The Write Balance is Collin Varney, a dedicated high school English teacher who has struggled to balance two aspects of his life in particular: teaching and writing. Each fulfills him in ways the other cant. He loves and needs both. Although these worlds overlap in unique and unexpected ways, teaching is his job. It demands more of him, as it should. He chose a profession of service, and his students deserve the committed, passionate him that chose it. He’s proud to say they get that. Too often, though, he allows teaching to claim too much of himself. This doesn’t mean he’s trying to escape the professions demandstheyve yielded the most rewarding experiences of his life. Instead, he wants to actively struggle with balance in a more conscious way.One of his favorite quotations (which he frequently shares with students) comes from Carl Jung: Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will control your life and you will call it fate. Those words urge us to take action, but they first require that we discover what that action must be. Although he’s been conscious of an imbalance for a long time, he’s done little about it. Ironically, students often remind him of this negligence. They pocket his references to personal creativity, and later they ask about his writing when he’s almost forgotten. Surely, they must assume, Mr. Varney doesn’t spend his energy on school alone. And in those moments, he recalls the times he’s tried to reveal to students their own potential with language, the necessity in coaxing out the creative voices they didn’t think they hadwhile his stayed quiet. He can’t wait to read your novel, a student once told him after urging him to share an idea he’d incubated for over five years (now close to ten), leaving him at his desk in silence, papers to grade, emails to write, lessons to plan, tired. He assumes we all face this to some extent. One aspect of life demands more urgently, another is neglected. And because the prior calls for immediate action, it’s tempting to act out of frustration, even if we know that disdain will concoct a messy boil of contention for both.Now if you’re like him, he could use a reminder here and there that he’s lucky to have two such aspects that are valuable enough to balance (not to mention his relationships with his amazing wife, family, and friends). So rather than growing frustrated or calling the mixture fate, assuming its out of his control, he realizes what he (and maybe you) really need is a way to hold up one part of life to the other, to reflect the worth back and forth. By not recognizing balance as an ever-changing skill to practice consciously, he’s neglected a significant part of who he is, only then to believe the circumstances were no longer his to shape. But he can always tinker for a realistic balance. We can all embrace risk while finding poise in the chaos. For him that means sharing his work. It wont be perfect, but it’s better to practice publicly than not at all. This site is a way to make time for a piece of him that hasnt thrived, an ode to the creatives who’ve inspired him along the way, and an invite to anyone else who wants to (re)engage with a neglected passion of their own. As his faceless logo implies, he knows he’s not the only one fighting imbalance. As a writer (and he would imagine for any creator), he believes there is no “right” way to balance the aspects of life but rather a need to replace the idea of perfection with the act of making more. His “write balance” is to simply make more, to practice publicly, to share his work. That means holding himself accountable, especially for his readers.If you want to be one of those readers (wow, you’re incredible), then you will be a humbling reminder to keep looking forward, to brave the tightrope back into the open again and again, away from his comfort zone. You’ll be a reminder that creating is worth it. There are countless ways to fall into procrastination, neglect, fear, doubt. This work is his way of looking up instead of down. So, welcome to his balancing act. He’d love if you stuck around to see it.
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