BALANCING ACT: BLENDING LIFE, WORK, AND RELATIONSHIPS® A free monthly newsletter about balancing life, work, and relationships based on the books and popular workshops conducted by Alan Weiss, Ph.D.

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Essays

Musings

Developmental Stuff

ORTIYKMWOYBNTO

Balancing Act^®: The Newsletter

(No. 324, July 2026)

BALANCING ACT: BLENDING LIFE, WORK, AND RELATIONSHIPS®

A free monthly newsletter about balancing life, work, and relationships based on the books and popular workshops conducted by Alan Weiss, Ph.D. Past copies are archived on our web site: http://www.summitconsulting.com

ISSN 1934-3116

Balancing Act^® is our registered trademark. You are encouraged to share the contents with others with appropriate attribution. Please use the ^® whenever the phrase “Balancing Act” is used in connection with this newsletter or our workshops.

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Balancing Act is in four sections:

Essays
Musings
Developmental Stuff
ORTIYKMWOYBNT-O Department

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This begins our 28th year of Balancing Act, thank you for your continued interest!!

The Fallacy of "Completion"

We can complete a race, because there’s a finish line. We can complete cooking a meal because the food is ready to eat. We can complete watching a movie because it ends.

But we can’t “complete” happiness, or contentment, or business strategy. There is always something else we can do, no matter how minor, and we often deny ourselves personal time, family time, and other rewarding endeavors because we are “guilty” that we could have done more for the client, or the business, or the cause. My advice is to stop at success, and not strive for perfection, or you’ll never be happy because you’ll never attain it.

Bigger Isn't Necessarily Better

The Super Bowl halftime, the World Cup, award shows, destination weddings, gender “reveals”: It seems as though we’re equating “bigger” being automatically “better.” I’m reminded of the Sultan of Brunei and Paul Allen of Apple who kept adding several feet to their zillion-dollar yachts to try to maintain their status as the largest in the world.

The Met Gala. Taylor Swift’s wedding. How can you be so successful and at the same time so insecure that you have to keep “outdoing” what’s already excellent and even terrific?

My Own "Chaos Theory"

We often see complexity and insolubility when things aren’t clear to us. We tend to panic, or guess, or give up. But there are even parameters around chaos. Mathematicians believe even the weather and the stock market can be reliably forecast. But all of us can reduce chaos.

Consider a jig saw puzzle. What seems like a morass of tiny pieces jumbled together actually offers some pieces with straight sides, meaning they are part of the frame, and some with similar colors meaning they are in the same part of the picture. And, in actuality, given enough time, we can all complete jig saw puzzles. The same applies to our businesses and life. Find the commonalities and connections and reduce the “chaos” to soluble issues.

The Rewards of Giving

Giving of ourselves—time, money, expertise, support—is a highly rewarding experience because the effort is really reciprocal. We feel better for having given, so long as it’s not coerced and it is voluntary and, better yet, initiated by us and not by an external appeal.

There is no “shame” in feeling good about doing a good deed.

We all tend to talk about “the good old days” (at least once we’ve attained an age where there are “good old days”). And let’s face it, things often were better, less confused, less divisive, more efficient.

It was a pleasure to travel coast-to-coast in the US on a giant 747 whereas now the airlines use 737s and A321s. There was more serious and objective journalism on TV than today’s biased commentary and nauseating “happy talk” news. You could behave and talk without fear of being secretly recorded, and give opinions with being shunned by the other side of the polarized aisle.

There wasn’t a threat of being sued by people who were illegally on your lawn and tripped and hurt themselves, nor were there laws protecting “squatters” who simply broke into your home and took over. There were no “microagressions” in personally innocent speech nor demands that we should wake up feeling guilty and go to sleep feeling regretful. The airwaves were not filled with ads from personal injury lawyers and miracle drugs.

Yet there was no telemedicine, no choices of hundreds of quality TV shows, no remote meetings, no distance learning, not as many protections for people, for animals, for the environment.

We need to learn to live in, and appreciate, the present, or as is said, “play the hand we’re dealt.” We can learn from the past, but not relive it (and shouldn’t try). We can anticipate the future, and either dread it or welcome it, but it’s not yet here. The grass is always greener, or maybe browner, at another time.

Just bear in mind that for many people, today will be “the good old days.

Development Opportunities

2026 Zoom Workshops

January 6	Maximizing the coaching/advisory dynamic
February 3	Maximizing speaking spin-off business
March 3	Role-playing tough conversations
April 7	Maximizing workshop effectiveness spin-off
May 5	Maximizing current events potential
June 9	Role-playing tougher conversations
NEXT: July 8	Maximizing low project labor practices
August 13	Maximizing panels—participant/moderator
September 8	Role-playing toughest conversations
October 6	Maximizing publishing potential
November 2	Maximizing lifestyle potential
December 8	Maximizing 2027 personally and professionally

All sessions are approximately 90 minutes beginning at 10:30 US eastern time. These sessions are $450 each, or the entire year for $5,000. Add three months of weekly 30-minute coaching for $2,500, a total of $7,500. (My cards are accepted for the full-year, and for the full-year and coaching options, not for individual sessions.) All sessions will include video recording, visual photos, and Zoom Companion summary. Register here: https://alanweiss.com/growth-experiences/zoom-workshops-2026/

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I'm an Old Cowhand...

I was flying British Air in first class and my habit is to remove my shoes when I take my seat and put on the socks they provide in the amenity kit. I placed my shoes under the seat in from of me. But the flight attendant said that I couldn’t leave anything under the seat because the space was too small.

“Do you actually want me to put my shoes in the overhead?” I asked.

“No, sir,” she said.

“Then where should I put them?”

“On your feet, sir.”