Some key questions for our time

There have been a few articles and webinars of late that have aroused my interest in challenging that getting back to ‘normal’ is not the right place to go. There’s the part of me that craves some sense of ‘normality’ and a part that is outraged at the prospect. So a webinar I attended recently with Six Seconds asked a series of poignant questions.

What is one thing you miss from the ‘old days’?

For today it’s going to a coffee shop and connecting with a colleague or good friend. I miss those opportunities to just order a latte and have a good natter or even sit alone for a while. And my Friday yoga class; I miss the marking of another week, whilst my boys were furiously working their gymnastics routines on a Friday afternoon. My attempts at yoga in my pokey study on a Friday have just not done it for me!

What are you noticing?

Locked within the confines of our house I am reliant on the press to observe for me and what I notice are profound imbalances, with pressure being intensified on the most vulnerable. In SA it is even easier to now to mask it from view, but it sits in my gut when I check in with my housekeeper or I read another account of the SANDF overstepping its mark.

On a less heavy note, I am noticing how clients who were somewhat apprehensive around Zoom coaching have relaxed into it and how simplifying in our household has gone a long way to lessen the rush and the driving force of ‘do do do’!

What are you seeing in future?

I think I’m remaining quite firmly in my ‘one day at a time’ bubble and choosing not to worry about what queuing for temperature checks at the start of  school in Cape winter weather is going to look like…But I am seeing patterns of working from home cementing, less traffic on our streets continuing and more mindful behaviour of how we are inter-relating benefiting our future selves.

How much choice do you feel you have now?

For today I think I have a great number of choices; when to rise, what exercise to fill my exercise slot with, what to eat, where to setup office in my home for today, how much to assist my children with their school work, how to respond to my clients and ultimately to choose as much as I am able of ‘who I wish to be’ today.

How much choice do you feel you have in the country in which you are currently living?

At the posing of this question my heart gave a ‘thud’ and my energy dropped. I really don’t want to come across as one of those privileged white women, but my circle of control does feel diminished when I think of my country today. I’m not going to name the reasons why; you already know them and somehow naming them gives the power. So I choose not to for today.

I confess I missed the rounding few minutes of the webinar as one of my children yelled for some urgent assistance. But what I did catch, was that history continues to teach us, through the ages, that greater co-operation results from unprecedented times. And unprecedented they are! So here’s hoping that in some small way I will contribute to the wave resisting the return to a world of over-consumption and competition, of profits over people, and of control over choice.

What about your answers to the above questions? Drop me a line to let me know.