COVID-19 is impacting every human being on this planet as it exposes our fractured and obsolete political, economic, social, medical and environmental systems. The illusion that we are somehow separated by countries, religions, races, etc., can no longer hold if we are truly letting in what is happening to us and all around us. As we let ourselves fully feel the fear, pain, grief and uncertainty that’s arising in us right now, we also have the option of looking at the many positive effects that are caused by this insidious virus. Many of us are experiencing benefits from “having more time” to connect with ourselves, friends, family, colleagues, and other loved ones. We’re also hearing about other positive shifts occurring in the world like remarkable levels of organization and cooperation between people, communities and organizations.
It’s become apparent to us that in the midst of this total breakdown, there is great potential for a new world order to emerge. A world where the values of cooperation, caring, compassion, co-creation and co-evolution are trumping competition, selfishness, judgment, blame and siloed work. We are all in this together is replacing every wo/men for her/himself mentality. The challenge is whether we can pay attention and respond to both the immediate needs that are arising at this time, while rewarding and reinforcing the heartful responses that we are witnessing among so many of us globally.
Can we be with the pain while also beholding and using this calamity to embed into our future values that will promote an inter-connected and caring Global Community?
To this end, we are asking those of us who are not personally fighting for their own or other’s lives to reflect on, name and share the positive experiences they are observing arising from this profoundly devastating moment in our evolution.
We are inviting people to ask each other, “What aspects of your life is currently being enriched as a result of the COVID-19 crisis that you would you like to keep after this crisis subsides?”
We will be pulling the diverse responses together, organize them and report back to you in the form of a blog or social media post. Below are some answers we have come up with, and we’d love to hear the positive benefits you’ve been experiencing!
- Sharing more quality time with our family – our children, spouses, parents. We are more attentive and are listening better to each other; having more meaningful discussions and not merely task oriented and rushed communications; we are playing and having more fun together; overall feeling a greater sense of belonging and connection.
- Deepening Reaching out and connecting with other loved ones, e.g. old friends and colleagues that we now have time to reach and catch up with.
- Taking time for self-care: working out and getting more sleep, cooking healthier meals, meditating or taking quiet time, etc.
- Space to explore passions and interests: reading, dabbling in writing, learning to play a musical instrument, and that one thing we also wanted to do yet “had no time” excuses to actually do
- Quiet time to be with myself, listen and discover more of myself
- People cooperating on a whole new level: we are experiencing humanity coming together and sharing resources, being less stingy and more generous with time, money, skills, networks, etc.
- Interdependence and Oneness: experiencing how we really need each other, and how one aspect of our lives (our health, our jobs, etc) effect so many others (and also the same for the world – how our hospitals, our economic system, etc depend on each other)
- Environmental Improvements: cleaner air, cleaner water, less toxins being dumped, etc