How to feel a little calmer while life has some challenges.

It's a glorious, sunny day by the sea and from my window it is hard to believe that we were all in lockdown ten days ago.  Life here on a sunny, but windy mid-week day is a relief because the crowds have not come.  The beach looks quieter, cyclists and walkers seem to be weaving around each other amicably.  I am enjoying seeing the kite-surfers emerge again and show off their skills as they make incredible turns and leaps.  I might have actually found a moment of calm post-lockdown. On days like this when I see people happily enjoying the beach and having picnics galore, I feel alone in having some post-lockdown fears.  But apparently not.  Post-lockdown anxiety is a thing now for a number of people.  I've read articles on this topic written in Australia, New Zealand, UK and USA.  And this is reassuring to me who feels such mixed emotions.  On the one hand, it feels exciting to venture just a little further from my lockdown routine.  And at the same time, each step out of m

Last week I wrote about patience which I'm not sure resonated with many people.  Did I miss something in the current zeitgeist?  Are people feeling less patient and more irritable ?  Fed up with this whole social distancing thing?  Maybe cracks are appearing in our largely cohesive response to lockdown and saving lives.  If our Prime Minister's senior advisor can apparently bend the rules of self-isolation, are some questioning whether to keep following guidelines?  Even something "simple" such as sending children back to school is creating divisions among experts let alone parents trying to decide what is safe. A few days ago I stumbled across an article by Camilla Cavendish about how we could all be experiencing some element of "quarantine fatigue".  As the phrase suggests, it is a known phenomenon where individuals in very restricted social settings become weary.  Studied by scientists in remote expeditions, they found that quarantine fatigue reaches it

Apparently, when rehabilitated primates are taken to be released back into the wild, they can take time to climb out of their cages.  Initially reluctant to leave their safe place and familiar carers, patience can be needed while they take brave steps back into the wild.   Caution is finally overcome by the desire to explore, tempted by their once familiar habitat and space to roam free. I'm not sure I'm ready to take those brave steps back out into the world as England starts to ease its lockdown.  I am peeping out of my lockdown "cave" in the middle of a mini heatwave and I don't want to venture out.  I can manage my normal walk and then I'm glad to arrive back into the sanctuary of my home.  How can anyone do this adjustment so quickly?  It all feels far too rapid for my sloth like pace of adapting to change. Because outside is no longer my quiet, deserted beach with a handful of walkers giving comfortable social distance.  I am no longer noticing the

"Slow and steady wins the race" comes to mind at the moment as I am observing the effects of starting to ease our lockdown rules.  My gut instinct is that it is too soon for England, and we needed to keep pausing alongside Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.  Could we now be in for a longer journey?   As the idiom teaches us, steady and consistent effort can in the long run be more productive than rushing to get somewhere.  The latter can prove to be unsustainable, unreliable or could even result in mistakes. It's natural I guess after nearly two months of lockdown that some of us (plus the economy) are itching to get going again.  To help keep steady this week, I'm focusing on the quality of patience.  I'm not sure this virtue is fashionable in our modern hyper-connected fast-paced world.  But coronavirus is forcing us to remember what patience feels like.  During our lockdown, I became re-acquainted with patience while only shopping once each week.  If we ra

I miss normal.  I miss being able to plan the coming weeks or months without considering coronavirus.  I miss the simplicity of checking the weather to think about when I could either swim, walk or even canoe.  Now I am checking the current R value and number of cases of Covid-19.  I'm scanning graphs to hope that I can see a downward curve appearing, giving me some sense of how we are doing. But I have surprisingly adapted to our "staying at home" normal.  It's not always easy, but I'm in the swing of it.  It's taken most of the seven weeks to feel fairly skilled at doing yoga or mindfulness sessions by video.  I am adept at washing shopping and cleaning surfaces.  Our towels and door handles have never been so well cleaned.  And we have finally got a system of shopping once a week (plus the farmers market and vegetable box delivery) that works. I continue to find pleasure in the small moments of life, as we all do.  Nature continues to soothe my slightly

At about noon yesterday, as in much of the UK, a storm rolled in.  Living right by the sea, storms never pass unnoticed, they are an event.  There is a sense of "battening down the hatches" to make sure we get through the impending winds.  In our well built cul-de-sac, it usually only means checking the recycling bins are secured.  I checked the high-tide time to see when the highest waves will roll in.  All that can then be done is to wait for its arrival, knowing that it will pass. The timing was perfect as my own emotional storm was simultaneously brewing.  The knot in my stomach that I had for a few days had progressed to a simmering volcano.  Waiting for the latest update about our social distancing rules was already involving a lot of mental and emotional energy.  I am very concerned about relaxing our lockdown rules too early...  It reminded me of the early weeks of this whole pandemic trying to work out what on earth was going on and what to do.  Watching the ten mi

Are you feeling virus-weary?  Me too.  I only heard this term recently and knew that fitted perfectly.  I am tired of thinking about coronavirus, with the endless uncertainties that come with this pandemic.  Writing just days before the UK's planned second "review" I have a knot in my stomach  about pending changes to our lockdown.  After a brief a look at the latest statistics, I feel heavy with sadness.  There are so many questions to ask but for now, I wish for our "curve" to not only be flattened but with many fewer cases.  In fact relaxing lockdown too soon fills me with dread... I am not sure it is safe to do quite yet (and maybe others agree?). I've noticed that before a "review" I start reading more articles and data about coronavirus to work out what could happen next.  Why?  Because uncertainty sits uncomfortably with me and I find sudden changes hard going.  But if I spend time reading too much, it will raise my stress levels and I w

