Business, faith and family. Except not in that order.

Those three aspects of life have been a huge topic of discussion in these past few weeks, beginning at Thanksgiving when Tiger Woods’ … whatever it was (is), first came to light around the world.

“Tiger’s got to take some time away from golf,” they said. “He needs to take care of his family.”

The woefully delicate balance between “healthy family” and “successful at (insert job title)” always seems to come up whenever someone takes a step away from work. At the end of 2009, even, two well-known public servants in Springville — city clerk Brenda Roberts and longtime police officer Roy Spann — retired from civil service, both citing the need to spend more time with their families.

“I’m just ready to start enjoying life,” Roberts said. “I’ve thought about it and prayed about it, and I think it’s time to start enjoying life.”

The subject came up again when Florida head football coach Urban Meyer discussed his “leave of absence” from work prior to last week’s Sugar Bowl (less than 24 hours earlier, he said he was leaving entirely before changing his mind).

“Faith, family and then work,” Florida AD Jeremy Foley said. “Anybody who doesn’t think in that order needs to get their priorities straight.”

(Note: This must have come as something of a surprise to Alabama head coach Nick Saban, who recently admitted he forgot his own wedding anniversary while neck-deep in preparation for the BCS National Championship Game in Pasadena.)

The issue, of course, is one of balance, something our culture has always struggled to maintain. And it isn’t limited to football coaches or golfing celebrities or public servants who occasionally feel engulfed by the world around them — balance is a problem for us all.

It’s simple, really. We all like to be in control at our jobs, which means we like to be the ones running things, but sometimes we need to step away from running things, which means giving control to someone else, which drives us all batty to no end … only if we don’t do it, eventually we’re going to blow our stacks.

Simple, right?

During 2009, one of my best friends — a pastor, a husband and a brand-new father — had to evaluate balance his own life, after enduring brain surgery in an effort to relieve him of his epilepsy (which caused a few seizures but multiple “auras,” which he described as “light seizures” or “out-of-body experiences”). We traded emails on the subject of Urban Meyer, and here’s what he said:

“My advice for Urban? You’ve got to trust somebody. You became successful as a head football coach by controlling things, by making the decisions and telling people what to do.

“Your health and your family don’t work on those parameters. If you’re going to straighten things out with your health and your family, you’ve got to trust your family to be involved in decisions and trust your doctors when they tell you that you’re killing yourself by doing what you’re doing.

“You can succeed in football doing things the way you’ve done them, and you’ll keep climbing the ladder and dancing on the top rung. Life ain’t just football, and some day you’re gonna want to make up for lost time on some of those other ladders that don’t have 2 minute offenses. Those ladders require some trust and foundation, and you earn those the hard and slow way.”

Faith, family and business. In that order. It’s the only way to live.