Humanity gets a love tap.
There's an English translation of a Persian saying (??? ??? ?????) īn nīz bogzarad.
"This too shall pass".
The Buddhist's point to Impermanence.
Indigenous Australia has it's Dreaming.
The Chinese say Rénshēng wúcháng, 人生无常, referring to the impermanence of life.
All point in some way to Humanity's ability, or need, to establish meaning to life.
As am I trying to do, in my own way, here.
How can this 'C-2020 event' help me, to be Human?
I have know for some time from my friends inside China that the COVID growth numbers are bad. Exponentially bad.
As have been the collective, repetitive failures of said political leadership in the face of it - from inside Wuhan, to the White House.
And I know there are plenty of other numbers out there that are far worse.
From the jaw-dropping 7.8B (7,800,000,000) of us Homo Sapiens on this old Rock at moment...
To the 245,000 suicides this year.
And 5,000 gun deaths in the US last year!
There are 840,000,000 humans who are under nourished, while there are TWICE THAT (1.7B) who are overweight. 750M of those clinically, 'obese'.
To date there have been ~17,000 deaths reported acknowledged to be caused by the Virus, yet there will likely be 30,000 die of hunger TODAY?
Where's the Humanity you ask?
https://www.sdg2advocacyhub.org/news/hunger-obesity-paradoxes-our-food-system
So what is the Meaning of all this COVID COVFEFE?
Finding Meaning & Purpose
Well firstly, of course, my meaning is going to different to your meaning.
And ours definitely different to that of someone in Wuhan or Bergamo who never saw their loved one again after dropping them off to the doc with a little fever.
Or the Medico who has to chose who gets the ventilator this shift.
Or the family business owner who, as a result of the shut down, no longer has any life savings left to put their child into school.
Or the Millions NOT on LinkedIn or other Socials for their Daily Juice!
Yes, for me there is loss. And grief. Not as with the loss of a loved one. Touch wood, none of this is to impact my family as it has the hundreds of thousands who have had their lives turned upside down in a matter of weeks by the illness, fear or loss of a friend or relative.
At this point in time, all I can narrow down my loss to is a loss of my faith in humanity.
That IT would act in the face of a pending disaster. The science. The brutal truth of it.
As a GenX-er, I have had this feeling before.
In 2008. After the fear created by the criminality of the Global Financial Crisis overwhelmed the growing global enthusiasm for the looming Climate disaster.
The science of thousands of scientists ignored as $$Billions were syphoned back into a system that was failing.
There is also a familiar sense of the LOSS of First World privilege.
Not that I haven't felt that before either. Depression, Divorce & Bankruptcy in the mid-2000's fundamentally crushing the EGO out from the centre of my white male privileged existence.
"This too shall pass".
For me, this is a global meme.
A 1st-world, social media-connected bubble pop.
The rapid removal of the world that was.
The loss of the Spring Break bender, or the Aussie-as Bondi swim.
A tragic loss of privilege. The psychological impact of a rapid dislocation of a known way of life.
Something those on the receiving end of my Colonial ancestry could attest too.
From my circle if inputs, I've drawn on what I see is the building dramatic perceived loss of a Way of Life.
Something traumatic caused by the speed of this Pandemics exponential arrival.
The driver of why coverage of this event is more important to those driving the Media cycle.
I empathise fully with its direct impact with the current, and likely larger future, loss of Life.
But just how could these seemingly sophisticated Global communities get preparation and response to this bug so wrong? How could there be such a collective arrogance in response.
"This Too Shall Pass"
Wu Wei
In Chinese, Wuchang means uncertainty.
It also happens to be a City District (suburb) on the South-East side of the Yangtze River, in a City now infamous for all the wrong reasons; Wuhan.
