I saw the title of this article on LinkedIn this week, and just had to read it: The Lie of Balance & Having It All. Obviously we talk quite a bit about balanced living here - it's even in our tag line! So I was interested in what the author had to say. (Feel free to check it out - it's a quick read.)  While I don't disagree at all with her 3 main points (make honorable choices, surround yourself with good people, and seek strong community), I fail to see where this precludes living with balance. But maybe it is her understanding of balance that is throwing me off....

Firstly, I don't see balance as at all the same thing as "having it all." Living with balance for some people - including myself - often means simplifying - having less, not more. The more you accumulate and add to your life, the harder it is to maintain balance - at least in my view.

Secondly, I admit that I don't have children (yet), and from what I've heard, life becomes infinitely more chaotic once that happens. However, I do have a busy full-time job, two online businesses (including 5 blogs), a new husband, and am in the process of buying a home, as well as fixing up my husband's home to sell. Life is a complete whirlwind! 

I also freely admit that despite my best efforts, I don't always live a balanced life! However, seeking that is a value that guides me, and I am able to achieve it to some degree more often than not. So before you give up on balance altogether, consider these 3 points:

Finding financial balance is a common topic on our website and blog, and for good reason. I don't think anyone today would disagree that our country's financial system is completely off balance - and that applies to the personal finances of most of its citizens as well. How did we get to this point? There are probably a lot more reasons than I could list here, but just a few include:

* Unbalanced spending
* Unbalanced lending
* Unbalanced borrowing
* Unbalanced financial world view favoring short-term "gains" over long-term stability
* Generally poor management of available resources

Obviously there are many more as well, but these are probably the biggest issues that would apply to both governments and individuals.

So what is the solution? Our modern money paradigm is obviously not serving us as well as we would have hoped. From major stock market losses, to virtually non-existent savings, to literally trillions of dollars worth of debt on student loans, credit cards, and more, as a country and as individuals, most of us are moving backwards financially. Maybe it's time for a new (or rather very old) money paradigm. Maybe it's time to get back to basics.

Last week we talked about the ethics of eating meat, and in particular, the problem of animal suffering. What we did not talk about, although Michael Pollan goes into it in some depth in his book, is the opposite side - the question of animal happiness.

I'm sure if you've ever been to a grocery store, you've seen some variation of "the happy cow." Maybe it was in the form of a smiling cartoon cow on a milk carton or package of cheese, or cows grazing peacefully in a meadow on the label of a plastic-wrapped roast.  Whichever form it was in, I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. Because although we humans don't like to think too deeply about the fact that the steak we're cutting into was not so long ago a live animal, when we do think about it, we like to think of the animals we eat as happy.  We want to believe that they had happy cow/chicken/pig lives, doing what cows/chickens/pigs like to do, before they became dinner on our plates.

Sadly, this is rarely (VERY rarely) the case in reality.... But we don't dig too deeply. For most of us, the happy cow on the box is enough "proof" to assuage our guilty conscience - although, as I often remind people, just because you refuse to know it's happening doesn't mean it isn't!

Thanks to those of you who submitted suggestions in reply to our question last week! Keep an eye out for posts addressing your preferred topic(s) coming soon....

I am nearing the end of The Omnivore's Dilemma, having taken my time to really think about each section, and enjoying my leisurely way through the story that is so well-told in its pages. I am now well into the hunting & gathering section, and it has made me think (again, as I often have before) about my feelings about eating meat.

As you probably know by now, I am not a vegetarian, and don't intend to become one. However, you never know how your tastes may change, so I won't say it's out of the realm of possibility. If I ever do make such a change, it probably will be for one reason only. As you also probably know by now, I do see humans as omnivores, and (clean, naturally & sustainably raised) meat as a healthy thing to eat (in moderation). After all, humans from all cultures, areas of the globe, and walks of life have been eating meat for thousands of years.

I was going to write about something else this week, but was caught by this passage I heard in church this morning, and was so enthralled by it, I thought this would be the proper season to share it with everyone. If you're reading this blog, I'm willing to bet it will also resonate with you, whether you are a Christian or not.

This phrase actually sums up everything that most of us are ever looking for. It is the reason we do everything from rising in the morning, to going to work, to building relationships, caring for our families, shopping, eating, taking vacations, giving to others, and all the myriad other things we do to feel fulfilled. Yet so very many of these things fall short in giving us the one thing we really want....

