Writers Balance

Jen at "so you wannabee a Domestik Goddess?" tagged me with the meme "How do you maintain balance in your life?" Ordinarily I don't write much about my personal life in this blog. I save those ramblings for 100 Bloggers. I wondered if this meme about balance, specifically for writers, might allow me to share anything useful to other writers? When I was raising a child, both married and alone, my writing was a problem. Because I had a very unsupportive partner, I had to shoehorn it into all the services performed for others. Now, gazing through the glaring headlights of hindsight, I know I made a deep mistake.

Until recent years I struggled for balance, seldom achieved it, probably because it is a living process of feedback loops and corrections. I'm one whose psychological pendulum naturally swung wide. "Too sensitive!" became the perjorative hurled my way. Coincidentally, my astrological sign is Libra, the scales! Gradually most other responsibilities slipped out of my life, and I've let them go. Fate forced me to focus on another career for a decade, but eventually that ended in early 2001, allowing me to return to commercial writing, editing and helping others get their books published.

Then I was in a position to allow writing to take over my life as much as I wanted. Granted, in 2006 the sudden death of my mother and breast cancer slowed me down. I am, indeed, living in the end times. I feel I have achieved balance at last regarding my life sub specie aeternitatis, a Latin phrase I learned as an adolescent. Looking at events "under the aspect of eternity" or with a cosmic view provides the perspective to see balance achieved. That which was denied to me earlier is now available in abundance, and I am at peace.