I’ve written about three different blogs over the past few days and shelved all of them, which is why I’m so late in publishing.
Nothing seemed right and maybe this won’t be either, but it’s going up anyway.
I think we’ve collectively established the twilight zone surrealness of this time.
I mean it’s weird.
We’re all having our reactions to it and all day every day we are busily telling ourselves and each other what or what not to do to navigate our way through.
We’re using humour and creativity to amuse and sometimes distract ourselves.
We’re ramping up our online communities, we are learning new things and generally trying to adapt. All good things to be doing.
It also seems pretty clear that we are searching for meaning and purpose as we move from week to week in a COVID haze.
We so want to place this into some kind of context to make sense of what is happening.
It’s very human, it’s what we do as a species.
We all have our perspectives, we all have our theories, we all want to figure out how to make it stop so we can feel relief, feel safe again, to have the world we knew back in place.
Of course, we’re free to think and do what as we feel fit, as long as we are not actively harming other people with our words or actions.
This means, like it or not, pointing fingers, blaming governments, blaming and shaming each other is completely unhelpful right now.
It does not solve a thing. It does not allow us to progress. It makes things worse. We need to stop.
These times can be brutal. A hundred times worse if you struggle with anxiety or depression.
Sometimes waking up into another day of uncertainty is crushing, and if the way you cope is by watching Netflix in your pyjamas for a day or two while eating chocolate chip cookies for all three meals, then that’s what you do.
We can’t all be Superheros, there is no “right” way to make your way through this.
We’re allowed to feel whatever we feel, anger, fear, hopelessness, confusion., anxiety, depression.
We’re hearing a lot of cheery”be positive!” being tossed around, well-intentioned, and if feeling positive in the face of adversity is what resonates, great, but no amount of false positivity forced upon us will make it better or change anything.
However, what will and does make it better, is to be real.
Meaning, stay with your feelings whatever they are because they are your feelings. Let them be, stop trying to make it different, those feelings will eventually get bored and go away.
Of course, please get help if you feel you’re collapsing into a black hole of anxiety and depression. We need you in the world. Otherwise, use common sense. Do the things we are supposed to be doing.
Wash your hands, stay six feet apart from each other, self isolate. and what I feel is as almost as important, as often as you can, practice kindness, compassion, respect and humility towards both yourself and others. We need each other, community is what is important now, we need to take care of each other, not to divide but to come together.
In time, COVID-19 life will be over, so let’s just make life as simple as possible. For now.
Photo credit George Desipris/pexels.com
