Several years ago, while backpacking my way along Australia’s east coast, I decided one day to take some surfing lessons in the rolling Pacific waters that lap the country’s shoreline. I spent most of that morning attempting to follow instructions and stand upright on an uncooperative surf board. For hours, small ocean waves would rise invitingly beneath my surfboard, swell to just the right size, and roll majestically toward the shoreline without me on them. Time and again, in my attempts to stand up on the board, the ocean would toss, flip, heave, and dump me off. Being pummeled by wave after wave, I felt like an uncoordinated oaf. The reality, however, was that in every one of my failed attempts to stand up on the board, I was always just inches away from achieving a state of complete and total balance.