Most of us will never have gone through something as epic as this in our lives, certainly not in the UK anyways. The coronavirus has disrupted our lives in all possible ways. This is serious and it does not appear to be going away anytime soon. It feels as though we are being battered from all sides. We have inevitable health worries for our vulnerable relatives and friends, anxiety around jobs, businesses and livelihoods. There’s anxiety around self isolation and how long that is going to last and concern about the world and what the future will look like. It’s a bit like the opposite of a bad dream: you wake you and for an instant feel like everything is OK and then it hits you and you remember the reality of the world right now.
I’ve been reading and putting together lots of resources on how we can best cope during these heightened times of stress and anxiety. How can we cope when we are being asked to stay at home for prolonged periods of time? How do we stay sane and how do we look after ourselves? How do people with kids cope when they are working and home-schooling them at the same time?
I know we will get through this and life will become easier. This is very much a temporary crisis, and I think it is important to focus on that. We are all in this together and there are already some amazingly positive things coming out of this. Communities are pulling together and looking out for the vulnerable and people working to support their local businesses etc. This will build resilience, strength and hopefully make our world a better place to be in the future.
I’ve been helping to put together lots of additional resources as part of Kate Garraway’s new Wellbeing Club. Sign up here for free: www.clubgarraway.com to access the resources.
Here are some key areas to focus on with some of the most useful resources I have found:
Reducing Anxiety and Stress:
Anxiety and stress levels are bound to be high at this time. Although it’s important to keep up to date with the latest news it can become quite addictive and there’s a danger it can impact our mental health if we are constantly plugged in to the news. We can’t control what’s going on in the world but we can control our own reactions to it and how we deal with it. Try to limit yourself to two or three updates a day. See my earlier post on stress here which may also be useful. Here are my some of my favourite resources to help:
- Breathing techniques to help reduce stress: Rangan Chatterjee’s breathing menu provides some simple and easy ways to reduce stress by learning how to regulate our breath.
- This podcast with Dr Judson Brewer discusses coping with anxiety and stress caused by the pandemic. It’s a must listen.
- Seven ways to help someone with anxiety a very useful article if you are living with someone with anxiety.
- Step away from anxiety: A podcast from the Greater Good Magazine exploring a practice to reduce anxiety. There are loads of other great podcasts here too.
- How to cope with anxiety podcast with Chloe Brotheridge
- Unwinding anxiety app – provides evidence based daily guidance designed for anyone suffering from anxiety.
Staying active:
It’s even more important than ever to stay moving at this time to keep ourselves fit and active and to help our mental health. There are loads of great free online workouts out there and lots of fitness experts are running live sessions on the internet. Here are my favourites:
- Kitchen Dancing this is great – it’s fun dance/fitness classes set to 80s, 90s and noughties music, in a disco setting, from the comfort of your own home.
- Yoga: Great for the body and the mind: There are lots of online yoga tutors including Yoga with Adriene. My local studios East of Eden and Yonder are doing live streams of their usual in person classes and I am sure lots of others are too. Try a 20 min yoga session in the morning.
- The 7 minute workout: A video taking you through each of the 12 exercises in the 7 minute workout. A research based high intensity workout you can do at home to improve cardiovascular fitness for an all over body workout.
- The Body Coach TV: Joe Wicks The Body Coach has over 250 free workouts and he’s also doing regular live streams of his workouts.
Connection
Staying connected is super important at the moment. I’ve decided to phone at least one person I don’t usually speak to every day during this period. I hope what we learn from this after it is all over that actually speaking to someone is so much more meaningful than just sending messages. We might even make some new connections with people who live near us who we have never met before. Let’s hope this continues!
- Are there older people on your street you can reach out to to have a phone call or keep them company at a social distance? There are WhatsApp groups for streets everywhere so it should be easy to connect up with your neighbours.
- There are so many ways of keeping connected to our loved ones at the moment from Google Hangouts, Zoom and WhatsApp video and my friends introduced me to an app called House Party which is pretty fun. Have you tried having dinner and or drinks with friends over video?
- The Sofa Singers: a free & weekly online singing event that aims to bring people together from around the world to spark joy and human connection
Stay grounded in the present moment:
We don’t know what’s going to happen over the next weeks and months so now is the best time to stay as focused in the present as possible. If you don’t already have a go at practicing meditation. See my earlier article summarising the benefits of meditation here and below my top resources:
- Try some guided meditation Apps like: Calm, HeadSpace or Buddhify.
- Yoga teacher and meditation expert Annie Knapman is doing some free lunchtime meditation and gentle movement sessions. Check out her Linked in page.
- Meditations by experts such as Mark Williams or Erica Raynor Horn or self-compassion expert Kristin Neff’s meditations.
- The University of Oxford Mindfulness Centre are offering free weekly mindfulness sessions.
Keeping kids moving
This must be a super anxious and unsettling time for kids and even more so for parents as the schools start to shut. There are absolutely tonnes of resources out there and seeing as my focus is on movement I’ve kept it to that for now:
- Cosmic kids yoga – a great way to start the day with the kids with some yoga.
- Joe Wicks P.E. The Body Coach is doing a workout for kids every week day at 9am streamed from YouTube*
- A whole range of ideas to get kids moving here.
Get Creative:
- Gok Wan cook along: check out his Instagram account for the next mass cook along
- There are lots of free gigs, DJ sets and music events being streamed. Check here for a list of up and coming stuff.
- What can you do at home to make the most of this time?
- read a book that’s been sitting on your shelf for years
- Clear out your wardrobe/cupboards/lofts
- start/continue writing a journal
- create a scrapbook
- plan a holiday you have always wanted to go on
- make some plans about what you want to do with your career
- rearrange your furniture
- take up an old hobby like painting, knitting, sewing
- if you are lucky enough to have a garden get out and do some weeding
- Do a jigsaw
- Put your favourite album on and actually listen to it all the way through
- Do an online course
- learn sign language
- write a letter to a friend.
Do things for others:
- Foodbanks are in urgent need of donations at this time. Find out how you can help here.
- Support your local businesses by buying vouchers, leaving reviews or providing donations. Here are some other ideas.
- Charities are struggling as lots of events have been cancelled and their funds are shrinking – so now is the time to set up a direct debit not just for Covid-19 related funds but for any worthwhile causes.
Have some fun and stay positive:
- Laughing is so good for us – watch a funny film, connect with your favourite comedian on social media, talk to a friend who always makes you laugh or listen to a funny podcast.
- The best Instagram accounts to follow for uplifting and positive stories: @goodnews_movement and @upworthy. Including: Italians determined to eat together! A spot of window tennis and he group workouts people have done in Spain.
- Come on Eileen Covid-19 version.
- Timeout has become Timein and has lots of great ideas of what to do.
