Finding Life's Balance #18

Hosts Dan, Terry, and Brian talk about Maintaining a Balanced Life!

They will help you live your life with purpose, change someone’s life for the better and leave a lasting impact on those around you. Everyone starts the race... but only the Fearless Finish Strong!
 
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Transcript

Dan Wheeler: 0:00

Brian Did you know Zeus and Apollo were Lilliputians.

Brian Roland: 0:06

My neighbor's dogs.

Terry Steen: 0:07

Hey, don't use words I can't understand. Oh, he was a compliment. Oh, okay, thank you do work out right is what you're saying I try.

John Matarazzo: 0:21

Live your life with purpose, change someone's life for the better, and leave a lasting impact on those around you. Welcome to finish strong, the podcast designed to help you discover your unique purpose and develop a plan to leave a powerful legacy. In this episode, Dan Bryan and Terry talks about the importance of maintaining a balanced life. Now, here's Dan. So let's get started.

Dan Wheeler: 0:44

The other day, I was doing a project around my house and I got into a weird position with my back and things just locked up. I was frozen, I could hardly move. And I went to my chiropractor the next day. And he said, Man, are you out of alignment? No wonder you can't move. And he made some adjustments and got things back into balance. And it seems like we do that in many areas of our life, where our priorities get out of balance and our life gets out of balance. We're going to talk about that in this episode, but finish strong. How do you maintain a balanced life? And why is that so important? I'm Dan Wheeler, and I'm joined by Terry Steen and Brian Rowland and our producer, John Matarazzo. Terry, it seems like the same law of golf applies law of life, when you take a golf swing, you want to stay on balance through that whole swing, if you get off balance, you're not making good contact?

Terry Steen: 1:42

Well, I'm a little bit offended that you would bring that topic up with me, you must have seen me golf, because I always lean back when I'm trying to hit and then I miss it. And you are exactly right, bam, I do the same thing as Brian, you don't even want to talk about his golf game. But you know, you guys probably have friends like I do. I've got a friend in particular that when you talk about balance in life, he just doesn't have it, he gets into one thing. And he just oh D's on it. And then he leaves everything behind. Like when he gets into a diet or he goes man, I need to start working out. He'll go at it to three workouts a day, and it'll last for a week. And then he quits and he doesn't do it for half a year. So you know, the balancing of life, to me has always been such an important area. And I think it'd be good for us to spend a little time today in seeing what God has to say about living a balanced life, you know, what does it look like? What steps do we need to take. And one thing that I think is so critical is that we need to have a daily routine, we need to have habits, we need to have time management in place to really be able to live the balanced life that God wants us to. And I come back to Mark I think this might set us up for the discussion is Mark 1230. And this is what God says about a balanced life. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. And those are the three to four key areas of our lives where he wants us to have biblical balance he our heart and our soul is our spirit, our emotions. And the soul is like the will or the choices that we make. And then of course, our mind is our intellect and our wisdom. And then the body, of course, is the physical part. So we have all three of those areas that we're playing, that he wants us to keep that balance.

Dan Wheeler: 3:56

And I know in my life, I've gotten out of balance in those areas and maybe not made the Lord a priority. And that's why for me, I have to start my day out with the Lord that you talked about habits and routine. If I don't start my day, thinking about the Lord, spending time in the word, having my devotions and praying my days out of balance. Do you find that's true, Brian?

Brian Roland: 4:20

It's absolutely true. And you know, it's interesting, because I did a morning cup recently on the 10 minute rule. And that is if you can do it within 10 minutes, do it. No, don't put it off. In the same same thing is in the morning with prayer. What I said was how I get up and I go and I feed the dogs, I get my coffee, I come back and I sit down and open the word and that's where I get my time right there. And I started with 10 minutes. But of course it goes way beyond that now because that's just what happens as you get into the word. But if you can do that, and get your day started that way, it gets you going in the right path, the right direction and really get some momentum going in my life so I can get going and get started and get my day done.