There's 2M people living in the district of Wuchang, each Grandmothers, Granddaughters, Brothers, Sons. There's 11M more families in greater Wuhan. 60M in Hubei Province. It is one of the busiest hubs for passenger and freight movements in China, and the source of the last previous largest outbreak in China, the Xinhai Revolution in 1911. An event which led to the overthrow of the Qing Empire & the formation of the Republic of China. (Pre PRC)
"This too shall pass".
Somewhere, someone, back in December 2019 or maybe earlier, fell ill with a dry cough and fever. In a pattern to be repeated 10's of thousands of times around the world, his diagnosis went neglected. The Fever developed to Pneumonia, leading to Respiratory failure and ICU incubation. This bug is bad.
And as would occur in 5,500 later cases in China, and now exponentially around the world - Death with complications in lung failure and organ damage. Something new on the radar.
After their own period of WuWei, (doing something by doing nothing), on Lunar New Year's Eve (Jan 23), the Chinese Central Government imposed "unprecedented" limitations on travel and public movements. Effectively locking down the city of 11M people, and then the entire Province. This, on the eve of Chinese New Year. The greatest human migration.
At this point in time, there were only 580 'reported' cases, and 17 deaths.
Unbeknownst to many Westerners, not just Wuhan, but the whole Country went into lock-down over what is usually the busiest time of the year. People shut in their apartments. Kids not at school. Business shuttered. Nothing moved without a scan.
"This Too Shall Pass"
People did not start to return to work until mid March. Even now, this is happening with restrictions and extensive temperature check and testing.
Sadly the doctor credited with alerting to the threat of the infection contracted the disease mid-January and was dead by the 7th of February.
This is a human disaster, not a political one. A mastery of nature loving chaos, over control.
Then somewhere, someone (or a few thousand), took this little microbe in their oesophagus and went back to their family in some other part of the world.
Maybe it was the very counties who recalled their Expatriate's back home to leave China to rot. Few, if any Western counties reached out to express their condolences for the shattering of Wuchang's humanity.
Those same counties are now scrambling around without access to the knowledge and experience gained by a "TOUR OF DUTY on the front line of a COVID defence.
The unseen super-bug currently eating its way through our society is having both a profound direct impact on those infected & treating the outbreak, but also on our 100 year old psychological norms.
"This Too Shall Pass"
As Kubler-Ross espoused in her seminal prose in 1969, when confronted with loss, we all, as humans, identify with 5 stages of grief.
Millions experience this every day with the loss of life. And in the past 50 years, many have sought this advice to get them through a traumatic experience..
So what is it that is so impactful about this bug?
Is it the power of the "contagion" fear? The pace of its spread? It's unhealthy magnification through Social (viral) media?
"This Too Shall Pass"
Denial
"Denial helps us survive loss."
And with COVID's spread, haven't we proved been good at denial?
I'm not going to sacrifice the Economy to this over-hyped Flu.
No Social distance.
Get back to work.
For Politicians, Denial helps pace their feelings of grief for loss of Control. There is a grace in their denial.
For the great grey mass, it's 'over there', 'poor them', 'they're not civilised like we are.' 'Meh!'
"This Too Shall Pass"
Anger
"Anger is a necessary stage of the healing process."
There are many other emotions under anger in the COVID world, judgement, blame, racism.
But anger is the emotion we are most used to managing. Mouthing off, or shutting down.
The truth is that anger has no limits.
It can extend to your Government, your friends, the doctors, your family, and yourself.
Unfortunately for the US, there's 400M guns washing around the American suburbia. With a lack of access to other distractions for venting this anger, (sport, alcohol), this stage might get some exponential figures of its own, beyond the direct medical impact of the virus.
Underneath anger is pain. A feeling of being deserted and abandoned.
"This Too Shall Pass"
Bargaining
We didn't get to enjoy this stage with COVID. It was too fast.
Before a loss, it seems like you will do anything if only your loved one would be spared. “Please Mr President, send in the Army Corps of Engineers" “I will never speak ill of you..."
We become lost in a maze of “If only…” or “What if…” statements.
