Thread by @ScottMakorow

Balance, Its Importance and How You’re Doing It Wrong

Balance is believed to be a state of equilibrium. The idea that when you are perfectly at one with yourself, you reach that happy middle.

You find your center.

Except I believe that that’s completely wrong.

Balance is necessary. We’ve all seen that guy who has no balance in his life.

Too aggressive. Constantly angry or upset. Always on edge.

Or the opposite.

Constantly passive. Never gets excited. Always seems like he’s on the verge of a mental breakdown or depression.

Both of these are undesirable.

We tell the angry guy he needs to calm down. The passive man to take charge.

While technically good advice, it comes from the idea that they need to find the Goldilocks zone.

“Not too big, not too small, just right.”

This doesn’t exist.

We’re human. Which means we experience emotions constantly on all levels of depth.

To find a middle is to deny this spectrum.

Middle is wishy washy. No highs, no lows. No views.

You are constantly the same always.

So if that’s not balance, what is?

Balance isn’t middle.

Balance is symmetry.

It’s not about avoiding the roller coaster. It’s riding it.

Like any ride, no matter the peaks and valleys you fly through, you end up back at center. Because it has to.

All you have to do is keep your arms and legs inside the ride.

True balance requires self awareness, understanding and acceptance.

You need to know when things are going too far off the rails and you need to bring it back the other way.

This means you have to know yourself first before you can achieve balance.

The first two are more personal touch for you to find so let’s touch on acceptance.

In order to master balance, you need to accept that you have emotions. You’re not a robot.

We’ve all seen or even been that dude who just holds it all in, noshowing.

That guy will blow up.

The key is for you is understanding that your emotions and how you react to things is under your control.

You decide how things affect you.

So when you feel a certain way, you can acknowledge it then push it aside if it doesn’t gel with what you want.

Now for my baseball readers, what does this mean for you?

All your career, you’ve been told to be balanced. In your stance, your windup, you need to be a balanced player.

Can’t show emotion. Baseball is serious or you’re disrespecting the game.

Viewership is down, you say?

What’d I say before? You’re human.

Athlete or not, you’re human.

You’ll get pissed you struck out. Sad you gave up the go ahead run. Ecstatic you won the series.

It’s normal.

What’s not normal is suppressing the game.

There’s room to maneuver here.

The key to balance in baseball is learning how to harness the energy from your emotions.

Pissed off you gave up a bomb? Down about going 0-3 on the day?

Use it.

All your emotions are fuel to the fire.

Oh almost forgot.

Big thanks to @RogueWealth.

Without you and notepad, this thread might’ve gotten deleted in Twitter drafts.