Terry Steen: 4:58

Well when we talk about this Subject this topic, what does it do to you guys? Does it when we talk about balanced life? Does it make you cringe? Like, oh, man, I don't want to talk about that, or does it excite you? How do you what do you think about it? Well, I always make a to do list. And sometimes I feel like I get too tied to that to do list. And if I don't get it all done, I almost feel like a failure or something. But I think we have to be open to the to God intervening in our schedule. And that's part of the balance. And by starting out, you read that verse, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength, and you kind of broke it down to those three areas, digitary heart and soul, Now, mind and body, but you've got the heart and soul at the top. And I think that's where the priority comes in. It all starts there, doesn't it? And I don't know about you guys, I'm sure you do the same thing. But I have always read, I've always heard anytime I read something or hear a management thing about time management or business success stories, almost every one of them are early risers, every one of them start their day early and do the most important things. And I think that's no different. If we want to have a balanced life, and heart and soul is the key, then we need to get up and have those devotions. Like you talked about Dan,

Brian Roland: 6:32

you know, and a balanced life to you. It's really determining what's most important in your life, and then building your life around that. So it wasn't important thing to me is to get my day started, right? And if I could do that, and start with prayer and start with meditating on the word, and having conversation with the Lord, then my life is unbalanced, because I built around that the rest of the day.

Dan Wheeler: 6:53

Yeah, you know, Terry said that successful people get up early. Maybe that's why Brian and I were never successful. Brian sleeping until noon, and then I realized it's because he's on the west coast.

Brian Roland: 7:07

Early is what was what made you successful? Four or five o'clock in the morning?

Dan Wheeler: 7:15

Yeah, we'll find out how early gets up when he moves to East Coast. But Terry, your your philosophy in life was always start off slow, and then taper off. Right?

Terry Steen: 7:24

It's worked for me. Now I have a different definition of success maybe than other people. But still in my head. I've been very successful and set the bar low. You're always Terry, tell us about those three key areas. Why are they so important? Well, it's what brings our balance the our heart, we have to have that spiritual direction. And we have to have that leads us into the mind where God wants us to develop wisdom. And that's how we can have a successful life and then our body. And we'll talk about that later. But that's our vessel. That's what gets us from point A to point B. And if we let that break down, then that's going to hinder the other two areas of our life. So they all work together. So but but like you said, the heart and soul is the key. And maybe we can think about and talk about some of the things that we do well and don't do so well. And those areas.

Dan Wheeler: 8:21

Well, you know, speaking of heart and soul, a verse that I've committed to memory lately recently is search me, O God, and know my heart, try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any wicked way in me. And that's found in Psalm 139 23 and 24. And I tried to start my day out that way, saying, okay, God, where are my thoughts? Where are they wrong? Is my heart clean? And for heart and soul? I think that's kind of an important place to begin. Yeah, you might not agree, I don't know.

Terry Steen: 8:53

Totally agree. I find for myself that I do very well at devotions. I do very well at Bible reading. But I don't do so well at prayer time. So that's I slip on the prayer time. I don't get that strong balance. And then sometimes the choices I make the use of my time food, what I eat some of those things I have to change to create a little better discipline in those areas.

Dan Wheeler: 9:22

Yeah, well, then we get to mind. So I don't have much to say about this area, because I don't have many thoughts.

Brian Roland: 9:28

Well, I'm losing mine.

Dan Wheeler: 9:32

Right, right. Now we'll try to have some but I don't know Brian, what do you what do you think about the mind the intellect, How do we keep that? Well, you

