balancing act

noun

plural balancing acts

: an attempt to handle or deal with two or more things (such as obligations) at one time so as to satisfy often competing requirements

"It's a difficult balancing act between celebrating the past and making room for the future."

—Jeffrey Brown

Vegas might be the starkest example of what the hospitality industry faces across the country: a delicate balancing act between bringing back jobs and revenue and keeping workers and customers safe from a virus that's killed more than 100,000 Americans.

—Dave Jamieson

It's a balancing act between appreciation, education and safety. Earlier this year, London city council voted to tighten up a parks bylaw that restricts the amount of food residents can feed to wild animals.

—Megan Stacey

Examples of balancing act in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

With three children aged 7, 5, and 3, and a husband with an equally demanding career, there's no doubt that life is a balancing act. —Alyce Collins, MSNBC Newsweek, 16 Aug. 2025

With the deaths of three people involved in police pursuits in the last month, Milwaukee police's decision to conduct a chase is a 'balancing act', the city's police chief said. —David Clarey, jsonline.com, 12 Aug. 2025

Success is a balancing act: management duties unsurprisingly include transfers, training, ticket pricing, and PR, but the meat on NUTMEG!’s bones is with its deck-building mechanics. —Matt Gardner, Forbes.com, 5 Aug. 2025

Securing the trucks carrying aid into Gaza is a tight balancing act for the Abu Mughsaib clan. —Ivana Kottasová, CNN Money, 31 July 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1907, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for balancing act

• overreact
• abstract
• attacked
• attract
• contact
• contract
• detract
• distract
• enact
• exact
• extract
• hijacked