The world has changed. And many of us wonder these days when things will finally go back to normal again. If you ask me, the answer to that question is: Never. Our society is changing at a pace that’s too rapid and too fundamental to think that things will ever be as they were before. But actually, maybe that’s not too bad after all…
If we focus on the current situation only, the outlook on the world looks grim. Covid-19 will change us all, and the changes will last far beyond the immediate impact of the virus itself. But what if it has the potential to not only affect us negatively – but fundamentally change us for the better? If we take this as a wake-up call to the reality of global human connection and consciousness, and to understand that, just as fast as the virus is able to spread, it allows for compassion, love and a deeper understanding of what it means to be human to spread just as well?
There are always two ways to approach any situation or challenge. One way is to focus on ourselves and the immediate impact on us. To let ourselves be driven by fear and anxiety, make short-term decisions, live in a coronavirus tunnel and let the media put blinders on us, preventing us to see reality free from our fear. But the other way is to step out of our immediate self-focus and see the immense potential that lies in our ability to pull together as human beings to weather not only this crisis – but to learn how much bigger we can be together in the face of adversity. To learn how adjustments in our behavior can lead to incredible power, cohesiveness and change around the globe. And how the way we position ourselves to be with each other is the underlying factor that will determine who we will be during and after this episode.
There are signs for hope and goodness, little flowers that emerge from the ashes of the fires around us, everywhere we look. Some are taking this time of remote work and confinement to their homes as an incredible chance to work on their personal development, meditate, engage in introspection and reconnect with their core and their inner values – using the retreat of the world as we know for a personal retreat to become a better and more resilient human being. The amount of video calls that are happening, people reaching out to each other for more than just the cordial 5-minutes check in with friends or families, give me hope that the yearning for true connection will become bigger and stronger than it ever used to be. Little acts of helpfulness and care for each other are spreading – one of my dear friends offered to go grocery shopping for all the elderly people in his neighborhood when he went to the store himself.
We all are suddenly far more responsible in using the world’s resources, if we want it or not, and are forced to contemplate what we really need to live a good life. And in the process, we start to understand that it’s much less than we thought, and that the connections that we make, human to human, give us so much more meaning and substance than anything else. And finally, it dawns on us how we might have been chasing the wrong ideas. How the lifestyle we lived is not only fragile but not sustainable. How it doesn’t truly make us happy.
It’s on us to decide who we want to be as we emerge on the other side of all of this in a few months. Will we waste our emotional energy for fear, self-pity, blame and isolation and binge Netflix all day? Or will we start listening to the world and our environment of how we can be most helpful now? How we can be with others with compassion and love and help work on our shared problems in ways that elevate everyone around us, including ourselves? And start contemplating of what it really means to live a fulfilled life in a world that we too long thought was a vending machine for our pleasures and desires?
I look forward to this discussion with all of you. And I would love to hear of examples all around us of how we are becoming better humans through all of this. Please comment and share if you have your own stories to tell. Let’s spread hope and pull together as human beings to overcome a challenge that might prove to be the one reminder that we needed to understand how connected we are.
It’s in our hands to determine what human connection truly is for us!
Kathrin Hilde Peters 