Brian Roland: 9:40

know that I think that getting the intellect going, it's just it's it's having wisdom, and it's praying for wisdom, and God says, will grant us wisdom when we asked them for it. And I think that's one thing we have we have to look forward to is, is asking him to provide that and then studying the Word because he opens up the word to us. It's a Living Bible. He opens it up. He lets us see what spiritual eyes and hear with spiritual ears on over over in Proverbs 11 one it says a false balances that abomination to the Lord but just a weight in his butt adjust a weight in his the lights. But so he wants us to have wisdom to he doesn't want us to be off balance and start going into things without being wise. I mean, I think that's the biggest thing is when I'm when I'm talking to friends of mine, and we start getting on conversations about the Lord. And a lot of my friends that I've talked to, and there are Christians, and they were not in the same balance. They're coming from one end, and I'm coming from another end. And finally, I have to say, What are you basing your facts on? And I'm basing mine on the Bible. I believe that from the Bible now, if that is my foundation, and yours is something else, and we're not meeting here in the middle. So I asked God for wisdom and how to direct me around those corners and how to speak with these people. And a lot of it is really more than noticing what's going on in my life. And then they ask questions. So will you think of it this way? Why do you think of it that way? Well, that's the wisdom God is putting in in me to speak out. It's not my words. It's his words coming through me. And I think we all have to have that kind of a mindset that we let God be the intellect and put the wisdom into us and speak for through us.

Terry Steen: 11:18

I totally agree, Brian, and one a little different slant for me that I focus on. And you guys may laugh at this the intellectual side a little?

Dan Wheeler: 11:30

Oh, no, I'm sorry.

Terry Steen: 11:32

Excuse me, you just took me by surprise. Hey, one thing I found over the course of years there again to be successful if you find most successful guys read. And that's one thing I've built into my repertoire are part of my daily, I should say monthly plan is reading. So for decades, I've made it a rule to always read at least two books a month. So I read a minimum of 24 books a year, sometimes more sometimes I don't quite get there. And then I decide on the variety of books. I'll start with comic book. No. I was gonna say no, what grade level are you? If it doesn't have pictures, it goes to the back of the pile. Okay. Yeah. But I but I read stuff. I read novels, I read business books, I read self help you know those things. And it truly we're joking about it. But that's an important part of keeping our mind sharp, and continuing to learn continuing to develop, especially as we get older, you know, we get older, we think, oh, the years have passed. It's not a big deal to be reading books and things. But to me, that is a very important thing. Well, you know, I'm kind of gonna go back to heart and soul in relationship to this because I know people I know Christians who read everything, but the Bible. And I think it's important that while we're reading other things, and that obviously helps to you know, keep a sharp, that we also have to kind of judge it against the Bible and say, how does this align with what God's word says? Because there's a lot of things out there, that if you're not careful, can really take you away from God's will and away from the word. Brian, your hand was up?

Brian Roland: 13:29

Well, I was gonna mention, Dan, is when you said that people are reading what other people are thinking and saying, but when you're reading the Word, you are actually reading what God said. Because it's all God's word that is presented to us. And so there's a difference there when you're getting it from man. And when you're getting it from God.

Terry Steen: 13:45

Yeah, and I and I think in reading the Word, it has to do more than read if you don't obey it. You know, that's key to developing the balance in our heart and soul. And I come back to, if you read in Deuteronomy, which I'm reading in my daily devotions, especially the 28th verse, the whole chapter, the whole chapter talks about, if you obey, you'll be blessed. If you disobey, you'll be cursed. And it's so important to find that balance in our spiritual life by obeying, so it all works together. If you don't have your devotions. If you don't read God's word, it's one thing to read a devotional as supplemental but it shouldn't replace reading the Bible.

Dan Wheeler: 14:32

Right, When it comes to the mind, I always think of Romans 12 to do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. And as long as you're keeping that heart and soul strong. I think the mind develops and Brian you kind of refer to there's a difference between knowledge and wisdom, right? Yeah, God can give us the wisdom we need.

Brian Roland: 14:55

Absolutely. Knowledge is something I believe that's something you create In your mind, from what you have learned, but it's the wisdom that God puts in your mind. And that's that that gives you the opportunity to have knowledge and have correct knowledge. Because there's both there's you're going to get and you're cutting knowledge that is going to be leading. misleading and knowledge that's going to be leading but the leading is what's bringing you it's coming from wisdom, getting tongue tied in my wisdom here.

Dan Wheeler: 15:22

Yeah.

