Isolation from COVID-19 pandemic calls for resourcefulness: engagement and ways to encourage exercising the mind and body.
_____
Many nations, including Nigeria, are on lockdown to contain the spread of Coronavirus. This brings to mind that we had been enjoying the privilege of liberty all along without even knowing it! The powerful is shaken, and the vulnerable weakened even the more.
States closed their borders to forestall movement of persons. Except for the medical sector and food markets, businesses, institutions, and offices are on lockdown.
In major cities and towns across Nigeria, the story is the same. Happy and active women and men remain confined at home doing less than they normally would; sometimes with little children. In Ogun, Lagos and the Federal Capital Abuja people have been confined to their residences for more than 576 hours, and with epileptic power supply under scorching heat. With food or no food on their table; these difficult circumstances are more than one can bear without a conscious effort to escape depression.
Rather than sitting idly by the window counting hours or just staring at the ceiling, it’s time to do things differently.
Positive mind engagement, productivity, and optimistic disposition are some of the ways of staying strong to see the end of the pandemic. The heart’s nature will radiate on the face giving you the strength to overcome whatever may come your way. Rather than sitting idly by the window counting hours or just staring at the ceiling, it’s time to do things differently.
Between 5 am-8 am every morning, at different corners and streets within the Enugu metropolis, residents are seen taking a walk, jogging, or running in their struggle to keep fit. Parents and their children are exercising because all gyms and amusement places are lockdown.
Listen and get to know your children better. Spring clean your home, get creative in the kitchen but reduce the quantity of food you eat to have positive results from your exercises.
It’s time to acquire skills, take regular exercise, read books with exciting characters that have positive impacts on young minds. Download games that can thrill your children and challenge their minds to sound reasoning while making up for the continuous period of absenteeism from school. Listen and get to know your children better. Spring clean your home, get creative in the kitchen but reduce the quantity of food you eat to have positive results from your exercises.
The lockdown is a perfect key to unlock your hidden potentials, and with the aid of the internet, one can learn skills and be productive even now. Bring out that sewing machine packed in the storage room and get to work. Play scrabble, tend to your garden if you have one. Just think outside the box and get busy.
Over 120 participants and I were beneficiaries of a free skill acquisition program organized by Joy Onyesoh Foundation, a Non-Governmental Organization. Isolation from COVID-19 pandemic calls for resourcefulness: engagement and ways to encourage exercising the mind and body. Joy Onyesoh foundation planned and executed two weeks’ online worship and training on hair accessories, throw pillows, turbans, and hair fascinators. With just needle and thread, we were able to achieve much, and so you can if you set your heart to it.
The lockdown had denied us our liberty. It confines us to our lone home territory. It reduces our bound to mere online-links, but don’t let it drown you.
The lockdown had denied us our liberty. It confines us to our lone home territory. It reduces our bound to mere online-links, but don’t let it drown you. Go ahead and enroll in online training: download E-books, movies, and games engaging yourself effectively and far away from depression.
Here are some links to online books that can be of interest to you in the PDF file below from Springer Ebooks. These books were made freely downloadable due to the lockdown.
Similarly, educational programmes have begun on radio Nigeria for primary and secondary school students who are yet to take their POST UTME and other exams. Take hold of this rare opportunity to make yourself better, read at your own pace and assimilate at your speed.
When this lockdown is over, we will look back and smile because we pulled through.
♦ Ije Ulasi is an Assistant Editor and Regional Correspondent with WAP
