You either walk inside your story and own it or you stand outside your story and hustle for your worthiness.
-Brene Brown
Who would have thought we’d all experience a global pandemic during our lifetime, right? Years from now, when you’re sharing your story about this time, where do you think you’ll focus? For many of us, there has been the good, the bad and even the ugly that have shown up during this time. Those huge ups and downs that so many of us have experienced lately with so much changing from day-to-day.
For a lot of us, when life slowed down, issues started to show up.
What deeper issues appeared when life quieted down?
- Perfectionism- Were you trying to navigate all of this perfectly?
- Being too hard on yourself- especially over not being able to do it all: working, teaching, childcare, etc.
- Relationship issues- maybe not feeling as connected to your spouse as you’d like or arguing more frequently with family members.
- Grief- have you been grieving the loss of your everyday life? What about your future plans? What else have you been grieving?
- Depression- Feeling sad and lonely and isolated during COVID-19.
- Anxiety- Fear over what might happen in the future.
- Lack of self-confidence- what’s keeping you from trusting yourself and knowing your truth in life?
- Emotional numbness- too many life stressors hitting at the same time.
- Not feeling worthy- maybe this time was actually good for you emotionally, financially, etc. and now you’re feeling some guilt with so much pain and suffering in the outside world.
- Not feeling good enough- Being pulled in many different directions that leaves you feeling like you’re not a good spouse, mom, friend, etc.
Where did mom guilt show up for you?
- E-learning- Counting the days until this added stressor is over and done with for all of us!
- Mindless snacking- Finally stopped buying all the snacks so the mindless snacking stopped for the whole family.
- Leaving the house- is it really safe? Will I bring something home to my family and we’ll get sick?
- Frustration over not being able to do it all, even though it would be nice to be super woman every once and a while.
- Feeling mad when people don’t follow the rules, as arbitrary as they may be.
- Too much news consumption- it takes away from other areas like connecting with family.
- Judging others for making different choices than I’m making for my family.
- Naiveté around COVID-19 at the beginning and somehow thinking it wouldn’t touch our lives.
- Being able to work from home, while many other people are on the frontlines and risking their lives everyday.
- The fear surrounding returning to normal activities where you’re less than six feet away from someone like getting a haircut.
Where did you find/discover those little moments of joy?
- Not driving very much since the kids don’t need to be taxied from here to there.
- DoorDash- why have I never used this before? This may be one of my new favorite things!
- Grocery delivery- who knew? Milk and eggs delivered to our front door? Wow!
- The painted rocks that kids left on my morning running path that have little bits of daily inspiration.
- Zoom everything- connecting with friends across the country for game night fun.
- Feeling incognito in my mask- it’s kind of fun to feel invisible sometimes.
- Quality family time- it seems to come more naturally these days versus sometimes feeling a little more forced when life got busy.
- Connecting over the lack of food and supplies, and having so many funny conversations about toilet paper, food, etc.
- Feeling happy when you’re doing something from “normal times” like going to the doctor or shopping at Target.
- The excitement you feel when an item you really need arrives at your front door or is available at the store.
What’s nice is that if any of these areas are bringing up feelings of regret for you, it’s not too late to make some changes. That way, when you look back on this time you’ll be able to share both the positives and the negative, a clear picture of what it was truly like for you. Plus, since we’re still technically “in it,” you can change the narrative to your story starting today!
