When this is over

In real terms, little will change. The virus has already taken a number of lives, and a number of people have lost their livelihood. In the grand scheme of things, however, little will change.

In an episode of a martial arts podcast, the discussion took many turns, but at one point touched on the fortunes of Asian economies in comparison to those in Europe and the United States. A point was made that economies largely built on the exploitation of other nations' people and resources were now significantly weaker.

Up to a point, the governments of the world's largest economic powers were very much in favour of the process of globalisation. One possible outcome of the process, however, was a decentralisation of political and economic power. How a government responds to such a situation says much about their perception of where they stand, or believe they should stand, on the international stage.

The European Union is, in theory, an example of a cooperative form of governance. To some extent, this is true in practice, but it's also true that international competition exists within the union. Something interesting happened, though. Competing concerns within the union led to decisions being made cooperatively as compromises were reached. Depending on your political stance, this led to decisions being made in the interests of everybody or nobody in particular.

Unfortunately, some members of the union believed they should have more power; some members believed that others had too much power. The decisions became less important in the minds of many than how the decisions had been reached. Here in the United Kingdom, the media picked up on this dissatisfaction, and it became a tool for those who were fearful of the implications of some rulings, to convince the rest of us that leaving the union would be in our interests too.

Whether all of the above was a good or bad thing depends very much on your frame of reference. It does, however, highlight how our sense of separateness is linked to competitive behaviour, even when the environment in which we find ourselves calls for cooperation.

The current crisis has led to many of us feeling this sense of separateness on an individual level. The sense of threat connected to the crisis has, on an individual level, amplified the sense of competition with others. This was most visible in the panic buying which exemplified and reinforced existing inequalities.

Now that so many of us are living in enforced isolation, we might miss the company of friends, family, acquaintances and colleagues. There will, of course, be exceptions. Isolation will be a relief to some. The question is, will the physical absence of others at this time lead to us valuing their presence in the future?

Loneliness can have a profound effect on our mental health. When coupled with a sense of threat and uncertainty, the effect is more pronounced. Those who are unable to be with elderly or terminally ill loved ones may experience anticipatory grief, and those who lose loved ones at this time may feel the effects of complicated grief. Many other forms of loss will be felt - loss of income, loss of liberty, the loss of a way of life, etc. Isolation gives us more time and space to ruminate.

We are faced with the choice of looking inward, to our own experience and suffering, or outward to the experience and suffering of others. This isn't an entirely selfless act. In his book, Man's Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl wrote that, during his time as a prisoner at a Nazi concentration camp, he noticed that those who were concerned for the welfare of others were more likely to survive longer. It's difficult to imagine how we, placed in such a situation, might be affected by the horrors we witnessed.

Modern writings on the subject note that compassion for self is a necessary component of compassion. Indeed, we may be of service to others, but it would be irresponsible to neglect ourselves. Acceptance and commitment therapy, for example, works with an acknowledgement that to be human is to feel emotions. Compassion focused therapy highlights how these emotions are often in conflict. When we give little attention to this aspect of ourselves, we are not exercising compassion for the one who looks back at us in the mirror, instead allowing feelings to gather strength and potentially overwhelm us.

"I feel... and how it affects me is..." It can be difficult to say this to someone else, if we lack trust in those around us or have reason to be uncertain of their response. To simply acknowledge it to ourselves is enough. There's a visualisation where we imagine reaching in to the feeling, and pulling it out, making it separate from us. Then, we reach out and bring the feeling back into us. It's a way of seeing the feeling as a part of us, but not the entirety of our being. Other visualisations involve seeing ourselves as an ocean, and our feelings as waves on the surface of the ocean, or variations on this theme. The waves come and go, but the ocean is constant.

In all of this, our thoughts about our situation and how we feel play a part. The words we use, whether spoken or in our internal processes, to describe what is happening, affect our experience.

I seem to have digressed, as I often do, but it is always linked in some way. Many discussions have started with "When this is over..." What I hoped to communicate was that how things are, when this is over, is fundamentally linked to how we use this time.

When I happened to see a good instructional video on Ba Duan Jin, I shared it with friends.

There has, so far, been no response. It doesn't matter. I know that performing this sequence, especially if we are otherwise immobile, has a positive effect on physical and mental health. I offered it in the spirit of helping others, but at the same time accept that others may choose not to accept it as such. It only matters that I offered it - that my focus was on others. I was thinking cooperatively, rather than competitively.

In the end, I don't know whether individually, nationally or internationally, a spirit of competition or cooperation will prevail. Most likely, the two will co-exist uneasily, as they have before. One or the other will be dominant at various points in time. Yin and Yang. Maybe we will use this time to come to some form of acceptance of the need for balance. Maybe we will just learn acceptance. Maybe that's enough.