of boxes and balloons

Someone close to me was in Morocco recently and heard a story about how we each have 3 balloons helping us fly in life. Work, family and friends. If one has trouble, we still fly but maybe a bit lower. If two or three loose air, this is trouble, and we cannot fly.
This reminded me of a box analogy I sometimes use to encourage people to strive for balance in their lives by putting work issues 'in a box" for example, when they leave work. In this way, we can better enjoy home and family or activities with friends as separate activities without the (sometimes) negative impact of the cares of one or another box becoming too pervasive. It's about balance.
I began to think about how the box analogy might fit with the balloon analogy. How they might be related and how the resulting model would look. I decided to write some of these ideas down and also challenge others (initially friends and family) to come up with a new facet or maybe an example from their lives. I'm interested in seeing if this might provide a helpful model or be of use as a kind of life map.
In this expanded parable, each of the balloons has a 'box' hanging below it where we each spend our time.
The boxes are hanging under the balloons and there is a relationship between the boxes and the balloons. At first in life, our boxes are relatively small and of simple construction. The main job of the person in the box is to make sure that the balloon is inflated. As time passes, things get more complex. We pass over beautiful landscapes or troubled waters. Sometimes we might ground out for awhile. Sometimes we fly high. Some people never really seem to getoff the ground.
For each person, the three boxes are side by side and one can easily jump from one to another. Of course the boxes each have other people and things in them, and if one doesn't spend a certain amount of time in a particular box, the space gets filled up by stuff from the other people who might be in that box. In this case, different things might happen. The box might get heavier and drag the whole contraption down. Depending on the size and weight of the stuff in the box, the space in the box gets 'taken over' and there might not be any room left. In these cases one would 'feel alienated' or 'feel like astranger'...
Of course the skies are filled with balloons and boxes. Some people manouver their balloons next to each other. Sometimes they actually clamp their boxes together. Depending on the circumstances, this can be an uplifting experience. Sometimes they drag each other down.
Sometimes, someone else will bring a small thing into one of your boxes. At first it might not look like much. In fact, you might not even notice it, but if it is real heavy, you might begin to loose altitude and not know why.
In certain cases a particular box might be shared with others to the extent that their balloons might help keep yours airborne. You might actually have an occasional 'uplifting' experience. This is useful if you are approaching an obstacle such as a mountain range that your balloons alone might not be able to rise above.
Just like in a real balloon, you can't really direct where you will end up. You try to predict based on wind and weather and of course you can control altitude to some extent by getting one balloon to really perform well or by jettisoning some stuff out of one or anotherbox.
So the question here is to see if others will find this analogyto be interesting or helpful. I'm looking for more examples of facets to grow the analogy or triggers to practical examples from your life. For example, if you don't spend time in a box, it will fill up withother things and there will be no room for you (worst case scenario -no friends, no family, no job).