In 1974 Phillppe Petit walked a tight rope between the World Trade Center buildings (the ones that came down during the terrorist attack). They were nearly 1,800 feet in the air.
In 2012, Nik Welenda walked a tight rope across Niagara Falls. While Nik’s wire was only about 180 feet in the air, that one seemed more difficult to me. Why, because beneath him the Niagara River was rushing over the falls. Everything was moving. This is not to diminish what Petit did. Both would be terrifying. But it just seems more difficult to me to maintain your balance when everything around you is moving.
I’ve walked structural steel. I’ve also walked over the catwalk of a dam with rushing water under me. Both were terrifying, but it was harder to maintain my balance over the moving water.
In my story about walking structural steel I progressed through three lessons from the experience:
- Figure out your goal and stay focused
- Reaching your goal requires trust
- Balance, Balance, Balance. Without balance you will neither reach your goal or build trust.
The world is becoming a very fast paced environment. With each step of increased travel velocity, the world had become more interconnected. With the advent of the internet and pipeline speed that velocity has become almost infinite in nature. It seems like a Niagara amount of information, data and connectivity is swirling around us every moment of every day. With each passing day it becomes more difficult for us to maintain our balance. Without balance bad things happen.
Over the next few blog posts I’m going to talk about balance with a focus on three key areas:
- Decision Making
- Stress and Health
- Human Needs
It seems that we are all living on the “High Wire” of life these days.
- How do we maintain our balance?
- Why is it necessary to maintain our balance?
- What happens when we lose our balance?
Balance, Balance, Balance.
