Page 89 - Msingi Afrika Magazine Issue 9

RE - FLECTIONS

us into conforming into new defi- of where we are going after now. I Absolutely, we can’t shy away from
nitions of comfort zones and also have envisaged it for long and now this reality that somehow we have
forced us to begin to love those new there is a better reason to now do it. stepped into. It’s a weightless life of
spaces and we are fast becoming gathering nothing to oneself. It’s a
creative with it also. Almost uncer- I speak of a weightless and nomadic new age of living for love, compas-
emoniously and unapologetically, lifestyle, void of the many distrac- sion, mindfulness towards others,
we’ve been instructed to stay put tions that mankind has bedeviled kindness towards everyone and a
inside our homes and get involved himself with. A minimalist lifestyle better attention to nature and how
with the things and people we would that is devoid of encumbrances of our lives and health are tied to the
rather have wished to avoid if we life and the gathering of material health of mother nature. It certainly
were not grounded at home. And things that covid-19, in one move, is the one and only way to go, not
somehow, in a most grand manner, came to put to shame. just because it will help the environ-
many are being forced to deep-dive ment and others, but because we
within, re-look life from a different With all that is going on right now are the environment and we are the
perspective and with ample time to in our world, we have realized a few others.
re-evaluate our daily choices, beliefs, things, that is, we can live with less
opinions and even aspirations. and still be better and even happier. Is it possible?
Oh yes! It is possible a hundred
But while there is much to say It has shown that we don’t really percent more. But we just need to
about this issue, here is what I also need visas for anyone to live in any disabuse ourselves of the age long
think, in the midst of the pandemic foreign country or that it should be programming that we have struc-
linked to deforestation, biodiversity considered a crime for anyone to tured ourselves with, based on what
loss, and intensive animal farming, stay beyond the duration of the visa we were told was what a developed
economic breakdown and all the given. country or community should look
negatives that the pandemic brought like. Imagine if each and everyone
with itself, all roads still seem to It has shown us that we can actually of us had a small garden in our
point towards a life that is more sus- work at home and be very effective houses or planting buckets on our
tainable, compassionate and mind- without those crazy traffic jams we balconies where we planted simple
ful. That is, a life that is weightless generate every morning and evening medicinal herbs and vegetables?
and light enough to be flexible and due to movement to the office and Covid-19 would not have taken the
real. back. toll it took on us, for we would have
been prepared with our medicinal
Pretense, hyped reality, people pleas- It has shown that mankind can actu- herbs grown in our own backyards
ing, high-mindedness are all exam- ally produce less pollution, actually or balconies to deal with the hyped-
ples of dead weights that create not live simple within reduced means, flu called Covid-19.
only inhuman tendencies within us, pay more attention to family, the
but which also drain life out of us, kids and even learn to communicate Maybe I am alone in these thoughts,
filling us with negative energies that again with those who live around but I sincerely think that life is much
creates more weights and deadness us. Because for many generations, more simple than the complexity we
of soul. humans have tied happiness to new have created out of it.
shoes, new exotic places of fantasy,
Days have turned into weeks, weeks new cars, which are outside of the We can do without the weights and
have turned into months and many actual things that create happiness, the complexities. We just have to
of us are either still at home or have that is, a life of purpose lived with know that it is worth it, but only if
accepted the fact that working from others in mind. we give it a try.
home is actually more fun than sit-
ting in the office from morning till And if you ask me, I think we are For eight months and more, we have
night or are simply not sure of what closely going towards the genera- told ourselves that wearing mask on
the next things to do are. tion that will have no choice but to our faces like ninjas was good for
embrace the reality of minimalism, Covid, but what about the masks
My thoughtful resolution backpack living or a weightless and and the weights in our hearts and
I and whoever is paying attention light living of nomads. minds that no one sees?
must know that we are actually sure

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