When I was 13, my 10-year old brother asked our dad, “Why is it when I leave my milk out it warms up, and when I don’t eat my soup it cools down?”

Dad stopped dunking bread in his chowder. He leaned back in his chair with a satisfied face and drawled, “Good question, Steve.” That was high praise.

Then he explained room temperature. He informed us that objects left alone will acquire the temperature of the space they inhabit.

He was also introducing the idea of equilibrium. That’s the tendency for different things to meet somewhere near the middle, to mix, blend, negotiate, emulsify. It’s one of the recurring motifs of life.

I noted the equilibrium concept again when I was 16. I was dying for long hair then, but my natural curl, frizz or whatever you call it got in the way. Oh my hair grew like it was supposed to, but some pulled out whenever I brushed or combed it. The combined grow/tear effect resulted in maximum length of about four inches below my shoulders (seven inches if I pulled a tress straight). It wasn’t going to get longer unless I straightened it (the chemicals used then were way too harsh) or let it dred (no examples of that yet in our culture).

Recently I realized there’s an equilibrium about confidence too. Call it “egolibrium.” I noted it when I looked at me, but I think it’s shared by all of us. See, people assume I’m self-confident. They comment about my strength and self-assurance. But I’m in here: I know it’s not so. The truth is, I oscillate between abject humility and overbearing pride. I flicker like a pixel from hubris to shyness, from exuberance to self-effacement. It’s just that the flicker is too fast to see. The brain makes a blend, and so I appear to be direct and self-confident.