Judy Mc­Cutcheon

The last cou­ple of years have been try­ing for all of us, it has brought many of us to our knees, yet some have been able to make the best use of it. In­di­vid­u­al­ly, we have vary­ing lev­els of re­silience and cop­ing skills. One of my daugh­ters told me that her cop­ing skills are wan­ing, and I said to her, “Ba­by, just a lit­tle bit more.” When we get to that point, we need to tell our­selves just a lit­tle bit more. I lost my fa­ther and broth­er with­in two weeks of each oth­er in 2020, and while the sting of death is al­most un­bear­able, I told my­self, just a lit­tle bit more, be­cause I knew that oth­ers lost so much more. Many of us have lost loved ones, and that loss was fur­ther pro­nounced be­cause many of them died alone, and trav­el re­stric­tions fur­ther com­pound­ed the grief. Many peo­ple al­so lost their jobs, busi­ness­es, homes, and for some, a com­bi­na­tion of those loss­es. Many women have lost their dig­ni­ty due to in­creased vi­o­lence in the home. Many lit­tle girls and boys have lost their in­no­cence to an in­crease in in­cest and sex­u­al abuse. Sui­cide rates have in­creased. Many who suf­fer from de­pres­sion and anx­i­ety have lost a fur­ther sense of self and hope.

The pan­dem­ic of­fered us a pause

When I look at some of the videos and read some of the posts on so­cial me­dia about the plight of per­sons across the globe, it is just unimag­in­able to think of go­ing for an ear­ly morn­ing run or go­ing to the su­per­mar­ket and get­ting chased or shot at be­cause of the colour of my skin. These dif­fi­cult times have shown the true na­ture of peo­ple, some good and some just down­right ug­ly. I read a piece by Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sus­sex, about her mis­car­riage, and it made me think about all the oth­er un­known women who have had still­births, mis­car­riages, or even the death of a child, and I won­der how they are cop­ing. The pan­dem­ic has asked us in many ways to pause and take stock of our be­hav­iours, ac­tions, and at­ti­tudes to­wards each oth­er and the en­vi­ron­ment.

Are we grasp­ing the lessons

that the pan­dem­ic sought to teach us?

There seems to be a day for every­thing, but I am baf­fled by the fact that we need a world kind­ness day. We seemed to have lost all sense of what it means to be our broth­er’s keep­er or to un­der­stand the true mean­ing of “love thy neigh­bour as thy self.” What these bible vers­es are telling us is that every­thing starts and ends with each of us. We do not have to share the posts and videos that de­stroy the lives of oth­ers. We do not have to re­joice when oth­er’s fal­ter or even fall flat on their face. But in­stead, we should seek to ask, “Are you okay?”

We be­came re­silient

The last two years have shown our weak­ness, our strength, and our re­silience. Mar­cel Proust said that ‘it is in grief we de­vel­op the mind.” As I re­flect on my broth­er and fa­ther’s death, I am re­mind­ed that it is in pain, we find re­silience and the strength to go on. We have lost so much, but we have al­so gained a lot. Many small busi­ness­es have been able to tran­si­tion to do­ing busi­ness on­line. Peo­ple who have lost their jobs were able to piv­ot suc­cess­ful­ly in­to en­tre­pre­neur­ship. The en­vi­ron­ment got that much-need­ed break from all the green­house emis­sions. We got to see na­ture in all her full­ness and glo­ry. We have found dif­fer­ent and bet­ter ways of liv­ing and be­ing, and for those things, we should be grate­ful.

Changed for­ev­er, em­brac­ing

this New Re­al­i­ty

I am com­pelled to write this to of­fer you hope. Hope that things will get bet­ter, but you must be in­ten­tion­al about what you want that hope to look like. Let us first ac­cept that the year 2020 has for­ev­er changed us, and there is no go­ing back to what we knew as nor­mal. We have to em­brace this new dis­pen­sa­tion. We must view the lessons that the pan­dem­ic taught us as seeds that we can plant and wa­ter for growth in the com­ing years.

Let us look to the fu­ture with fresh eyes and be filled with hope for the new op­por­tu­ni­ties and chal­lenges that await us, know­ing that we will be okay. See this as a time for us to in­cor­po­rate the good­ness that the pan­dem­ic of­fered and fight for the things that are im­por­tant to us with the hope that it in­spires oth­ers to join us in that good fight.

Judy Mc­Cutcheon is a Man­age­ment Con­sul­tant who works with com­pa­nies to help them in­crease their en­gage­ment and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. She’s al­so a mon­ey mind­set coach for women. She’s al­so a mon­ey mind­set coach for women.www.gob­lue­con­sult­ing.com

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