Coping when something you love has been taken away

The Coronavirus pandemic has undoubtedly been one of the biggest collective challenges many of us have seen in our lifetime. Beyond the obvious devastation of the heart-wrenching loss of life and economic repercussions, the psychological impact may also be long-lasting. For me, not being able to travel has taken a big adjustment.

I live to travel. It is the reason I came to Japan. I love seeing new places and gaining new perspectives. Nature empowers me. I feel connected and grounded when seeing the world from the top of a mountain or staring out to sea. My own problems seem to fade away and a feeling that things will just work out settles over me. It’s like a spiritual reboot. Everything about a new place fills me with a sense of adventure and excitement. The climate, the architecture, the language, the customs, the food, the sounds, the smells, the sights, everything. Not being able to travel leaves me feeling frustrated and impatient. I sometimes feel like I’m being suffocated to be honest.

Getting away

When things got stressful or too predictable in our daily life, my family would often just spontaneously decide to go somewhere. We’d quickly book a hotel, pack up the car and be off within hours. Longer trips, I would of course plan in advance. We’ve been all over Japan. Our longest road trip was about four years ago, when we took a ferry up to Otaru in Hokkaido. We drove the 2000km back home, over 12 days, focusing on the Tohoku region in Northern Japan. By the age of 10 my girls had been to almost every prefecture and even as far south as Ishigaki and Iriomote islands in Okinawa.

Last summer I had flights booked for me and the girls to fly into Istanbul and out of London. The plan was to travel overland across Europe by train. We were really excited about the trip. I had the girls get involved and start researching places they might like to see and take part in planning our route. Of course no one had any idea that the world was about to completely change.

Disappointment

Cancelling the tickets was disappointing. So was not being able to fly home to England for Christmas, and having to cancel plans to have my family come and visit. The problem was though, it was hard to vocalize that disappointment publicly. What are cancelled travel plans in the face of death and illness, collapsing health systems, people losing their jobs and livelihoods and families being torn apart? What right did I have to complain about something so trivial? So I shoved that feeling down hard and told myself it couldn’t be helped.

The thing is though, don’t we all often find ourselves doing this, in many areas of our lives? How often do we deny our feelings over disappointments because we feel self-conscious about making a fuss when ‘others have it much worse’? A sad fact of life though, is that there will always be someone who has it worse. It’s pretty much a guarantee. So what do we do? Bury our authentic experiences and keep quiet? Or do we accept them and put them out there because someone may relate and validation and empathy are the things that connect us as human beings? How many times have you heard someone complain about a problem and secretly think to yourself, wtf are they complaining about? My life is way harder! I suspect it may happen more than anyone would like to admit.

Japan and the pandemic

The truth is, Japan has been relatively less affected by the pandemic compared to some other countries. We haven’t suffered high death rates or extended lockdowns. People here have been asked to refrain from unnecessary travel and outings, but for the most part life has gone on as normal. I think the biggest personal impact for me last year was when the children had three months of school closures. Already being familiar with zoom, I adapted to teaching my university classes online fairly quickly. I actually found a lot of benefits to that way of teaching that I will continue to incorporate long after the pandemic subsides.

Japan already had a mask culture. Many people, myself included, often wore them anyway during flu or allergy seasons and while using public transport. So constant mask wearing quickly became the norm. Shops erected plastic screens, restaurants and supermarkets placed hand sanitizer in the doorways and some places started checking for fevers before you were allowed entry. Thankfully, the number of official cases has remained low in my region. I’ve met up with friends, attended my piano lessons, been out to eat and the kids have been in school since last June. Aside from the not being able to travel, my life hasn’t changed all that much really.

Local travel

Even though the numbers are relatively low here, especially in the countryside, I have still been cautious about taking the family away. Back in November, we did go to an art island, called Naoshima which is not far from Okayama, between Honshu and Shikoku. It didn’t seem too risky though as we drove and stayed in a very small guest house. Aside from that I have been to stay with friends a couple of times.

I would love to take the girls on a trip this spring break. We actually sat down and considered it, but I have decided it is probably best not to at this point. I must say though, the fact we have pretty much been everywhere did play a part in this decision.

The advantages of not being able to travel

Despite my frustration and impatience for the world to open up again, I do have to admit to some advantages of not being able to travel. The biggest one is that, since my work was thankfully largely unaffected, we have been able to save money towards our next trip. We would probably have been on quite a strict budget, had our original jaunt across Europe been able to go ahead. But by 2022, I am hoping we won’t need to be as restrained. (Assuming prices don’t skyrocket of course…) Another huge advantage is that my recent decision to quit drinking will definitely make the trip cheaper than it would have been in summer 2020!

I am not sure if it is only down to the pandemic, but I believe it has had a profound impact on the way I’ve reexamined my life and what I want to do. This time last year I was focused on a new online teaching business. I wanted to create courses and an English speaking community. I even built a website and opened a Facebook group for that purpose. However, I’ve since realized that my real passion is writing and that I had adapted my business goals to fit in with what I thought I “ought” to be doing, as opposed to what I really want to do.

The future

I believe over the last year many people have looked at their lives and thought about what is truly important to them. In March 2020 I was fearful of what the future would bring. Now, a year later, I am excited and hopeful. The pandemic has taught me that we can’t predict and control everything. We need to remain flexible and open to possibilities we didn’t consider. I think this is what has helped lead me to question things that I had previously thought were unquestionable.

Living your life as if on a treadmill, safe and predictably, is probably more common than you’d think. Stepping out and doing something different is hard. Outside criticism may come from a place of love, but it can also be influenced by the critic’s own fears or even unacknowledged envy. Many people live their life with regrets about things they wish they had tried or done. I’ve decided I’m not going to live my life like that. I am going to reach for my dreams and be able to look back and say, well at least I tried. Failure isn’t a concept I really believe in anyway. Setbacks are just stepping stones, that teach you how to move forward. The key is to remain open to sometimes being taken in a direction you hadn’t envisaged.

I’m eagerly awaiting the day I can rebook my trip across Europe and I believe it will come. In the meantime, I will honor my feelings about not being able to travel. I throw my hands up and admit: it absolutely sucks. However, I also choose to remain mindful and grateful for the lessons the pandemic is teaching me.