The Pandemic Blues

 

September 2021

These are stressful times and people deal with stress in different ways.

For some it is basically intolerable and so denial is used in great measure to hide one’s self away.  “Ignore it and it will go away.”  The problem with this is that there are real dangers that will not disappear if we don’t look at them and pretend they do not exist.  This is how one potentially sleep walks off of a cliff.

With so much insecurity and uncertainty in times like these there are also those who look for absolute assurances and certainties to steady their boat (it’s very similar to denial in that they are mostly illusions we create).  Everything becomes black and white.  One must be all right while others are all wrong.  It is easy to become impervious to any counterargument or information that contradicts our chosen absolute narrative.  This seems to be particularly true when it comes to our present political divide.  

It can be reassuring, but it is also intellectually lazy and opens one up to being unnecessarily ignorant.  And in the case of a pandemic, possibly dead.

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