Lockdown Diaries Nominee#50 Lockdown Diaries- Ishita Shah

I think many would agree with me when I say that lately, each day has lasted a year, but each month seems to have lasted a week. The strange inexplicable feeling of time having flown by in a hurry, but also slowing down at the same time, has been experienced by me and a few others that I know. Such a paradox holds true during these unpredictable uncertain times. We watched people withdraw from the myth of certainty.

The lockdown for me began as I had just joined a new Intellectual Property law firm and twenty days into this new routine, I was forced to find a new one. While I have been lucky enough to not be bogged down with work or suffer from ‘Zoon-exhaustion’, a different exhaustion of sorts has taken over.

What once began as time to rediscover old forgotten hobbies, and simple pleasures or even just a simple joy of sleeping in and saving the cost of our daily commute, then became an almost dysmorphic experience. No man can exist as an island. While I have been grateful enough to live with my family, I know not everyone can say the same. The sheer willpower that it takes to stick to our goals at a time where everything around us seems to unprecedented and distracting, has been difficult for me to find in spite of having a comfortable home and a ready support system. I shudder to think about those who had to isolate themselves of live alone. At one point, my unproductive hours began affecting me negatively. I think growing up in a capitalist consumerist world, where our worth is often judged by our productivity and income or just how much we are contributing to society per day, it can become difficult to just exist without feeling like you must be constantly doing something. The joy of doing nothing did not feel joyful anymore. I once read that if you want to judge the quality of one’s life, observe how you feel when you do nothing.

There has been a lot of helpful information floating around on the internet and there has been no shortage of enterprising people who have used this lockdown to their advantage. We saw instances of humanity and glimpses of kindness in people reaching out to help strangers, citizens feeding the strays, animals rejoicing as mankind retreated.

A huge takeaway for us as a fully functioning society or even on an individual level, is that we will always need people, infrastructure and resources and that what we once took for granted require a greater amount of appreciation. What I found myself wondering was that as every nation spends an exorbitant amount on warfare and nuclear armaments, half of that amount should have ideally gone into healthcare facilities. We have to now collectively imagine a cleaner world and change every governmental priority to that of it’s citizens.

Going forward, this will set a new norm. Updated legislations and protocol for implementing the Disaster Management Act, 2005, changes in public policy and strengthening the socio-economic system, Emergency like situations and Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897 or even simply educating the general public and raising awareness will be the need of the hour.

ReachIvy.com organized an online blog/vlog competition to provide people the unique opportunity to share their lockdown stories using their creativity. The competition met with a fantastic response from participants across 4 continents, and our jury has handpicked the Top 50 entries from them for the Popular Choice Award 2020!

The above entry has been submitted by Ishita Shah from Mumbai, India.Kudos to Ishita Shah for this beautiful piece!

Show your support and help Ishita win the contest by liking this blog post on all ReachIvy.com’s social media platforms!