Normal? What normal?

I always found the concept of normality strange.

According to the dictionaries, normal is what is in accordance with the norm, with the rule. Something regular, common, usual.

Where does our craze for wanting to fit, label, standardize and control everything around us come from? From people to contexts, what does it mean to be “normal”?

I dare say that there has never been such an acclaimed normality.

“Up close, nobody is normal”, Caetano* would say. Have you ever stopped to think about the size of the prejudice involved when we classify someone as (ab)normal?

In the case of economic, business and government scenarios and contexts, what existed was a certain predictability, in a world that was not connected in a network, where the level of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity was infinitely lower.

This pandemic, that has begun to dominate the planet with the dawn of 2020 and, here in Brazil, has put us on hold for three months now, forced us to see that the world we knew, to which we were used, no longer exists.

Suddenly, overnight, our lives were turned upside down, our routine was confiscated, our fantasies of command and control were stolen and we realized our insignificance and finitude.

The urgency and the need forced us to abandon the illusion that we had to live in a tight, stable and controllable reality.

If “the past is a clothing that no longer serves us” (Belchior)*, we need to unlearn old beliefs that imprison us and create new habits that will determine our future.

If "nothing that was will be again the way it was once ..." (Lulu Santos)* and "nothing will be the same, tomorrow ..." (Milton Nascimento)*, why the hell are we trying to define a "New normal"?

All we can control is the way we feel, think and act in relation to life as it appears in the present.

A new normal begins in you, in me, in each one of us. Here and now.

How about we work so that being human, trusting, including, educating, respecting differences, fighting inequalities and having solidary attitudes is normal from today on?

#FairCause # herethefutureis

*Caetano, Belchior, Lulu Santos and Milton Nascimento are very famous and talented Brazilian song writers and singers.

I am Neivia Justa, awarded and recognized Brazilian businesswoman, C-Level headhunter, mentor, board member and mother of two teenager girls. I work to find and engage leaders who think, communicate and act in a conscious, diverse, inclusive and innovative way to guarantee a sustainable future for all.