We, the human race, are in the grip of a global airborne disease pandemic. Regardless of interpretation of the severity of this problem, everyone is, on some level, struggling through restrictions being externally placed on comings and goings. Many of us aren’t leaving home. Others leave only under certain circumstances. Still others leave to go to a work environment that is risky for them and their families.

Psychologically, mentally, emotionally, many people are struggling. Extroverts may be struggling more than those who savor indoor time. I happen to know a few who are having a particularly rough go of it.

While we don’t know for how long these restrictions will continue, there ARE ways to get through the next X number of months. I have my own time-occupiers (pandemic or not) that keep me engaged in normal times, let alone in the strange days we are in now.

Here are some things I do on a regular basis. They fall within three categories. Feel free, mysterious readers, to steal any of them for yourselves:

Learning:  making lists; learning (or improving) a language; taking photos; design of anything; traveling through the remarkable power of Google Earth; and anything that involves watching hours of YouTube videos.

Creating:  making lists; writing a story or essay or even free-writing; finding new recipes for ingredients you already have; making new recipes; writing a new blog post.

Planning:  making lists; going through budget; filing; organizing; throwing things away; coming up with a plan for when this whole thing ends. Because it will.

Making lists is in all categories, because it is practically a prerequisite to everything I do.  Physical fitness takes up a lot of the day, too.  With all the fitness studios and gyms offering free trials and online classes, an argument could be made that some of us could all come out of this ordeal healthier than we went into it! Today two workouts made it into my day (vinyasa yoga and barre) but only because I couldn’t decide which one to do, so I did both.

And honorable mention must go to the two recipes that comprised my dinner:  This one and this one.  Feel free to poach those, too.  Par excellence!