Terry Steen: 15:22

And wisdom, of course, comes from God, right. That's what we have to ask for. That's what we have to pray for intellect. You know, God gives us the mind to learn. But we have to do the heavy lifting on that. So we become more intelligent and more knowledgeable, but wisdom comes from God. Obviously, that's more important, but they all work together.

Dan Wheeler: 15:44

Speaking of heavy lifting, we've talked about the heart and soul. We've talked about the mind. What about the body? Terry? Is that important to keep that in balance?

Terry Steen: 15:52

Interesting that you would ask me to talk about the body? Yes, I have been working out you probably noticed. Let me show you. Can you see my biceps?

Brian Roland: 16:02

Ah, that's your bulging disc, isn't it?

Terry Steen: 16:05

Name is Zeus. That's what the one I call Zeus. Yeah, over here is Apollo. So no, no, wait, wait, Was that a joke or you know, sometimes people forget about the body. And if you go walking through the mall, if you go into a store, you'll see people that you can tell they have forgotten to take care of their body. But that's Brian Did you know Zeus and Apollo were Lilliputians.

Brian Roland: 16:35

So my neighbor's dog,

Terry Steen: 16:37

hey, don't use words, I can't understand. Oh, he was a compliment. Oh, okay. So you do work out what you say. I try. It's all part of the balance. But you know, just as importantly, is sleep, eating properly. Those are all things that are critical. So we have to eat properly, we have to sleep properly. When it comes to workouts, you know, it's important to have cardio resistance, core balance, stretching, all those bring balance to the workout routine. But as scripture Lee, what I come back to is first Corinthians six, verse 19, and 20. And to me that's kind of foundational to talking about the body. And the importance of it, it says Do Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you've received from God, you're not your own your bow with a price, therefore honor God with your body. And to me, that's just reinforces the importance that our body is housing, the Holy Spirit, that's a pretty awesome thought.

Brian Roland: 17:54

And you know, too, when you're talking about the workouts, and that too, if you if you don't continue it, atrophy sets in, you start losing it all, you start losing with with the COVID, what was happening here, my gym clothes, I'd sold all my weights, net, because I'm getting ready to move. I'm not working out and I'm sitting there going, picking up boxes going these didn't used to be heavy, what happened, but you lose it in atrophy sets in with age. And when you start letting that go, and you're not working out continuously, you lose what you have. And that's happens, the same thing. In our spiritual life. If we don't work it out daily, we can lose what we have.

Terry Steen: 18:28

Yeah. And another thing that I was reminded of a number of years ago, I had a friend who was kind of getting a little sloppily. Is that a word? I don't know. I was gonna look it up slowly, sloppy. He wasn't in shape. And he was a pastor. He was a pastor. And here's the verse that he would quote. He said, for physical traits. This is in what the fourth chapter of First Timothy, it's the eighth verse. And it says, for physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life that come. So he was using this verse as a reason not to do any physical workout because the godliness value was so more important than the physical training, even though it said it has some value. So we can rationalize if we want. But the reality is, it's still important.

Dan Wheeler: 19:34

It's interesting because Romans 12, one and two one talks about the body and other talks about the mind, and and ultimately, God's will. So it really talks about that balance again, but Romans 12 one and I'm reading from the New International Version says, Therefore, I urge you brothers, in view of God's mercy to offer your bodies as living sacrifices holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual act of worship, and You I used to really try to work out hard. But a lot of it was driven by, you know, I was on TV and I wanted to look good. And I was doing the fitness shows, and it was a bit of a challenge. But now I work out differently. I workout just to kind of maintain to try and keep my chest bigger than my stomach. But I love to work out Christian music, and I make it an act of worship. And while I'm working out, I'm thanking God, for my body and that I can do it. And we all know also that there is a mental benefit to working out with the endorphins that are released, you have that sense of well being

Terry Steen: 20:36

I've heard that

Dan Wheeler: 20:37

you otta try it sometime. A lot. Yeah.

