“If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.”
- Mother Teresa
One thing the last year has made us do is stay home and love our families. While 2020 (or the entire pandemic as it stretches into 2021) has been challenging, scary, stressful, and even tragic for so many of us, I don’t so easily identify with the “2020 sucked” mentality.
On the contrary, I was constantly grateful for one overriding change: WE SLOWED DOWN. Carpooling, planning, scrambling, being here physically while being somewhere else mentally, traveling for days at a time for work — all of it stopped.
We built a garden. We cursed the garden for it’s paltry yield. We laughed at ourselves when we bought tomatoes at the supermarket instead. We ate around the dinner table. We swam almost everyday. My wife schooled my son in 1-on-1 basketball. I taught both children to skateboard. I lowered my cholesterol, naturally. I slept better hours. We played more board games. I learned to hate the board game Trouble. We failed at a very large puzzle. We baked all sorts of stuff, some of it even edible. We ate more tomatoes. On and on.
I lived in the moment more. I made myself more present. I loved my family more. And the world is better for it.