Change?
I currently live in the space created by as-yet unanswered questions:
What are we learning now that we will forget when this is over?
What is it about the lives to which we can return that will seduce us, hypnotize us, and make us forget this?
Most of us experienced various forms of unnecessary emotional powerlessness in our pre-Virus lives—peer pressure, the need to prove ourselves lovable or adequate, various obligations that felt mandatory, a belief that competition of many kinds is inevitable.
What are we learning now about actual powerlessness, and actual choices? What will make us forget this post-Virus?
What am I learning about myself that I don’t like? What am I learning about my pre-Virus parenting by watching how my children react to the demands of their current lives? How will I wrestle with this troubling knowledge post-Virus?
We are now so hungry for personal contact. How did we so casually devalue it pre-Virus? How did our precious goals and treasured institutions push us to devalue it? How can we possibly resist this pressure in constructing our post-Virus lives?
What do I want everyone else to learn from this experience? Why am I not fully committed to learning this myself?
How will I feel if, after the deprivation, the anxiety, the struggle to stay hopeful, the sacrifices, and the glimpses of self that dismay me…how will I feel post-Virus if I learn nothing from this?
— Marty Klein, Ph.D
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