Page 19 - Seniors Today - July 2021 Issue

A year ago could one have imagined that
Changes for the better
For all of us, the last year and a half has
been an anxious time, lived under the
shadow and dread of the virus, with the
nagging uncertainty of it all. Despite this,
something strange and beautiful happened.
It was as if nature had commanded us to
pause, to relook at our lives. We began
to appreciate the simpler things in life,
find pleasure in small achievements. We
began connecting better with our families,
appreciating them more. We enjoyed our
togetherness and our bonds deepened. For
the first time we seriously looked at our
wellbeing both physical and spiritual, and
many found the opportunity to pursue
it seriously, giving us a sense of inner
serenity and health. Regular exercise,
meditation and learning, pursuing hobbies
we never had time to acquire, gave us
a great sense of fulfilment. We got an
opportunity to examine our lives, and
many of us realised how important it was to
simplify them, declutter them from all the
superfluous trappings we had gathered.
At the height of its fury, especially during
the devastating second wave that hit us
like a tsunami, not one family was left
untouched. Loss, grief and panic impacted
us all in some way or the other. It was
then we discovered that happiness and
contentment can be realised with the
simplest of things, with the most basic of
activities, with acts of caring and sharing.
SENIORS TODAY | ISSUE #25 | JULY 2021
helping someone find that elusive oxygen
cylinder would be a source of immense joy?
Or that helping someone procure a hospital
bed to admit a critically ill patient would
become a major highlight? Or just sending
a box of food for a Covid patient could make
us feel good? As lives got saved, as near and
dear ones recovered and returned home,
as we reached out to people in need, these
simple acts of helping, of giving, brought
contentment and we experienced a deep
sense of happiness.
It was the pandemic that brought home
to me the understanding and the value
of the Danish term ‘Hygge’. Pronounced
‘hoo-guh’, it means to comfort, or console,
taking pleasure in the small everyday
gentle things of life, in joining loved ones in
a relaxed atmosphere, of giving someone a
hug, of bettering the quality of life.
Things are getting better now, yet the
stresses of the pandemic remain and a
potential third wave still looms large. In
such windows of recovery, negativity often
creeps in through in all sorts of ways, and
shedding it is not always easy. Even when
we try to ward off negative thoughts they
keep coming back. And thoughts have a
direct bearing on our moods. Indulging
in repetitious negative thinking is a sure-
shot path to unhappiness. I have often
found that it is smarter to acknowledge
19