For the next generation

 

“It all depends on how we look at things, and not how they are in themselves.” – Carl Jung

 

Will fear take over? Will, we simply create a new generation of safety net minions. Lemmings to go over the cliff?

Will we be afraid to follow our passions? I worry that I’ll meet more and more parents who are pushing for the good serviceable job. The one they feel is so secure. Will all the passion die? Will humanity grow or regress further?

There have been many low moments in the home over the last few weeks. We all take turns. Even Dinky dog has had his bad days. You wouldn’t feel his life has changed much? But he doesn’t understand why people don’t want to say hello. I guess he misses his cafe time too.

One of the hardest conversations I’ve had was my mother crying in angst that we have too much. Will we be struck down in suffering because we do? Her worries that we don’t give enough back. With me assuring all they pour through me, I pour back. And I have over the last few weeks until I couldn’t pour anymore. Till I rocked in the corner.

I’ve been in the odd position of sitting in the middle of the world. Watching and communicating with each country as this has unfolded. I started for Chinese New Year in Singapore. Then my own relations became the epicentre of hell in Italy. Next, I heard the stories of the panic buying from Australia and the UK. I watched on knowing the US was in for the biggest storm imaginable. While those in Singapore seem so compliant they hardly seemed to suffer. The Solomon Islands has remained untouched. Except for a mass exists of the ex-pats threatening the economy. Meanwhile, over in New Zealand, we’ve seen the most personal approach with texts to every citizen and ‘hang-out’ time with the P.M. I’ve watched in pride as Ireland strove to protect their vulnerable early. But equally in horror as those across the water were told to get ready to lose their loved ones. And now I watch as South Africa joins the fry. I never truly appreciated just how global my own connections were until this moment. I see the same patterns of fear; good, bad and ugly. I joke I’ve concentrated on the good and used everything else to write.

Some families have embraced the home. Enjoying the creativity and cooking time. Even in the darkest hours in Italy, we were reminded by one; now you have time to cook all the meals you don’t normally. You can simmer and soak. We suddenly have all the time in the world. I’ve seen a mother teach a child to read a road sign. Another whole family jog the beach. From the littlest of 3.

I’ve spent two years in a writing cave. Now I’ve emerged to talk with more people in weeks rather than months.

But there’s been a dark side too. I’ve never felt so unsafe in every way. I’ve felt pain as I know those I care for suffer jobs loses and financial uncertainty. I’ve worried about the displacement of others from their loved ones. I’ve seen families start out enthusiastically towards the adventure – to only then allow their children to sink into an abyss of TV and Netflix. I worry that becoming a gamer has actually become a viable career choice. While others who offer so much seem to have become worthless overnight. With each countries lockdown, I’ve charted the change in value.

I worry the reset I was so enthusiastic about a month ago – now looks like a really bad recoding exercise that will be based in fear and constraint. Will we be so afraid to be freelance? Will once more the arts sector seem a no hope choice? Will we have gained any more true value for education in all this noise?

Will people be any more in alignment with their lives? Because in all of this the key I’ve seen – it’s irrelevant what your path is providing your life is alignment for you to follow your dreams. You live to live not to work. If your life is simple everything is possible. I know lots of content people sitting out this storm. Beavering away in their passions. I know others with security in turmoil. I know plenty of good serviceable jobs gone. Richness has been redefined.

I want the next generation to not be lemmings. But I worry they will look on in all this carnage and be too afraid to be anything else.

Naoisé March 29th 2020