Body and health: 2020 Gave Me a Bright Side

četvrtak, 31. prosinca 2020.

2020 Gave Me a Bright Side

From the Editors: Lessons Learned in 2020

2020 hasn't been an easy year for anyone. The Verywell Family, Fit, and Mind editors look back to reflect on their biggest challenges of the year and anticipate what's to come in 2021.

Nick Ingalls, Senior Editor

When someone tells you to "look on the bright side," it means something bad has already happened to you. It also means the advice you're about to get is probably unhelpful, because it's hard for someone else to find your bright side for you, even if they mean well. In 2020, the bad thing happened to everyone. How do you find the bright side of that? Still having your health and your job should be a baseline, not a silver lining.

A year ago, in a similar message to our readers, I wrote about working out when things are, well...not working out. I wrote about going with the flow, and creating habits when time is at a premium. Re-reading that message now made me realize that I somehow followed through on resolutions in 2020 more than I ever have before.

Frankly, that success was not because I tried harder or found a better way to set goals for myself. Simply put, it's because of the pandemic, and the 3 hours per day that I reclaimed by working from home instead of commuting. Whether it was getting more sleep, establishing a steady exercise regimen, working on house projects, or anything else I didn't have time for last year, I was able to fill these newly empty pockets of time with the habits I'd been desperate to form in years past.

By the sheer luck of having a job that allowed me to work from home for most of this year, I was able to find that bright side. I'm extremely grateful to even be in the position to manage some semblance of balance in a year of such extreme sameness and negativity. While 2020 often made it feel like it was impossible to get anything done, I've realized that finding self-improvement wherever I could has been more meaningful than some of the superficial things I've been missing out on.

As 2021 begins, so too will the work of making sure that bright side becomes a permanent fixture in my life even when the lure of the return to normalcy threatens to undo my progress. If I could find a bright side this past year, though, I like my chances to do it again once the crisis has passed.