Episode 16: Want Out of Quarantine? Do This First.
As I started writing this episode for you, I’m sitting outside with my family, my husband and I are sitting on a bench as we watch our kids ride their bikes, happily and with such freedom. Rarely do they have to stop playing to yell the warning known by kids everywhere, “CAR!”
I’ll be honest, this last week has been filled with joyful moments for me, much like the one I’m enjoying now. I’m a planet lover, and the stories around the world of the magic of less pollution and reports of beautiful acts of kindness have warmed my heart, as I’m sure they’ve warmed yours, too.
I know the danger and the unknowns are still out there, and I don’t mean to diminish them. But something pretty incredible is happening, too.
There was an article called “Prepare for the Ultimate Gaslighting” by Julio Vincent Gambuto that made it’s rounds around social media platforms and inboxes. You might’ve seen it.
** Update**
In August of 2023, Gambuto released a new book called, "Please Unsubscribe, Thanks!". You can grab a copy of that book by clicking here.
It’s so good. In fact it’s good enough that I wanted to shat just a little bit of it with you here.
Here’s a reading of my favorite part:
"I hope you might consider this: what happened is inexplicably incredible. It’s the greatest gift ever unwrapped. Not the deaths, not the virus, but the Great Pause.
It is, in a word, profound.
What the crisis has given us is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see ourselves and our country in the plainest of views. At no other time, ever in our lives, have we gotten the opportunity to see what would happen if the world simply stopped. Here it is. We’re in it.
And because it is rarer than rare, it has brought to light all of the beautiful and painful truths of how we live. And that feels weird. Really weird. Because it has…never…happened…before.
If we want to create a better country and a better world for our kids, and if we want to make sure we are even sustainable as a nation and as a democracy, we have to pay attention to how we feel right now. I can’t speak for you, but I imagine you feel like I do: devastated, depressed, and heartbroken.
And what a perfect time for Best Buy and J. Crew and Gwyneth Paltrow to help me feel normal again. If I could just have the new iPhone in my hand, if I could rest my feet on a pillow of new Nikes, if I could drink a venti blonde vanilla latte with two pumps of syrup, then this very dark feeling would go away.
And so the onslaught is coming. Get ready, my friends.
What is about to be unleashed on American society will be the greatest campaign ever created to get you to feel normal again. It will come from brands, it will come from government, it will even come from each other, and it will come from the left and from the right.
We will do anything, spend anything, believe anything, just so we can take away how horribly uncomfortable all of this feels. And on top of that, just to turn the screw that much more, will be the only effort even greater: the all-out blitz to make you believe you never saw what you saw.
The air wasn’t really cleaner; those images were fake. The hospitals weren’t really a war zone; those stories were hyperbole. The numbers were not that high; the press is lying. You didn’t see people in masks standing in the rain risking their lives to vote.
Not in America.
You didn’t see homeless people dead on the street. You didn’t see inequality. You didn’t see indifference. You didn’t see utter failure of leadership and systems.
But you did.
And so we are about to be gaslit in a truly unprecedented way.
Business and government are about to band together to knock us unconscious again.
It will be funded like no other operation in our lifetimes. It will be fast. It will be furious. And it will be overwhelming.
The Great American Return to Normal is coming.
From one citizen to another, I beg of you: take a deep breath, ignore the deafening noise, and think deeply about what you want to put back into your life.
This is our chance to define a new version of normal, a rare and truly sacred (yes, sacred) opportunity to get rid of the bullshit and to only bring back what works for us, what makes our lives richer, what makes our kids happier, what makes us truly proud.
We care deeply about one another. That is clear. That can be seen in every supportive Facebook post, in every meal dropped off for a neighbor, in every Zoom birthday party. We are a good people.
And as a good people, we want to define — on our own terms — what this country looks like in five, ten, fifty years.
This is our chance to do that, the biggest one we have ever gotten.
And the best one we’ll ever get. We can do that on a personal scale in our homes, in how we choose to spend our family time on nights and weekends, what we watch, what we listen to, what we eat, and what we choose to spend our dollars on and where.
We can do it locally in our communities, in what organizations we support, what
truths we tell, and what events we attend.
If we just want to live a simpler life, we can make that happen, too. But only if we resist the massive gaslighting that is about to come."
