The lockdown due to the pandemic has slowly been coming to an end in the part of the world where I am. People are going back to their offices, the restaurants are opening, and yet I feel like nothing will ever be the same. One thing is certain – social media and the internet have proven to be a vital part of humanity today, and our awakening. It helped some of us keep contact with our families and friends, it helped us gain information about how to be safe, it helped us stay at home and enjoy art. It also helped the less fortunate of our society. It helped spread messages of inequality and oppression all over the world. And we finally had time to listen.

It seems like the lockdown actually unlocked empathy. It feels like we needed to be stopped in our fast-paced lives to see how we’re slowly dying. We needed to be bound to our homes to realize some people do not have one. While we were waiting in line to enter the grocery shop, we had time to understand what access to food means, and we finally found the space to become aware of realities that were not our own, but no less true.

Going back to our reality, we are given a choice. The choice that we were given on the day that we were born, but we forgot. We are given a choice between nature and the superficial. A choice between truth and suppression. A choice between staying silent and speaking up. All of these seem so clear now that we have spent time away from systems and society as it is. With injustices happening every day in every part of the planet, we might feel threatened and helpless. At the same time, we can feel peace and unity finding out we are not alone, but there comes the burden of awareness, the burden of the awakened – knowing and feeling that people are hurting. Some are hurting in poverty, oppression, sickness. And some are hurting in greed, emptiness and power.

What is needed at this present moment is exactly what is happening – awakening. A realization that the current systems and the current norms do not serve us as a humanity. Not when women are afraid to go jogging alone, not when black people fear for their life when encountering the police, not when children are still dying of hunger. This is why the lockdown might have been profound, but not necessarily a positive experience – because we were once again reminded that no matter where we are, we all experience pain and fear in the same way. With the privileges that all of us reading this text have, we need to look for ways how we can dismantle systems of oppression, systems that cherish financial gain over well-being and systems that were made to distract us and divide us and stop us from waking up.

Let’s not forget, there will be times we will feel like there is too much to care about, too much to fight for. I want to remind us that this is what it means to be fully alive and human. Don’t let the “unawakened” keep you from that.

 

Author: Eva Feldman, as a highly empathetic person and a psychologist, she connects her understanding of the human psyche with spirituality, focusing on consciousness and awareness. Her goal is to share knowledge and passion about human beings in a simple and understandable way, and in that way to contribute to raising awareness in this day and age. Masters degree in Psychology, education in Art Expressive Therapy, as well as personal interests of social justice, mindfulness and Being, make for an interesting addition to her practices of dance, yoga and teaching. She found a purpose in living life fully and encouraging others to do so. Follow Eva on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/toomucheva/

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.