It was not until after I had completed the Balance In Life album, that I noticed a few themes were woven into the songs.

I identified the song themes as – Social Issues, Self Improvement, and From Where I Sit, and decided to make song medleys on these themes.  

The post on Social Issues was done in late July and can be found at this link – https://richardlepinsky.com/social-issues-songs-from-balance-in-life-album/

Self Improvement Song Medley

This Self Improvement Song Medley includes the songs – Balance In Life, Doing What Your Doin, Change Your Mind, Can’t Back Me Into A Corner, all from my first album titled Balance In Life.

These songs were written as I enjoy life in my sixth decade, and are based on my own life experiences and observations.

Balance In Life song

I have felt for many years that keeping life in balance makes life smoother, and is a trick we all want to master. It applies to all areas of our life – spiritual, financial, family life, work life, and social life.

Financial Balance

I think we don’t want to be at either of the extreme ends of having too much or too little of anything. We all want the Goldilocks Spot of having enough, that is being just right.

The Goldilocks Economy is defined at Wikipedia as an economy that is neither too hot or too cold – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldilocks_economy

You could also apply it to your life.

As a young family man with young kids, there was little or no money left at the end of the month. In part, because young families are building their lifestyle and estate, and buying lots of things.

Life may be running smoothly, but if you can’t pay your credit card bill at the end of the month, it may be the start of falling behind financially. Not a good thing.

Work Life Balance

In my younger years, I felt I could work hard and keep the pedal to the metal for the benefit of making money.

The basic premise of needing to work to earn money, we can’t escape. But working in overdrive is another story. We can do it for a while, but eventually we all run out of energy or desire to keep up a hectic pace.

Maybe your work life has been demanding on you. Pressure to complete work in shorter time, or having to work a lot of overtime

It is tough to come home, and enjoy an evening with the family, when you are too tired or stressed out thinking about what you have to do again tomorrow.

Balance Your Work Load

Denis Waitley talks about 8 ways to Balance Your Work Load, in this article – https://www.success.com/8-ways-to-balance-your-workload-for-max-productivity/

Out of Balance Relationships

If you are not getting along with your spouse or our children, those relationships can become out of balance.

Maybe there is not enough time for the kids social activities, or to keep the house in well maintained order. And maybe the dog keeps peeing on the floor.

With the hectic pace of life, things can get out of balance from time to time.

Maintain Balance In Life

The song tries to bring our attention to have balance in our lives. It is not always easy, but it is something to strive for.

Doing What Your Doin song

I have observed people who do things the same way over and over. I observe that things could be improved, but the person is stubborn and does not want to change their method of operating. Then one day, they realize that there is a better way, and they make a change your the better.

Hopefully the change is weeks or months later, not decades later.

An under lying theme of this song is the quote –

the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again

and expecting a different result.

The quote investigator says the earliest known reference to this saying was in October 1981 from an al-anon meeting. Read more on it here – https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/03/23/same/

Change Your Mind song

The Change Your Mind song is asking the question, when are we going to change our minds ? It is a slightly different take on the Doing What Your Doin song, except I am now talking about our thought process, rather than our physical actions.

Just Change Your Mind

In theory, it should be easy to just change our thoughts on something and we would take different action.

Life experience and observation tells me it is not that simple.

Why don’t we exercise ?

I know my excuse for not doing exercise, is that I don’t want to be uncomfortable, like getting out in cold or rainy weather.

It seems I am not alone with that thought. Sherry Pagoto Ph.D, lists many of these discomforts, like –

being too hot, being too sweaty, getting out of bed too early and it’s cold. There are a lot of excuses.

Read about them in her article here –  https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shrink/201411/the-real-reason-we-dont-exercise

The question remains however, when are you going to change your mind ?

Can’t Back Me Into A Corner song

I was a self employed the majority of my career. I chose that life because I was able to control my life work life, including my hours, and reap 100% of the benefits of my work, rather than splitting with my employer.

Dave Edwards in his article 10 Benefits of Being Self Employed https://www.lifehack.org/articles/work/10-benefits-being-self-employed.html

name some great benefits.

Listen to the Self Improvement Song Medley from Balance In Life the album here.