When we go out

Managing your feeling or the highs and lows of a game, of a tournament or a season is an essential skill in my line of work. My sport is very dynamic, requiring rapid reactions, with very little time for making decisions. Not giving into frustration in the face of inevitable mistakes, or to the feeling of joy when you do something well, is a big advantage. Maybe that’s why I’ve always been interested in subjects related to emotional equilibrium and wellbeing.

People who know me are aware that I’ve always got at least one book open. Many have to do with the search for knowing the mind and managing our emotions. This is something were all exposed to, that affects everybody to one degree or another. We want to feel good and at peace with our decisions, to bring happiness to the people that matter and to make our own small contribution toward a better world. We want to respond the right way to the challenges that always present themselves, and to bear as best we can life’s difficulties.

Luckily, for a long time now society has ceased to stigmatize those people who seek help to understand themselves better and find answers to the challenges of life. At present, some 5% of Spaniards receive psychological therapy. An equal amount try to model their thinking and conduct through teaching by coaches, books, articles or conferences. I think it’s positive that, finally, we’ve learned to talk about our feelings and that we’ve accepted that the same experience can affect different people in different ways, or even yourself, depending on the situation you’re in.

So let’s talk about feelings.

Assumed luxuries

What we’re going through now could be considered a great test, unprecedented even for those generations that have experienced other serious challenges, such as war. We now have the chance to put into practice everything we’ve learned by understanding the seriousness, uncertainty and exceptionality of the situation we’re going through.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a test in every possible way: as societies, as professionals, as individuals, as couples, as parents, as patients, as members of the human race.

We human beings tend to take stock at times that we view as frontiers.

In this situation –so different from what we were accustomed to– a tendency toward reflection is normal, something comparable, to what we feel, though on a much smaller scale, at the end of each year. We human beings tend to take stock at times that we view as frontiers. Governments think about whether they spent their resources where they were most necessary. Some jobs that were once poorly considered (I’m thinking of employees in supermarkets and pharmacies, for example) are suddenly of great importance. People think about how they feel and change their scale of values: that important event that made us cancel a family gathering wasn’t so important after all. And the simple possibility of being safe in your home with the people you love is suddenly a treasure.

With the confinement, we’ve come to realize that we were taking too many things for granted. That our family members would be healthy tomorrow if they were healthy today. That if we want something and can afford it, we just have to leave the house and buy it. That if we get sick, they’ll take care of us. That if we want to see our friends, we just have to make a date with them and go see them. But a highly contagious and infectious microscopic virus has set logic on its ear. It’s turning out to be really humbling for a society that in many cases believed it was not only very comfortable and even invincible.

I hope that this health emergency will help us to value much more all those comforts that are taken for granted in developed countries –but that in no way are common in other parts of the world. Not everyone can enjoy them even in those countries that are called “first world.” In the United States, the official poverty rate is 11.8% (according to data from the 2018 census). In Spain, 21.5% of the population is at risk of poverty. On the global level, armed conflicts, a lack of hygiene, and deadly diseases such as diarrhea, Aids and tuberculosis oblige many people to constantly undergo what is now happening to us on a much lower level: uncertainty and worry about your own health, the wellbeing of your family, and the future. If there were ever a time for putting our life in perspective, understanding how vulnerable we are, and ignoring insignificant daily concerns, that time is now.

What we will get out of the crisis

Anthony de Mello said in a book I read a few months ago that “everything that happens to us is good.” Does that mean that the thousands of deaths and the disastrous effects on the economy and society that will follow this pandemic are “good”? No. What that phrase does mean is that anything that happens, even something as catastrophic as this, can also provide some lessons that will leave us better prepared for the next pandemic or highly adverse situation. What do you say we look for those lessons together?

I recently saw a TED talk by the neuroscientist Mariano Sigman, speaking from confinement. He said that our only guidance about how to act in a situation like the present one comes from movies or literature. Human beings have thus had to explore our reactions to an unknown situation. I’m one of those people who believe that adverse situations reveal a person’s real character, and I’m happy to see that this crisis is bringing out the best in lots of people. Maybe it’s because many of us like to feel that, as Sigman explains, “we made all the effort we possibly could have.”

Over the past few weeks I’ve seen some very inspiring initiatives. Companies that make donations or manufacture material necessary for this shared emergency. Entrepreneurs who activate resources like 3D printers to create medical equipment. Creative people who put their ideas and solutions at the service of the community. Public figures who make donations or help others feel that they are accompanied and cared for. (I take this opportunity to thank those who have joined the campaign #nuestramejorvictoria that Rafa Nadal and I set up in a coordinated joint project by all of Spanish sport.) Healthcare professionals who stand between the virus and us, unafraid about whether the ‘bullet’ may also hit them. Families that have to face serious personal difficulties about education their children or losing their job but who, nevertheless, come to their windows or balconies every day to applaud across streets and patios. Or families that even applaud with their children in the living room if they don’t have outside windows.

The present health contingency has put us all in the same boat.

I’d like to believe that this situation will make us more human. That it will shake up our value systems, making them a little better. That it will enable us to distinguish between what’s urgent and what’s important, to be more grateful. Maybe to return to the old barter concept: each person thinking what part of what he has or knows how to do can be useful for others.

It moves me to see that in a situation of this magnitude there is a tendency toward unity: toward helping, making sacrifices, recognizing the merits of others. When sharing the pain, we feel part of something common. The social, racial and cultural divisions –the divisions of all kinds– have taken a back seat because this disease doesn’t distinguish between any of those categories. Let’s hope that when all this is over, we’ll be able to find other points of connection and remember that it’s not the only problem affecting the whole planet. There are others like climate change, gender inequality, childhood obesity and other forms of malnutrition, to give just a few examples, that all of us should continue to attack. We should be united against all those other threats and celebrate together when we have reason to do so.

The present health contingency has put us all in the same boat. Let’s all agree, for example, that when faced with this damn virus the best thing we can do is stay at home and protect each other. That for once, we’re all clear about what the enemy is.

Many people are fighting for their life right now. Others for their job or a way of supporting their family. Some are taking difficult, life-saving decisions. Those of us who are lucky enough not to be in any of those groups owe something to all these people: our confinement should not be merely a way to survive, but serve for something beyond just flattening the curve.

So that when we finally get into the street, we can be better than what we were before: may we never take for granted what we have and may we know how to appreciate what’s important in our lives.

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Article in Spanish published in Forbes Spain.