Lockdown Takeaways
Anxious months full of Inner Richness
How to describe all the emotional states and thoughts experienced during lockdown?
Well, I am unable to describe them all, but I’ve been wanting to share some of the takeaways, struggles and joys I felt in the past 3 months or so.
Day 1… I knew it was coming. Most of my family members live in Italy and I knew that any day those restrictions they were experiencing since weeks, would be put in place here in the UK too. When they kicked in, I erased all plans, travels, events, workshops, appointments, retreats and all else from my diary. Along with all the uncertainty and the sadness felt during cancelling plans and travels I had been planning for years (Bali- I will make it there at some point!), I felt an enormous amount of space opening up in front of me.
At the same time, I was anxious of not knowing what was happening. Every day I was becoming more aware of not being able to be with my loved ones and my family. And that if anything was to happen to me or to them we couldn’t be helping each other out. I felt and still feel various fears, amongst which that of loosing my job, loosing my independence, not being able to have my loved ones around or be there for them. I was unsure how safe it was to take the next inhale, but also to share my exhale.
Amongst all this, moments of reflection unfolded and some moments of joy came up: from not having to get into the rush hour traffic every day of the week, to having time to dive into some of the yoga books I had been postponing reading, to attending amazing online workshops, webinars, courses, to sitting outside in the garden for hours and watch the trees and plants exploding into abundance as we were moving from Spring into Summer, and having the possibility to do yoga every single morning.
I spent time looking at old photos, listening to music, reading, attending yoga classes with teachers across the globe. Some days I was in Bali in the morning , somewhere in Europe or India at lunchtime and then in America by the evening. But there were also many hours spent on video calls and the many zoom meetings that drained me quite a bit, but those were also the only opportunities I had to interact with the outside world. I feel so lucky I had these opportunities.
In this time, I explored further how to feel one with Nature, but also feared to get expelled by it. The first two months I spent very little time in the outside world. Being in my garden (what a blessing), felt enough and safe for me. I found solace and space in letting go of the need to be out in the world. When I left home for my first grocery shopping adventure in April, the views around me were rather apocalyptic. I came back home without flour, bread and toilet paper, but with some rice and pasta. I also came back with a strong sense of uneasiness and felt quite troubled by seeing the place I live in totally deserted, every single store shut and the roads all empty.
The main learning for me has been a real check in with concepts I had not had the chance to experience first hand yet: all is uncertain, and humans haven’t got control over anything. I read it in yoga books, but it was now a real part of my life.
I also feel that many of us have learnt that we can all live with less: we don’t need to go eat out as much, or travel for work as often, or need to buy new clothes every season, or go food shopping several times a week.
In the end, we all live different realities: whilst some humans are fighting for life, some are busy baking and some are sharing the difficulties of homeschooling. Some are longing to see their partners, parents, children who were, and in many cases still are, kept away from them in different countries and some are complaining that they are spending far too much time with their family. Some humans were travelling thousands of miles by feet to get back to their villages after there was no work or food left for them in the big cities in India. Some were wondering why they couldn’t drive down to the beach. I could continue, but then this blog post would be infinite.