Surviving Lockdown

We’re all well aware of Covid-19 and the dangers of infection, so I won’t bore you with all that. We absolutely need to take care to stay indoors as much as possible during lockdown, and to keep our distance if and when we venture out. But you already know that, right?

Apart from the restrictions laid down by the authorities, we also need to take care to stay in the best of health. That means becoming more aware of the various ways we can remain healthy, and hopefully improve our health. Ways such as …

• Maintaining good habits
• Creating new good habits
• Exercising every day
• Keeping busy!
• Staying positive
• Keeping the mind active
• Steering clear of too much TV News
• Learning something new
• Practising gratitude

Maintaining good habits

It’s way too easy to let personal habits and hygiene slip if you’re not too careful, and this can easily happen when your normal routine is disturbed.

Try to get to bed and get up at a regular time, even if you’re ‘confined to barracks’. If it helps, imagine you actually have to get to bed at a certain time … imagine someone shouting “Ten minutes to lights out, c’mon, sort yourselves out!” And imagine there’s some sort of penalty to pay if you’re more than ten minutes ‘late on parade’.

Same goes for personal hygiene – you might think a morning shower isn’t really necessary since you’re stuck at home all day, but is that really you, letting yourself go like that?

Creating new good habits

Maybe you’ve been meaning to catch up on some reading. We’re snowed under with information these days and it can really get out of hand, specially when we’re busy with so many other things. Well, if you’re stuck at home all day, bang goes that excuse! Why not set aside a half hour each day for catching up on those articles you’ve bookmarked, or that inspiring biography you’ve been meaning to read? Or even to catch up on some escapist reading? There’s nothing to say all you read has to be serious stuff, right?

Exercising every day

Forget about extreme exercise regimes … for now, just make sure you do some exercise each and every day. It needn’t be much, and it needn’t take long, but a few minutes of light exercise can make all the difference in the world.

Start the day with some light stretching and deep breathing. Just a couple of minutes can set you up for the day.

Later, devote a short spell, maybe five or ten minutes, to some regular exercise. It can consist of simple exercises like jumping jacks, press ups, freehand squats, pull ups and burpees. There are any number of bodyweight exercises to pick from, and you won’t even need any weights or apparatus. If you just do a short session of that kind of thing it can mean you’ll stay in shape. And you’ll feel a whole lot better for it!

Keeping busy!

Let’s face it, there’s plenty to do round the house! Maybe you could take a shot at cooking, for example, if it’s something you don’t normally do, or if you consider yourself unable to cook. If you give it a shot you might surprise yourself! And the internet has more easily accessed recipes than any cookbook you might find on a shelf.

Maybe that’s not your thing – OK, maybe start working, little section by little section, on tidying or re-organising the house. Just make sure it’s acceptable to your partner first, otherwise you run the risk of creating friction instead of creating harmony!

Or maybe you have the creative skills to do some worthwhile DIY? Or to help the kids create some really useful or attractive items? And you don’t always need to be able to get to a DIY store to do some of these things, it’s amazing what can be achieved with paper, cardboard, tape, and various other things you might have lying around the house. Search online for creative ideas, there are hundreds of sites that can feed your need!

Staying positive

You can improve your chances of maintaining a positive outlook by using positive self-talk, and by using affirmations. Keep telling yourself you’re a survivor! Remind yourself how strong and healthy you are, and how resilient to infection … of any kind.

Prepare a few positive affirmations and memorise them. The more often you repeat them, and the more you do it with real emotion, the more you will belive them at a deep level. And remember, your own voice (whether aloud or just in your head) is the most trusted voice in your universe).

Your affirmations could be something along these lines:

• My system is strong and resilient, and I easily repel infection.
  
• Positive energy courses through every cell of my body.
• I have rock-solid faith that I will survive this crisis.
• I get stronger and healthier every single day.

Keeping the mind active

Don’t allow yourself to slide down into a slump. It’s easy to let that happen if you’re not careful, but if you determine to stay focused you can, and will, direct your attention and your energy to positive pursuits.

Steering clear of too much TV News

I’m not saying turn the TV off, I’m just advising against checking the News channel on the hour, every hour. Like anything else, if you focus your attention on it, it becomes very important to you. And with the current dire news, you really don’t want to be directing too much attention to it.

It’s understandable though if you want to check the News from time to time. It’s important to keep up-to-date with current guidelines and developments. Just don’t let it take over your life.

Learning something new

This truly is a sad time for many, with news coming in of literally hundreds of deaths every day. But in the midst of all this, the fact that we’re in lockdown means we have more time … more time to use constructively.

If you’ve been meaning to study a foreign language for ages, now is the perfect time to do it. There’s nothing stopping you devoting an hour every day to your chosen language, and since you can do it without interruption, your rate of progress could be surprisingly high. Remember, the internet offers many different ways to study languages, and many of them are free. Make use of them now!

Or maybe you’ve been meaning to learn a musical instrument? Now’s the perfect time! Go to it, and by the time this is all over maybe you’ll have achieved something you’ve been dreaming about (and procrastinating over) for years.

Practising gratitude

Maybe more important than anything else, make this a time to really start to appreciate all that’s wonderful about life. Each day, someone else doesn’t make it. If you’re still around, be thankful today wasn’t your day to die. Look around you and see everything in a new light – it really is a wonderful world, and the only reason it sometimes seems dull and tarnished is that our perception of it has become jaded. Decide that this is the time to see things as they really are, and feel profound appreciation for all that life offers.

Stick to the guidelines … Save lives!

I hope you find something in this to help you through these troubling times. But as well as putting some of these things into action, remember to pay close attention to what the world leaders are saying. The best scientific advice is being offered to governments around the world, and we would all be well advised to follow their guidelines. By staying indoors and keeping a few metres apart when we have to go out, we’ll be doing all we can to stem the tide of this terrible disease.

A Few More Tips …

Keep in touch with family and friends. With modern technology this is easier than ever before. Although we’re all staying indoors, we don’t need to be alone. We can be [virtually] together at the same time!

And don’t forget those that are alone. If you have elderly neighbours, see if you can help them, whether it’s to bring them a few essentials, to drop off prescription medication, or just to call them on the phone and let them know you’re thinking of them. It can make all the difference in the world!