In this follow-up to  last week's post, I will share the second part of my experience with learning to pray. It's a timely one, with the holiday of 'Thanks-giving" later this week! (First of all pardon me for any typos and such - I've had a bit of a cold the past few days, and my brain is a little foggy...But I will try not to ramble on too long!)

Last week I discussed the first part of a successful prayer life (for me, at least) - learning what to pray for. This week I will discuss the second part - how to actually do it. Again, even if you're not a Christian, this can be a very helpful tool in your spiritual and life growth! If you would prefer not to call it prayer, then don't. The way I do it, some people might not call it prayer anyway, but to me it's all one and the same.

Let me start though, with a reference to Christianity. If you've ever read the Bible, and studied the way that Jesus prayed, you might have noticed something interesting. Almost every time that Jesus prays as recorded in the Bible, he starts not by asking for something, but by giving thanks! That's right - he doesn't say "give me this, Lord," he says "thank you" FIRST - before receiving!

Isn't that interesting? For those who have studied modern non-Christian spiritual teachings such as 'The Law of Attraction," you may remember that in order to receive something, you have to first act as if you already have it. This can be difficult for some - how can you pretend to have something you don't? The easiest and most natural way to do this, is to give thanks for it!

Jesus obviously knew this. After all, remember the loaves and the fishes? Jesus didn't sit down to pray to the Lord and say, "God, can you please give us some more bread? Oh, and while you're at it, can you also multiply these fish enough to feed five thousand?" It does not say this in the Bible at all. Instead, it simply says "Jesus gave thanks." Then he broke the bread and divided up the fishes, and lo and behold, "they all ate and were satisfied." Giving thanks is pretty powerful stuff!

This is all well and good, but in actual prayer practice, do you just sit down and close your eyes, and say 'Thank You" to God/the Universe/the Divine - whatever you pray to? Sure you can - that's a great start! I've found there is no better way to instantly create a feeling of peace and satisfaction - even calming the most troubled mind - than to think of all the things I am thankful for. But there are a few specific ways in which I express gratitude in prayer that have proven very helpful to me - maybe they will be to you as well.

This week (and next - in the spirit of the season), I'm going to "get religious" on you - just fair warning. :-)  But for those who may intend to tune out, I encourage you to stick with me. Even if you're not a Christian believer, prayer is not as far from your life as you might think. In fact, if you're a practitioner of any kind of meditation - as many people seeking balance in their lives may be - this is really just a form of prayer if you think about it. Both involve mentally focusing on something outside of yourself - something larger to which we are trying to connect. Both seek to achieve peace, health, and well-being in our minds, bodies, and spirits.

But here is where some may think the difference lies - and I'm not sure exactly how this happened, but somehow we seem to have come to think of prayer as asking FOR something. Not that there's anything wrong with asking for help when you need it, and Jesus does say "ask and ye shall receive." Maybe that's where it comes from, but in disregarding the rest of what the Bible says about prayer, we're pretty much throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Not to mention, I'm fairly certain that Jesus wasn't talking about a new Playstation, Jeep, or even a new house. What he was talking about receiving was the presence, peace, and strength of the Lord. And whether or not you call it "God" or not, this is also what most forms of meditation seek to achieve as well. So if you would prefer not to call it "prayer," to call it "meditation," "mindfulness," or something else, that's fine. Either way, it is something that we - all of us seeking to lead a balanced and fulfilled life - need to engage in regularly in some fashion. Engaging in communication with God, the creator, the Great Divine, is what gives us our juice, our own force of creativity and vision, our inspiration to take what we have been given and make something greater out of it - something that will benefit not just ourselves, but others as well. And without that, what are we all doing here?

If you're a Christian, or even if you're not, you've probably heard the scripture that says your body is a temple.  As 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 says: "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body."

If you think about what this truly means, treating your body with reverence and care, as though it is sacred or houses something sacred, it is easy to see that even the most devoted Christian falls far short of living up to this command.

In fact, many, if not most, Americans - Christian or not - treat their bodies more like a garbage can than a temple.

Stop and think about all the products you put on or in your body every day - do you really know what's in them? What are they made of? Where do these substances come from, and what might they do to your body over time? Do you smoke? Do you drink alcohol? And what about the food you eat? Do you know where it comes from? How it was raised? What ingredients are in it? And what of the way you treat your body? Do you use it to its full purpose and capacity every day? Do you devote it sexually to one chosen partner - who also treats it well?

Maybe it's hard to envision what it truly means to treat your body as a temple, so how about some context.