Brian Roland: 20:46

I mean, I think,

Dan Wheeler: 20:50

Well, you know, the three of us are all mid 60s and beyond. But John Matarazzo is our producer, and he's a young man, what do you john, did you say 35? Something like that. 3636. So how important is balance in your life? What do you think of this discussion?

John Matarazzo: 21:07

Well, definitely, I've been challenged recently to get back to the gym and take care of my body. Because I've had my back go out of line and whenever the muscles atrophied around it from after my car accident, and I needed to strengthen those so that I would, I could actually do what I was called to do. But whenever those muscles get weak, it really does make it difficult to do what you're supposed to do. So it's difficult to work out, but it's worth it. And just trying to find balance in life is is really difficult, but it is worth it no matter what it is, it is worth it.

Terry Steen: 21:42

You know I might add is we're coming to a close routine can be a dirty word to some people. But for me, that's about the only way I can keep balance in my life is establishing a routine, establishing those habits, being proactive with my time management, I found that when I made the move to the new house, and I was in the middle of a bunch of it was a different environment, I had different things I had to do. And I realized my routine got off, and my balance in life cut off and I had to re establish a new routine to get myself back into this balanced life.

Brian Roland: 22:21

No to just what you're saying. Deb and I were talking about our lunch today, how we can't wait to get back into a routine once we get moved, because we're so out of whack right now. Yes, everything we're trying to do so many things at one time to prepare for this move, because it's coming up so quick. I totally agree with what you're saying. Or when you're out of routine, you're out of balance.

Dan Wheeler: 22:39

So it's important to grow stronger, and, you know, finish stronger, with a balanced life. And it's important at every stage of your life, I guess we at this age realize we really have to take care of ourselves. And you know, so many people let themselves kind of fall apart. And if you're falling apart, physically, it's hard to keep that mental side strong. And we always have to keep the spiritual side strong. Again, I'll go back to the verse Terry, that you started off with

Mark 12: 23:11

30. And you'll You shal love the Lord your God with al your heart, with all your soul with all your mind and with al your strength. And Terry, wh don't you just give us a quic recap of those three areas an why they're so important.

Terry Steen: 23:27

Yeah, they're, they all play a part in our overall being that God loves so much He created us in all those aspects and all those areas. So the heart and the soul, the spiritual and the emotional side are critical that we keep those in tune. And we can only do that through obedience to Him and to his word and keeping that word active and keeping that Holy Spirit in our life. And then of course the mind, we have to keep the mind sharp, and we have to have the wisdom that God gives us to live in this world to be able to impact other people's lives. And we're not going to do that if our bodies run down if our body does not function if we can't get around and do what we need to and that is what houses the Holy Spirit.

Dan Wheeler: 24:17

Brian, final takeaways.

Brian Roland: 24:19

Keep in balance, think about this. If you don't, if you're on your heels, you're not going to be unbalanced. If you're on your toes, you're going to be imbalanced. And when you're on your toes, you're always moving forward. So you want to keep balance.

Dan Wheeler: 24:32

Boy, that's that's a good thought. Brian, you know, we don't want to live our lives in the rearview mirror. We need to look forward and we look forward to hearing from you about our podcasts finish strong. You can always leave us a review I'm going to throw to our producer John Matarazzo because he's good at asking for those reviews.

John Matarazzo: 24:50

Yeah, we appreciate every review that people give us and five stars. We like those the best. If you write a review on Apple podcast that helps more people find Finish strong by fearless faith so that they can in their life finish strong as well. So make sure you review if we like it, we might actually read it too.

Dan Wheeler: 25:09

Well thanks for joining us for another episode of finish strong. My thanks to Terry, Brian and john, and we hope that you'll grow stronger and finish stronger by maintaining a balanced life. We'll see you next time.

John Matarazzo: 25:25

Thank you for listening to finish strong for more information about finish strong and fearless faith. Check out their website ffaith.org mak sure that you rate and revie this podcast to help more peopl accomplish their God give purpose so that together we ca finish stron