I hope this post finds you well. I am excited to share with you my plan for the next 4 weeks on this blog. I will be using the wheel you see in the above image to guide us through each of the 4 sections on the wheel.
Why now, you might ask? Why am I sharing this wheel full of strategies with you, when there seems to be some good, hopeful, news about the pandemic slowing? Well, as good as the news may seem, the world is still struggling with the Covid-19 pandemic and all of the domino effects it has had on economics, education, and overall well-being, just to name a few.
There is hope, of course! We have several vaccines, in many countries, that are paving the way toward immunity and the restoration of life, to some degree, as we used to know it. That hope feels like a ray of sunshine, peeking through the clouds on a cold winter day.
Yes, there is hope that things will begin to return to something resembling normalcy sometime this year, and that is awesome. It reminds me of my days as a distance runner, when the miles, which were endless and solitary (I love to curl up inside my head during a long run), were suddenly interrupted by the vision of the finish line. The choices at that moment included keeping the same pace, despite the growing excitement in your entire body, pushing harder by using that last burst of surprising energy found because you could see the end, or slowing down, and relaxing because the run was almost over.
All of those options have their benefits and challenges, while the last one provides more loss than gain, I would argue. Slowing down might lead to great regret after you cross the finish line and look at your time. The act of slowing down didn't gain you anything, really. You are already tired, so it isn't like slowing down helped you regain some energy. And it is possible that people passed you (never a good thing in my head). Also, slowing down might result in injury at this point, as your body is in a serious rhythm that has now been interrupted.
So, avoid the temptation to slow down, and let your guard down. Now is the time to muster up some energy for the last few miles in this very long, nearly 12 months, race!
To help avoid the temptation to slow down, or in our very real pandemic world, relax your pandemic behaviors, we are going to focus our attention on maintaining or strengthening our resilience through the use of this resilience wheel. We will begin next week with the top left quadrant: "How Can I Comfort Myself", and we will move in a clockwise fashion through the remaining sections of the wheel each week.
Each week, I will provide you with specific, empirically supported tips from each of the sections on the wheel. So, next week, as we begin with comforting yourself, I will guide you through evidence-based ideas for each of the 4 sub-sections of self-comfort.
Some of the tips or suggestions may be topics I have already covered in previous posts, but this will provide you with a cohesive strategy that you can keep organized, I hope.
Feel free to print the image if you like, and post it somewhere in your home. Or take notes on it as you read each of the posts for the next 4 weeks. It is up to you how you use this information to help you continue to stay, or strengthen, resilient in 2021 (and beyond)!
For now, don't slow down yet, we are not to the finish line! Continue to follow the guidelines presented by trusted scientists (like the CDC and WHO), and know that all of your efforts will pay off when this pandemic is over. That day is closer than it was last year, last month, last week! We can do this!
As always,
Be well, stay safe, and take care!
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