Day 11: Your Favorite Lyric

Day 11 of the 30-Day Depeche Mode Challenge – Your Favorite Depeche Mode Lyric

This has to be “Get the Balance Right,” in its entirety. It’s a brilliant picture of the struggle of just living, and the lyrics from this song often pop into my head as I’m dealing with life, and watching my friends and family deal with life.

There’s more besides
Joyrides
The little house in the countryside

I’m not a “picket fence” girl – in my mind, there is much more to life than marriage, children, dogs and a pretty white fence.

Understand
Learn to demand
Compromise
And sometimes lie

My philosophy is to be thoughtful and understanding of others, but don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it. Sometimes it has to be a joint effort. I hate to lie – in fact I’m quite awful at it – but sometimes I will keep my mouth shut or stretch the truth if I have to protect something important, like a a personal or industry secret. Comes with the territory!

Get the balance right
Get the balance right

Everything about life is balance – work-life balance, balanced finances, balanced diet… moderation in all things. I believe that the act of living is the act of continually striving to find the balance that works for you, and that is very important for happiness.

Be responsible
Respectable
Stable but gullible
Concerned and caring
Help the helpless
But always remain
Ultimately selfish

This is my favorite part… I’m all about stability and security (to a fault), but I’m also sometimes naive. But I think that allows me to remain hopeful when I am feeling insecure. Another big struggle that I have witnessed in myself and others, is the tendency to over work in the help of others. Some of my friends are so self-less in their pursuits of making good, that their own good begins to suffer. Their mental and physical health declines due to stress and fatigue – they never take any time off. Selfishness is considered a very bad thing by society, and in large amounts it is, but we have to remember that if we don’t look after ourselves we will no longer be able to also look after those we care about. Most of my day job involves creating marketing materials for nonprofit organizations. We get paid for what we do through grants and other funding, and I’m happy to know my work makes a difference in my local community. However, that doesn’t mean I’m going to stay at work for 9-10 hours a day! I need to be home with my own family and my own hobbies to recharge my batteries.

When you think you’ve got a hold of it all
You haven’t got a hold at all
When you reach the top
Get ready to drop
Prepare yourself for the fall
You’re gonna fall
It’s almost predictable 

Almost

Martin keeps his astute observations of life coming with this verse. Life is never continually going to be good. The good and the bad times seem to come in cycles, and sometimes just when you think things are getting better something awful happens. Or, the opposite – you’ve lived hell for a while and suddenly something amazing happens. It’s a pattern of rise and fall.

Don’t turn this way
Don’t turn that way
Straight down the middle until next Thursday
First to the left
Then back to the right
Twist and turn ’til you’ve got it right

And summing up his thoughts, Martin accurately communicates the general experience of navigating through life through a metaphor of erratic direction – the constant efforts we take to try to get where we want to go.