Adapting to the post-pandemic life

Article by Romina Ciccarelli, Counsellor and Psychotherapist. 21st June 2021, Edinburgh

Last Saturday I went for a walk to enjoy the sought-after sunshine. Along the way I witnessed 3 people falling in front of my eyes. Different ages, soils, and shoes. No identifiable patterns.

Allowing myself some free association, I wondered: What made us fall and what made us keep on our feet during this pandemic?

While the carpet of restrictions put in place and vaccines are unfolded at our pace, we dare to interact physically with others. Maybe not entirely, but at least timidly – this could provoke many strange sensations. Is anything the matter if I do not feel ready yet to come back to civilisation?

After all this time, to connect in real world can be so awkward and transitional as riding your bike after decades of putting it off: I know it’s done, how it feels, but I’m afraid it won’t go the same way I used to do it. How might others see me doing it?

We see people with whom there are pending talks or situations and sometimes that can be enlivening of some feelings, which can mistakenly be considered as losing the control we owned in our comfort zone – no matter how much we longed for our freedom. Many people have split up during this turbulent time and the ways we approach others today have shades which were unthinkable of in January 2020, for example.

How do we desire post-pandemically?

We call 𝑟𝑒ë𝑛𝑡𝑟𝑦 (Priya Parker) to the act of being back in society. This phase can trigger reopening anxiety. This so called 𝑟𝑒ë𝑛𝑡𝑟𝑦 invites us to warm up the numb muscles of being social – we haven’t used them in more than a year and we need to do this slowly.

Unquestionably, we have been transformed by this stage of isolation and what we always did, might well be modified in its ways and procedures. Trial and error must be put into practice, and it is now that we must propose ourselves not to fear being wrong.

Not only our mind, but our body does also have memory as well and it’s necessary to shake dread off the shoulders to be able to be around others and touch them. We don’t want to bounce from physical reclusion to emotional one, right?

The ‘fallers’ I observed during my stroll had a helping hand who walked beside them and helped them to get up.

Above all, why do we exist in this world if it is not to walk with others? Now you can download Superpow! App from App Store or Google Play: https://www.superpow.app/