What The Pandemic Has Taught Me

It’s hard to imagine that we’ve been doing this for an entire year now. This, of course, being living pandemic life – quarantine, staying at home, wearing masks, sanitizing, watching news updates, etc. In March of last year, I remember posting a reminder to wash your hands. Now, that seems like such a baseline precaution, because we’ve come so far in a year. 

I read a really interesting piece this week about how the late-stage pandemic is messing with our brains. It’s a good read if you have time. A big takeaway for me (and a good friend who had shared it) from that article was the following:

“I have a job that allows me to work from home, an immune system and a set of neurotransmitters that tend to function pretty well, a support network, a savings account, decent Wi-Fi, plenty of hand sanitizer. I have experienced the pandemic from a position of obscene privilege, and on any given day I’d rank my mental health somewhere north of “fine.” And yet I feel like I have spent the past year being pushed through a pasta extruder.”

I really want to emphasize that my post today is coming from an extreme position of privilege and this is something I’ve wrestled with throughout the past year. How do I have room to struggle when so many others have it so much worse? For so many, this year put a spotlight on how cruel life can be and I don’t want to, in any way, diminish that, because it’s very real.

What The Pandemic Has Taught Me

Part of me doesn’t recognize my pre-pandemic self. She was a different person…and one I’m not rushing back to being. When I reflect back on the past year, I am beginning to take note of the stuff I don’t want to go back to and the routines I don’t want back. If nothing else, the pandemic allowed me to shine a spotlight on my life and I am (actually) very grateful for that.

Here’s what I’ve learned in the past year, what the pandemic has taught me, and the value I’ve gleaned in a year that has tested all of us in so many ways:

1. I got to see my friends. Living in Hawaii means not only distance, but a time change. In the “before times”, all of my friends were, of course, doing the same as I was – living our lives. When the pause button got hit, I Face-Timed with so many of the people I love in a way that never happened before. I loved this and I hope it doesn’t stop. In so many ways, I saw my friends more in the past year than I have in the previous 10.

2. I don’t want to be an influencer. I took ~6 months off the internet in 2020. It was a gut check for me about how I wanted to show up here (and on social media) and what I was actually “influencing.”  When I stepped back, social media (Instagram in particular) had become a space I didn’t recognize anymore. It felt like I was constantly being sold to or yelled at and I knew I had a lot of work I needed to do internally without all the noise.

Over the years, blogging and social media has evolved into something I never could have dreamed about and I felt like I lost myself in that a little bit. I’m just a writer from central PA who happened to start her blog 10+ years ago and people decided to follow along, but I’m not an authority on anything, I just like what I like. More, I’m a human being who has thoughts and feelings (and messes up!) and is constantly learning. I’m very grateful for the community I’ve created and the space I have, but the world of influencing is something I left in 2020. I’ll continue to show up online, but in a way that is healthier for me, and hopefully all of you, too.

3. I had good, real conversations with my family…and they are really cool people. When you’re in the house and everyone around the world is experiencing collective trauma (in different capacities, of course), it leaves quite a bit of room for navigating it with the people you love most.

I have talked to my parents, sister, aunt, uncle, grandma, and cousins more in the past year than I have since I moved to Hawaii. Our family is a close knit bunch, but the years and miles (and living our lives!) has definitely made it harder to connect. Being at home, we’ve Face-Timed, Marco Polo’d, texted, and connected in a way that felt so good. When no one is leaving the house it’s kind of nice to just chat like you’re in the same room, without having to run to whatever event comes next. I am determined to maintain this as best I can and even created a guide for good questions to ask grandparents that I’ve loved!

4. Time spent with our dogs. It’s no secret that our dogs are getting older. In 2018 and 2019, our travel schedule kept us away from home for more time than I can count and while travel is something we dearly miss and have been extremely fortunate to enjoy, I would be remiss in not saying that spending time with the dogs the past year, constantly, has really made me value their companionship. In the darkest days for me mentally, seeing their joy at just my presence was so uplifting.

5. Perhaps my biggest takeaway was a slower pace of life — and I didn’t welcome it. I remember sitting at home thinking…well, two weeks sitting around might be nice. And as those weeks morphed into months, I was mad at myself for ever welcoming this pause button. I did a series – The New Normal – and it was interesting to read it back and see my moods evolve.

The New Normal Part One | The New Normal Part Two | The New Normal Part Three

As we gun toward a new chapter with more vaccines being distributed, the world peeking out, and resuming whatever the other side of this pandemic looks like, I can’t help but feel trepidation. Like everyone else, I have fallen into a comfortable routine over the past year, one that has been marked by more lounge clothing, cleaning routines, and lazy days than I care to admit in the name of gripping tightly to my own mental health, quality time with Dane and the dogs, and recalibrating my priorities in life. 

I can’t tell you what I’ve done for the past year and if you asked me, I’d probably recall moments not specifics. Time has both stood still and gone at warp speed creating a blur, which is something that drives my inner type A (enneagram 3) absolutely nuts. But through the heartache and frustration, anxiety and fear, I’ve learned more about myself in the past year than ever before and maybe it’s the moments, not the specifics, that make it all so worth it.

I believe many would agree that a worldwide pandemic was never anticipated and while I admittedly feel anxiety about the “what’s next?” (am I alone here?), I am looking ahead toward this next chapter with a little bit of hesitation, and a whole lot of perspective.