LIFE DURING LOCKDOWN

                                Image Credit : kirwanspharmacy

    Who would have thought that the seemingly small CORONA VIRUS would be the cause of us losing our freedom? Up until today CORONA VIRUS has affected almost all the countries of the world, while continuing to take people’s lives and health, it is also letting the people of the world  to take  a break from the hustle and bustle of their daily lives and sit at home and enjoy the things that they “did not have time for”.

    Hats off to all the introverts out there as I have no clue how they do it because as an outgoing person, I’m having a very hard time staying in. Besides sleeping for 10 hours, watching T.V and using phone for atleast  5 hours, and reading some of the books  of my choice, and going through all the possible interesting lessons in e-learning applications that our college has facilitated.., and I still seem to have so much time left in the day. Phew!

  Now, as we are in the 8^th week of this quarantine, I am immensely enjoying my quarantine routine at home and learning a lot of things that I could never do due to lack of time or just plain laziness. In these days I have been engrossing myself with learning different life lessons like..,

• LEARNING THE IMPORTANCE  OF  FAMILY  TIME:

These days when we are cooped up in our houses with no friends to go to, no clubs, no parties, the only source of entertainment [apart from internet] is your family. In these days I have learnt more about my family than I ever thought I knew I think it made our bond stronger and I realized that family is with you through thick and thin.

• THE IMPORTANCE OF “ME TIME” :

    Being quarantined has given me more “me time” and has changed the relationship I have with my own self. It has taught me how to be comfortable in my own skin and how to love yourself more. As my social interactions are quite limited, I am the only person who I have to keep busy and maintain my sanity.

• VALUE OF WORKPLACE/COLLEGE:

    At first the idea of classes from home sounded very relaxing but it turns out that online classes is even harder than normal classes at college. It made me realize how going to college keeps me preoccupied for most of my day.

• THE IMPORTANCE OF SOCIALIZING:

    Being quarantined at home cuts the chances of  meeting up with friends, having a vacation- [basically doing anything that requires you from going outside] This limits my daily activities to such an extent that I feel lazy and bored all the time.

• SELF-DESCIPLINE:

    During the weekend you could do whatever you wanted because it was only two days of freedom from seven working days, but being home quarantined means that you have all the time in your hands and have no clue what to do with it. Staying home the whole day makes you want to eat and sleep more than usual which will reduce your immunity power greatly. I learnt that we need to set a mental routine for our self and allot times for activities, eating, naps etc. to make staying home as enjoyable as possible.

• APPRECIATE YOUR HOUSE-HELP:

    With house hold help given an off till further notice, it becomes the responsibility of the whole family to divide the work amongst themselves. After a while I realized at this point of time that my house has transformed into those reality T.V show in itself. With duties and responsibilities assigned, I think that by the time lockdown is over I will be a pro at everything starting from cleaning, washing dishes and clothes, dusting to cooking. Although this lockdown is driving us all out of our mind, it is teaching us all one thing which is gratitude. Not just towards the government, doctors, nurses, house helps etc. and teach us to not take our freedom for granted.

    On the whole, to wrap things up, the most important lessons that I have learned in these past days is that in this trying times, we must obey our government and stay home with our families and let the mother nature re-boot herself because it may not actually be our government that is telling us to stay isolated, it may be the mother nature trying to tell the same but in a hard way. Let us all keep patience for this too shall pass!

So, that’s it STAY HOME, STAY SAFE.

ASHFIYA  AMREEN M S

1^st  B.A [PSYCHOLOGY]

KATEEL  ASHOK  PAI  MEMORIAL  INSTITUTE,  SHIVAMOGGA.