"I'm coping" or "I'm enjoying the bird song and sunshine!" are my standard replies to anyone asking how I'm doing in lockdown.  Is it just me saying these kind of fairly bland answers?  The conversation often moves quickly to sharing how lucky we are to live by the sea in these times.  The most revealing answer I've given (and this is to close friends) is "pretty okay, a few ups and downs".  What on earth is happening to my power of communication? Ah yes, the pandemic.  I'm so aware that all of us are experiencing lockdown with its own struggles that I don't want to "laden" anyone with more details.  Or I'm mindful that as soon as I might try to reveal a concern the gratitude conversation will return - "how lucky we are to be healthy and how much worse it could be".  As someone who recently spent a week writing about gratitude, I get this.  I enjoy heartwarming conversations about the abundance of nature, o

If only relaxing felt easy at the moment.  Relaxing feels like something I have to actually remember to do!  But I can feel a sense of calm return as soon as I engage my parasympathetic nervous system.  To help do this, I am planning some relaxation "boosts" to support me through the ups and downs of the day.  Maybe I'm not super chilled at every moment (I wish) but I can build in chunks of relaxation. Having had two days of painful headaches in the week and back pain that has flared up, I'm feeling a little less robust than normal.  With the headaches and nausea, I found myself thinking maybe this could be the start of the virus?  That led to a few hours of stress hoping/praying that no more symptoms develop.  How I long for the days when I could just have a headache and know that it was hormonal or from too much dark chocolate.  Now it becomes entwined with a pandemic. Definitely time for some calm to return!  First stop for a relaxation boost - I booked a face

I've sneaked in another week on relaxation.  Why?  Because I felt rushed trying to cram relaxing into a single week!  And with two days of painful headaches in the same week as writing about relaxation I wondered if I needed to put this into practice a little more.  I've really enjoyed relaxing in my yoga class or out on a walk by the sea.  I have had some moments of feeling content with this simpler way of life, writing and being out in the garden.  But this peaceful state does not last all day (or all week) and there is more to reflect/improve on... So I turn to the topic of coronavirus and wonder if all the talk/reading/watching is too much for my body or mind?  All the wonderful moments of relaxation that I enjoy could actually be disturbed by half an hour of reading the latest articles? Why would I be so hooked on reading about coronavirus?  Well, we are in the middle of a pandemic and the fourth most affected country right now.  So there's a lot to learn.  At th

Just imagine, a whole day where you don't talk about coronavirus or social distancing at all.  Not one moment of sneaking a look at the latest saddening statistics.  Not one headline.  Nothing. This was my birthday wish, which came true yesterday (Thursday).  I just wanted to feel "normal" and have a happy birthday as my cards say.  Was it easy to stick to?  Yes!  It was a relief to steer away from that topic and engage with the world without coronavirus being invited to my party.  Even a five minute talk or quick internet check can take me ages to digest.  Not on my birthday.  I'm going cold turkey.  My second birthday wish was to have a walk somewhere different from my daily walk by the sea.  I know living by the sea remains a blessing and I can happily stare at the sea for hours each day observing the changing sky and wave patterns.  The seascape however is flat and there are very few trees.  And just for my birthday I want to see greenery and maybe woodland?

Relaxing during a yoga session on Zoom might seem easy, even to those reading who have never rolled out a yoga mat.  But relaxing in my early weeks of trying yoga remotely was tricky.  There is a whole art to working out how to follow instructions on Zoom, especially when my sound quality was so poor I was guessing over half the words.  Added to this, the yoga teacher is about 6cm tall on the screen as opposed to normal in person size.   I nearly abandoned Zoom after two weeks, but in the spirit of kindness for myself and new technology, I persisted. This week a small miracle happened -  I can now hear all the instructions clearly.  A combination of technology adjustments plus long conversations with my partner about things such as bandwidth and slow internet connection.  And the added issue that everyone in the world is now on the internet trying to maintain some kind of work or human connection.  Being able to hear and connect to others for a yoga class or mindfulness group is maki

"We're pretty chilled" I overheard my partner telling a friend on the phone recently.  I laughed so much I nearly choked on my herbal tea.  Chilled would not be the first word that I would use to describe how I feel.  I have taken on our household chores with such seriousness that I have rotas for shopping, cleaning and washing of shopping.  With just one shopping trip a week, using ingredients has started to feel like wartime rationing.  Rather than relaxing for half an hour, I am either ticking things off my list or wiping down door handles.   Slowly I am adapting to our different way of doing things right now.  I can now happily get Zoom to work so I can actually hear the words that are being said rather than trying to guess half of them.  The supermarket visit remains challenging but I am uplifted seeing some empty shelves filling back up with old favourites.  I am so excited to have red lentils, peanut butter and some toilet roll!  Our wonderful Farmers Market and

An hour after I wrote about my deep gratitude for bird song and clean air, I felt tears down my cheeks.  What was I thinking?  How can I write about bird song and clean air when there is real human suffering going on.  People are sick.  Relatives are hoping their precious loved one will pull through. I know what prompted this - a headline I fleetingly saw about care homes and coronavirus spreading.  My dad is a resident of a very pleasant and caring nursing home.  How can I enthuse about beautiful bird song when he could be at risk?  Shouldn't I just sit here on tenterhooks rather than enjoy the blossoming of spring? And then I think of my father.  Right now, I know what he will be doing.  He will be sitting in his room after a filling lunch, looking at the landscaped gardens from his window.  His favourite moment will be spotting the green woodpecker who hops beneath his window on the grass.  Equally exciting is the waddling pair of mallards heading to the nearby river.  He e