A microbe, not a monster, has brought the world to its knees. The dividing lines of the impoverished and the privileged, East and West, the powerful and the powerless have disappeared. We are united in a disaster that seems to overwhelm humanity in a manner unthought of at the turn of a new decade. It is indeed a walls-down world as globalisation promised where the virus travels untrammelled across continents, carrying devastation in its wake. Nature has spoken and man has been put back in his place in the vast scheme of things.
Yet in the midst of every disaster lies hope for the strong-willed. They will find the strength to fight the invisible enemy behind closed doors, through self-imposed safeguards. Physical movement is to be restricted, social visits completely curtailed and people must turn inwards for the well-being of their own as well as the others outside. It is the inward eye that all of us have and kept shut most of the time that needs to open with a new vision. It is the compulsion of living with yourself and the small group with you that opens up immense possibilities. Look your spouse in the eye and say how much you love them, tell your children how happy you are to have them. Give love and bonding special space in these difficult times.
This is the time to go back to the masters who have shaped the world for us—writers, scientists, artists, philosophers and saints, those who would willingly speak to us and deliver universal truths if only we would listen. Whether it is a sonnet of Shakespeare or a bunch of Van Gogh’s sunflowers, or the simple act of a falling apple that stirred Newton, or the prophets of the Bible, the Gita or the Dhammapada, let us turn to them. It is also the time to look with new eyes at the golden sunrise at your window or the stars that twinkle through the dark skyscape.
It is also the time for greater reflection on the existential questions of life and death, peace and conflict, living meaningfully or just being. It is about having time in the midst of this ordeal to remember with gratitude those who have left us and treasure those around us whose love and presence we must value above the petty considerations of life. Viruses will come and go but what all of us will remember is the indomitable spirit of those fighting for us and with us. Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.
Sudha Devi Nayak
Email: sudhadevi_nayak@yahoo.com