The Horrible Pandemic

Hasn't it taught us all so much? Explore the horrible pandemic with me. Point by point.

1. Have We Become More Reflective?

The horrible pandemic has changed our outlook on life. This disease meant the departure of so many of our loved ones. These times have made most of us more reflective and shifted our perspectives and values. We started valuing the essentials more than ever before. Mundane and small things such as going out with a friend, having dinner with a loved one, cooking a nice meal, going to the salon/barber for self-care have all become incredibly gratifying things to do. 2 years ago, these things were insignificant and normal to most.

Have we started exercising more patience? Have we become more content with our simple routines and mundane habits? Have we started prioritizing mental and physical health over looks and material? Has this pandemic been a blessing in disguise? The pandemic forced us to face our problems. There was no way that we could quick-fix and distract ourselves from whatever mental challenges that we were facing. It was us, versus us, and I think we have prevailed.

The happiness ceiling that we bestowed upon our heads has, all of the sudden, gotten much lower. It felt much more within reach. I, for example, am no longer trying to save up to get myself a Camaro, I realized that I was being irrational and miscalculated when it came to my priorities and the way I viewed things. I realized that ultimately, it won’t make me anymore fulfilled or happier and that feeling of status and boosted self-esteem will last for about 3 months only and I will be left with debt, regret and a high-maintenance product that I can’t really afford.

2. Do We Understand The Meaning of Friendship?

Has this pandemic made us value real and meaningful relationships more? We were unable to hangout in groups anymore, we had to stick to limited company. This meant that we had to be with people we felt somewhat comfortable with. You know, the one or two friends we call in dire need, the loved one that we share all of our secrets with, the ever-life sacrificing parent that we would give our lives to protect.

It became very clear to me, that with relationships, we should start prioritizing quality over quantity. This is easier said than done, especially if you already have an existing circle that might make the process of elimination more complicated, or if you are working in a field that depends on widening your circle or requires you to actively establish connections and be a part of new circles.

During this time, I came to the realization that we have no choice but to watch closely how others react to us when we start developing and improving every aspect of our lives. Some of the people within our circles might be happy for us and others might not. I have learned that this is completely natural. We don’t have to be someone else’s heroes; we do not even have to be our own heroes. We can just exist, with few people that we know and love, and that would be enough.

3. Social Media is The World.

Even though I have been working on social on a daily basis for the last 6 years, I have not really understood the power of social until this horrible pandemic has started. Social media is the natural course of human progression, and there is no denying the seemingly increasing impact it is having on our mental health and on our lives in general. Social is an extension of us. There's no such thing as “social media toxicity”, we bring the toxicity. Everything that’s on social media is an extension of the human being. The click-bait headlines, the false happiness, the overly fake positives, the overly fake negatives, the over-stimulation, the abundance of information and sales, the analytics, the money. Social media is the world.

Social is a weapon. A tool. Like everything else that determines the human worth and is controllable is a tool. The thing about it is, it has so deeply taken over our lives that we find it difficult now more than ever to maintain a sense of reality.

I never thought social media is inherently bad, nor did I think it was purposefully designed to be addictive or “engaging”, we decide what we get addicted to and what we engage with. The human came up with social media, just like the human came up with all other things that were invented and are used for either good or bad. We give social its significance.

With the pandemic, people might have become quieter on social, after all, we had to be quarantined/working and studying from home for almost the better half of it. Meaningful and real topics have always emerged on social; we just paid more attention to them during this pandemic. Viral videos and funny IG sketches felt unimportant during this time. Less click-bity headlines captured the attention of the masses. I think we as people have realized that there are more important things in life than going viral for a nice 48 hours (or whatever the lifespan of an IG post is). I felt like more people detoxed and took breaks from social. More people valued human connections. Of course, social remains the #1 money making machine for businesses. The question I started asking myself during this time is, if I am not making money on social…, then what exactly am I doing?

4. Focusing on What Matters.

The pandemic has made us rearrange our values and brought more clarity to what is important us. I noticed that we were often getting lost in things that do not really make a huge difference, in the grand scheme of things at least. Material things like clothes, cars, watches, bags and so on. This is also not a new concept, focusing on what matters is ultimately what is going to bring us closer to achieving our goals if our goals revolve around happiness and fulfillment. We do things because we want to do good and we want to feel good. During the pandemic, focusing on what matters became either extremely easy or extremely hard. I guess it depended on who you have built yourself to be. It hit people who depended on a routine differently than people who did not.

