Reflections on the Coronavirus Part 14: The Final Call

In the fourteenth week of the 'Making Sense: Understanding the Meaning We See in the COVID-19 Pandemic' supervision conversations, we have continued to explore our experiences and perceptions of the world around us. As in previous weeks, this discussion was a free flowing conversation between between coaches and consultants, and the summary below attempts to capture the themes. Participants this week, for the first time, were all from the United Kingdom.

As the call began I was struck by the difference between this call and those of previous weeks. I had followed the same template in advertising the call, posting the event once with a single reminder and for thirteen weeks the call had been full, with a wait list. There was no wait list this week, and although the call was fully booked, only two people (other than myself) actually attended. Others had apologised ahead of time or simply not dialled in. I reflected on this difference as we began and wondered if, as we emerge from lockdown, the call was no longer needed. Were people now returning to their lives?

Our conversation also began with a very different tone, and had moved from the highly personal content of previous calls, to a conversation centred on the political and social context. One participant began with an image that had come to them, of the current British Prime Minister speaking in the Houses of Parliament, only to be attacked by an outraged statue of Winston Churchill. We discussed a shared sense of dysfunction in our government and institutions and the feeling that we needed to participate and offer alternatives, rather than simply react.

We considered the protests connected with the #BlackLivesMatter movement, and wondered wondered what this meant, beyond the presenting issues of institutional racism; Why had this become such a focal point for social unrest? We wondered whether the dominance of the Western paradigm was simply passing, and whether we were witnessing its death throes. We considered the rise of Asia and the perception that they had managed the pandemic better than the West, and were set to become the world's new powerhouse.

There was a shared sense that the narrative from our media was no longer credible, and a recent BBC 'docudrama' on the 'Salisbury Poisonings' was cited, with the suggestion that we were simply being 'fed' a series of old messages about old foes as a distraction. We considered the possibility that we were being shown aspects of China that make sense according to our old norms, and in a way that distorts or represses the real picture; 'It is hard to accept that we are a bit shit, and they are not'. Referencing Ian Morris' book 'Why the West Rules - For Now', we explored the prevailing Western narrative that the West has a 'god given' right to rule, rather than accepting that history has been a series of historical and geographical accidents, which are constantly evolving and changing.

We wondered what stories we will tell ourselves as we emerge from the pandemic, and whether our memory of the past would change. I was reminded of a quote from the Jungian Analyst, Renos Papadopolous who suggested that 'it is not only the past the shapes the present, but also the present that shapes the past' (1996 p. 158), and we discussed the extent to which we may rewrite history to justify our current narrative; Will we remember who led us here and why? Will we learn the lessons of the past?

I returned to a question that had been asked at the beginning, which had referenced this group and then been extended to a wider social context; 'Where is everybody'?  As we reflected, the group suggested that the world after lockdown felt increasingly dehumanised and unreal, with little sense of meaning. There was a feeling of frustration with the messages in the media, which felt 'second hand' and 'old'. This frustration had driven a sense of mischief in one participant who suggested that they were starting to 'poke and annoy people who had set themselves up on LinkedIn as gurus and thought leaders' when previously they would have 'just let it go'.

We discussed the feeling that while we have now accepted that the 'old normal' did not work, we have not yet made sense of what next. We considered that our narratives were changing, but we were still unclear how these new stories would end.

We then sat in silence for what felt like a very long time. I listened to the traffic outside and my wife moving around in the house, and reflected on how the noise of the world seemed to be returning. My reverie was broken by one participant's suggestion that they now feel a lot more connected with those who are immediately close to them and to their environment, using their feelings about their home as an example: 'It is an ugly house but it our space, and I would struggle to sell it now'. We discussed our own experiences of the value of simple and purposeless human interactions...just being among others. There was a sense that we had become accustomed to the rhythm of life we had now established. We agreed that we felt clearer about what made us happy, but were worried about the implications as we re-entered the world beyond. As we wondered again about 'where everybody had gone', we considered the fantasy that people where rushing back to the past without the opportunity to reflect and reconsider.

I was reminded of the words of James Hillman who suggested:

'By soul I mean....a perspective rather than a substance, a viewpoint toward things rather than a thing itself. This perspective is reflective; it mediates events and makes differences between ourselves and everything that happens. Between us and events, between the doer and the deed, there is a reflective moment -- and soul-making means differentiating this middle ground' (1975)

We wondered if this was a time in which we should be considering our 'souls' and considered how we could begin to reengage with the feeling of basic humanity in our organisations, which seemed to feel particularly 'soulless' now. We wondered whether the industry of 'purpose and meaning making' that had arisen was really making meaning, or just 'making something that stands in the place of meaning'. We wondered whether one way to do this was to engage organisations in the real and difficult conversations that faced all humanity; 'god, death, sex, poverty and climate change'. Were we prepared to have difficult but 'soulful' conversations?

As the call ended, I reflected on my original intention to hold them until no one came. I now feel that, although we were still a group of three (and I did not sit alone for 90 minutes as I had promised myself), the time had come to draw the calls to a close. The conversation has almost ended!

I will now be inviting everyone who has joined a call over the last four months to come together one more time to reflect, and hopefully to participate in a short piece of research to explore their experiences. If you have taken part in any of these conversations, I hope you will be able to join us.

Stay safe and stay sane....

References

Hillman, J. (1975). Revisioning Psychology. New York: Harper & Row

Morris, I. (2010) Why the West Rules - For Now. London: Profile Books

Papadopolous, R. (1996) Archetypal Family Therapy. In Dodson, L. and Gibson, T. (Eds.) Psyche and Family. Wilmette, IL: Chiron