Today I had a bit of a conflict with someone in the neighborhood. I promise you that most people who live on the street where I live appear to be nice neighborly people. I have met some of them, and others probably saw me running or walking through the neighborhood. Today’s conflict is something that we will possibly see a lot more of throughout the country in some areas. With so many people being sheltered in place, and not knowing what to do, conflicts may arise. Some ill emotion may rise from something in the past. My best advice is to not engage.
What will you feed during this time?
If you are sheltering in place, then now may be a good time to saturate yourself with positive vibes. Take moments throughout the day to check in on where your thoughts are. With the news that we are hearing day in and day out, it is easy to feel pessimistic about the outlook of where we are. Acknowledge these feelings. They are your feelings, and they are valid. Considering for the time being we have to stay at home, after acknowledging your feelings, move on. Resolve to fill your space, your time, your home with doing all that brings light, positivity, and healing into your space.
If you get bored of that, start thinking about how you can extend all of what you have done at home to the rest of the world once we leave self isolation. If each of us learned a new skill, or spent time refining existing skills, and then shared it with the world. How amazing, creative, colorful, and loving the world will be. I know that I look forward to sharing my soaps with the world. I have all of the equipment that I need, and all of the ingredients needed (I think). I just have to make soaping happen.
In any event, while this is all fun, rainbow, and sunshines, there are some other things for the more realists type of people reading this blog. You will have to come back for the interview though!
Hearing from a professional
Earlier this week I reached out to several professionals about interviewing them for the blog. They have graciously agreed to do so. 🎉🙌🏽 One of the people I spoke with is Quaiser Abdullah. Quaiser has experience and training in learning, management, leadership training, communication and conflict resolution. Acknowledging that conflicts will arise, these conflicts may spill over outside of the home. In a few weeks, we will be hearing about conflict resolutions, and giving all of us some pragmatic advice on how to navigate conflicts that arise.
Overall, this was a wonderful day. I am excited to see what tomorrow brings to us. While I am sure there may be more conflicts that arise with this particular neighbor, I will focus on the positive in my situation. There is no need to allow someone’s 5 minutes of unpleasantness ruin the remaining 24 hours and 55 minutes of your day! We are better than that, and we deserve to honor our time as such.
Namaste
~Ony
