Keeping Life in Perspective
PRIME – January 2015
Book offers new slant on how to ‘juggle’ life’s responsibilities
By Debbie Gardner
debbieg@thereminder.com
No matter your age – or stage in life – we are all running some version of a balancing act on a daily basis.
It might be fitting a part-time job or volunteering into grandchild-care duties, splitting your time between caring for a spouse (or sibling) and an elderly relative, parenting teens or young adults while working full-time, or some personal combination of any and all of those demands.
On a good day, the pace can be tiring. On a bad day, it can be exhausting, stressful, disheartening, and even depressing.
But there can be a light at the end of the tunnel.
And no, it doesn’t mean shirking your responsibilities, or running away to a deserted island where no one needs you.
The key, according to motivational speaker and Greenfield resident Rob Peck, is to find a rhythm that lets you keep all those balls in the air – with some breathing room for yourself.
Peck is the author of a new book – “It’s a Juggle Out There: A Guide to a Better Balanced & More Fulfilling Life” – that provides a fresh perspective on how to handle these demands in a way, he said, “that is exhilarating, not exhausting.”
Just before the holiday crush, PRIME sat down with Peck to talk about the book and his approach to life.
“I decided to write this book, easily, 10 years or so ago,” Peck confessed. “It has been easy to procrastinate, to let my perfectionism get in the way.”
It’s that perfectionism, Peck said, that keeps any of us from looking at life’s “to do” list from a different perspective, one that presents opportunities instead of obstacles.
“Obstacles are placed in our lives not to obstruct, but to instruct,” the 60-year old Peck said. “It’s not for no reason that my initials are R.P. – Recovering Perfectionist.”
The choice of a juggling metaphor as a way to rebalance life’s demands is no accident, either. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, Peck also holds a degree from the Academy of Antic Arts, and uses various classic and innovative juggling feats to emphasize points and connect with his audiences during his motivational talks.
In other words, he practices what he preaches.
“Good jugglers,” Peck explains in the opening chapters of his book, “Know how to catch a lot of balls simultaneously. Great jugglers know how to let go of everything nonessential.”
Learning the ropes
How do you get from good to great when it comes to juggling – or balancing – the different roles in your life? Like any good athlete – and a juggler is an athlete – it takes practice.
But rather than using the old adage that says practice makes perfect, Peck reforms that thought to say “practice makes progress” toward the ultimate goal of a more fulfilling life.
“The big question is how do you keep the right balls in the air,” Peck said adding that the responsibilities to be managed are “highly individualized” to each juggler.
The key to recognizing which are the “right balls” for each of us to juggle lies, Peck notes, in rediscovering the kind of mind-body connection that a juggler uses to keep his eye on one ball while his hands are tossing and catching the other ones.
The big three
“It’s A Juggle Out There” uses three basic lessons – all taken from the art of juggling – to help individuals reestablish that mind-body connection Peck said is so crucial to achieving a balanced life.
The first lesson – find a rhythm that works for your biology and biography.
“Be yourself. Everybody else is taken,” Peck said, acknowledging that can sometimes be a difficult task in a society espousing that faster is better and winning at all costs is the ultimate goal.
“The five wisest words I know are inscribed on the oracle at Delphi [Greece]; ‘Know thyself. Nothing to excess’,” Peck said. “If you do the first two, you get authenticity and awareness. With the last three, you get moderation and harmony. It’s putting all five of them together that’s tricky”
The book’s second lesson – “The ruin of peace is perfectionism” – echoes his own personal struggle with the need to master what he sets out to do.
“Literally and figuratively, no one can juggle it all and as some point everyone drops the ball, which is precisely the moment of truth, because juggling reminds and reinforces the two imperatives: to be patient [with ourselves] and to persist,” Peck said.
The third lesson – “There’s a thin line between racing and chasing,” illustrates how today’s fast-paced culture is the antithesis to the serenity we all seek.
“The beauty of a good juggling act, or any graceful activity, happens because performers know how to take their time,” Peck explains in his book. “They’ve learned the core Zen practice of shifting from powerful effort to effortless power.”
Making it work
Throughout the pages of “It’s A Juggle Out There,” Peck uses anecdotes that offer insight, questions that invite introspection and suggestions for the implementation of lessons learned in the process of examining the obstacles – such as worry, perfectionism and lack of perspective – that keep us from becoming easy-flowing people in the face of our daily “juggling acts.”
Advice such as “don’t complain, reframe” and “pits are also seeds” present humor-tinged challenges designed to encourage readers to develop greater reserves of resilience and resourcefulness, both key to creating balance.
“When you change the way you look at things, you change the life you lead,” Peck said.
Peck also infuses his road map to a happier life with a unique mix of guided meditation practices, based on the teachings of Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, and pragmatic advice from Steven Covey’s “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” designed to help people refresh and recharge their spirits.
His goal – to encourage us all to practice something he calls “Kind Management” – a hybrid of time management and stress reduction that tackle the twin modern-day stressors of overwork and overload.
“Practicing kindfulness allows us to align our deeds and our creeds in a way that’s guided by an inner compass, rather than an external clock,” Peck said.
“It’s A Juggle Out There” is available on
Amazon.com.
Rob’s Recipe for Waking Up on the Right Side of the Bed
Step One
Take two minutes to lie in bed and greet the morning with reasons to feel grateful (including the absence of past ailments or easing of present ones).
Step Two
Sit up and savor the simple pleasure of several slow, relaxing deep breaths.
Step Three
Lie on your back in bed and spend five to seven minutes slowly stretching opposite limbs, shaping your body in the shape of an extended X. Take care to notice where muscles feel tight and see if you can discover a gentle way to ease that tension.)
Step Four
Be mindful of your jaw responding to muscle tightness by clenching, and counter this reaction by lightly opening your lips and placing your tongue at the bottom of your mouth. Better yet, fix your face in a broad smile that signals relaxation to your brain.
Step Five
Roll out of bed, open the blinds and, weather permitting, lift the window. Stick your head out and smell the morning. Take a firm stance; raise both arms over your head and say, “Yes!” If that’s too over the top, a quick wink at your reflection will suffice.
Step Six
When it’s warm out, brush your teeth in the sun and feel lucky that this lets you spend a few extra minutes outdoors on a nice day.
Step Seven
Pour a tall glass of water or juice, and before breakfast, sit in a quiet spot. As you slowly drain the liquid, jot down the names of three people your gut tells you would welcome a small gesture of kindness.
As you down the last swallow, raise a glass in a toast to starting your day with kindfulness practices that fill you with a spirit of gratitude and generosity.
The above “recipe” reprinted with permission from “It’s A Juggle Out There: A Guide to A Better & More Fulfilling Life” by Rob Peck.
