Please note…these are not my words but I wanted to share them through Elephant Journal while I share my own story about what I am seeing. I was far from home actually staying in Vietnam, a neighbor to China. Vietnam seemed to have everything well contained and things were harmonious until someone from Europe reintroduced the virus back into the country. Then it seemed that the Vietnamese were not so happy with our presence. I recognized it was time to go home. I had been thinking about it since the end of February as Vietnam had been so hyper aware that there was trouble in the atmosphere. You could just kind of feel it.

I was extremely tense and feeling like a mess for weeks. I tried to shift my thoughts but it’s like I didn’t have any power to do that. All my practicing of mindfulness was being tested and I was ultimately failing. I forgot my foundations. A few days before I got out of Vietnam, I saw this post on Facebook and it brought me back into a balanced state. Made me see outside of myself.

I had my own problems dealing with being so far from home when shit hit the fan but really, everyone is affected. The letter below will stop you in your tracks and make you think. Really, what is the message for this virus that has forced us all to look at life in a totally different way? We lost our way and now we’re being highly tested. I believe all of this is going to change us. I hope it’s in a good way as opposed to some paranoid, germ-a-phoebe kind of way. I hope we appreciate the joys of having a picnic out in public. Embrace our freedoms after quarantines. When all we have is our phone to communicate right now, it doesn’t really feel like a great blessing. We will see that we need one another.

Many of us will probably have to spend time alone in a way we never have. We can no longer avoid all of the things we have been. We can’t just go shopping to ease the pain of a break up we never dealt with 5 years ago. All of our security is being ripped out from under us. This is a time of great growth and of course great unknowing. For those of us who like things to be in our control, this is an especially challenging time. Can you learn from it?

That’s my two cents. Please enjoy An Imagined Letter from Covid-19 to Humans:

Stop. Just stop.

It is no longer a request. It is a mandate. We will help you. We will bring the supersonic, high speed merry-go-round to a halt We will stop the planes the trains the schools the malls the meetings the frenetic, furied rush of illusions and “obligations” that keep you from hearing our single and shared beating heart, the way we breathe together, in unison.

Our obligation is to each other, As it has always been, even if, even though, you have forgotten. We will interrupt this broadcast, the endless cacophonous broadcast of divisions and distractions, to bring you this long-breaking news: We are not well. None of us; all of us are suffering. Last year, the firestorms that scorched the lungs of the earth did not give you pause. Nor the typhoons in Africa,China, Japan. Nor the fevered climates in Japan and India.

You have not been listening. It is hard to listen when you are so busy all the time, hustling to uphold the comforts and conveniences that scaffold your lives. But the foundation is giving way, buckling under the weight of your needs and desires. We will help you. We will bring the firestorms to your body We will bring the fever to your body We will bring the burning, searing, and flooding to your lungs that you might hear: We are not well. Despite what you might think or feel, we are not the enemy.

We are Messenger. We are Ally. We are a balancing force.

We are asking you: To stop, to be still, to listen; To move beyond your individual concerns and consider the concerns of all; To be with your ignorance, to find your humility, to relinquish your thinking minds and travel deep into the mind of the heart; To look up into the sky, streaked with fewer planes, and see it, to notice its condition: clear, smoky, smoggy, rainy?

How much do you need it to be healthy so that you may also be healthy? To look at a tree, and see it, to notice its condition: how does its health contribute to the health of the sky, to the air you need to be healthy? To visit a river, and see it, to notice its condition: clear, clean, murky, polluted? How much do you need it to be healthy so that you may also be healthy? How does its health contribute to the health of the tree, who contributes to the health of the sky, so that you may also be healthy?

Many are afraid now. Do not demonize your fear, and also, do not let it rule you. Instead, let it speak to you—in your stillness, listen for its wisdom. What might it be telling you about what is at work, at issue, at risk, beyond the threats of personal inconvenience and illness? As the health of a tree, a river, the sky tells you about quality of your own health, what might the quality of your health tell you about the health of the rivers, the trees, the sky, and all of us who share this planet with you? Stop. Notice if you are resisting. Notice what you are resisting. Ask why. Stop.

Just stop. Be still. Listen. Ask us what we might teach you about illness and healing, about what might be required so that all may be well. We will help you, if you listen.

(Author unknown)