The Doors are Closed - What about our Minds and Hearts?

It is 9 am on a Saturday morning and the birds rest on the branch of the sturdy fig tree and exchange tweets oblivious of the situation around. With the outlook calendar painted all free, I realize that I am slowly sipping my coffee and recognizing a new subtle flavor which I hadn’t noticed before.

In the face of truth, we as humans tend to get humanized and connect back to the core. I remember the late afternoon of July 26th of 2005 in Mumbai (India), where the warnings of heavy rains started coming in and most of us didn’t realize the gravity of the situation immediately. The phone lines got clogged and we went about a few more hours doing our daily business before leaving office. We thought they were yet another heavy rains. The sudden strange situation was new to us and we took it with a pinch of positivity that everything was fine and going to be fine and we had time before we reacted to the situation.

The jovial crowds on the streets were singing and commenting on having to walk back home in knee deep waters until we all realized the magnitude of the situation when the water levels rose up to our necks. The vista of scenes from our lives scrolled in front of our eyes as we waded through the gushing waters and a few lucky survived!

The current situation with the COVID-19 reminds me of this day. When I hear of people spending time in café and parks despite the lock down, I think of the stage one in the earlier situation where people took it easy and were confident that ‘nothing’ would happen.

Learning 1: It is high time we take this situation seriously rather than waiting for it to blink right into our eyes and tell the grave truth. It already is.

Learning 2: Where else would one get a chance to save lives by doing a simple act of staying indoors? It doesn’t just concern us but also others whom we might be impacting if we don’t practice social distancing diligently.

Learning 3: Did we just get to know there was an elderly couple living down the street who might need support and may be we could set up some online grocery shopping for them? Maybe, we had distanced ourselves so much in the normal lives that we hardly knew who our neighbor was?

Learning 4: Does staying indoors seem difficult? This might be the right time to spare a thought for those people of all ages who are immobile and are confined to their homes, those asthma patients who get scared to step out due to the smokers in public places and those people who shut themselves in dark rooms during depression. Many more are behind closed doors even when things were ‘normal’ for the rest. It is time we escape from the concentric circles of me, my family and my career to a more expansive and inclusive surrounding.

Learning 5: We have been blind to a lot of things around, taking things for granted and they all seem to dawn upon us when we shut ourselves and look more inward!

I am no doctor or a soothsayer, all I have is a few soothing words and empathy for those who are going through a rough time. Beyond boundaries and geographies, we are all interconnected and good thoughts and deeds can be passed on anytime.

And finally, the simplest yet the greatest difference we can make to the world today is ‘empathize’ with everyone around and get close to their feelings while staying away from them!