At some point, you must have wished you had the ability to press pause in life. An opportunity to take a deep breath and rethink your life goals, interests and relationships. Globally, the Covid-19 outbreak caused people to retreat to their homes to prevent the spread of the virus, and in doing so, pressing pause on life itself.
Whilst for others the global halt might have brought frustration to their social-economic life, it also presented an unprecedented opportunity for society and people to catch up on realities of themselves. A chance to contemplate on what is and isn’t, a chance to build and to catch up on what we’d usually miss during the daily hustle and bustle of the fast paced 21st century life.
As you grow older life moves really fast. You complete your secondary education, go to University or College, go for internship, graduate, start work, start a family and do whatever it is you need to do in order to survive. And in between all this, you have no time to think about life’s essence, what you would like to explore and fulfil within yourself. You find yourself confined by the demands of fast paced life.
Yes, at the end of your day you get in bed and one of the things you probably do is think about what to do next and how your week is going to pan out. But is it honestly enough?
As we transition into the “new norm” ask yourself what this little time has done for you. Were you just complaining about how bored you are or how things are not working out for you?
The pause button came and it’s probably not coming again anytime soon. But what would you say you took out of it? This is an opportunity that I honestly hope many made the most of in growing oneself.
You could have taken this time to improve your resume, catch up on your studies, take some short courses, come up with a business idea, read a book to learn and improve yourself, build on your spirituality and build better relationships with people.
In all honesty, life is always moving you, as a person they say you have to keep moving. You leave home every day, five days a week to work or go to school and only have two days which you need to divide among different activities and you might not have time to re-evaluate yourself as an individual, to notice certain things and re-strategize.
And if you still have time, maybe a week before you get back to work or a week before you go back to school or living your normal life, call someone you haven’t had the chance to check up on because of your busy schedule, come up with some family activities for people within the house, be spontaneous. I doubt one would complain and say they are bored if they are being spontaneous enough and making the most of this period. Movie marathons with the family are an awesome way to bond, mums are dads and vice versa with their kids and sharing duties around the house as a way to bond too.
Catch up on school. There is probably somewhere you are lagging behind. If you are not lagging, well good for you but its always best to go through something train yourself to better. The school part is a little hard when you are home but a page a day makes a big difference. For little kids, parents have taken up the role of being teachers which is always a great way to build the child’s confidence and good for the child’s brain development.
Read a book on life, literacy or just a romance novel. You either entertain yourself with it or learn from it and it’s a win win because there is nothing like an uneducating book. In any book you would be able to learn a new word.
Take up classes, interact with experts online on things you might want to get better insight on. Sometimes investing is not always about putting in money and getting back money. Invest your time in a class, listen to podcasts or watch educative videos and your reward would be knowledge.
I believe learning, reading, interacting and knowing things builds one’s confidence to go out and take on the world. So I hope you had a great pause and used this time re-evaluate yourself ahead of a new time for mankind, going back into the “new normal” world feeling like the awesome person you are with a clear mind of where you are going and it’s not too late, if you haven’t returned to your normal activities yet, you can do at least one of these things and honestly it will make you feel great.
Never stop learning and adapting. The world will always be changing. If you limit yourself to what you knew and what you were comfortable with earlier in your life, you will grow increasingly frustrated with your surroundings as you age.
David Niven.