Fine-Tuned and Fancy-Free
Five Romans on how balance and harmony play into their daily lives. Including at the table.
Do Italians Do it Better?
Italians are known for their aspirational for their work-life balance and pleasure-seeking approach to life. Fact or fiction?
I asked Roman residents to define balance and harmony in their professional and personal lives. Points in common, many of them bring balance to their own lives through art and creativity.
Then just for fun, I asked them what they ate yesterday.
Cristina Di Venanzio: Medical Physicist
I work in a hospital in the field of radiation, both imaging and therapeutic. I practice and teach dance on the side.
How do balance and harmony apply to your profession?
In my work, balance is knowing how to maintain the right space between rationality and science and empathy for patients' suffering.
Harmony, on the other hand, is knowing how to create and maintain a healthy, humane, and cooperative environment among colleagues.
And in your personal life?
Balance is the fine thread that connects work, family, and my passion for dance.
Harmony lies in the transition from one to another. It’s the ability to find space and dedicate the right attention to everything and everyone.
What did you eat yesterday?
Breakfast: avocado toast
Lunch: beef-based “sushi” for example: beef carpaccio or crispy guanciale maki, from a creative new restaurant in my neighborhood called Fassangue
Dinner: Chickpea and spinach meatballs, chocolate gelato
Mara Lastretti: Psychologist, Psychotherapist, PhD in Neuroscience and Psychiatry
I’m deeply about passionate about my work and do my best to offer an approach to psychology that surprises.It sidesteps conventional treatment to create connections, networks, and new opportunities. Above all, my aim to help people see more truly see themselves.
On Harmony and Balance
I’d like to share a metaphor that I use often during psychotherapy. It’s rooted in very special memory, my grandfather’s old briarwood radio. This family heirloom is a true reflection of balance and harmony both in my professional and personal life.
Its warm and unique sound represents a perfect synthesis of materials, quality, and finely tuned adjustments—a delicate balance of elements capable of transforming a set of components into something bigger, richer, more alive.
As psychotherapist, I see balance or equilibrium as the “right adjustment” of the multidimensional aspects of the psyche: emotions, thoughts, actions, and relations.
An ability to find stability amid a world of chaos and contradiction without being overpowered. Balance isn’t stillness, but flexibility. It allows us to respond to even the most challenging events while staying centered.
Harmony, on the other hand, is the result of that well-orchestrated balance: it is the feeling that all parts of oneself—desire, values, emotions—sound together like symphony, even with a few imperfect notes.
It is a state of feeling connected as opposed to divided or struggling. Harmony is the fruit of an evolutionary process, a continual dialogue between our interior and exterior worlds.
How do you apply these concepts to your own life?
Balance means finding space for every part of me—welcoming the needs of others as much as my own, without neglecting or isolating myself.
It is a constant dance between duties and pleasures, between activity and rest, between work and affection.
Harmony, on the other hand, is that feeling of stillness that arises when my deepest values are reflected in daily choices, when my actions “sound” in tune with who I really am.
Just like my grandfather’s old radio, the perfect sound is more than just the tuning of the instrument. It is the ability to find one’s true tone in a world voices, noises, and dissonances. It is a constant work of adjustment and tuning. Therein lies the magic of our own personal alchemy.
What did you eat yesterday?
Breakfast: rye toast with olive oil from Puglia
Pranzo: zuppa di ceci (chickpea soup)
Dinner: I ate with friends, which made it nicer even if it wasn’t the healthiest. We had Cesar salad, chicken nuggets with BBQ sauce, and paired them with red wine.
Giulia Ferrari: Immigration and Citizenship Lawyer
At work, do my best to apply what I learned during my classical studies. The ancient Greeks called it mesotes (μεσότης), “the right middle” or what we know of as The Golden Mean.
It means to strive for a constant balance of our actions, especially regarding ethics and virtues. Finding balance in my field means not betraying oneself.
There’s very little harmony in the courtrooms, nor can you find it by writing an appeal sitting at your computer…and that is why I do theater on the side.
I think it’s easier to find harmony in all art forms. As for balance, I subscribe to what was said earlier: I am in constant search of it in my personal and daily life as well.
What did you eat yesterday?
Breakfast: espresso macchiato
Lunch: fettucine with ragù (no wine because I was going back to the office).
Dinner: Okonomiyaki. It’s a bit like a frittata. (Japanese readers please forgive me!).
Giovanni Midali: Personal Trainer, Athletic and Mental Wellness Coach (hobbyist photographer)
Balance is never static, but dynamic process of constant fine-tuning. It is cultivating a deep awareness of the different areas of life—physical, mental, emotional, social and spiritual—and distributing our energy there in an intentional way to avoid depletion in one area at the expense of others.
It is the ability to navigate between challenges and opportunities, maintaining a balanced perspective and adapting our strategies in the moment. It includes the ability to say “yes” to what nourishes and “no” to what depletes, creating space for personal growth and long-term well-being.
Harmony
Harmony is the natural consequence of balance. The feeling of inner coherence and deep peace that arises from the awareness of living in tune with one's values, goals and aspirations.
It is the ability to find a positive flow between different areas of life, where the different parts complement and support each other, creating a synergy that amplifies well-being. It includes the ability to accept imperfection, to learn from mistakes and to find beauty and meaning in challenges.
In summary, for me, balance is the how and harmony is the result. Balance is the active process of managing the different areas of life, while harmony is the resulting feeling of well-being, serenity and wholeness.
How about in your daily life?
I’ve been following the same guidelines in my daily life for nearly 20 years: balance of training and rest, learning, mental and physical relaxation. Harmony and balance at the table are essential for clarity and focus. Through experimentation, anyone can reach a state of stillness and a healthy and balanced life.
Check out Giovanni’s travel photography.
What did you eat yesterday?
Breakfast: Greek yogurt and fruit
Lunch: rice, seasonal vegetables, humus, eggs
Dinner: seitan in sauce, roasted potatoes, salad and egg whites
Alessandro Vassilas: Architect, Entrepreneur and hobbyist painter
I consider balance it a political act, it matures only with experience and not with temperament or thought. Balance comes from sharing and openness to diversity.
Having a comparison, a foothold that allows you balance both geometrically and philosophically.
Architecture and Philosophy
The more points of support you have, the more comparisons exist, the more union there is between points, that is, between people, and the more balance is achieved.
Equilibrium can be achieved between elements that are different from each other, or with different weights or different loads.
Elements like beautiful or ugly, right or left, man or woman if they are predisposed to union and change. Where they find points in common they create harmony.
Harmony originates as a musical term, but harmony can be achieved with oneself when we find balance among the elements and factors of life.
For You Personally
I’ve motivated my studies, an awareness and understanding of differences and excess. The choices I make in my work translate into my daily life in an effort to find the balance between people and in the world.
What did you eat yesterday?
Breakfast: Moroccan avocado juice, a small piece of cheese, a cappuccino, and a second coffee two hours later
Lunch: Two eggs, salad, an orange
Dinner: A suppli ( Roman-style fried-rice ball), anchovy meatballs, sauteéd chicory, two glasses of white wine (Vermentino and Ribolla Gialla)