Will you change a life?

With everything that is going on in the world right now, I feel life has greatly shifted. The past few months with COVID-19, the world has stopped in mushroomed attempts to put out this invisible fire. I felt the calling to help. With a compromised immune system, my options were limited, so I thought about reaching out to friends in different continents, different countries and ask them how they were dealing with stress in times of crisis. You see, these friends and networking contacts are experts in their fields: from doctors and life coaches to teachers, healers and business managers.

The strangest thing happened though: I thought their advice would overlap and that they would have the same stress-reducing tips. Boy was I wrong. I realized through this process that because everyone is unique, that they are also unique on how they deal with stress. Some turn to music or nature, others to meditation or exercise. The list is really endless. And speaking of lists, a few even talked about lists: gratitude lists, to-do lists, 6-12 months plan for a future crisis.

https://youtu.be/vA7dPNCRRKk

I will be forever grateful for these generous souls who took the time in their day to chat with me over Zoom. My technological learning curve is steep: not because I wanted it to be, but because I realized that for me to help those that are having a hard time, struggling with stress and overwhelm during the coronavirus months, and probably in the aftermath, I needed to grow my brand new channel. These Evolution Talks, as I named them, are part of this series of How to Deal with Stress and Crisis, and for them to be useful, I need your help.

I need your help in sharing the channel. I am not a celebrity, and my reach is limited. So, if you share it with your loved ones, friends and communities, and someone you know watches it and they are secretly struggling with pandemic stress, they might feel inspired or not alone, or maybe they take one of those tips and implement it into their routine, it could change a life. Will you help me change one life?

Here is the link to my YouTube Channel: https://rb.gy/lwmt9d

You will be in my gratitude list. Thank you.

When the crisis is over

How do you define yourself before, during and after a pandemic?

I can’t say that the common person was prepared or even thought about the possibility of one occurring. I bet lots of people who weren’t paying attention in school won't even remember that 1918 saw a pandemic. 1918 seems so long ago, over 100 years and so much has changed since then. The world had seen its first World War, and we had a second one, even more devastating.

Watch this episode to make sense of all of it

It seems like the more time goes by, man finds ways to be more belligerent and assert his power over others. Boasting this unrepentant superiority complex, we are not civilized at all. We consider ourselves to be the top of the food chain, but we treat others and the planet worse than any other species. We also suffer from selective memory as humanity as a whole obliterates much of the good it creates by harming others and nature. Nature that has given us so much bounty; nature, our savior, can also be our destroyer.

Why is COVID-19 happening? Why now? I am not talking about where it came from but referring to its existential cause. Could it be nature’s way of teaching us a lesson? Our karmic destiny? Will we change as a consequence? Will our leaders reassess priorities? It would certainly be the right time to do so.

There are many occasions I can be a positive person, but I fear, in this case, my skepticism is king. I fear that the powerful will, more than ever, want to hold on to it, and this carelessness about the future of the select few who could make drastic fundamental change will be guided by fear and the obsession with power, control and greed.

If this pandemic taught us anything positive thus far is that we are much more dependent on one another and that together we can really make a difference, even if our togetherness seems skewed and mostly done virtually. The commonality of love for others has propelled the essential workers to become superheroes and this planet may propel others to make changes, but is it strong enough or will others resume their selfish isolationist ways, where survival of the fittest is at the core of a species that cannot learn from catastrophe to save itself?

As we take our time to connect with our loved ones in different ways, I feel more than ever called to make some changes. I feel lots brewing in my brain, a cauldron of ideas spinning, and I have faith I am not the only one. Hope and love will always trump fear and hate.