Two years later and the world is still not as you used to know it. Periods of relaxation and ease are constantly giving their place to another burst of fear, anxiety and desperation. And, once again, as you feel that you can finally have your life back, another greek-alphabet-derived-variant makes its appearance asking you to reconsider once again everything you thought was normal.
You act with disbelief, anger, sadness, frustration, not knowing how to react in this situation. You want to know when all this is going to end, but no-one is there to answer your questions. Everyone you know either share your feelings of uncertainty or have convinced themselves that they know something more to find relief. No-one is there to actually calm you down, tell you that everything will be all right and give you a definite date for when this situation will be over so you can emerge to the world again.
But isn’t this like every other situation in life that is unstable?
Unless you are a child, there is no parent figure to hold your hand and guide you to the way out. Sometimes even parents are unable to provide this support to their children. So how can an adult react to this thing?
«I’m so tired», you may say. «I don’t see any point in what I’m doing, everything I thought for stable are constantly being compromised. How am I supposed to find any meaning to the things that are important to me when I need to see everything in my life suspiciously, like hiding a deathly threat?»
The answer might be that you’re not «supposed» to find purpose and meaning in any of this. Everything that you are feeling is valid and real. We are not used to this kind of living. Our brains are not wired to perceive threats that they cannot see for such a long period of time. Of course there will be anger, of course there will be stress, of course there will be all those feelings that you are feeling and you would like to get rid of as soon as possible. Blaming yourself for not being able to function at an optimal level and having all those roller coaster of emotions and thoughts is not something to look at yourself with suspicion. Do not record yourself as being «problematic». Do not record this moment in time as something to get rid of as soon as possible.
You are still here.
Accepting the reality as it is right now, is one first step. Denying what is there is not going to make anything better.
You are still here.
Accepting these emotions as part of this reality is one second step.
You are still here.
You do not need to control your emotions. You do not need to suppress your thoughts and feelings to act like «you’ve got yourself together».
You are still here.
Find the stillness in this very moment, take a breath and be still here. Do not turn your back on what you consider important to you. Do not lose your desire and perspective of this life. You are still here and so are they.
Days of Wonder 