It has been a whirl wind of stuff over the past few weeks. This virus thing is definitely a shift in how the world is going to be moving forward. We’ve had virus and pandemic things before, but this one is different somehow. It’s bigger, broader, and more impactful on basically everything. We do not know all of the ways it will change our lives. We cannot predict what the final outcome will be for each of us individually or collectively as a race or culture. Most of us are sitting in the largest unknown we have ever experienced. As a planet, there have been other moments, but not within most of our life times has there been such an unknown on a global scale. Individually, yes, many of us have had great unknown times in our lives, but globally, nothing like this in my life time.
So, what do we do? We have choices here. Since I started this blog, I have been working on myself and those who have chosen to work with me to focus on being in the present moment and consciously living in the unknown. This is not the most easy thing to do. As humans we are attached to planning and predicting our future and reliving and rehashing our pasts. We do not like this unknown space. It is uncomfortable, and so we choose to make life more predictable by living in a past we recreate in our own mind. We remember how it was based on our ego’s need to survive, and then we project that past forward into the future to guarantee it will continue to match our past, and it doesn’t often disappoint, except when it does.
Right now, how can we use our past to predict our future? Many of us can’t do that right now because there is nothing in our past that looks like what this present moment is bringing, so we just don’t know what to do with that. We are trying to project our past into the future and we can’t see it. This is quite scary for many people. It is causing widespread panic for many people. This is why there is no toilet paper in the stores. What can we reasonably predict? We will need to use the bathroom, and we need toilet paper, so we stock up in case there is an apocalypse and we can’t buy it anymore. In all of the disaster movies, or apocalyptic TV shows, do you ever recall the heroes being worried about toilet paper? It makes me laugh that people are so freaked out about toilet paper. There really are so many options. Truly, I am worried about running out of toilet paper, not because they will stop manufacturing it, but because all of the people who are hoarding it.
Anyway, we can panic over this unknown future we cannot predict, and truly, many people are doing that. I myself have had many moments where I start to try to predict what will happen, and I start to go down the road of catastrophe, and I feel the rise of panic, and then I stop. I put my hand over my heart and remember that all of this has purpose, and we are not necessarily meant to know the future. We can only know what is true right now. So I focus on right now.
Right now, I am healthy. I am working. I have an income, at least for the next two weeks. I have food and place to live. I have money to buy what I need. I have everything I need. I am perfectly fine. There is nothing to worry about in this moment right now. If I start to think too far ahead, then I start to feel unstable, so I bring it back to right now, and right now, everything is perfectly fine. I am planning for what to do next, and only what is next for this moment. I cannot plan too far ahead because all of that is unknown. Right now, I can see two weeks ahead. Then I do not know what is going to happen. Even in that two weeks, I do not really know. Anything could change. So, I come back to right now. What is the challenge in this moment? In this moment, there is nothing to worry about.
I imagine that not everyone’s present moment is so stable. Perhaps you are sick, or someone you love is sick. Maybe you don’t have work or are trying to decide if you should work. Maybe you don’t have a home to live in, food, or money to buy what you need. Maybe you did run out of toilet paper because people are hoarding it. I don’t know why those things might be happening in your world. What I know is that if they are happening, there is opportunity there for you to grow in them. How can you use whatever is happening in your present moment to raise your vibration and grow as a human? I can’t tell you how to face your uncertainty in this moment. You are the only one who knows what is best for you. I know that for me, I am trying to just keep putting one foot in front of the other, focus on breathing, and staying calm.
We have learned that intense low vibrational emotions like fear, panic, worry, and doubt cause our bodies to go into fight or flight stress mode. In that mode, our bodies are prepping for disaster, and that means our immune system is not an essential function. This event in our history cannot be dealt with in fight or flight. It can only be dealt with in peace and higher level emotions that drive your body to heal and stay healthy. If you want to survive the pandemic, the best advice I can give you is to meditate, stay calm, stay present and focus on higher level emotions of love, gratitude, and faith.
The universe has proven to me over and over again that it has our backs. What is happening is for us. We might not understand why all of the time, but it is for us in some way. We do not have to figure that out either. We do not have to know what all of this is for. Sometimes we are not meant to know in the present moment. We will only know what we are supposed to know when it is time to know it, and only when we are open to knowing it. If you want to know now, try being more open to hearing the wisdom of universe. If it is time to know, you will be told.
For me, I am actually feeling okay with not knowing. I am not sure what all this is for, and that is okay. I am fine just being here and now and taking it one tiny step at a time. Today, I will focus on the things right in front of me. I cannot look too far into the future, or I will lose my focus on the now, so I stay here and now, and here and now, everything is fine. If it is not fine, I think, “What do I need to do to be fine right now?” Then I do that. Each moment, each day is just like that. Taking one moment, one day, one thing at a time. That is how I keep from panicking.
This is a global crisis. We all need to do our part to deal with it. To stay healthy and weather this storm, stay calm, breath, stay away from other people if you can, and wash your hands, frequently. Do what is in front of you to do, and stop trying to predict and control the future. As a race, I have faith that we can do this thing, whatever that is, and transition to a new norm, whatever that is, and do it successfully. We got this!
-Namaste