A New Normal

A return to normal.

There has been a lot of talk lately about when we will be able to ‘return to normal.’ Understandably so. The wake of the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted all of our lives in various ways. And world leaders are struggling to decide on remedies to the situation, and there is much debate on when we as a society will be able to return to normal, and what that will mean when the time comes.

I’ll leave the specifics of that to other articles. My focus is slightly different. I’ll make the argument that we have no normal to return to. Our lives were not normal before this.

Waking up at 6 AM to get ready and spend an hour in traffic to work your 9 hour day (let’s be honest, its 8-5 now, not 9-5), to sit through another hour of traffic to get home exhausted at somewhere between 6 and 7 PM, depending on any errands you need to run on the way home.

If you have any secondary hobbies, activities, or children, you attempt at that until 9 PM. Then you have an hour or two to wind down, then sleep, often getting maybe 6 hours of sleep a night?

All government, utility companies and public bureaucracy are only open during those times, so you’re having to take time from work to get simple necessities done, only to have to “make up” that time later.

Conference here. Meeting there. Run here. Run there. Punch in. Punch out.

And we wonder why so many of us were anxious, depressed, upset, agitated. We felt…. Off. Something wasn’t right. This is not how we were meant to live. This constant white water was not part of nature nor the human condition. But had convinced ourselves it was “normal.”

It was not. It is not. I will admit, this is not normal either. But the bits of time we’ve gotten back. The ways we’ve been forced to reevaluate.

I would like us as a society to contemplate a return to normal. A return to mentally, physically and emotionally healthy balance of life. Where we can work enough to both survive and enjoy our lives, rather than always being under the gun on bills and work deadlines. That isn’t life. It never was.

I won’t pretend to have all the answers to this mult-faceted dilemma. But I would like to see the conversation grow. And before the bureaucrats and big business owners seek to jam society back into this unhealthy dog race once more, that we contemplate what a new normal could, or should be. Try to avoid 1 to 3 word answers. Challenge yourself to think. What could we ask for from our leadership to make our lives better? More sustainable? Healthier?

Now is the time to submit those requests, or possibly demands, as a whole. There is no better time than now. And as the pandemic eventually dies down, we could find a new normal to begin, one that benefits us as people, and not just powers that be.

What does your new normal look like?

New Time

Of all the things COVID-19 has taken from us, there's 1 very valuable thing it has given us back.

Time.

Time to spend at home. Time to reflect.

Over the past few decades, we've continuously ramped up our need to stay busier and busier. As if constant white water were the key to success. And all the 'Hustle Gurus' would keep adulating working 18 hour days and sleeping 3 hours a night.

It's given us time to reflect. To read. To talk more with one another.

Yes, we could still get lost in the endless media feed. But I would encourage everyone to take some of this downtime to enjoy some quiet (if possible with your living situation.) Sit and read together, read to each other. (If you don't have books, Google Folklore or Mythology. There's tons of free stuff.)

Play an instrument. Sing. Exercise.

This extra time we can better ourselves, enjoy time in our own skin and in our own homes.

I feel like in the bustle of this age, we have such precious little time to enjoy these things. I'm not making light of all the negative ways this is affecting people right now. But I'd like us to take this moment to, so much negative aside, be grateful for this opportunity to not be running at mach speed for a few weeks.

Any maybe after this, we might have more opportunities to enjoy a slight slowing of pace. Times of reflection, times of conversation, times of self betterment.

I think I miss a slightly slower pace. I know I'm not alone. I feel, think and believe that the constant sprinting that certain careers and lifestyles demand just aren't healthy. Mentally, physically, or emotionally.

I hope that this may shift some priorities, and perhaps even force some different business practices in the long run. That perhaps we can find and create opportunities to cultivate and enjoy the one resource we cannot renew nor increase: Time.