To be Human again

To be Human again

Over the past few months for some countries and few weeks for others, one thing seems to have sort of united the entire world. A similar virus that knows no nationality, fame, social status, race or religion; literally no one is immune completely from this virus.

As I think deeply about the challenges at hand and how it would (is already) affecting different nations, I thought about several areas of life, socio-economic impact  and the possible lessons we can learn from this crisis, especially in Nigeria.

In as much as it is very tempting to lump together all of these lessons in one post, I think it would be more interesting to pace it, pick a perspective per time, share and take up on another.

So today, I would like to touch on lesson 1 – to be human again.

I know a lot of people have been thinking in this direction. Some call it a plague, memes are put up on the ‘end of the world’ with an illustration of Noah’s Ark. Many people and nations are turning back to God at this time. People now long to see, talk and interact with others.

Even though at the moment, our phones are tools for us to stay connected with the rest of the world while in isolation, yet we have come to realize that somehow it’s beginning to bore us and our minds. We are learning that more than ever, we want to be close to our families and loved ones; we want to pick up our phones to text or call people we haven’t reached out to in a long time.

We even want to connect with strangers and show genuine care; internet trolls are now silent and crippled by something bigger than their scared little minds; we now see the numbers of death and it is no longer just a statistics – it could be anyone.

The world seems to be at a standstill, waiting and hoping for some good news. Oh boy! We are now tired of waiting to quickly retweet/share/forward bad news, we are yearning to feed our minds and circulate some good news in the midst of it all.

I was at the supermarket yesterday to get extra packs of water, while on the very controlled queue, a young man started a conversation with me, we talked about the panic buy and I laughed about the crates of eggs in his cart. We smiled, exchanged some words of hope and went our separate ways.

The little things we took for granted. Guess what? I didn’t see a single person on their phones – no one!

My point is, more than ever, with everyone around us using the protective masks and generally trying as much as possible to avoid close contact, in the midst of the panic and fears, still I see that some people just want to smile, talk and be human again!

Truth be told, this isolation thing is HARDDDDD! But it is what we need to do to stop the virus from spreading and by ourselves play a major role in saving our world.

I hope that when all this is over (it will be), we will remember this first lesson to be human again. We would remember (I hope), not to take for granted a hug, a handshake, a smile and random conversation with a stranger, a visit to our friends and the many big and little things.

Sending a lot of love, prayers and light to all nations; affected persons; health care professionals and all families around the world.

TA

P.S,
You should read this article too, click here.