“Now the question is: how has Pandemic changed you? Even if we get to a point where we get everything back in our lives the way it was (in pre-pandemic era), are we the same people we were?” Today’s woman dreamer, Tamanna Raisinghani, a Santa Barbara based software engineer shares a reflective essay on the past couple years and how the world is adjusting to the New Normal. A creative writer and mom of two, Tamanna has love for writing code and stories :)! Enjoy her article! As we get ready for Fall, let us know - how has the past year changed you?

Year 2020

Year 2020 will be known as one of the most notorious years in the history of this century. It has brought extreme turbulence in more or less stable routines that we built over the years with our lives strongly anchored to it. Something we took for granted! Did we know any other way of looking at the simple tasks like dropping our kids to school, going to work, visiting friends and family, doing groceries to name a few? The very infrastructure of our lives was shaken to the core by this virus. It struck like lightning and one constant since then is the shocking PAUSE it has brought in. It almost felt like I am driving with my favorite music playing in the car and I know where I am headed. The entire map is in my head. Not aware of the rude shock that awaits me that would make me take my feet off the accelerator and apply brakes. The familiar road I take every day has a dead end written all over it. The comforting illusion of control evaporates quickly and now I have to take a U-turn and drive again except this time I drive with no directions. I do not know if my destination even exists. Nothing brought us out of our heads into the present moment and to our knees faster than COVID situation. 

It may sound Cliché if I quote John Lennon's famous saying: " Life is what happens when you are busy making other plans", but that is what happened. When we were busy planning our lives, COVID happened. Pandemic was not even part of our vocabulary in the 21st century. Was it not extinct over 100 years ago and even less talked about than dinosaurs? How it jumped out of our history books? It seemed as if we woke up to a different planet overnight.

When everyone was talking about how Artificial Intelligence will take over our lives for good and for bad, who knew that its not AI, it would be a small invisible virus that will mock the fragility of human life and rage a war against us with such fervor that we would lose the ground we stand on. All the life lessons we learned so far are up for a toss as the very ground those lessons were built upon does not exist anymore. While we sank into the marsh of the pandemic to land on a new ground beneath us, we had to let go of everything we knew. We held on to each other more firmly than ever and realized that when nothing helped; that we are in this together is enough to pull us through. Such is the power of human connection. However, it is so unfortunate that it took a devastating virus like COVID to learn the most basic lesson of our lives. 

The New Normal

After the initial shock, denial and disbelief, we all gathered our energies and revamped our lives. We allowed ourselves to fall apart because we knew this falling apart is not the end but the beginning of building something new. We threw our plans out of the window as holding on to them caused more pain.

Human knowledge in any field in this time and age has no limits but this pandemic has taught us that no matter how much we know, acquire and succeed, nature can throw a bigger challenge in our faces. More than anything this pandemic made us aware of our innate strength and capacity to adapt, evolve and learn. As Victor Frankle (Author of Man's search for meaning) rightly said: 

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way

When this virus was choking our lives, we still had one freedom that no one can take away from us. When the beautiful tomorrow of our imagination didn't exist, life still offered one promise to us and that is the promise of this very moment. We always have a choice to show up for now. Each morning we woke up, we were given another day to show up and make a difference. When something breaks, our immediate and most obvious reaction is to fix it. However, not everything in life is fixable. In-fact life needs no fixing. We do. It is the time when we should suspend our expectations from life and ponder what we can give to it. A lesson to learn from the front line workers, doctors and researchers who kept their fears aside and rolled up their sleeves to defeat the virus. Despite many losses, the future looks hopeful because they never failed to show up for the service of humanity. Let’s not forget to express our sincere gratitude to these torch bearers of indomitable human spirit who give us hope to get some semblance of normalcy back in our lives. 

When we are still crawling our ways back to the eye of the storm, returning back to normal holds different meaning for different people. Though everyone's life's trajectory was altered, people who lost their loved ones to COVID are the ones who inhabit a different universe and will not be able to return to normal in the ways others hope to. Returning to Pre- covid normal does not just mean that all businesses open up, people are socializing, kids are back to in-person school and we are back to our office facilities. It is much broader than that. It means healing from the traumas we will be holding within us for the years to come and to reach a point where we can leave all this firmly behind us. The reality of the new normal we are getting into post vaccination is yet to be tested. Can we handle a roller coaster stopping suddenly? It will feel very unsettling and dizzy. Covid has not only churned our lives but shredded it too. So instead of jumping into the new normal, let us slide into it for a smooth transition. Let us pick the pieces and weave a new tapestry, which is much stronger, enduring and resilient.

LIFE IS SHORT

As the sayings go:

'Life is a sexually transmitted disease and mortality rate is 100%.

'None of us will get out of here alive.'

We know that our time on this planet is finite but has the finitude of life been more apparent before than it is today? 

Someone has rightly said:

'As a society, when you have your mortality slapped in your face, it changes you'

Now the question is: how has Pandemic changed you? The shift in the ways we operate in our day-to-day lives has been monumental. But I am not talking about external changes. How the pandemic has changed us internally is the pressing question. Even if we get to a point where we get everything back in our lives the way it was (in pre-pandemic era), are we the same people we were? 

The changes inside are nothing less than astronomical. I would casually talk about 100 things to do before I die and thinking I have all the time in the world, I will get to it when I am older. Busy-ness is our excuse to push the things that matter. Except I can cross two things out of that list - Binge watching on OTT and gaining weight! (Do not get inspired, I am underweight). On a serious note, the pandemic has forced us to see our mortality in a different light. We learnt what matters. The lack and deprivation taught us the value of abundance we had. Social starvation made us hungry for building a better community life. When things are too close to our eyes, they look blurry. We failed to notice our blessings including the fresh air right below our nose, now coming to us through the mask. To understand the value of family, friends and our well-being, if we need something as catastrophic as COVID, then our pre-covid lifestyle must have been flawed. Here lies an opportunity to mend that life and reset to a new evolved one that brings more joy and meaning.  

Life has given us a lot and now it is a payback time. We can learn from any situation if we choose to, even from this virus. This virus is infectious but so is kindness and love. Virus does not discriminate so why do we? Virus mutates and we can evolve. Unless we grow with it, we will not be able to beat it. COVID might have isolated us physically but never have we felt this connected to each other in our efforts to come out of it by going through it collectively. Help and support we can offer to each other in these trying times will go far in building a society where people are more aware, responsible and compassionate. So keep showing up each day to whatever life offers. Just do our part and leave the future to itself. 

Thank you Tamanna for sharing this wonderful story with us! We are excited to have you in our global women’s network!

Bio: Tamanna Raisinghani, Software Engineer by Profession, living in Santa Barbara with husband and 2 daughters since 2004. I am an avid reader and being a night owl helps with catching up with my reading when daytime business does not allow me to read as much. I Love to write, be it code or stories (thankfully stories don't break like code. No compilation or runtime errors to worry about!). When not writing, reading or watching TV, I like to go on walks or hike with kids. 

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