2020- A Perspective Paradox

A paralyzed world;
Cast by an eternal gloom of sickness, death, and disease;
With a racist generation spread across seas;
But a mental health, no longer preserved.

Well, I’d say you got that right. 2020, summed up, pretty much. The year that seemed like the golden jubilee of our lives, didn’t turn out that amazing did it?
What with feisty summer plans, and graduation ceremonies going through the roof ,we got caught pretty vulnerable, slowly floating away from the life we used to recognize. Saturday night shenanigans, frequent outings, dreamy holidays and
friendly hugs seem a little too far-fetched now don’t they? Truth be told, we happened to go full circle this year(that supposedly felt like forever), and guess what, those Instagram-worthy lives just slipped away from our reach, and well, live
in our memories now. More precisely, the first half of 2020 was a rollercoaster of cribs, complaints, curses, and indubitably, heightened emotions. Being locked indoors, having unrealistic virtual meetings, while looping through the same, old,
monotonous routine was clearly not what we had in mind.

But guess what, the universe had other plans.

A healing world;
On its road to recovery,
An awakening generation, open to discovery;
With mental health, no longer a stigma hurled.

A slight shift in perspective makes a world of a difference. Proof, that it took a deadly pandemic to open our eyes to our healthcare needs. Was staying indoors all that bad? Suddenly, being safe was more important than being stuck. What were the odds that the existence of a deadly microbe led us to prioritize our wellbeing? The earth that was once succumbing to the irreversible actions of humanity, was breathing again. Call it what you want, but seems like we got another shot at life, life that we now knew the value of. Blinded we were, however, by our apparently progressive mindset, because developed minds didn’t engage in racial prejudice and
division ceased to exist in a prospering society. Contradicting may be the case, grief and loss, stressed the importance of mental health, a social stigma, that we once
seemed to avoid.

2020 inspired us, awakened us, and empowered us.

Here’s to the year that taught us that the lessons of the day before weren’t enough.
Everyday was a battle that humanity had to fight together.

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What’s something you took back this year?

-Reva Agarwal