When I was studying for one of my first licensing exams, I used to go camp out with my books in the Borders Books cafe down the street from my apartment. Not always able to focus and often taking way too many breaks, I'd wander around picking up books here and there and found one of those hobby ones that included juggling balls. Perfect distraction to not having to learn insurance tables and tax codes and understanding amoritization schedules.
The kids know about my random skill as there's an unusual number of juggling balls lying around the house much thanks to my hoarding habits and King Cuddles has been trying to learn how to juggle himself. He's made considerable progress though he tends to like to try adding in extra balls before he's quite ready and we've talked about how the more balls you have, the higher you have to toss one in the air and let go for a longer period of time. It hasn't really stopped him from trying to add the extra ball though.
The funny thing is that even while I talk to him about trying to master 3 balls first, I'm realizing that I'm totally guilty of juggling a high number of things. People frequently like quote Shakespeare's "a jack of all trades is the master of none" but the full quote is actually "a jack of all trades is the master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one." That line of thinking falls in with my list of useless but unending party tricks of juggling, being able to do the Hamilton rap, developing a comedy circuit routine around Ho jokes and remembering almost every old Friends, West Wing and Gilmore Girls episode to the nth degree.
But as I'm starting to navigate a new season of work and life, I've been reminded a couple times that this is the biggest shift that I've had in a few years and honestly, just trying to track my schedule has been much more of a juggle (no pun intended) than I thought it would be. There have been a number of days where I feel like my brain is in a fog. I'm still mapping out what this will look like but trying not to let go of some of the life giving practices that I had previously built like swimming and writing and walking. I think I lost sight of that a little and was adding in an extra ball or two before ready just like KC was, but starting to feel a little more grounded and trying to figure what the right number is for me now...at least this week. Fingers crossed as I continue to navigate the ebbs and flows and learn to have grace with myself in that process.
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