One Year On
Today marks one year since our first lockdown in the UK. We’re being encouraged to pause and reflect on a challenging year, so many have become ill or have died: lost livelihoods and lost lives. There has been a lot of suffering.
I’ve found it very hard to think of the year as just one year – it feels like we’ve had about 3 years in the past 12 months. So much has changed – our family meet-ups, our work, our schools and places of learning, our socialising, our communities, our places of worship, celebrations, entertainment, exercise, holidays. There are many others. Thankfully we continued to have school support otherwise this blog would be very different.
I’ve missed family gatherings, social spaces, entertainment, restaurants and foreign holidays but I’ve also appreciated the quiet spaces and calmer existence. I imagine that this enforced social distancing has been much harder for extroverts. I enjoy walks in nature and given that this was all that was allowed we had to discover new walking areas near where we live. We were able to sneak in a staycation or two in Wales and Cornwall in 2020 so that helped tremendously. Time by the see can be very soothing as we imagine the sea washing away our worries. Have you found a way to make regular walks or exercise interesting for you?
I realise that I’ve got through this time by being incredibly busy and maintaining two online women’s circles; one weekly and one monthly. These connections existed pre covid-19 and have been invaluable. I will be hosting more circles for women coming out of lockdown as we try to reconnect with ourselves and each other. Sign up to the blog to find out when these go live.
The continuous conversations about illness and death have made me want to make the most of the time I still have. In 2020 I threw myself into writing courses and completed my third book. I was able to offer a few writing workshops, and these brought as much pleasure to me as the participants. I had offered these face-to-face before 2020 and was pleased to be able to take them online. I’m forever grateful that work and family life have remained stable, and I was able to transition my counselling practice online. Like many home-based workers I’ve found it hard to maintain good eating and exercise habits and this needs to be a focus going forward. This has been my way of coping, but I’d love to know what has kept you going?
