Renee Meriste, an Estonian expat living in Los Angeles, is asking the humankind, what will we do tomorrow, when the coronavirus crisis is over – will we carry on as usual, endlessly consuming and polluting, or shall we change our ways?
Tomorrow is a beautiful day. The kids are in school, the shopping centres are open, the airplanes are flying, real estate sells, the stock market goes up again.
Yes, I survived.
What will you do that day?
Currently, we can hear so many people say:
- I want to it back to normal
- I want life to be like yesterday
- I want to travel again
- I want to buy stuff again
- I want to go to my gym 24/7
- I want to get my groceries 24/7 and I want to more and more…
Is life about having more and more? You also hear this….
- I can’t handle it at home
- My family is driving me nuts
- I can’t teach my children, I am not made for it
- I need more alcohol for the next three weeks
- I am bored
- I am done with Netflix
- The government does a bad job, but I always try to pay less taxes
- Conspiracy theories boom, because it gives us peace that nature had nothing to do with it. We are humans, we rule the world and galaxy
- People who only want facts to prove something and have no feelings, just keep saying don’t listen anyone except a scientist with a spreadsheet.
Proof is not a spreadsheet showing of the data of the future, proof is what you feel and experience in life.
When someone who always says, show me the proof of this, I say, please show me the proof that you love another person, show me the data of your kindness.
Are we in this together?
Will you show a spreadsheet (data) with houses, gifts, cars, travel – everything you gave to them, and this is the proof of love and kindness? Please prove your feelings as data!
We have learned that we can study, communicate, even dance and drink over Zoom, Google Duo, Instagram and many other similar services.
Many sources like the media, governments and friends say we are in it together. This is true, but everyone’s circumstances are different.
Being in quarantine, some of us think of a kind of a new year’s resolution – for example, “if I will come out from it alive, I will never smoke, never drink, never do something…”, but then life happens, you forget and you want those things again. So, in order to really not do them, you have to change yourself. We all know how our new year’s resolutions normally go.
There are many people who don’t feel the pain of those who have lost their jobs and income. People who work for the public sector, creditors, banks and many more, since their day and work does not change. They have the same income and the financial pressure has not hit yet. Some have the added pressure of life-threatening exposure to the virus and this stress cannot be ignored. It should be acknowledged, and we should show gratitude for them.
We are also grateful to the creditors who feel the responsibility to help people and postpone payments, add months to the end of the loan dates and other options in an effort to help. But, there are some creditors who, for example, will themselves get help from their creditors and the government, but they will not pass it forward.
The world will not go back to yesterday
If more companies choose this path, then we are not in it together in the same way. Creditors who take advantage during these times and are saying, “I am better than anyone else and you have to pay”, are the reason we are in a mess – the reason the nature is slowing us down. It means they don’t understand the position of the ones who lost jobs, income and even family. So, if you are just a self-centred business and you don’t care who survives and who does not, please do not use the “we are in this together” phase to do business as usual.
We are in it together, all humans.
We are all thankful to all the frontliners and helpers: the health-care workers, the first responders, the grocery store workers, truck drivers and more. They are all making many sacrifices to support everyone else.
The world will not go back to yesterday, it never does. The world keeps turning and keeps changing.
What will you do tomorrow?
Do you want to see in the social media what someone else does, see their pretty photos and just like those photos and videos? Or do you want to love and live yourself and experience being part of nature and making sure viruses like that will never happen again? Will your success be measured of the likes or following? Or maybe happiness? Maybe not being on the social media will make you happier?
Do you want to continue living like yesterday and come back to the same situation? What is the most important thing for you in life? A spreadsheet showing an endless raise? Let’s buy more, let’s use more, let’s have artificial intelligence, people will not have jobs, let the machines do everything.
More, more and more. Just give me more of everything!
Wait.
Do you want to be happy tomorrow?
Am I a human? Am I part of the nature? Or just let robots rule us, forget the nature and being human? May be the nature stops us if we don’t save the planet ourselves?
Pollution has gone down globally, the ozone layer is growing, the nature gets healthier – is that good or not? Are humans leading it all or is it the nature?
What do you prefer, being at home, fearing death, and endless sales and usage? Or do you want to go outside and walk, listen birds to sing, hug your loved ones? Do you need a 24/7 gym to in your daily schedule, and cause yourself stress because you have to do it?
Do you want to be happy tomorrow? Or stressed out for getting and using more and more?
Hopefully sooner or later we can say, “We survived”.
I think we should continue the tradition of saving the Earth.
Now we know we can stay home for two weeks and close down everything. Maybe we should all agree that every March and every September, for one week, we let the Earth breath and spend time with our families and loved ones at home, like in a quarantine today.
The planet Earth can breathe and we will feel closer to the nature.
Or let’s use everything again and wait nature to stop us, again?
It’s a beautiful day. Today is a beautiful day. The kids are in school, shopping centres are open, the airplanes are flying, real estate sells, the stock market goes up again.
Yes, I survived.
What would you want to do today?
For the latest developments in Estonia, follow our special blog on coronavirus.
Cover: Soomaa National Park in Estonia (the image is illustrative). Photo by Sven Zacek.