Again, that was written by Julio Vincent Gambuto. I highly HIGHLY, recommend you read the full article.
That last part “We want to define, on our own terms… if we want a simpler life, we can to that. This is our chance, the biggest one we’ve ever gotten.”
Oh man, can you hear the truth in that?
So, how do we do this? How can we start design your life after quarantine, the world we want to live in, on a macro and micro level, after this is over?
The answers, are coming up in this episode. Grab a pen and your favorite journal for this one.
So one of my favorite pastimes is puzzles. I love them. I love the dopamine rush that arrives when I finally find that one piece I’ve been searching for, or when I discover that I’ve had the wrong edge pieces in place, and rearranging them provides that magical opening I’ve been waiting for…
The quarantine has provided some great opportunities for me and my puzzles. Right now I have happen to be working on one of a beautiful French village by the sea.
I noticed took a break from it early Saturday morning, to return to it after a little walk. I was struck by the groupings I’d made.
All the red flowers were done, the blue table clothes and the blue sea and the cobblestone street that are at the heart of the puzzle.
And that’s when it occurred to me that we’re going to put our lives back together in much the same way I’ve been putting this puzzle back together.
By starting with the most vibrant parts of our lives, the most beautiful scenes, those that make us feel complete, but stand out.
We don’t have to go back to exactly the way things were, we can be selective about which parts of our lives we change, which we keep the same and which ones we alter, slightly.
I want you to think about your life right now, and decide what you want to keep for your life after quarantine.
Take just a second and write down maybe 3 to 5 things you’re really enjoying.
For me, that’s the improvement in the air quality, in the kindness of strangers and having lunch and a small walk with my kids every day. I also love that my kids aren’t scheduled the way they were before. We all eat dinner together now, something that was sort of hit or miss as the kids had opposing practices and classes most evenings.
OK, now that we’ve seen what you’re enjoying, let’s create a plan for you to execute once we “re-open,”whenever that happens.
Health:
What changes do you want to make around your health once we’re back?
Do you want to eat a more plant-based diet, or reduce meat to only once or twice a week?
How about your exercise? How often do you want to break a sweat? Go for a walk or practice some of the amazing body-weight exercise routines that have been floating around social media?
How often do you want to eat out? More often? Less often? Think about that now so you’re not just reacting when restaurants open back up.
Take a second now and create your healthy life after quarantine.
Relationships:
What do you want to make sure you put into your relationships once this is over?
Do you want to have a once-a-month brunch with your girlfriends? Sunday night zoom calls with family who are far away?
How about scheduled FaceTime calls with grandparents or siblings?
My husband and I have been taking hour long walks together on Saturday and Sunday mornings, we were just saying this weekend how lucky we feel, normally we’d be split up, I’d have been at a dance competition with our daughter, and he’d have been at a soccer game with our son.
So we made a pact this weekend that we’d make sure we go for hour long walks on the weekends once life starts back up again – even if it means those might have to take place at 6:00 in the morning to make sure they happen – because we love the alone time, we love that it’s free and we love that there are zero distractions from each other.
How do you want to design your relationships after quarantine?
Entertainment & Education:
Oh wow…this is a big one for most of us I think. I’ve seen tons of sharing on social media about what people are watching, what’s good, what’s silly and what’s worth our time.
What do you want to consume once you can go out again? Have there been shows, books or podcasts that you’ve been consuming more during quarantine? Do you enjoy that? Do you want to keep that up?
Have you enrolled in any new classes or studied anything new? Is there anything you’d like to add to this list before things go “back to normal”?
What you consume matters.
It dictates how you see the world and what your brain focuses on after you’re done consuming.
Be choosy about this one. Read books that either make you laugh and engage your imagination or that teach you something new and expand your view of the world.
There are so many exquisite works of art when it comes to our media, and so much garbage too. Stay choosy my friends, stay choosy.
OK, so now’s the time to create your plan around this one, too. How often do you want to watch tv or movies in your life after quarantine? What will you be watching? What will you avoid?
Do you want to create a movie night for the whole family? Would you want to create that as an outine (we love iPic) or as an in-home adventure (in full discloser, we do that, too … pizza movie night every Friday night..we love it).
