We now find ourselves more than forty days into a hard lockdown as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic that is raging the world over. The current situation is less than ideal and the inconvenience it has brought with it challenges us daily, if not hourly.
Our first impulse as human beings is to complain bitterly about what we lose in this situation or process, as we have become so reliant on our "stuff"! Our routines, our indulgences, be it big or small, and yet, through it all we have lost sight of the fact that this new paradigm has given us something so much more important!
We have been given the opportunity, or should I say we have been forced to stop all the craziness and take stock of who and where we are as people. We have been afforded an opportunity for deep introspection as well as an opportunity to change course, given the unprecedented times we find ourselves in!
I have personally had to literally STOP everything and ask myself where this is all going for me, as I had for some time just been going with the flow like a rudderless ship. I had become so disillusioned with life and my quest for seeking purpose again, and this current reality or better stated, this forced reality has presented me with an opportunity to analyse and re-calibrate my life and it's trajectory to meet the rapidly forming new paradigm that has presented itself.
Daily introspection and analysis of situations and interactions have brought me to certain insights and lessons which will light my way forward, and these are the lessons:
1. Remove yourself from the noise
As many things were in play before the Lockdown was in place, I found myself in the midst of so much noise from various places. I had the noise in my head, which was self-induced from being a natural over-thinker, I had noise from relationships, I had noise from my career aspirations and most importantly I had noise from my moral compass to deal with. Napoleon Hill once said that "The number one Reason people fail in life is because they listen to their friends, family & neighbors." I had become so caught up in all the noise that I lost touch with and sight of my own voice, and it's so easy to do, in fact so easy that you don't realize you are even doing it! You bend to a request from a loved one or family member, and all of a sudden it becomes an expectation and we feel duty-bound to fulfill as we would not want to disappoint or hurt them. The clear fact to be cognizant of is that there is nothing wrong with family or friends, we just need to be aware that most of the time their advice or recommendations are born out of their own motives and desired outcomes. We need to be able to listen to and act on what our own inner voice tells us, so as to not live our lives dancing to the tune of others. Life is too short to be unhappy, and living one's life trying to fulfill expectations and requests from others creates this unhappiness.
2. Treat others the way they treat you
We get taught to do unto others as we would have them do unto us, and we find that others don't necessarily live by that ethos. Sad as that may be, we unfortunately have to reciprocate in terms of their treatment of us. I have found this to be the most difficult thing to do, as it goes against my upbringing, but I have found that there is in fact a level of peace to be found in applying this approach to my life. We sadly come to the realization that our energies are wasted on trying to be nice to some people, given that they will never be nice to you. Energy is everything! We need to be very circumspect on where we invest our energy, as well as assessing what energies are being pushed our way.
3. No sense in giving advice
I have been sitting with this struggle for some time now, and it has been a struggle to come to terms with this reality for me, but yet again I was shown that there is absolutely no sense in giving some people advice. People have a need to validate their thinking, and I have found that the most common way to do so is to solicit advice from others. We all do it! The problem here however is that in soliciting the advice, often, there is no intention of taking the advice to heart. We have our own position of departure on any matter, and in most instances, we stick to it irrespective of whether or not we receive advice in respect of that point of departure. The principal reason for this is that we are actually not willing to take different perspectives on the said matter, as we are emotionally invested in it. We are clouded by the emotions and often reject the advice, be it directly or indirectly, simply because we are so engulfed in the emotions, that we fail to see the logic required to deal with the situation. Our points of departure vary from: "I am the parent" to "I will parent as I see fit" to "You will never understand" (The blanket statement telling the other party to back off). I have therefore resolved to keep my viewpoints(advice) to myself for the sake of keeping the peace.
4. Communication
I know that I am not the best communicator, and this is something I have been working on for quite some time. The present situation has brought the power of communication to the fore, but it has also highlighted the importance of communication. Imagine being quarantined with someone and there is no communication? We take for granted how critical communication is, and we do so at our own peril. The old saying goes:"Beauty and looks fade, so when taking a life partner, be sure to choose a good communicator as the conversations will fulfill you long after the looks and beauty have faded". I have found communication to be of such critical importance to me, so much so, that I value it over physical intimacy. The problem we are however faced with is that we never work on our communication and to that end find that our relationships fail, only for us to look for all the other reasons why the relationship failed other than the fact that the communication was either poor or non-existent.
5. Being valued
I have found that in this phase of life we find ourselves in, showing our loved ones that we care is of cardinal importance. The period has been especially difficult for my kids, as they have had to have real-time experience in taking care of themselves and showing discipline in getting their chores and school work done given that work-from-home scenarios have altered family life quite immeasurably. They now get up in the mornings and prepare their own breakfasts, and lovingly so, ensure that all in the household have some of what they have made. Dishes are washed up and the environment is cleaned without all the nagging that previously occurred. They have resorted to baking and learning how to cook dinner to avert boredom, and it is so refreshing to see this and not get thrown with the :"I'm bored" line all the time.
I value that so much now seeing how they have interpreted the situation and they have responded the way they have. I value my kids and they have started to express how they value us as parents, and this is a direct result of the medium of education they receive. The ethos of the school is now so obvious in the way they conduct themselves and the way they critically analyse situations, that is just swells my heart with pride to see that even at this tender age, they bring value and are in turned highly valued. I must admit that as a parent it warms my heart to see their expressions of thanks for the smallest things I do for them, they are so thankful and they express that in so many ways. I know as parents it seems really thankless most of the time, as we are just expected to provide for our children's every whim, without so much as even a "thank you" at times, but when everyone plays their part without complaints, the joy is palpable. I am by no means saying that they don't complain now, but they find so much more to be thankful for and it makes me value them so much more.
The time spent in this deep introspection has taught me that we chase many things in life with the expectation that these things will make us happy or fulfill us, only to find that such a pursuit is lifelong and often we only realize at the very end of our lives that we were in hot pursuit all the time and that we forgot to live and experience things!
We place our expectation of happiness in things or people, critically forgetting that happiness is an inside job! We are only capable of making ourselves happy and it is definitely not linked to things or people. People and things enhance our happiness, they do not create it.
We have been shown that we can live with just the bare essentials, and that by no means diminishes our ability to be happy.
I am saddened when I hear people talking about:"When things get back to normal". The reality for all of us is that this is the new normal!
We can't not see how fundamentally things have actually shifted. Economic systems are being forced into new directions, the value placed on all the fluff in our lives has actually diminished if not dissipated, our movements are being altered as well as the way we interact with others.
We have been schooled on what actually matters most in life and that is connection and connectedness.
We see that when the economy is eventually reopened, a vast majority of people will not be returning to their places of employment again. So tell me again about :"When things get back to normal"?
Life is about loving and being loved in return. It took a pandemic to bring us to a halt, where we were given the opportunity to go back to basics.
The question to you therefore is:"What have you taken out of this experience?"
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