Balancing our emotions during Corona crisis.

Balancing our emotions during Corona crisis.

The corona pandemic has given rise to a very volatile situation of emotions running high
in various contexts. It has created many new ‘normals’ that need to be learned, adopted
and make these a part of our essential tools to function effectively in life. At home when
all the family members are together 24/7 due to lockdown, it may lead to more conflicts
and irritations arising out of small things. Outside home, in the healthcare setting, there is
the fear of getting the virus among the healthcare workers as they are directly dealing
with the corona affected and suspected cases. The law enforcing personnel also have a
hard time dealing with the emotions of the people out there on the street, ensuring
compliance of the governments’ directives and guidelines, and maintaining their own
emotional balance in the entire process. The poor, the migrant and daily labour workers
are experiencing a very tough time where they find it very hard to manage their emotions
in the face of job loss and other hardships related to their daily living. The young
generation is confused as their studies and job aspirations have been hit hard and they are
facing the uncertainties in their education timeline. The elderly are also living with
constant fear of running short of their medicines and fear of getting the virus or falling ill
otherwise also.
Alongwith these fears, anxieties and confusion, the crisis has created new demands to
which we need to match up. Everything has become online and we need to learn the
digital skills to adapt successfully to the situation. Digital skills has become the new life
skill and that too the most important life skill now.
All these emotions affect our personal, family, interpersonal and work life. So we need to
learn how to balance our emotions in this Corona crisis which will help us to fight this
crisis at a psychological front.
Given below are a few strategies on how to maintain emotional balance in the present
Corona crisis:
• Be aware about yourself: Know your emotions, identify exactly what are the
emotions you are experiencing and in which kind of situation.
• Use ZOHARI window technique: It is a tool for self awareness and opens up four
areas in one’s life based on things that are known as well as unknown to self and
others.
• Focus on your thoughts: In addition to knowing about your emotions, focus on
your thoughts also. Many a times our thoughts are not based on facts. Hence it is
important to identify our thoughts as they lead to feelings and actions.
• Schedule your time: Structuring the time will give you a framework and avoid the
anxiety and uncertainty about what to do. This kind of feeling helpless about what
to do may arise where you feel you have nothing to do now since you are at home
due to lockdown, or you feel you have so many things to do in this lockdown
period. When you schedule the time, it reduces this overwhelming feeling and
identifies what you will do with your time now. However, one thing to be noted
here is that it should not be a strict regimented schedule which again will lead to
anxiety and stress. Schedule your time with a little amount of flexibility. Do not
try to make every minute of yours or your child’s time accountable or filled with
some activity or the other.
• Give space to each other: Schedule in ‘me’ time as this is required to rejuvenate
and regenerate yourself because otherwise you get caught up in the demands of
household tasks, family members, especially small children and elderly, and work
assignments/demands. Let others in the family also have their own ‘me’ time.
• Engage in hobbies/interests: This is the time to take up hobbies (of course, those
you can do indoor) that you always wanted to do, but could not find time to do
earlier. You can form online groups also to pursue your interests and hobbies.
You just need to be creative in thinking of ways to engage in your passion.
• Create a family space: Alongwith personal space, create a family space also
where all the family members can do something together – thus schedule in family
time where all the members spend their time doing something together. It may be
playing something, exercising, cooking, seeing a particular programme or a
movie, or just sitting together and sharing memories and singing.
• Create a family culture: A family culture refers to something that you do regularly
and religiously and it is fixed, e.g., reading a story together before bedtime, saying
prayers in the evening, doing meditation in the morning, playing a board game
after lunch twice a week etc. This gives a sense of predictability and makes the
bonding strong.
• Meditation and breathing exercises: Engage in regular breathing exercises and
meditation that will help bring calmness inside you.
• Reflect on the meaning of life: Any crisis situation offers an opportunity for
reflection on one’s life. You can reflect on the higher purpose in your life and
understand the essence of life. The Corona crisis has made us realize the positive
aspects of life more.

So check your thoughts, check your feelings and emotions, check your actions and check
your meaning of life. Pay attention to all these from time to time, write them down in the
form of a journal or diary. This will help you to be more mindful and achieve emotional
balancing during this Corona crisis.
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Article By: *Prof. Swati Patra, Discipline of Psychology, SOSS, IGNOU

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