No ignoring Corona Virus Covid-19

Maria Arpa

Wednesday Whisper

11 March 2020

This week

No ignoring Corona Virus Covid-19

Plus…

Maria’s Midweek Mindfulness

and

The Wednesday Whisper

The spread of flu and fear

Whatever your take on the media portrayal of this latest threat, there is no denying that it is having an impact on our lives. From flight cancellations and travel bans to school closures and panic buying we are all having to consider what we do, where we do it and who we do it with, as well as trying to predict what is to come.

These times require mindful communication and practices as part of a collective responsibility taking. So I feel especially sad when I hear how the fear mongering motivates people to become violent. Reports of hate crimes towards East Asian people leave me feeling shock and disgust as I hope for a more intelligent response to the situation.

The Persian Poet Hafiz wrote:

Fear is the cheapest room in the house,

I’d like to see you in better living conditions.

Maria’s Midweek Mindfulness

I’m sitting with this latest ‘scare’ and watching it unfold. I’m finding it OK to not know and to roll with whatever is happening as my life involves a lot of travel.

The Wednesday Whisper

How is it for you to not know?

If this blog has any resonance for you, please reply, comment and share.

4 Comments

Minna Bruce
Posted 5 years ago Reply

I am now home and the ‘not knowing’ seems a much bigger deal here than it was there.
Being home does not make the ‘not knowing’ easier.. like I thought it would.
It’s more complicated.. and it’s a reality.
I’m realising this ‘not knowing’ effects so many areas of life separate from the virus itself.

I’ve copied here the best thing I have read since landing at Heathrow..
I hope you enjoy it.
I find it is balm to my soul.

LOCKDOWN
Yes, there is fear.
Yes, there is isolation.
Yes, there is panic buying.
Yes, there is sickness.
Yes, there is even death.

But,
They say that in Wuhan after so many years of noise
You can hear the birds again.
They say that after just a few weeks of quiet
The sky is no longer thick with fumes
But blue and grey and clear.
They say that in the streets of Assisi
People are singing to each other
across the empty squares,
keeping their windows open
so that those who are alone
may hear the sounds of family around them.

They say that a hotel in the West of Ireland
Is offering free meals and delivery to the housebound.

Today a young woman I know
is busy spreading fliers with her number
through the neighbourhood
So that the elders may have someone to call on.

Today Churches, Synagogues, Mosques and Temples
are preparing to welcome
and shelter the homeless, the sick, the weary.

All over the world people are slowing down and reflecting.
All over the world people are looking at their neighbours in a new way.
All over the world people are waking up to a new reality
To how big we really are.
To how little control we really have.
To what really matters.
To Love.

So we pray and we remember that
Yes there is fear.
But there does not have to be hate.
Yes there is isolation.
But there does not have to be loneliness.
Yes there is panic buying.
But there does not have to be meanness.
Yes there is sickness.
But there does not have to be disease of the soul
Yes there is even death.
But there can always be a rebirth of love.

Wake to the choices you make as to how to live now.
Today, breathe.
Listen, behind the factory noises of your panic
The birds are singing again,
The sky is clearing,
Spring is coming,
And we are always encompassed by Love.

Open the windows of your soul
And though you may not be able
to touch across the empty square,
Sing.

By Fr Richard Hendrick, Ireland

March 13 2020
Minna Bruce
Posted 5 years ago Reply

(Written Friday 13th March but delayed in being sent due to no internet & travelling)

There is a real mixture of feelings and emotions that come charging to the surface over these extraordinary goings on..totally apart from the concern for the frail and elderly who’s lives may be in danger due to this virulent virus.
For someone who strives to deal with control issues it’s a toss up between the fear of losing control of decisions relating to my every day life; and also oddly the relief of realising that it’s really not in my control.. so there is probably nothing I can do.
There’s something rather peculiarly cathartic about it.
It’s a bit like my ongoing feeling of being pleased that I’m not the Prime Minister with all those important decisions to make! (I sometimes wake up sweating with concern for the people who do have to make significant and critical decisions.. and just thankful it’s not me.)

I’m abroad in the middle of Africa at the moment, surrounded by mountains, blue skies and chirping crickets.. so I feel very distant from it all.
The rest of the world seems to be becoming more frantic by the day.. it’s certainly clear that there is a very real sense of fear growing fast..
There’s quite a bit out there that says it’s being hyped out of proportion.. so who does one believe?
If you let it, the not knowing of where this is going to end up, could start to wobble one’s foundational sense of calm.
It dangles a huge question mark of anxiety over many aspects of life and business.. so we hold our breath.
It’s a bit like a film where you watch in agony for the people carrying on as normal because they don’t know what’s about to happen.
Should we be being sensible and preparing for something? And if so what? and how?
Whatever the final outcome, we are now on course for a just so many businesses to go under.. both small and large.. and that’s personal disaster for thousands, which for each individual is wretched, painfully devastating and cripplingly destructive.

What I DO know is that I want to get home tomorrow as planned.. and be in my own home.. then the not knowing will be easier.

Just this moment my husband has told me that back home in our tiny town in Hampshire, two friends have just been tested positive!
So I’m finding myself asking new questions which I may not know the answers to…
What are we frightened of?
Are we frightened of being ill?
Or is it the ingrained fear of death?
Or is it of causing someone else to be ill and therefore possibly putting them at risk of dying?
I will think about it all on the plane on the way home.. it might take my mind off my fear of the plane crashing!
- Maria Arpa
  Posted 5 years ago Reply
  
  I think you’ve named a lot of what’s going on. Thanks
Neil Jackson
Posted 5 years ago Reply

I think one of the better things about getting older is that you have experience of various crises in the past. In the 80s we were all going to AIDS, but we didn’t and now people are being cured. We learn to roll with it.