Money:
Oh boy..the big one, right?
Maybe you or your spouse were furloughed during this time, and you’ve learned how to live without a whole bunch of things you once believed to be “necessary”.
Are they? Can you live with out them? Do you want to put them back in?
You know, money never lies. I love this about money. If you show me where you spend your money, I’ll tell you what your values are. It’s a true story. And it holds up, no matter what.
If you’ve spent your money on high quality food, or even donated and increased your charitable contributions, you know where your values lie.
If you’ve noticed you’re hoarding or scared or being stingy, what does that feel like for you? Does that hurt you or help you? Does it really make you feel better or does it make you feel like crap?
Now that you’ve had to be a little bit more picky, or spending has simply stopped because you can’t go out right now, you’re getting to see what your life would actually be like if you never ate out or went to the movies, or you didn’t shop quite as frequently as you used to, what do you notice?
Are you happier without all that stuff? Do you miss it?
What do you miss about it?
Where did you spend out of habit that’s had to stop?
Do you want to pick it back up again?
Or are you enjoying the “lessness” of it all, the freedom from stuff, from going out, from buying new clothes for every occasion or having to fill your gas tank every couple of days?
Be intentional about where you spend your money, and make a list of purchases you’re more than happy to keep out of the budget list now that they’ve been forced off the list.
Career and Contribution:
If you hate your job, or if you were laid off, or dismissed or you haven’t felt valued during this time, start thinking about how you want your career to look when we're out of quarantine.
Your career can be your source of contribution to the world. I know that’s 100% possible.
I say with a deep sense of gratitude and with a huge feeling of pride, as I’ve worked my tail off to create my career over the last 10 years, but my day-to-day life hasn’t changed that much during this stay at home order. I don’t get to see my trainer every
morning, which I really miss, and my kids are home, but other than that, my work hasn’t changed.
In fact, it’s been busier than ever as women all over the country have been reaching out to me for ideas and support on how to pivot their careers and businesses and how to keep the income coming in to the household.
You need to learn how to take your business online, you need to learn the technology and refuse to let anything stand in your way. Because the entire world just went virtual…everyone was just forced to go digital…now’s the time to learn how to be part of this new economy.
Let me tell you something right now, and this isn't meant to hurt anyone’s feelings or push anyone’s buttons, but I mean it from the bottom of my heart.
When you contribute through your work, when you’re the driver of your work meaning you’re responsible for the success of your business and your initiatives, something changes.
A fire gets lit deep within you that nothing can put out. Your purpose drives your work, your heart drives your work and when the stuff hits the fan, like it is now, you trust yourself to do what you need to do to make it happen.
So I want you to think about your career and your biggest driver of contribution right now. What does that look like for you? What do you want it to look like?
If you could wave a magic wand on your life right now, and you can imagine you're in life after quarantine, and you’re in control of your career and how you contribute to the world, what would that look like?
And listen, if you’re stuck on this, or you think this is only for other people, or you think you can’t take your business online I want you to know that I’m here for you.
I just opened up my Heart-Centered Business Bootcamp for over 50% off.
I never, ever discount my courses, but we’ve never, ever been in the middle of a great pause, either. If you want to join me to design your career and life after quarantine, now’s the time. I would love to teach you how to start and grow your business online, right now.
You can join us by clicking here.
I want you to be in control of your life after quarantine, woman.
In control of your health, your relationships, your entertainment and learning, your money and your career and how you contribute to the world.
Take this episode to heart, and design your life after quarantine, now. And whether you learn how to launch and grow your business with me or someone else, I don’t care. Do it. And do it now.
As Julio Vincent Gambuto said at the end of his article:
"We are a good people. And as a good people, we want to define — on our own terms — what this country looks like in five, ten, fifty years.
This is our chance to do that, the biggest one we have ever gotten.
And the best one we’ll ever get. We can do that on a personal scale in our homes, in how we choose to spend our family time on nights and weekends, what we watch, what we listen to, what we eat, and what we choose to spend our dollars on and where.
We can do it locally in our communities, in what organizations we support, what truths we tell, and what events we attend.
And, yes, if we just want to live a simpler life, we can make that happen, too. "
The time is now, the moment is here. Rebuild on your terms and design your life after quarantine while you're still in it.
