The city where you live or work may be on a lockdown but your life should not be on a shutdown. Even as much movement is restricted, there are things you can do within your home to maximise your life during the lockdown.
Due to the covid 19 pandemic movement of people around the world has been largely restricted. The slogan is now “stay at home”, “stay safe,” or “work from home.”
However, not everyone is equipped with the facility to work from home. So apart from working, what else can you do to maximize your time at home in a period of lockdown?
In a previous post on this blog, I advanced some broad guidelines to maximise your time at home during a lockdown. This post is my attempt at throwing more light into the ideas broached in that introductory post.
Let’s enjoy the ride together.
1. Do things that will rejuvenate you
In this fast-paced world, an average human being is stressed out, overstretched and overused. Now that you are on lockdown, I would expect that you make deliberate effort at renewing your energy.
There are three areas of your life that you should touch in this regard: spirit, soul and body.
As a human being, you are a spirit, you live in a body and you have a soul. How much have you taken good care of these individual parts of you over the years?
Here are my suggestions on how you can rejuvenate the trinity in you:
A) Your spirit –
Be in tune with your Creator. Develop/maintain a personal relationship with Him. Worship Him.
Talk to Him in prayer. Seek to know Him more by studying His Word.
B) Your body –
This is the time to stay long in bed without feeling guilty; have maximum sleep/rest hours.
Eat healthy foods and engage in appropriate physical exercises.
C) Your soul –
Read as many relevant books as you can during this period. Meditate too (here I mean, imaginative thinking, not emptying your mind).
Also engage in writing. Just write.
2. Do things that can rekindle your lost or strained relationships of interest
I can understand that because you have been so busy all these years, you didn’t have the time to nurture or maintain some relationships that might have been mutually beneficial to you and the other person. Please use this lockdown period to reach out and rebuild.
Of course I know your movement has been restricted to your house so physical visitation to someone is out of the question. But thank God for technology, we have super fast ways to contact people that interest us.
Make a call, send a text message or chat, send an email communicating your love and care. I guarantee you the feeling and outcome will be worth it for you (and the person on the other side).
If you don’t know who to start with, let me give you some ideas: your parents, siblings, uncle or aunt that you haven’t spoken with (at least) in the last three months.
What about people that the only time you talked to them was to say Merry Christmas or Happy New Year two years ago? Call them now and have a normal conversation with them.
Do this Practical exercise
Before you continue reading, please pull out your pen and writing pad now. Write down the names of 5 to 10 people you should contact immediately either through phone call (strongly recommended), text messages, online chats or email.
Reach out to them once you are done reading this post. I will be overjoyed to hear your feedback.
3. Pay more attention to your spouse’s emotional needs
Prior to this time, you have been so busy you have not given sufficient attention to satisfying your spouse’s emotional needs. Lockdown has changed everything now.
With the lockdown, there is enough time to focus on specially loving your spouse. Give each other maximum pleasure and satisfaction.
You don’t have any excuse not to engage in love-making with your spouse during this lockdown period. Do it well and do it often.
Let down your guards and be vulnerable to each other. Listen to whatever your spouse has to say, after all you are not running late for any meeting now.
4. Have more family time
The lockdown has afforded you more time to spend with your entire family. Use it to engage in activities that promote bonding more with your spouse and your children.
You will have noticed that you have missed out a lot from the goings-on in their lives while you were busy with your career, job, business, education or whatever it is that had kept you away from your family before the lockdown.
Now that you are around at home with them, play educational games together. Watch family-friendly movies together. Eat together.
Pray together. Study the Bible together.
Tell stories to your kids and let them share their own thoughts too. Ask them about their friends, their interests and ambitions.
No judging – just listen to them. You will have a good laugh listening to them.
5. Reach out with a helping hand to some needy persons around you
Let’s face it, the lockdown has caused much economic hardship to some people around you or a far off. It’s time to reach to such people.
Not everyone is as blessed as you are. Even if you think these are not the best times for you economically, remember that there are people that are worse off than you are.
Bottom line, no matter your economic estate, you can still reach out and bless someone around you with whatever you have. Be it some items of groceries or sanitary items, I’m sure they will be received with appreciation.
Some people will need money, so you can do a bank transfer to their accounts. (Thanks to all the celebrities who reports monitored on social media show that they have been transfering some funds to the accounts of some of their poor followers).
6. Learn a new skill
This lockdown period is not too short for you to acquire a new skill or improve on existing ones. And you don’t need to be in a formal classroom to achieve that goal.
In this age of information technology, you can learn virtually anything online. The videos are there on YouTube for free. Just search search out the one you want and get started.
For instance, you can learn, or improve on your knowledge of, excel spreadsheet, power point presentation, photo-editing, etc.
How about topping up your culinary skills? Can’t you learn how to make ice cream at home during this lockdown?
What about dough-nut, pop corn and your other favourite snacks at home?
Whatever it is you have to learn within this available time, just learn it. No more excuse of “I don’t have enough time…”
What I wish for you is to be better equipped when you emerge at the other side of the lockdown. Make it possible.
7. Begin to re-strategise or plan for your life post-lockdown
As you know, this lockdown is not going to continue forever. At some point in future (no matter how long that will take), the stay-at-home order will be lifted.
When that happens, what are you going to do? Go back to life as usual?
I guess you will have to make some adjustments to the way you live your life. One effect of the covid 19 lockdown is that it has reshaped the way we do things.
Conclusion
I’m convinced that life is not going to be the same for most of us after this experience. If that is so, I will advise you to make some changes to your life’s plan or else the change might have to be forced on you.
My point is, use this lockdown period to think about your life, reorder your priorities, setting new goals for your career, family, business, education, relationship, etc.
What do you think?
Thank you so much Victor.
You are welcome Timi. And thanks visiting my blog.