Striking A Balance

This weekend I was in Seattle with a dear friend and we were discussing our life situations and that basically, neither one of us is entirely content with our respective situations. There were various aspects that we discussed but one that we touched on that I am interested in is a balance of “input” vs. “output” as we phrased it.

I will skip the details of how we got to the discussion but, want to expand upon it some. By input we were generally referencing the fact that, in our current situations, we read, a lot. I personally have about 5 different books going right now and my friend probably has something similar. We both take in a lot of information constantly in an effort to escape probably and to simply be learning in ways we do not get to do regularly during the week. We end up with a problem though.

Namely, that problem is that we get lost in simply receiving information. We get stuck in our own heads. That ends up making us feel worse, possibly simply accepting the situation we are in without trying to affect change in it.

Then there are the “outputs” which, in essence, are creative activities which help us to end up with something at the end. Mine is writing specifically, my friend is interested in writing more but does not do it as much. Other things would be such as some other endeavors I want to pursue but have not yet along with goals for more physical pursuits of fitness etc. that we are both pursuing.

Another example would be the fact that both of us spent probably an hour in a book store trying to solve some of those puzzles that one can get as brain teasers the towers of Hanoi ring puzzle type. Although these puzzles do end up leading to a “solution” I would argue that they are very poor outputs since they are not “creative” in the sense of being something original created by the person performing the puzzle.

One thing that both of us have fallen into though is being out of balance in these inputs and outputs. We have a lot of input, insofar as we are constantly trying to find things to learn and be stimulated in somewhat fulfilling ways. But, we do not have much in the form of friend networks or creative pursuits to have the outputs side. As such, we end up not having a balance of learning and creating which leaves us feeling less empowered to make changes that we need to do for having more fulfilling lives.

Expanding on this idea: think about all of the entertainment we have now in the form of internet and TV specifically; what if part of our general discomfort comes from being out of balance in a similar way. We end up watching a lot of TV, a lot of videos, reading a lot of articles but not everyone creates things after that. What would happen if more individuals ended up creating more to balance out all of the things they are receiving from external sources? Would it lead to more empowerment to engage with various parts of life?