Covid and Resilience
Yesterday I got my first Covid vaccination; I’m not a big fan of needles but happy to do my bit to protect my own health and those with whom I am in contact.
However, lack of personal immunity has probably saved me from being stranded somewhere in Australia; pre-Covid a winter week on a sunny coast was always high on the list of priorities.
What Covid has done is change our current reality and our future trajectory. For those of us who are used to being in charge of what we do, this is a bit of a shocker. Last year we were able to cope with this disempowerment because we had post-Covid to look forward to; at least some prospect of a return to near normal. Turns out that ‘post-Covid’ was wishful thinking; and probably not a state to which we will ever return.
Covid resurgence across the globe suggests Covid will be our companion for some years to come and the emergence of the more virulent Delta strain suggests there could potentially be yet more strains in the wind. It’s a rollercoaster ride; community spread across the ditch, a closed border, and now, many families split across Australia and New Zealand for at least a couple of months. And not much clarity about our target immunisation rate or about our appetite for co-existence with, versus our elimination of, Covid.
And of course Covid isn’t operating in a vacuum; it is the cherry on top of all our other ongoing stressors; the mortgage, the kids, changes at work, Netflix as well as the Olympics to keep up with……
For many, these extra stresses have emptied the Resilience Battery and are causing anxiety and distress. And the really bad news is that the rollercoaster ride of open-closed-open-closed is likely to continue for some time yet. Until vaccination rates get us to global herd immunity and vaccines are dealing to the new variants, things aren’t likely to approach anything like ‘normal’.
There are a couple of things we need to take action on so that we are best placed to cope with whatever Covid throws at us next:
- Look after your own resilience.
- Be alert for dwindling resilience among those around you, especially family and work colleagues.
Looking after ourselves is about a balance across all of the things that make us functional as human:
- Diet
- Sleep
- Exercise
- Mental health
- Down time
- Family
- Relationships
- Thinking and planning (instead of worrying)
- Mindfulness
- Spirituality
We need to be intentional about all of these things, spending some time each week immersed in each of them.
Looking out for those around us, especially those we work with, needs us and them to access some external resources to make conversation about resilience at work happen and for action to follow.
One such resource is Let’s Talk Resilience at Work; a facilitated online or face-to-face series. It is designed to get conversations and actions moving for workplace groups of up to 30 participants.
It is facilitated by your choice of Kathryn Jackson or Linzi Ebbage-Thomas
If you would like to find out more about growing resilience at work in your organisation, call Kyran or Nicky on 0508 ODI ODI or leave a message on our website at Talk To Us