This crisis is very complex, but it does reveal an undeniable reality, it is a direct consequence of the way that we have been treating the natural world. The damage that we have done to the planet is coming back at us like a boomerang. This catastrophe is an enormous opportunity at a global level for humanity to reflect upon our conduct towards nature, and other species and to start acting in a well-balanced, more responsible, more conscious, more caring manner.
At a personal level, there are many opportunities: one way of looking at it is that we realise that our lives are full of unnecessary activities, accessories, or things.
We can live simply within certain basic needs. These basics include rest and silence, something we rarely have.
It also reveals the need for daily, affectionate, and emotional physical contact with people, which for many is very limited these days. Considering how essential this is, it seems to me that it’s going to be very important when we come out of the other side of this. This crisis is an opportunity to re-evaluate some everyday pleasures such as walking, going out, breathing fresh air, or seeing the light of day. Being able to recognize the wealth that lies in these routine things that we took for granted before is a huge gift.
Resilience is the ability to recover from difficult situations that put us to the test.
It has a lot to do with the concept of plasticity, flexibility and the potential to go with the flow like a stick floating down a stream, and not tense up as an unexpected circumstance comes along to break us. Resilience is a material quality and an attribute of the human spirit. It’s very important to build up resilience and know that we can rely on it as back up when facing life’s challenges, which are nothing but impermanence and change all along.
In these times, we are feeling impermanence to the extreme.
But the reality is that everything is impermanent and that we have relative control over the things that happen to us as humans and as individuals. I’m able to nurture this quality of adapting myself to the different circumstances I am going through, knowing that I can step into a place that isn’t subject to ups and downs. This is what some people consider the soul, the spirit, the heart, everyone calls it something different. We are talking about the part of us that’s eternal, our being, where we can go to search for strength when the storm is raging outside of us.
Perhaps the changes aren’t pleasant nor what I would have chosen. However, knowing that I have somewhere to go, I am going to be able to allow the current to pass right by me or even take me for a moment, knowing that I will get back up again, that I have somewhere to stand. Plasticity and flexibility also depend on being anchored, like trees that sway in the storm, because their roots run deep. For us, these roots are a spiritual dimension along with a method that we can implement to strengthen ourselves to this extent.
Something that does very little for our resilience are beliefs, beliefs that are deeply rooted thoughts that are formed at some moment or other for whatever reason. We’ve made use of these beliefs at some stage in order to survive something, to get through a certain situation. But afterward they have stuck with us unwaveringly: Life is like that. This is what I have to do to be safe, this is what I need to survive, people are hostile. In a nutshell, lots of beliefs, some of which are cultural, social, or family beliefs.
We all form beliefs during our lifetime, holding on to them and hopefully, questioning them when life shows us something different from what we had perceived. Now, if we are very strict with our beliefs, and we aren’t capable of looking into them, to question them, to revise them, and change them, then we won’t become very resilient.
For example, I feel that my job is my life and I am only worth what I produce. In this situation where I have to stay at home and people can’t work, if I stick to the belief that my job is my life, the situation could destroy me. Why? Because I don’t have anything to take my job forward. On the other hand, I know that my job is important in certain circumstances, but not this one, I have other resources and other dimensions to me that I can turn to. In this case, I have the plasticity to adapt to the situation. The beliefs can once again become prisoners. We need to check on them daily, every time that we realize that we are rigidly sticking to a belief.
One way to nourish our resilience is to remind ourselves of all the times that we have already overcome difficult situations in the past, and how we were able to get back our joy, our smile, our energy.
Remembering this in difficult times is important, because sometimes when everything is dark and very uncertain, we don’t see that light at the end of the tunnel. That’s why remembering similar moments, where we overcame a crisis, could help.
Another thing that helps is to look at what feeds the source of every one of us, the soul, our being. What do I need? Nature, I can look through my window at the sky, I can look at the trees, I can touch a plant that I might have at home, be conscious of the air that I breathe, and be thankful for it. If some music helps, I listen to music or speaking with a friend, drawing, or writing. It’s about searching for ways to feed what drives us, that is what sustains our roots in the midst of change.
Another way is to keep in mind that life is full of changes and that on the other side of these changes, good things will come. This is called hope and hope has nothing to do with expectation.
Expectation is wanting things to turn out in a determined way, that certain things will happen, wanting life to go along with my plans. Hope is simply the possibility of something good happening. With everything that is going on, that something good will be on the other side of this scenario. Holding on to hope makes us very flexible, receptive and resilient, so I wish for large doses of hope for all of us to get through this situation we are going through together as the human race.
Self-compassion makes us resilient because it takes us out of the false mindset that we sometimes have, where we fill ourselves with demands and we feel as if nothing is good enough. Above all, in these moments when most of us are more sedentary or working less and have doubts with respect to our future. It’s very easy to slip into self-scrutiny: I should be doing this, or such and such is doing something and I’m not. These mindsets make us rigid and unbalanced.
It is key in these moments of crisis, to be able to make gestures of self-love.
Gestures as simple as placing our hands on our hearts and registering the anxiety or fear that we are feeling and naming them. We have to know that by just holding them, they will pass. This gesture of bringing ourselves back, of being humble, of putting ourselves in contact with our inner self, puts us back in the mindset of the deep-rooted tree. Because if we are in our head, it’s very easy to break contact with our own power, with our own source, that is our heart. That’s why self-compassion is more vital than ever in order to be able to stay flexible and to be able to deal with what is happening in the wisest and coherent way.
