The news gets grimmer every day. Many of us are living in Lockdown. We are frightened and understandably so. The Coronavirus disease is causing a pandemic which is shaking our beliefs, culture, daily habits and the very essence of our lives. These are life changing events for us all. Whatever this leads to, whatever we suffer, or learn, I suspect life will never quite be the same again.
Will I fall into a chasm of fear, helplessness and despair? I’ve been there, and that taught me that we have choices and it’s never as bad as our fantasy and creative mind can allow it to be. Rather use that creativity to generate hope and optimism, and on a strictly practical level – make a plan to keep myself afloat.
5 things to manage Corona times
What follows is my list of things to do every day. If I keep to them, I will be OK. It helped me to visualise the plan. My artistic efforts are pictured above!
Maybe a plan like this might be helpful to you? Other ideas are around. For instance, the Unicef Executive Director, Henrietta H. Fore has been broadcasting a Video diary from her home office. In the broadcast on Day 4, she recommends to make a Well-being plan.
(If it’s relevant to you, Unicef’s advice about looking after children and teens during the pandemic might also be worth reading.)
So here is my personal list of what I need everyday for well-being.
1. Move your body!
Movement and sport is absolutely essential to me. It’s the way to keep Spondyloarthritis at bay. If I move, I’m usually pain free. If I don’t, the pain comes back within a few days. So how to replace the weekend mountain trips, the back classes, training gym, climbing gym, physiotherapy and the fitness centre which keep me moving?
As long as I’m allowed to, I will go running in the hills behind my house early in the morning. I meet nobody and feel safe. Or some days, I practice Rickie Moore’s wonderful yoga for inner peace, which takes an hour. I can also go walking. The incredible value of walking was made clear to me by the neurologist Prof. Shane O’Mara on a BBC podcast called Don’t tell me the score. In summary, walking benefits our muscles and posture, helps to protect and repair organs, aids digestion and can even turn back the aging of our brains. Moreover, it encourages us to think more creatively, helps our mood to improve and our stress levels to fall. I’ve tried to follow Prof. O’Mara’s recommendations on walking, and I really think that they work. A quick summary with 8 reasons why walking is so good for you is here.
2. Look after stress levels by meditating
Sometimes I get really stressed out, which leads me to make mistakes and misjudge situations. I can even feel my heartbeat accelerating, or my voice getting tense. To relax again, I need to get myself into the here and now. I’m never tense if I’m in the present moment. It’s reflecting on some event in the past, or worrying about the future that makes me stressed.
Climbing, running, swimming, or other physical activities all help to concentrate the mind, but meditation has a special healing quality. Sometimes I can sit on my cushion and physically feel the tension falling away from my body. There are so many schools and techniques to meditate. If you are curious, it’s all on the internet.
Mindfulness is also a very helpful tool to reduce stress. It’s not the same as meditation. I like this simple way of distinguishing these two practices:
Mindfulness is the awareness of “some-thing,” while meditation is the awareness of “no-thing.” (here’s the reference)
Mindfulness is being aware of the present moment. It’s noticing and paying attention to thoughts, feelings, behavior, and everything else, but without making judgements. Jon Kabat-Zinn founded the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program at the University of Massachusetts to treat the chronically ill.
Personally, I prefer meditation. It’s the fascination of trying to get to a completely different level of consciousness. Albert Einstein famously said, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” Meditation often enables me to reframe problems and find solutions.
There are masses of information on the internet. I find Andy Puddicombe a fascinating person. He co-founded the App called Headspace. I don’t know it, although it’s probably the most popular one. He has worked hard to make Meditation and Mindfulness more accessible and relevant in today’s world.
I’ve been meditating for about 8 years now. Sometimes only for 10 minutes, but every day is the key. I still get distracted a lot, and this is quite normal, unless you are really, really experienced. My practice has not (yet) enabled me to switch into altered consciousness every time I sit on my cushion. My practice is learning to catch myself drifting off into other thoughts and bring myself back to quietness. This does help with problem-solving and calms my mind too. I also enjoy meditations that help develop a certain state of mind, such as Loving Kindness, or Compassion. There is no wrong and right way to meditate!
3. Get some overdue work done
Lots of people feel this way about the Lockdown. They can finally get some work done, which they’ve wanted to do for ages, or read some of those books stacked on the bedside table…. I am looking forward to blogging more and am launching new professional activities as a patient representative/advocate in medical research. Maybe you have other projects, or can contact old friends again.
4. NO TV before bedtime!
We all know that we shouldn’t be online in the evening, let alone watching the news. A few evenings ago there was an evening report from an intensive care unit in Bergamo in Italy, a city 30km from the Swiss border, where an old friend lives, who had a liver transplant. I was stupid enough to watch it – woke at 3am, feeling sick, my head spinning. I felt feverish but was too dizzy to move. When I did manage to measure my temperature, I had slightly over 35C! No fever whatsoever!
In the evenings I am generally to tired to read, so I need to do something very passive. That’s why TV is such a temptation. My solution was to get out some of those old coffee table books with stunning photos about beautiful places in the world and look at them again. Wonderful! I haven’t looked at such books for years!
5. Remember the power of Love and Compassion
It’s important to me to feel connected with others and to feel the power of Love and Compassion. A marvellous doctor called Sir Harry Burns, who I have been so privileged to work with, emphasised the need for Love and Compassion in health care in a recent talk. He was referring to the care of others, but it’s also important when caring for ourselves. (Sir Harry has also done a great TED talk on What causes Wellness).
I’ve heard that Neuroscience says that it is better for your health and well-being to give than to receive. I don’t know if there is really any evidence-based research on this, but I can believe it. Helping each other, staying in touch, supporting each other, will make a big difference to how we overcome this crisis. And I am sure that despite a bit of hamster shopping, people will rise to the occasion. Just knowing this, gives me strength and hope for the days and weeks to come.
Take care, stay at home, stay healthy, and stay in the space of Love and Compassion.