We're social people and it's hard to keep to ourselves
and not want to be around people, it's also hard to spend hours
mentally unstimulated.
So what do you do?
You watch television, and if you keep the news on for hours at a
time, it can really ramp up your anxiety
to hear nonstop information on the rising death toll.
So here's some suggestions for what you can do about this.
First, there's a lot that we can't control, so you have to accept that,
so you focus on the things that you can control, and this may be something as simple as washing
your hands and avoiding touching your face,
these are not natural things for you to hyper focus on,
but now is the time to make that your daily project.
Then there's the issue of isolation, find creative ways to connect with people.
I think social media is going to play a big part in this,
and maybe you could do a group livestream,
or group chat or online hangout with friends and family,
with more people at home it leaves a lot of downtime to fit in this
kind of socialization.
Now, if you're working from home, I'm not suggesting that you stop working and
do chats, but if you previously had to commute to work,
the time that you saved not having to travel gives you some extra time to fit in this virtual
socialization.
The next suggestion is to keep a structured day.
Some people have always worked from home and they thrive doing it,
but for some, the lack of the separation between your work
and your home life can just leave you feeling like,
“what's the meaning of life?”
It can feel like you have no downtime, it's just all work and things to do.
This can be especially true if you roll out of bed
and work in your underwear, so I suggest that you go through the motions
of putting on clothes and setting a start and a stop time for your
work.
You may even want to go to a separate room to do your work so that
you don't turn your personal space like your bedroom into a workspace.
What if you're not working at all?
Then do the same thing, get up, get dressed, go to a place in your
home or outside and sit and reflect on your skill sets
and what else you can do to earn a living.
Can any of your skills transfer to something that you can do remotely?
Treat your search for new work just like you would treat your job or you
dedicate time to it?
Jumping all in on this process keeps you forward thinking,
you keep looking ahead to what you can do and what you can accomplish,
once this passes and this will pass, so prepare yourself for what you can do with
yourself once it passes.
The next suggestion is to limit the time that you spend watching the news.
We have to strike a balance between keeping updated and
keeping informed about what's actually going on,
and being overloaded with death counts, yes, we need to have an appreciation for how
serious this is, but you don't need continuous updates.
Maybe you could just reduce your watching to
a morning and an evening time.
My last suggestion is to spend some time outside if you can.
This infection is transmitted through contact, airborne infections still requires close enough
proximity, thus the recommendation for keeping a 6 foot
distance, but it's not as though there was a nuclear
blast and we all have to stay inside to avoid radiation
exposure, so if you have access to a yard, a deck or
a porch, spend some time outside in the fresh air and
natural sunlight, getting closer to nature is calming
and can help distract you from focusing on every body sensation and worrying
if every tickle in your chest was the virus implanting itself,
so don't go there.
And these kinds of mass shut downs and closures allow you
to have more control over keeping yourself and others safe.