Irrelevance of Balance

Although I'm sure I'll come back to the many conflicting ideas of kindness floating around in my head lately, a theme has been emerging in my life that I feel the need to make mention of. I'm not sure I'll have any sort of concluding thoughts on this theme, perhaps just a few initial perceptions...

While eating lunch at a strange little place downtown, we talked of life and work and school and the general overwhelming nature of life. I was honest in saying that entering grad school could be just a terrible thing as far as my life balance goes. My wise friend and mentor, in her usual honest, frank way said that she didn't think balance in each stage of life was really a possible thing...maybe over the course of a lifetime one could hope to average out somewhere in the realm of balance, but not in every season. Some seasons have more work, more study, more quiet, more chaos. But to attempt to achieve balance in each stage just would drive a person to a frustrated insanity. I wasn't so sure I agreed just completely. 

But tonight, as I started another new book (note, I said started...I've got a pile of something like seven started books...none of which I've managed to finish), I stumbled upon this quote from Jacques Ellul, a French philosopher that I won't even pretend to know anything about. In his book, Reason for Being: A Meditation on Ecclesiastes, he writes:

Remember your Creator during your youth: when all possibilities lie open before you and you can offer all your strength intact for his service. The time to remember is not after you become senile and paralyzed! Then it is not too late for your salvation, but too late for you to serve as the presence of God in the midst of the world and the creation. You must take sides earlier - when you can actually make choices, when you have many paths opening at your feet, before the weight of necessity overwhelms you.

This, to me, sounds like encouragement for specific seasons of life - those seasons when you're young, full of energy, ambition. This is perhaps not the time to strive for balance at all. It is the time to strive to be the very presence of God in the world. Later will be too late. I will be tired and slow and old. But right now, now I've got the drive, the passion, maybe even the insanity to dive deeply into my purpose for living. 

As I said before, I'm not so sure I've got any actual conclusive remarks on this matter...just a few unfinished thoughts on the theme of seasons and the irrelevance of balance in living out a life of purpose. I'm interested to wait and see if anything else comes up like this, and if nothing else, perhaps I have another book to start in the near future as I've already looked up Ellul's book and found it right on the shelves of the campus library.