This time last year I wrote a blog post encouraging us to ponder on what we may need in our New Year, as we were in a third lockdown. I had been observing the behaviour and habits of my fellow Londoners’ who patronise my local park. I had considered how lockdown brought us to a point where we, as humans can decide or not to be thankful for the smaller everyday things in life. For example….bread, food home, family, friends work, community….etc..and encouraged us to not focus on the major disgruntles or dissatisfactions we may be experiencing, which are probably minor compared to many who are suffering.

So today 9th and 16th January 2022, I’m wandering my park on Sunday lunchtime, people watching; nature bathing, reflecting, listening and looking on, as an amateur culturologist does on sunny days. I’ve overheard converstations about travel, about work, arguments about dogs, seen people sitting, reading or listening to their tunes on their headphones,others chatting on their phones or with one another.

The gentle chitter chatter of children’s voices creates a humm from the play park, planes fly overhead, birds tweet and generally a happy sound is evident. Life is nearly back to normal, or is it ? What is normal? As we were before March 2020? As we were before the Covid foe landed and many thousands died, or lost jobs or families broke down, or children lost schooling, or cancer patients lost their chemotherapy appointments. If you are waiting for normal to return then wait on…it may be a shock… I HAVE NEWS FOR YOU….because we and the rest of the world has changed…permanently.

In my counselling and psychology studies I learnt about psychological flexibility, it’s a term used to define and then ascertain how flexible mentally and behaviourally we are when changes happen. We can assess how adaptive cognitively we are and how we’ll we adapt to new behaviours or restrictions placed upon us.

As psychology researchers suggest, the key to our ability to thrive and survive depends on our levels of psychological flexibility. The ability to adapt to new situations is something, we as humans have been doing for millenia, but somehow in our 21st century mindset it seems like our ability to be psychologically flexible has frozen and we just want it the way it was before the pandemic… Normal!

May I suggest that the best way to approach our lives are with the mindset of new normal… being ready to change our ideas and plans.. then try to be flexible and not rigid. Forgiving not resentful and learn to shift into a new gear…it may feel like reverse or chugging in 1st gear up hill, but until we find our new gear we will be running in to brick walls and culde sacs. Metaphorically speaking. It’s a well researched fact that older people who manage to survive and flourish are able to change and adapt to their new situations. As I observe my neighbours, many of whom are octogenarian or older I can see that they implement change into their daily routines. They are resourceful, determined, cheerful and resilient. Some aren’t, and their development and ability to be open to new ideas may have ceased at 50 or 60 years of age, they struggle with new ideas or problems or technologies. Observing them has encouraged me to reflect on my psychological flexibility and how I’ve adapted and studied for a degree through lockdown and how I had to adapt to new ways of learning and coubselling, as did my colleagues and tutors. In my creative therapy group we were encouraged to create a mantra for ourselves.. so on reflection …my mantra for the New Year of 2022 is taken from the very first Psalm in the Old Testament part of the Bible..my adaptation goes like this ‘I will be like a tree planted by the waters edge, my roots will go down deep and my leaves will always be fresh and green.’ I will be mentally agile in my silver years and always look on the brighter side of life where possible’. I hope you can join me in writing your own mantra for 2022 and send me a copy. From One Pearl to Another Mags Lewis January 15th 2022.

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