Before COVID-19, it was the norm to send our kids to school sick. It was the norm to power through ourselves, to go in sick to work, to wear our illnesses as a badge of honor and keep working, working, working. We didn’t have the time or support for, the luxury or understanding of needing a break or rest.
How far we’ve come! Now it’s not enough to brush it off as a cold or allergies. Now we not only need to diagnose COVID-19, we need you to stay home safe, to make things safer for others. Now, it’s not fashionable to power through, to not take a break, to not quarantine and risk others’ heath. We have finally entered a new paradigm – one which the hospitals dealing with infection control always knew but which the lay public didn’t until the pandemic exploded. The spread of sickness is serious and we need to modify our behaviors, we need to stay home and rest to get well enough to contribute again.
But this isn’t a negative. We, raised with the modern mindset of work, earn, grow, forget that there are counterbalancing philosophies. It is also imperative to sit still, recuperate, and draw inward. Incessant activity just for activity’s sake, especially if we’re sick as dogs, is not the right thing. When it’s time to rest and heal we need to honor that. Not break our bodies and the world trying to keep going.
Comments