The swift punch-in-the-gut of COVID-19 has hurled our wellbeing into a state of confusion, dilemma, and reflections. No longer do we wake up early to prepare for work, but change our top and plug the laptop’s charger to conduct remote working in the kitchen. Although it seems impossible, we have found ourselves more online to replace the in-person interaction at work, school, and personal lives. Besides such a leap of change, the news has flowed in with stories about death of loved ones, despair in isolation, and desperation for breakthroughs in news and research. While the gloom hovers in the air of the everyday living, a shift in narrative pervades.
The parents, crowned as the figures who nurture and protect their children with their intuitive wisdom and championed guidance, have taken the dark path by investing their free time in ambushing, whether or not unconsciously, those who they think are “different” from them. Not only are their actions considered as a waste of dignity but also a knife to the graceful philosophy of parenting.
Neesa mutes the side effects of doses and medications. She’s a part of a housing agency that offers safe space to people who experience mental illnesses. She doesn’t walk up to the residents just to prescribe them certain drug tablets and capsules wrapped in tin foils. Instead, she morphs into a sponge that absorbs their dripping anxiety, siphoning their exhausting heavy thoughts as her own to ease the burden that weighs on their mind and shoulders. Neesa heals lost souls as a Mental Peer Health Specialist.
Gabe weaves himself into the fabric of life, tearing its skin layer by layer. He doesn’t shy away from the dare life throws at him. Instead, he picks up the stones and launches them back. “My experiences have taught me to enjoy every moment of your life, be patient and never give up hope,” he says. “Being a strong person has nothing to do with muscles. It has to do with having the will, determination, and courage to never give up hope.”
