These days, the world is coming to a still. Seems that just about everywhere it’s the same – people stay at home, worry about their jobs, social contacts at minimum… For many people, work (and a steady income) has become endangered, and many are thinking how to start an online business, work from home, create something they can sell, and get those few extra bucks. Also, stress is getting hold of many, and health problems might make the situation even worse.
Actually, we all are going a little bit crazy.
We’re just not acustomed to being caged
Do you miss that morning coffe with your friends in your favourite coffee shop? Of course you do, me too. We used to sit every day, sometimes for 15 minutes, sometimes longer, enjoy each other’s company, drinking coffee and planning (and complaining about) the day ahead of us. It’s such a minor thing, so – I don’t know. But we’ve been doing it for years (20+), and we all really miss it.
Families have became used to the timeline in which we all have something to do, go to school, work, shop, gym, whatever. Now, we’re sitting tight in our appartments, forced to be together much more than we’re used to. It shows already; just in our small town, last week there have been over 80 divorces filed. Which is not far from the yearly average. It happens simply because many relations became empty, which you can sustain if you’re always busy – but not if you’re having time to face it.
People are going crazy
These conditions bring us all back to ones self; you either can function or you can’t. You have to discuss, plan, act accordingly, and before all support each other. And being nervous about the possible disease does not help a bit.
Have you noticed how people changed their behaviour in the last few weeks? We’re all using opportinities to go outside a little (I hope you get that chance also), maybe for a walk or anything, just to get out of the box. And the people we meet simply act different, ourselves included – they say hello much more often than before, but at the same time we all somehow take care not to get too close to each other. Some distance have become obvious, and by the time this is over I think we will become acustomed to it.
Me, I’m a very social person; the first days of this s**t I had so many problems with myself… Luckily, we own a small house, so there’s always something to do. But the regular schedule just fell apart. You know, time for a coffee – no, wait, everything is closed. Oh, I need that tool to fix this – nah, they’re closed also. And so on. So many confusing moments in a day…
Stress is kicking in, as well as panic attacks, and for many people these conditions are terrifying.
What have we lost?
Our business was heavily organised around field maintenance of printers for the past 10+ years, so you can imagine what happened. Practically, we fell from driving around all days and fixing things to sitting and staring at the computer screen most of the work hours. Of course, money flow has followed this. Or stopped, if you want. Now, I’m not saying this is all we do, because we’re programmers and we do a lot of time on computers, but still. We’ve lost a great deal of our income for the time being.
Social contacts we’ve lost for sure. I have a son and a daughter living 20km away, and we haven’t met since it began. Also, I haven’t held my grand daughter (5 months old) for over two weeks now, and I won’t for some more. It’s tough, but we speak every day and we even tested video calls which is actually new for me as I’ve never used this tech before. Who would have thought, it works. 🙂
What have we gained?
But, we gained time.
So far, it’s been more or less trying to reorganise and use all tha extra time usefuly. but we’re getting into it. Heck, we’ve even baked bread a few days ago, something I haven’t done in decades. It was fun, actually, and we had lots of laughs when we saw the outcome.
We took many coffees on the balcony these days, and we’ve seen so many things have to be taken care of around the house. So we started, first there was a bit of cleaning, then the roses neede some care, the grass in the front yard needs attention, and so on. When you do all these and feel a bit tired in the evening, you feel good; you achieved something, and you did it for yourself. Try it, it does wonders for the mind.
So, what can we do with all this time?
I’m sure that like me, you have a number of plans you never attended to, simply because there was always something that had to be done first. I really hope this status will not last too long, but in the meantime we all have to keep our sanity and make ourselves happy in some way. We can take care of each other or start an online business, for instance. Here are a few ideas you can try and maybe find inspiration in. And with many of these you can even make some money as you go.
Interested? Read on.
👉 Take care of your family
This one must be the first, as it’s by far the most important thing you should do.
Maybe you didn’t take time for your kids because you were working all days? Do it now; take them out if you have a backyard, play ball, throw some frisbee, whatever. If you can’t go outside, find that old board games and start the battle. Build a castle out of the old boxes from the garage. Make masks and perform a little theater for mommy.
Do you remember how good it felt when you held your darling in front of the tv? Or, how much you used to enjoy to comment on something that both found interest in? Do it. Open a bottle of anything, sit down and start talking. Rebuild that bond that used to be so strong and got weaker somehow with all the “must-do” things in life. Everything else will seem much easier after that.
👉 Take time for yourself. Sleep. Rest properly.
A good sleep is what keeps us all going, believe it or not. I know people who sleep very little, and I know people who really need a long sleep to function properly. For instance, I sleep around 6 hours, even less sometimes, and I’ve been living so for the past 30 years. On the other hand, my darling wife can’t function with any less than 9 hours – she simply can’t survive it. You can imagine all the fun that we’ve had about this over time.