For me, the level of difficulty was somewhere in the middle. My system got messed up, but I wasn’t hugely dependent on my system for me to be mentally healthy. For me, the sense of happiness and fulfillment always comes in bursts. Thanks to the pandemic, priorities such as physical and mental health became clearer and much more important to me. The pandemic uncovered so many life truths that made me way more self-aware and focused on the things that ultimately mattered to me.

5. What's the Meaning Behind All of This? Really?

Yeah, we would all like to be accomplished, to have our lives mean something big, to have our names memorized by strangers, to have our bosses thank us for all the amazing business we are bringing. I ask, is all of it really worth it? Does all of it really mean something in the grand scheme of things? Do we need to be accomplished to be fulfilled, do we need the validation of others to have our lives mean something? Or is it all in our heads, we choose the type of heroes we want to be.

How did the pandemic bring us more clarity to in terms of meaning? When have we become so meticulous about our live-decisions and how did we get all of this maturity and wisdom? The pandemic brought clarity to the fact that intrinsic validation is the only validation we require. It forced us to find fulfillment in the smaller, simpler things in life. It made us, deal with us, for an extended period of time, without distractions, without shortcuts and easy ways out. We had to figure out our true meaning, our true significance. Accomplishments meant very little when looked at from this perspective. We felt a very sudden and simple triumph having kept ourselves and our loved ones safe. The pandemic was about survival, and for so many people, survival was their greatest accomplishment.

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6. Have You Heard About the Art Of Minimalism?

If you have not, you are missing out on one of the easiest ways to build environments that lead to happiness and fulfillment. By environments, I mean both mental and physical environments. The less you have, the less you have to worry about. On the surface, this seems like a bad advice, especially if you are the ambitious, go-getter type like me. But, minimalism does not mean not working your butt off, on the contrary, minimalism means being able to function and be satisfied with whatever it is that you have at your disposable. Needing less to achieve more. Minimalism is about efficiency. Minimizing needs and maximizing everything else (usually productivity, work and results). This does not mean materialistic minimalism only, but spiritual and emotional minimalism too. Feelings, intrinsic needs, wants and everything that comes along with them.

The more we can adapt and work with as little as possible; financially, spiritually and emotionally, the happier we are. I got rid of all of my furniture during the pandemic and settled for a picnic chair that I kept in my living room for a good 6 months or so. I was much happier because it gave me more room to meditate. I figured if I can control what I need to be happy, then I can be happy anywhere, at anytime, and with anything.

7. It Feels Weird (....and icky) That We Have Finally Become Agreeable.

The pandemic brought us all together in ways we could have never imagined. It was a true equalizing force that came to make everyone play on a level-field. Everyone was vulnerable and at risk no matter their social status, income or educational levels. This made us as a human race take collective decisions & actions; keeping social distance, wearing masks in public, respecting precautionary measures and procedures. This was unprecedented to me personally. Never before have I seen the rich be so concerned with the same exact thing as the poor.

Who would have thought that the people would finally align with governments on something and vice versa? The chain of command seemed alright to people and a true responsibility to governments. Sure, there were protests against the pandemic in some countries, but generally, people understood and gave consent to the governing parties to make best decisions in order to combat the spread and save lives. It was refreshing to see everyone working towards a common goal, and that people realized that sometimes, decisions made in power, can be for the greater good of the people.

8. Passion is temporary. Consistency is permanent.

We’re all passionate about something, and that passion can drive us to work really hard for some time. The truth is, the motivation that stems from passion wears off very quickly. What we are left with is a choice; either to follow through or stop because we are no longer motivated. The pandemic magnified this feeling. Motivation wore off quicker than ever before. We had no downtime for a cool trip to Europe to re-energize ourselves. It was us against the days of hard quarantine and work from home. This made us understand the importance of consistency.

Despite me working in 4 jobs before, I never really had any consistency and was always struggling with keeping a good work rhythm. The pandemic forced me to be consistent throughout just to maintain a decent level of mental well-being. I had to be consistent at following rules, working from a distance, keeping in-touch with home and being an overall disciplined grown-up. They say “hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard” and that is absolutely true. Consistency is the main reason behind good results and long-term success. Passion is sexy, sure, but consistency is straight up marriage material.