We keep hearing about “the new normal”; but that is because most are still clinging to the hope of returning to the past – “the old normal”.
A quote from a recent post to the Jack’s Winning Word blog comes to mind – “If you have a hard time forgetting the past, remember you can’t drive a car forward by looking into the rearview mirror.”
I’ve written here in the past about letting things go, usually about mistakes that one has made or old relationships that went awry; but, this is different. When your whole way of life is impacted by events it is harder to find a way to let go of how things were and move on with how things are. Really big events, like wars or the happening of 9/11 or pandemics can dramatically reshape our lives and take a long time to put behind us.
We do need to stop looking back at how things were and start figuring out the best way forward in our “new normal”. Many have already taken the step of procuring stylish face masks, having decided that if one has to wear a mask, it should at least be stylish or attractive. I suspect that most also carry hand sanitizer with them and take the time to sanitize often. Most are practicing some amount of social distancing and I suspect that will continue for a while. It may take a while for many of us to get comfortable in crowded spaces or to allow personal touch at places, such as barbershops and hair salons, but that will come out of necessity.
We must also deal with the permanent changes in our economy that this crisis has caused– the companies, stores and restaurants that will now be gone and the business practices that have changed. This crisis exacerbated an already troublesome trend for some merchants of people shopping on-line instead of in their stores. Many more people stayed home and shopped at Amazon, Wayfair, Chewy or other on-line stores than would have otherwise. Many local merchants also joined the on-line trend as a way to survive during the crisis, but they will likely still depend upon local foot traffic for their future; it will just be a little different in the stores.
Restaurants were probably hardest hit, with many not expected to reopen (estimates are that between 10-15% of all restaurants will be permanently closed). Those that do reopen will present a very different look to patrons, with capacity limitations and social distancing constraints greatly impacting the dining experience. The menu’s may be the same, but “going out to eat” will never quite be the same. Still, it’s better than staying home to eat and we can still see other people – they are only 6’ away.
It can take a generation or two for these big, life-changing events to be pushed down in our consciousness to the point where we don’t think of them often. Those who lived through them seldom forget them, because they remember what life was like before them. Those born after the event have no frame of reference for how things here. For them “the new normal” is just normal.
So, here we are, about to start the “new normal”. A big first step will be putting the old normal behind us instead of continuing to look in that rear view mirror. Let it go and let’s move on.
My, what a stylish mask you have on, where did you get that?
NormsMilfordBlog 
[…] Trips down memory lane should be made with out regrets. Spending time on regrets for things long in the past is more wasteful than time spent in anxious worry about things yet to come. At least when worrying about the future, one still has the ability to change the outcome. The same is certainly not true about revisiting past failures or potholes in your memories. I have posted here a few times about forgetting things and moving on – most recent in conjunction with the Corona Virus pandemic (See https://normsmilfordblog.com/2020/05/16/let-it-go-and-move-on/) […]