The creative socializing, the witty memes, the gratitude lists, the dedicated at-home workouts.
The powerful, compassionate, brilliant journalism my peers are churning out.
The general appearance of doing pretty okay.
Antonio Rodriguez / Adobe Stock
This is all both beautiful and baffling to me.
The ingenuity and strengthwhere are they getting it?
Why cant I find mine?
(Am I pessimistic?
Are they naive?)
Except then I remember something: That the occasion is a global pandemic.
That to just get by is actually enough right now.
And to be not doing okay is normal and natural and not a problem.
So here is how I have been doing.
Ive been waking up feeling paralyzed.
Self-care routinesnot so much, honestly.
I havent been live-streaming workouts and getting in the best shape of my life.
Ive actually been sitting on my butt all day.
Ive slacked off on my daily meditation.
I have not been motivated to use the time saved not commuting to take up knitting or bread baking.
I havent Marie Kondod my bedroom, or done quarintinis with friends over FaceTime.
(What will go to shit next?)
Oh, and the existential crises, you guys!
Ever-widening cracks are exposing the most ugly and shameful parts of our supposedly very civilized societies.
You know the ones.
Questions like: Why are we here?
How is society so effed up?
How did we not prepare for this?
(Seriously, people?)
Why didnt we listen to the experts who were sounding the alarm for years?
Do we even have a shot at stopping climate change if this is how we meet a pandemic?
Is this regular life now?
Why do we work 40 hours a week?
What am I even doing with my time on earth?
I had my first teletherapy session a couple of days ago.
(It was weird at first, and then surprisingly fine.)
We talked a lot about the mismatch between how Im feeling and how the people around me are acting.
A good rooftop cry.
(Highly recommend.)
A FaceTime with my bosss boss where I admitted I wasnt doing great.
(Also weird at first, and then fine.)
A 2 a.m. reacquaintance with some classic existential-crisis literature:The Age of Anxietyby British spiritual philosopher Alan Watts.
(Read it.)
(She got it.)
Seven honest minutes of mindfulness meditation.
Put another way, in Wattss words: There are no wrong feelings.
Not ever, and perhaps especially not right now.
And this is okay.
