Too Busy for Balance…

“Temperance and labor,” said Rousseau, “are the two best physicians; the one sharpens the appetite, the other prevents indulgence to excess.” Temperance and labor⎯these are words worth remembering.

There is both underdoing and overdoing in work. Working too hard at work and working too hard at leisure, at playing,⎯both could well become excessive. There is also excessive haste, working swiftly and shoddily to get the work finished, regardless of quality, regardless of how well or how poorly. “I knew a wise man,” said Sir Francis Bacon, “who had for a byword, when he saw men hasten to a conclusion, ‘stay a little, that we may come to the end sooner.'” Too much impatience in getting things done, and not enough enjoyment in doing may also be lack of moderation.

Another extreme is that men sometimes become too specialized, too narrow, too busy for a balanced life; too busy to spend time with family, with friends, with well-rounded sides of life. Any person who has become too busy to spend time with family, with home, with things of beauty, with things of the spirit, with service beyond himself⎯too busy for time with his son, his daughter, too busy to keep close acquaintance with his loved ones, has pursued whatever he pursues to excess.

“Enjoyment and duty” are indispensable elements in the balanced living of life⎯the enjoyment of work, the enjoyment of home and loved ones, and duty to both, are part of the balance of life and of labor. Said Dean Charles R. Brown: “We have too many people who live without working, and we have altogether too many who work without living.”