owen-ebrown - Tumblr blog

owen-ebrown · 6 years

Text

Creating and Consuming

It would only be natural to be thinking about if balance really does matter as much as I am making out, so I should explain this; Balance for me, is important because it stands as the opposite of feeling anxious, on edge and worried. In the last few months these are feelings I have found inescapable. I feel like my control over my own life path and over my emotions is completely out of whack and so this is one area I have been seeking to improve by taking a renewed stance over what is most important when it comes to finding balance, control and peace. For me this is understanding that there is only one balance that is truly important for me and my happiness. This is a balance between creation and consumption. This type of balance can be used in almost any aspects of life and is certainly something that has helped me personally, even if it is not necessarily a rule that everybody could live by. The easiest place to start is the area of life that this thought first came from. Whenever anybody asks me what my hobbies are, I instinctively say writing or perhaps photography. These are clearly hobbies that involve creating, in contrast with hobbies that are based around consumption like listening to music, reading a book or watching netflix. However, as soon as I am having an even slightly bad or upsetting time, these are the first hobbies to go. I turn from somebody who is creative into a potato that just listens to sad music and cries all the time. For my own mental health, I know, without a shadow of a doubt that if I can force myself out of a slump, which isn't always possible but if I can get to a desk and start writing, I instantly feel better having started to create something once again. It makes perfect sense really, If I feel lost or out of control, the easiest thing to do is to create something, In things you create, you have a sense of control that can never be found in consumption. In a society defined by consumerism, these can be difficult ideas to keep in tact. It should also go as being said that perhaps your problem is the other way around, perhaps you spend way too much time creating and working on your products that you feel drained and upset, in that case you may need to find balance by consuming more. This is a rule that we take as almost common sense in other areas of our life, we are naturally very stressed if we are spending money (consuming goods) at a rate much higher than we are earning money (creating wealth) so by keeping it in mind more broadly, hopefully it can keep your more conscious of yourself and work well as a step to being happier. Even in social situations, it is important to sometimes take the initiative, to lead a group and to make big plans but sometimes it is easier to sit back go with what other people have suggested. More simply, within university, I try to balance reading course materials with writing notes and creating revision tools. The same principle can also make your attitude to food and exercise much easier, whilst I firmly don't believe you should use food or lack of food as a punishment or a reward, if you consume too much junk food, to balance that out, create a bit of a caloric deficit by doing some exercise. For all the rubbish premade food you consume, make sure you balance that out with creating some great and healthy home cooked meals. Whatever I do now, I try to make sure I end each day making sure I have spent a good portion of it creating because i know that when I am feeling down, finding the energy to be creative is incredibly hard but is always worth the effort because that is generally when my creativity shines. Consumption is not a bad thing, it's a wonderful thing but if all I do is consume then it should come as no surprise when I feel like I have nothing to offer the world. Spending time doing more creative things and finding balance between creation and consumption means that I can almost always feel as though I have something worthwhile to offer. It gives your life meaning.

A note for happiness. #1 Balance. Balance is a phrase that seems to be thrown around a lot within the arena of health and lifestyle. As a concept, this of course, makes perfect sense, we all want to balance our home life and our work lives. We want to party and relax. We want to exercise and we want to unwind. There are endless resources, both online and in self help books that set out with the explicit goal of helping you find balance and undeniably they are all most likely filled with excellent tips to help you discover ways you can add to and grow your own life and your happiness. From personal experience, I can say that I spent about a whole month this january focussing on my physical health. I made sure I ate enough food and cooked healthy balanced meals, I exercised loads and made sure to get about nine hours of sleep each night, which is the amount I have found suits me the best. My life was perfectly balanced, or at least it would have seemed that way from the outside. University had not started up again and none of my friends and flatmates were around for the whole month. Whilst I had found balance in what was my whole life at that time, as soon as other elements like work and socialising came into play it quickly all fell apart, my food was terrible and my focussed exercise plan disintegrated into only occasional runs with no real motivation in them. My problem was that individually, the aspects of my life that I was seeking to balance were completely manageable. If university was the only part of my life, no doubt I would be managing it excellently, likewise if socialising and keeping up with friends was all I had to do, I would have coped in an almost effortless way. However life is not like this. I needed to frame this issue in a new way and change my perspective on how I would ‘balance’ different parts of my life.

0 notes