The COVID-19 Chronicles | I hope everyone’s doing okay during this apocalypse 🙂 Ugh, okay! It’s a Pandemic I know but during this blog, I’ll probably interchange these two terms. Nevertheless, I hope everyone’s okay.
What have I been up to?
TV. Lots and lots of TV. I have binge-watched Love is Blind, Tiger King, Murder in the Thirst, the Twilight series, Ridiculousness, Nailed It!, Charmed, Always a Bridesmaid (I watched it twice. It’s one of my top favorite movies of this century), caught up on seasons 3 of The Masked Singer, and College Hill: Virgin Islands. I’m currently watching Little Fires Everywhere on Hulu.
Some days are good and some days are not. Some days I am in a great mood, while other times I am very anxious and can’t shake it. Some days I feel useful, while other days I feel useless. Nevertheless, I have learned to be optimistic and stay prayerful during this time. It’s a lot going on and it’s easy to feel discouraged. I allow myself to feel but not stay in those feelings for long. But what also helps is keeping me busy. Honestly, I think it’s how my brain works. I’m always finding things for me to do, pandemic or not.
Throughout this apocalypse, I have found some things that are interesting.
LoFi
If you didn’t know what it was beyond this point, it’s these videos on YouTube that plays music. It’s pretty much instrumental music and it has a motion picture throughout the video. They’re good during study sessions, crocheting, cleaning and tidying up, working, etc. I first discovered it when actor Will Smith uploaded one of his own. Then my favorite bullet journal doodler, Amanda Rach Lee, made an April entry of bullet journals with a theme of LoFi and I was SOLD. Then I found another video and I was in love. It reminded me of how much I love the correlation between music and being creative. Listening to LoFi feels soothing and inspired me to get back into writing… not blog writing, but WRITING writing. The last time I did this was back in October 2019.
I am in control of what I see.
I already knew this but it was a reminder to myself. My Facebook timeline quickly became so discouraging and morbid. Many, many people wanted to post who died and how many people have the virus. People were also arguing about the dumbest things to me. (I shall not tell you what they were about.) AND THEN, the world wants to keep up with how many people have died in many countries as if it’s the 2020 Olympic Hunger Games. MORBID HONEY! People are losing their jobs, people are losing whole families. You’re thinking Sis, why don’t you just keep scrolling? I don’t find it beneficial to “keep scrolling” because I saw the posts and now they’re in my mind. So I started to make it my business to unfollow those people temporarily. I also had to take a break from it for a short period. I reminded myself that I am in control of what I see.
I prefer looking at things that make me laugh, positive posts, and triumphant posts. So many people wanna keep up who died and who has the virus, but not many people wanna know what’s the outcome of this Stay-At-Home order? How many people recovered? How is this affecting the environment? These are posts that I prefer to look at.
The outcome of the Stay-at-Home Order
Many things have given me hope during this apocalypse. Hearing about the environmental outcomes of Italy, China, and India are some of the countries that helped me to realize this weird discovery of earth’s healing. I also feel like people’s personal lives are healing, maybe not in all aspects but I do see something. Some people are taking this time to start their businesses or being creative again. Some people are doing back to cooking at home. Some people are watching their fast food intake and/or getting back to working out. Some are taking this time to get their finances together. Some parents and guardians are noticing the things that teachers go through during a regular school day. Some families are taking the time to bond. Some people are actually checking up on people. Some people are even taking walks outside. It’s a beautiful sight to see! After all of this is over, I hope to see people figuring out what can we do to preserve this healing process in the environment and our lives.
A flexible structure in my life is important.
I’m not like many people out here being structured-less in their household, nor can I not have a schedule for myself. In a time like this, I need a routine. At the same I am flexible. I am not going to be hard on myself if I choose not to go by the structure in my daily life. Sometimes I just wanna chill and other times I wanna be productive. All of this during this time is okay!
These are honorable mentions.
This is not a new thing, more of a reminder. Even though I make it a habit to find encouraging words, I also encourage myself a lot.
- Listening to Podcasts – I’ve started doing this last year, so this isn’t a new thing I’ve done during this apocalypse. Now… I don’t listen to them all at once, but these have been my favorites so far. In no particular order (other than alphabetical)…
Becoming Well with the Sibsons,
Dead Ass with Khadeen and Devale Ellis,
Let’s Make Out Podcast,
WAITING ROOM with Allante’ Booker,
Wine and Weed,
and Woman Evolve with Sarah Jakes Roberts. - Listening to Music – I’ve already mentioned my discovery of LoFi in this blog. Between many artists going live and new music coming out, I am in LOVE! This time kind of renewed my love for music and had me thinking Sis… what have you been DOING up until this point?!
- Reading the Bible – I’ll be real and say that I have not been reading my Bible as much as I should. I’ve made it a goal this year to read the Bible daily using the Bible app. I’m currently on a Bible plan called the “Bible in One Year 2020 with Nicky Gumbel” and I’m persevering. So far, so good!
- Watching Sermons – That has helped a lot. Enough said.
- Meditation Before Bed – Sis… Bro… this has made a huge impact on my sleep pattern. I don’t do it for a long time, 10 minutes max.
Creativity can thrive when you make time to nurture.
This may not support a previous thought but we’re going to keep it moving lol. This is how my mind works. It’s sporadic! Anywho, I am in the process of finishing up crochet orders and personal projects of my own. I also doodled a lot and made updates to my bullet journal. I also got back into writing… not blog writing. These have been nourishing to my soul. Sometimes I wanna get creative and other times I can’t find the strength. I do listen to myself during those times. Sometimes I have good reasons for not doing it and other times I don’t. There have been times where I had to make myself lol, which I had to thank myself. Either way, creativity hasn’t stopped, and during those times that I am feeling creative, I take full advantage.
Being a teacher and an entrepreneur during a pandemic has been hard, but I do my best to persevere with the time and space that I’ve been given. Emailing my kids and continuing to post things about my business are helpful. So what have you been doing at this time? I’d love to know!
Check out my last blog here.
~Live Laugh Love~