“We´ll come out of this better people…” Are you sure?

Over the next few Sundays, we are going to share some thoughts on the web that can help us to choose how we want to carry on after the great pause caused by COVID-19. Some of us are still in quarantine and others are already in the de-escalation phase,. We begin with this reflection by Veronica Alonso that will continue next Sunday.

Why do we say that we are going to come out of this situation as better people? Do we really believe it? Or do we say it because we have heard it said, and we would like it to be that way?

I have tried to reflect on these words and I invite you to do so too. I think it would be a real shame, if after going through a situation as dramatic and painful as this pandemic is proving to be, with the negative consequences and death that it has brought, we do not know how to take advantage of this opportunity for life  to makes us a little (or a lot) better.

I think that all the time we have spent at home with fewer distractions (or at least apparently so), could serve to cultivate our interior life. What do you think? Maybe we will ask ourselves more questions about what really matters in life and what is secondary. Instead of living dulled by the immediate things we have to respond to, perhaps we are going to learn to make what is happening around us our own and find ways to improve it.

We often live with our sensitivity anesthetized by consumerism, or by small pleasures, which are sometimes simply mechanisms to evade reality. In other cases we don’t care about what happens, we live in the here and now, in a rush, in continuous activities which keep us entertained. We don’t dream of building a more humane world, we don’t take any risks and we don’t have any initiatives.

But at this time when life seems to be more reduced and at the same time calmer, it is good to ask ourselves if we are able to face this situation and the world, and allow ourselves to be affected. I do not say crushed, I say affected.

What does it mean to cultivate my interior life and the value of personal reflection? Reflection makes me descend to the depth of my own existence and discover my role as the protagonist in this story, as a vital part of the body which is formed by all humanity. It makes me discover thousands of new possibilities in my own heart. I really want to live. I want to love. I don’t want to waste this life that has been given to me. When this is all over, will I still take the time to reflect on my own life?

Veronica Alonso