Stability and Flexibility

What makes our lives stable or flexible? What makes the difference? Why is it that stability to one person is chaos to another? And when people think that their life is very stable and settled, another might think it is too rigid. How do find the happy medium for ourselves?
We can find the right mix of:
- flexibility and change
- individuality and connectedness
- autonomy and predictability
Without flexibility everything becomes a crisis. But with too much flexibility nothing becomes a crisis, which is also a problem I think. Children enjoy having stability, as a matter of fact- they seem to thrive on it. We also need to give children a chance to self-regulate. If they are over-regulated, when given the chance, the child will swing to the other end of the spectrum. Sometimes we let the things that we don't like become the forbidden fruit, which makes it all the more wanted by the child.
Children with autism, and some other disabilities, thrive on structured days. They are at the far extreme. They need the rigid schedule to function. We all need some sense of rigidity, but also letting ourselves be flexible when the time comes that we need to change.