Nothing Else Matters

Like many of you, I am frightened; I am extremely worried about elderly and vulnerable loved ones, our country, and what we will be left with when we get through this crisis. This is a period of change that none of us are prepared for physically, mentally or emotionally; but we have no choice other than to dig deep and to do all that we can to help ourselves, our families, the local community and those heroes working tirelessly for us in the NHS. I am currently writing from a privileged position in that I can self isolate and I have not been directly impacted by the virus, my heart goes out to those who are not as fortunate.  

I have been in isolation for the last two weeks, and so I have had a lot of time to reflect on what we are going through. I haven’t given a second thought to letting go of the many unimportant activities that have been part of my life for many years, but I have been thinking about the health of both myself and those whom I love, as in the end, nothing else matters.

We will never be the same people that we were just a few months ago; some of us might lose loved ones, some of us may fall ill, but I hope that all of us will emerge as better people, I believe that we owe that to those who will not survive this. We must resolve to learn from this tragedy and use this pain as a way to grow, we must turn our wounds into wisdom. The logo for my blog is a peacock feather; one of the reasons that I selected this is that it is believed that a hungry peacock will be willing to eat thorns when food is scarce, but these thorns produce wonderful feathers, something beautiful is created out of something so hard to digest, and so, I too, always try to turn my own thorns into peacock feathers.

Rock bottom is a  catalyst for change and I truly believe that  we are being urged to slow down, be still, renew, refocus, and to totally reassess our values. Many of us are key-workers who are still working outside of our homes, but the rest of us now have down time like we have never had before; it’s time for some silence and solitude.

It’s time to do an inventory of our lives.  Many of us will now have a greater appreciation for all that we already have and for our health. Sometimes we need to be pushed into circumstances to make us change. Our health matters so much more than the ‘stuff’ that we have, there is more to life than making money at the expense of our health and time with our families. Is it worth always striving for more whilst sacrificing what really matters?  

By the end of all of this we will have developed a resilience to cope with whatever comes our way, and hopefully we will stop ‘sweating the small stuff’. The things that we used to worry about seem so insignificant and pointless, life has thrown is a major curve ball that puts all else into perspective.

Hope is essential at this time, try to choose faith over fear. These are terrible times, but we have to carry on and hope for brighter days ahead. Trust that thing will not be like this forever, live in this moment and don’t worry about doomsday scenarios that have not and may not happen.

When I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s, I learned to accept that I must give up control, and that is something that we must all surrender to in these difficult times. Many of us have a profound dislike of uncertainty, we cannot control what will happen over the coming months, but we can control how we react to it. We can choose to be selfish or to share, to help or to hinder, to socialise or to save lives. What’s it going to be?