Whatever your needs are, now’s the time to fulfil it. A good sleep will take a lot of mental burden off your mind, as things will be more solvable all of a sudden. It will also keep the stress away, as well as rejuvenate you and make you look younger.
All in all, you will feel better about yourself and more capable of getting through hard times.
👉 Remember that old hobby you once loved
Were you building model airplanes years ago? Maybe knitting? Were you proud of your garden or simply loved to read? Anything that comes to your mind and makes you happy, you should do right now. Build something. Read something. Share something.
Of course, if your biggest and dearest hobby is theatre, I’m sorry, you’ll have to think of something else. But I’m sure you’ll think of something.
👉 Start that diet you always wanted to
Maybe you’re planning to start a diet that would help you lose wight or even just make you feel better? Good timing. You’ve never had more time at your hands to start preparing special food, like smoothies, for instance. Or specialised keto breakfasts and meals. Or, maybe you always wanted to switch to vegan to see if it’s worthed. Do it.
It will take more time than just putting together what you’re used to, but that’s the whole point. You have that time now, and the benefits that you will notice after a few days will make your decision even stronger.
👉 Build that website and start a blog
Have you ever wanted to start a blog? About your rose garden, maybe? Well, now’s the time for it. It will cost you a few bucks to get that domain name registered – registrars also offer discount now – and some installation, WordPress most probably, but then you can start taking an hour per day and writing whatever you always wanted to write. Then, invite your friends and your Facebook audience to read your masterpiece and you will quickly find more ideas.
If you don’t know anything about WordPress, don’t worry; here’s a link to a nice little course you can get for peanuts and will take you by the hand in your first steps.
👉 Write that ebook that hangs in your mind
We all have a writer hidden deep inside. There’s just so many things we’d like to talk about, and sometimes it’s easier to write it down. So sit down, take a coffee, and start writing. You can easily use just about any text editor you have installed, or Microsoft Word or anything. Just commit to write 1,000 words every day, and you’ll have a 10,000 words ebook before the end of next week.
And if you want to share your book around, take it to a form you’ll be proud of, using one of the ebook creators. The best one – and cheap also – is Sqribble, which we also use ourselves for many of our technical reports.
Tip: there’s a coupon available that will make it super affordable these days, and a whole lot of bonuses that will give you even more opportunities to develop your writing and even marketing skills as you go.
👉 Finish that online training that you’ve bought
You remember you’ve bought yourself an online course on something you wanted to do, right? Then, you had so much to do that you almost forgot about it. Yeah, we all do that. This might be the best time to take a sit and go through it. You’ll see, ideas will start pouring in as you go through something that interests you.
There are all sorts of online courses available today. You can find just about anything that might be of interest, you can learn how to take care of pet ducks or how to start an online business. Does not matter, just find something you want.
👉 Create that digital product you’ve thought about
Maybe you’re a programmer also? Go through your old notes, find that idea that you loved so much, and DO IT. Create a program, a WordPress plugin, a report on the subject you know so much about, an ebook maybe. Write it, format it (remember we talked about Sqribble?), share it. Or even sell it on your website or even Amazon, for instance. There you go, this is how you can start an online business.
👉 Start an online business
Maybe you are about to lose your job, maybe you already did, or maybe you’ve just dreamt about running an online business to get those extra few bucks into your household every month. You can always start an online business.
It’s not so complicated as you might think, at least if you’re not thinking about millions. A few bucks here and there can be made with soooo many things online, and it really pushes your confidence to a new level when you see your first success. It really is possible and relatively easy to create an extra few hundred every month online, and we know of something that can help you a lot in the start.
It’s a membership site, but don’t get alarmed: it’s really cheap and you must only pay once to access over 130 videos that will help you start your online venture. It’s called Online Entrepreneur. Take a look and grab it while it’s there, you will not regret your decision.
All in all, DO IT!
If it’s needed or it simply makes you feel better while being safe for your and everyone around you, DO IT.
Don’t procrastinate and put anything aside, it’s your life and your time. Keep safe, stay well, start an online business and keep yourself busy.
Don’t let the stress take you out
Whatever you do, stay well and don’t let the stress get the best of you.
There’s so many things to get stressed about these days that it really can get overwhelming. And while a little stress is good for you as it makes you take action, too much can really hurt your health. And we really don’t need another health problem, do we? It’s commonly known that too much stress causes heart disease, for instance, as well as many other problems, including bad sleep at night, which in turn can cause other health probems.
Take whatever action that calms you down and put it in your daily agenda. It can be a little yoga, simple workouts you can do at home, maybe some accupresure sessions, or a simple aromatherapy evening. It really does not matter. The only thing that matters is you felling better and clearing your mind to be able to do things that will help you through this unprecedented situation with as little mental scars as possible.
Take care of your family, of course, and respect all the measures needed to keep that ugly Coronavirus bug out of your beds.
Stay well, hear you soon.
