If not now, then when?

I was speaking with one of my dear friends recently. He is in Spain, I am in India and we meet only when he comes to India. I had plans to visit him in Spain in January but he was in the middle of a house move and I had enough on my plate. I also wanted to go there in summer. Going to the beach would be fun if sun was out and we didn’t freeze wearing bikinis. My son Simha loves water. It only seemed fair to make the trip in summer. May, we thought. Universe had other plans. So, we talk and catch up on what’s happening in each other’s lives. I love the guy. He was the first one who picked a flower and placed it in my ear and said I looked beautiful. I had tears in my eyes that day, while we lunched together, with his partner. No one ever had done that, a simple, beautiful gesture. Some souls entwine with ours and there is nothing that feels more complete and satisfying. If you ever feel that, hang on to those moments and the friendship. They will make you feel beautiful.

So, we talked that one afternoon. He said something that had me thinking and talking a mile a minute. If not now, when? Every single day, till the day before the world woke up to a virus that is eating us all up inside and out, we complained.

• World is not fair, it is too demanding.
• Life is unfair, it never gives me what I want.
• I just can’t get this done since I hope there are 48 hours in a day.
• I want to be this, that and some, but I just don’t have the means or the time or the opportunity.
• I want more time with my spouse/partner/children/parents/pets, but, oh well, I have to make a living and that means little time at home.

Are we warming up yet? He had plans. I am privy to them and like most of us, he has shelved them for now. I have had to force myself not to go in to depression at the thought of not being on my favorite trails and organizing races. Life has other plans, always, I think.

Have you thought about the positives of this shelter-in-place time?

• I don’t spend on the (n) number of coffees at the local cafe.
• I don’t spend money on gas that I usually would do and the trips that consume all that gas (petrol) I don’t miss.
• I don’t make any trips to clubs right now, and I hardly do anyways. (include the amount you spend in each visit)
• We buy fewer vegetables though we don’t seem to have lowered our consumption (Why?).
• I don’t order out (In my case I hardly do, but if you do, include the amount you spend ordering out).
• I have learnt to do a few more repairs myself, fixing all kinds of odd things (YouTube has come in handy at times as one my friend says — she lives alone, is over 70, and changed a pressure cookers steam valve all by herself).
• I read more books than spend time on my laptop, reducing albeit minute power consumption.
• I don’t go to the gym, saving on gym membership (I always workout at home, but for those who use a gym, count that in).
• I press my own clothes (For those who are used to dry cleaning and having them pressed outside, does it make a difference).

List can be endless. Nah? Do share your list in the comments section once you are done reading this. Would love to collate and put it out in the digital world, with due credit of course.

Some of us will have it easy, some of us will have it hard and some, will find it extremely difficult to recover. He had plans and after shelving them once the lockdown was announced, he took to learning new things, honing his skills, and feels he can do better when the world opens up for business. We don’t know when it will be, but, I am sure, as you all are, that the world will be open one day, borders will be porous again and we will be able to hug our loved ones beyond our immediate family. He is honing his skills, acquiring new ones, doing yoga (we both love that part of our active life!) and planning for when he will have a chance to live a life, a life that might look nothing like what it was and is today, but most probably a better version of what was. Perspective. Sure not everyone might feel that the life ahead is a better one and it won’t be for some. They would’ve lost loved ones, lost the financial back up and some might suffer trauma and not come out of it like others might. May there be enough support for them and as I always have, will be the first in the line to do what I can for them.

I slightly digress. Going back to the question of ‘if not now, then when?’, so, when? For all the complaining we do, what will it take for us to do what we hoped to do when we have time? Earth is reviving, animals, birds and all other creatures are roaming free (I think they are partying :) ), scientists can track smallest of tremors, which they couldn’t earlier, because surface level tremors are much lower (lack of traffic and other vehicular movement), rivers and lakes are reviving (industrial emissions reduced drastically), elephants and tracing their old routes, bears are climbing trees closer to human habitat, turtles are laying eggs in larger numbers and, and, and. I can go on. What will you do with the time you have been afforded? By physical distancing (social distancing is I think totally inaccurate as we all are mingling socially online but are not physically gathering in one place), we are doing what it takes for us to have what we need — time, cleaner air, time with our most close members of our family, virtual lessons that can help us hone our skills, opportunity to appreciate the role of house help and understand the lives of those who were left hanging when the lockdown was announced and how fragile life is when we live without noticing moments of life that shape our every day living.

I leave you with these thoughts.

By the way, my yoga and wellbeing journey started a few years ago, actually yoga 15 years ago and wellbeing about 5 years ago. What I am doing now is not totally new or something that I started to do after the shelter in place orders were passed. But, I would reason with myself every day that I did not have enough time to set up a decent website that was informative at least if not visually pleasing, can’t put my mind to writing a blog post though a zillion ideas and thoughts swirled through my ever-busy mind, that I just can’t pull myself away from race directing because, well, that was my main role in life, being an RD and putting on crazy races.

The day I stopped going out to teach classes physically, I downloaded Zoom and began teaching virtually. It is not my first time teaching virtually. I have used Whatsapp video calls to do the same, so I was already familiar with the teaching method. When shelter-in-place orders were passed, I realized that my revenue stream was negative. I had already spent for the upcoming race, which won’t be happening and I had given a 100% credit to all runners.

Financial dilemma apart, I began to practice yoga on days I don’t teach, return to my workouts earnestly, engage my son in more ways than I had earlier. read books that were unread and sitting pretty on my nightstand, sharpen pencils and pick up pace on a pencil sketch of Simha that I had started a long time ago, and then, it hit me that I hadn’t taken time to understand some underlying causes of anxiety and they were crystal clear in my head now as though someone scripted and transferred them in to my head, akin to a sci-fi movie. Not being able to fall asleep is a result of me forcing myself to lay awake so that my subconscious mind paid attention to my son Simha, in case he woke up and his nanny didn’t. For 9 months, as we saw three nannies come and go, it became an acute symptom and today, my body does not know how to fall asleep. Ironically, only after I have all this time on my hands that my brain processed all that data and told me what I had done to myself. Do we really want to go back to where we were or do we want to hit the reset on our lives instead of the pandemic and rearrange our lives to try out a different way of life? Would the results be so bad?

I am so happy I spoke with my friend today. Sometimes we just need that one friend who tells you that they love us and have our back. Love you too, my friend.

Before I sign off and leave you to ponder over your thoughts and ideas, this blog post wouldn’t have come to be had it not been for this lockdown. I would’ve spent the next two, three or ten years making excuses to not begin penning my thoughts and sharing with the world. So, as I share my experience of the past 4 weeks in lockdown and how my thoughts have emerged, shaped and drove me to action, I urge you to think about your experience, write it down for your reference and share it with me or the world. You can share a link to your blog or simply comment on this post.

Stay home, stay safe, rethink your time ahead and wish you great success in whatever you plan to do. My wishes go out to everyone who lost a loved one and I hope you find strength and joy in their memories. Life will come full circle, some day.

-Kavitha, WeYoga.