The following is from yesterday’s #ThoughtRevolution newsletter sent to Subscribers. It was well-received to such a degree that I’m sharing it more widely, here. Please share with anyone you think it might help and comfort.
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Our whole lives have been turned upside down.
A haggard Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addressed Canada this afternoon with his stringent, far-reaching Covid-19 announcements. We’re closing our borders. Canadians ought to social distance.
The downtown streets in my ‘hood are empty. My winter getaway was cancelled. Such measures are unprecedented in modern times. It is an unsettling adjustment, this social distancing. It feels like a bad movie, or, as a gal pal puts it: “we’re living in a Margaret Atwood novel.”
Easy, therefore, for many to feel panic, stress and anxiety.
And there’s no toilet paper.
But you can relieve the negative emotions you might be feeling. Take a broader perspective, curate your focus, and be the one who writes the narrative of your experience within this experience.
Start with what an experience is, which is a moving happening that has an end date. This is temporary.
And let’s call the shutdowns and closures and cancellations what they really are: acts of deep love for others, and deep self-love. We are protecting those at risk; we are protecting ourselves. This is beautiful.
It’s also a long-awaited switch in global energy; many of us have worried and complained that it feels like our world has gone haywire with rising hate, liars for leaders, wars, fires, misery.
There has been a long list of evidence to justify growing concerns, but now we are taking care of each other, all around the world.
And for me, there is something healing about a planet now going quiet. Literally, the atmosphere above Italy, where citizens have been in lock down, has actually been clearing. The air over China is also better.
There is also something peaceful and relaxing about having legit reason to not be over-scheduled, over-committed, rushing here and there – never being in the now. Take your watch off, put your phone down. Engage. Read. Binge on good podcasts (here are some of my recent faves) and television is these days is a treasure trove (try The Loudest Voice and I loved The Affair.) Go to bed early, or bring a back-burnered project to life. Let’s not forget, when Shakespeare was quarantined because of the plague, he wrote King Lear. We can meditate (I love Marianne Williamson’s corona virus healing meditation) and we can journal; diarize this profound experience. We can do fun things like my great friend, the vocalist Simone Denny, has done with her “Superstar” social media spin to encourage hand-washing. As I write this, a yogi friend in quarantine texted me to invite me to do restorative yoga via Skype tonight. We can use our imaginations. We can play Madonna’s “Holiday.”
There is an opportunity now to do things for ourselves we don’t normally have time or energy to do. It feels extended snow-day-ish, one of winter’s soothing gifts.
So, while not taking away from the seriousness of this situation, you can find beauty, and possibility in it, if you look:
Facebook groups are popping up – people wishing to help people – every hour. And did you see the exquisite musical moment between residents on balconies at an apartment complex in Sicily? I posted it on my Facebook page.
Add to this; how can you help? Perhaps it is something simple, like thanking the front of line workers. We can take time to ask how they are doing if we know any personally. We can be kinder on purpose to each other, too. We can be kinder on purpose to ourselves; stop what-iffing about all of this, for example.
Thoughts and acts such as these have vibration to them, measurable by science in something called hertz. We can literally inject more love into a world that has been thirsty for it for too long. Universe knows what it is doing. Our planet knows what it is doing.
We humans forget what we’re doing. We forget we are powerful focusing mechanisms, and we can and must curate our focus, daily and especially in times like now. Many of us have been glued obsessively or addict-like to virus news non-stop. This creates emotional imbalance and isn’t healthy. You can go to your favourite news source to stay informed, but you don’t have to marinate in it. Control this shit, and especially stay away from American fear-mongering.
And PS, there’s lots of good news to be reported. Just focus. Look for it. Here is a piece on how Canadian scientists have isolated the virus. Here is a wonderfully hopeful piece on how a Nobel Laureate number cruncher has correctly predicted the timing of the virus’ impact in China and nearby regions. Contrary to bandied gloom, he says this will come to a halt. Here is a good news piece for those worried about financial catastrophe. Be a breaking good news reporter. Share the good news you find out into the world. Share the funny, too. Lots of quippy clever memes are circulating. When you can laugh at something that once caused you negative emotion, you have mastered control over its power over you. I like the one with the guy who has a white paper coffee filter over his nose and mouth. On it he has written: “Coughy filter.” Ba-dum-bump.
This is a global re-set (which is what another pal called it the other day.) It is a time that is ripe with positive possibility and filled with beauty. And, it’s a choice we each make about how we will be in this unfolding experience; it’s action we take when we choose deliberately where to place our focus.
Panic comes from feeling ignorant and powerlessness. You and I are neither.
Love,
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