Me the last few weeks. Keeping an eye on things. Making moves as necessary. Trying to keep loved ones safe.
You know that Nietzsche quote about how a person can handle any WHAT if they’ve got the right WHY? That feels pretty true right now.
Quarantine is basically the opposite of my Enneagram 7 dream world. I’m an extrovert who can’t see other people. I’m a traveler who can’t really leave the house. I’m an optimist living in a scared and grieving world right now.
But I’m not quite as devastated as it seems like I should be on paper. Disappointed over the cancelled plans and stuff I’d been looking forward to? For sure. But... I’ve also been more focused on what the present asks of me.
Right now, that’s meant doing everything I can to help three people I love stay at home and minimize their risk. It means making sure Rhys and Deanna and Beignet have everything they need. It means looking for weird ways to put joy in people’s lives- remotely, with the help of tech, etc. And it means figuring out how to keep doing my day job at a caliber I can be proud of, knowing that the needs of the people I serve aren’t on pause right now just because most things are.
Purpose matters. And I know so many of us are having to reassess ours. Are we adding something to the world that it really needs?
It can be overwhelming to look at problems beyond the scope of your abilities. I can’t singlehandedly stop a pandemic (beyond stopping the spread by distancing and all that) but I can look after 3-5 other people and make sure they’re as well as possible right now. If each of us made that a goal, it could be one of our biggest weapons against despair.
A Purpose in a Pandemic