We want life returned to what is was; we want our previous blissful existence restored. We want to go back in time…if only, if only, if only.
Guilt is Bargaining’s companion. The “if only's” cause us to find fault in ourselves and what we “think” we could have done differently.
I can't think of anyone who I know who has had the COVID mind-shift from "she'll be right", to Ah Fuck", who hasn't had a pang of the guilts. 'I shouldn't have gone to that meeting'. 'I shouldn't have sent the kids to school', 'I should have listened to those warnings.'
And as the waves of realisation of the severity of this Pandemic wash over communities around the world, the Denial, Anger, Bargaining will roll though in different tides.
We will be battered against the rocks of Information overload.
We will need support.
"This Too Shall Pass"
People often think of the stages last weeks or months. They forget that the stages are responses to feelings that can last for minutes or hours as we flip in and out of one and then another.
"We do not enter and leave each individual stage in a linear fashion. We may feel one, then another and back again to the first one."
Depression
I draw directly from David Kessler here.
"After bargaining, our attention moves squarely into the present. Empty feelings present themselves, and grief enters our lives on a deeper level, deeper than we ever imagined. This depressive stage feels as though it will last forever.
It’s important to understand that this depression is not a sign of mental illness. It is the appropriate response to a great loss. We withdraw from life, left in a fog of intense sadness, wondering, perhaps, if there is any point in going on alone? Why go on at all? "
There will need to be FAR GREATER investment in the psychological support required as this event moves through society.
Money's going to Defence will need to be redrawn to Health.
Money's going to Big Business bailouts will need to go to broad social welfare support.
There will be job losses. Business will close down. Livelihoods will be lost.
If the spread goes unchecked, as it appears to be the case, Industries will collapse, Economies will be tested. Hell, even Empire's could fall.
If not capped, and caseload expands to challenge not only Health services, but households. Depression will set in.
The extreme social isolation required to cap the spread of the virus, (a stage not yet accepted by most Western Governments), will trigger a greater sense of loss of what was.
FOMO propelled via Instagram will be replaced by FOWI (Fear of What Is).
Much more funding will be needed for the workers who can provide this support.
"This Too Shall Pass"
But it will be a long haul.
Acceptance
Accepting the reality that our life, as it was, is gone and recognising that the new reality is a permanent reality will be needed.
This is where the Innovators and the Optimists will thrive.
They will need support.
Green shoots will be seen.
"We will never like this reality or make it OK, but eventually we accept it. We learn to live with it. It is the new norm with which we must learn to live.""As we begin to live again and enjoy life, we often feel that in doing so, we are betraying our loved one. We can never replace what has been lost, but we can make new connections, new meaningful relationships, new inter-dependencies."
We move, we change, we grow, we evolve.
We may start to reach out to others and become involved in their lives. We invest in our friendships and in our relationship with ourselves. We begin to live again, but we cannot do so until we have given grief it's time.
"This Too Shall Pass"
Meaning
Through my own lived experiences of loss and grief, I have learned to be able to step back from events and identify what Meaning I need to take from it for me to process in a healthy manner.
I have learned I need to practice this every day. Often, at many time during a day.
It has taken years, and many modalities to harness.
And I'm still learning.
Through his own loss Kessler introduced a critical sixth stage to the process - Meaning. He argues that it’s finding meaning beyond the stages of grief most of us are familiar with—denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance—that can transform grief into a more peaceful and hopeful experience.
For me it's being of service. Practicing Wu Wei. Embodying Yoga. Compassion, Gratitude.
My Purpose has been shaped to help others move their energy towards the next great community challenge facing Humanity post COVID - the Climate Crisis. #SDG2030
What is it for you?
Do you need help to discuss and define? DM me to take further.
H+Lab provides Help for Being Human. A mix of Coaching & Wellbeing management modalities to help find Meaning & Purpose in this interesting, challenging & changing time.
"Be like water my friend" for this too shall pass. ;-)
Be well. Stay safe. Live differently.