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Never in my personal lifetime has this world ever gone through Covid-19 life. Although I was in graduate school during SARS, the measures required were not as intense as it is now. This time of crisis can bring about lots of anxiety and uncertainty and may even trigger us into a fight-flight-freeze response. This new lifestyle brings worries about our future and may even bring us to a place of existential questioning and investigation of our ‘self’ in this world. To further add to the anxiety, is social isolation due to social distancing. These distancing measures are required however; it is having great impacts on personal well-being and mental health.
Without a doubt, this unusual time will bring about great worries of how to manage until the next day – there needs to be some energy spent towards ensuring our survival needs are met. But, this time also provides us with some opportunities for reflection, analysis and change.
There are options for us – we can continue to tune into the ‘anxiety channels’ (I.e., constantly watching the news outlets and layman’s research on Covid-19), which may give some knowledge but may also further aggravate worries, or we can try to re-establish control in areas we can truly control.
For those with children:
Many of us (myself included) are in the position of working a full-time job yet are also full-time daycare. This is a very challenging and difficult time. However, this time may also be viewed as a small blessing – it gives us an incredible amount of time with our children (that we typically wouldn’t ever have and sometimes wish for more of), gives us an opportunity to teach them about challenge and change, and may nourish our lives in a way that it reminds us why we work so hard to ensure that our children have the best futures ahead of them.
For those in career limbo and uncertain about their present day jobs:
This time away from our regular jobs and increased time at home may provide us a great chance to brush up on our resume and start browsing around for new career opportunities and/or career changes.
This time away from the ‘regular job routine’ may help us identify what we like and don’t like about our current jobs and hence, help us pinpoint what type of job-career I may be truly looking for.
For those saying, “I always wanted to learn and/or try this activity”:
This time will provide a great opportunity to research where and how you can obtain those goals/dreams of pursuing those activities. You may even be lucky enough to start now with more affordable rates of virtual classroom/online learning.
For everyone:
This time at home should encourage a personal reflection on what you truly find to be important for your life. It may trigger feelings of great longing for those activities I miss (I.e., going for a hike), it may make us question the relationships we have and/or don’t have in our life, and it may also accentuate great feelings of indifference to activities I once thought as very important to my life.
These are only a few ideas on how this Covid-19 life at home can be a great moment of opportunity and change for us. This time may provide an opportunity to reorganize your priorities to ensure those that truly matter to you, are taken care of.
If you are interested in getting some counselling support to help you consider some of these areas of reflection and change, I offer teletherapy sessions with Ride the Waves Counselling Services as an option. Feel free to contact Chris at: ridethewaves.cs@gmail.com.
I wish everyone well and continued safety and leave you on this great idea I have stumbled upon during this time:
Every day that you wake up and find yourself wishing that you could do a certain activity (but can’t due to social distancing), write it down on a piece of paper and collect these papers in a box/bottle (whatever you so choose).
When the isolation period and/or when social distancing rules are lightened, go through your box each day and pick out one paper.
Complete the item on your list with presence, awareness and appreciation.
Then, move on to the next item