The discourse around the COVID-19 pandemic has been fraught with the concept of ‘new normal’ and preparedness for the same. But isn’t normalcy a relative concept? The pandemic will eventually end, but how we deal with it will linger on.
By Dr. Debanjan Banerjee
“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.”
The French existential philosopher has often been remembered during the COVID-19 pandemic, courtesy his classic The Plague (La Peste, 1947). It makes us question, ‘What is normal?’ Why do we strive for it?’
Evolutionarily, humans are ‘social’ beings who love their connectedness and structure. There have been fundamental shifts in these two parameters since the pandemic started and subsequently intensified. Who would have thought that masks and sanitisers will become the most precious possessions in our households? Or that emotions will perpetually be masked for protection? Friendly hugs and handshakes prohibited, mourning for deaths banned, and any form of the travel restricted!
Also, that weddings can be modest, work can be effectively executed from home, rituals can be celebrated without a crowded extravaganza, and education can be facilitated online. Most ironically, who would have estimated our immense potential to spend time with ourselves and our family, segregated from the outer world – an exercise that was long due!
Same yet different
COVID-19 has created marked changes in socio-economic and psychological dimensions:
Pandemics are not an “on-off” phenomenon. They are chronic, persistent, and long-lasting. The real challenge begins once the threat of infection ceases. Even now, as the guidelines for ‘Unlock’ unfold and the cases rise, we have somehow accustomed ourselves to the “virus amongst us”. Economies, education, travel, social connections, national and international borders all are on the verge of slowing returning back to ‘normal’.
More than anything, the pandemic has brought to light the crevices in our understanding of ‘normalcy’ and the social fissures of our civilization. While the absence of overcrowding during the lockdown has rejuvenated ecological balance, the entrapment of humans has increased domestic abuse. On one hand, certain families have nurtured their broken ties, while on the other, some relationships have drifted apart even in closed rooms.
Certain sections of the population, like the age and gender minorities, the socially impoverished, the migrants, manual labourers, frontline workers, etc. are disproportionately affected by the outbreak and the grey lines of othering and discrimination have once again been highlighted markedly, thanks to COVID-19. While some of us might be engrossed in planning for the ‘new normal’, for many ‘normal’ is something that they have been striving for years now.
Course correction
But what is this ‘normal’ anyway? Normalcy evolves around our living and as we experience reality. In lines with the discussion all around, we can either crave for the ‘old normal’, grieve for it and aspire for things to go back to what it was, or we can attempt to live through the COVID-19 experience to embrace and witness a ‘modified normal’ where:
Since the outbreak, there have been discussions on policies for migrants, provisions for mental health, awareness about public health, prevention of child and elder abuse, cessation of intimate partner violence, protecting the homeless, and many other such ‘wishful thinking’! Well, all of these are equally necessary (if not more) now, as they were for years preceding COVID-19, while we have integrated these social evils into our perceived ‘normal’. In that sense, I am thankful for this experience of the pandemic as an eye-opener.
Millions of lives have been unfortunately lost, multiple businesses slashed, and industries bankrupted, which might have long-lasting psychosocial implications. However, humans are immensely resilient and have historically bounced back following multiple such disasters. Dr. Victor Frankl, the holocaust survivor and proponent of logotherapy, had coined the term tragic optimism to signify the human ability to appreciate and live the ‘purpose of life’ through the crises of guilt, suffering, and death (all three of which we are facing now).
The pandemic will eventually end, but how we deal with it will linger on. Masks, sanitisers, and vaccines might help us against a re-infection, but will do little to protect us from our inner demons, which the virus has brought to the limelight. Let us collectively assume the responsibility to live through this ‘modified normalcy’ incorporating the lessons the COVID-19 experience has taught us and eliminating the not-so acceptable social realities that we have for conveniently denied for long.
(The author is a Psychiatrist with NIMHANS, Bengaluru, and member of Health Analytics Asia’s FirstCheck.)
