09 Apr Suggestions to help survive the lockdown
Suggestions to help survive the lockdown during the coronavirus pandemic.
- Stay home! Social distancing is so far the best way to avoid spreading the virus, to avoid overloading the National health system and ultimately to reduce the number of deaths.
- Wash your hands thoroughly whenever possible for 20-30 sec with soap, rinsing with warm water if possible and avoid touching your face (nose, mouth and eyes).
- While you are at home stay active and try new, fun things. Be curious!
- Try to do something special for you every day.
- Keep a sense of weekend by adding a special home-based activity or a meal, avoiding the feeling that every day is like Monday.
- Keep in touch with loved ones. This connection can keep us all going through this strange time. The internet can really help here and Zoom meetings can be quite fun.
- Be active and find the best form of exercise for you. This will help your wellbeing and support your mental health.
- Get out in the sun – Appreciate and enjoy nurturing nature whenever possible. This can open our eyes to the surrounding beauty that we overlook many times when we are rushing around.
- Learn and practice some breathing exercises to calm down and reduce anxiety.
- Try gentle yoga or stretching to increase flexibility and wellbeing.
- Boost the immune system – Eat healthily and control alcohol, caffeine and sugar intake. Implement good habits to support your sleep and reduce stress.
- Drink water regularly during the day.
- Protect your lungs – stop smoking or exposing others to passive smoking.
- Avoid overexposure to social media, news and overusing gadgets. They can disturb our sleep, perception of the “here and now” and trigger anxiety.
- Read books and/or listen to music. Both activities can transport us to different places and relax our minds.
- Externalise worrying thoughts by writing them in a diary if helpful.
- Offer help to anyone in need if you are in a position to reach out. There will be someone in a worse situation who will welcome our help.
- Be compassionate towards yourself! During this challenging time, it will be difficult to do the usual things in the usual way. Start with the less demanding tasks before progressing into the more difficult ones.
- Remember that this pandemic will eventually end! It will be great to meet and hug our loved ones and friends again. Before that, we have to survive the lockdown so let’s use this time as an opportunity to recycle ourselves, to get psychologically, emotionally and physically healthier, to appreciate and realise our priorities, to reconnect with our loved ones, to contact the friends who we may have lost connection, to grown internally, to get rid of the unnecessary and to cultivate simplicity and the appreciation of the living world around us in nature.
- Ultimately let’s acknowledge one upside of the lockdown: The air pollution has decreased and the planet is saying “thank you”!