Juggling the Elements of life - Tolstoy Wisdom

Someone told the life is about balance. If you compare the life to a balancing act in a circus there is some similarity. It seems easy when we are just spectators. Even laugh when someone try to balance a ball on a stick on tip of their nose. Even harder is to eat an apple while balancing the stick and the ball. But there is a problem. The difficulty doesn't come from not only the act of balancing but also from the fact there are multiple elements in life to be balanced. And only way you can do this is by juggling.

Juggling life

Juggling is a better analogy. We can consider each and every ball an element in our life. One for friends, one for relationships, one for relatives, one for work, one for spirituality, one for happiness. The problem is how to let them all not fall at once? And we have to juggle not just balance.

How do they juggle.?

If you have seen a juggler, you can see they are comparatively more dynamic than a balancing actor. He has a holistic view on everything at once. He catches the falling ball smoothly, transfer it to the other hand to buy some time and release it up again with momentum, while simultaneously catching another in empty hand. There is balancing in his act, yet it is more smooth and agile. He knows each and every ball is equally important, but choose to catch only the one which is fallen so far.

It seem there are equally important elements in life as well. Health, work, relationships. If you juggle with three. If you let one fall, your total act would be a disaster. At the same time you have to change from one to the other, giving your attention more to the one which is falling right now. Now imagine some balls are made of marbles. If your health falls on the ground it can shatter entirely, so is your family. But maybe work and success can wait, and bounce back like a ball of rubber.

Tolstoy Wisdom

Then again there is the problem of what to focus on? A Tolstoy wisdom story comes handy here.

One day, a king determines that he will be able to cope with any occurrence if he has the answers to three critical questions:

1. "What is the best time to begin everything?"

2. "Who are the best people to listen to?"

3. "What is the most important thing to do?'

Many educated men attempted to answer the king's questions, but they all came up with different answers. The king decided that he needed to ask a wise hermit in a nearby village. The hermit would only see common folk, however, the king disguised himself as a peasant and left his guards behind to see the hermit. The hermit was digging flower beds when the king arrived. The king asked his questions, but the hermit went on digging rather laboriously. The king offered to dig for him for a while. After digging for some time, the king again asked his questions. Before the hermit could answer, a man emerged from the woods. He was bleeding from a terrible stomach wound. The king tended to him, and they stayed the night in the hermit's hut. By the next day, the wounded man was doing better but was incredulous at the help he had received. The man confessed that he knew who the king was and that the king had executed his brother and seized his property. He had come to kill the king, but the guards wounded him in the stomach. The man pledged allegiance to the king, asked for forgiveness and went on his way. The king asked the hermit again for his answers, and the hermit responded that he had just had his questions answered:

1. The most important time is now.

2. The most important person is whoever you are with.

3. The most important thing is to help the person you are with.

(Which the Wise king already did without hesitancy)