone, or sport, would always get you there. Sometimes we are so stressed we even forget how to breathe properly, or we live months dehydrated without realising what is the source of our fatigue and we blame it to our work, or worse.

The same works for the mind: it’s not just introspection, healthy relationships and love. It’s also being grateful, taking time rest, and making peace with yourself.

To me, the conjunction between mind and body comes at the point where you are able to understand how you feel and where you are in life by understanding separately your mind and body and seeing them as two parts in synergy: they have to be that way in order to help each other.

And among all the people out there who have solutions for a happy life I am not here to provide one. I am just here to ask a general, big question. Is it really possible to have balance? Or is it just a continuous struggle, and at one point you just have to stop and say: I don’t need this anymore. I have everything that I need in life, it’s time to enjoy it.