COVID-19: Yesterday

“Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away…”

I have been doing my best to practice self-care during these trying times and one of my self-care choices has been limiting my time on social media. However, when I do log in, it’s hard not to see a stream of memes about COVID-19. The memes that are sticking out to me the most are the ones about longing for 2019, when I remember just a few short months ago in December, people were longing for 2020: “New Year, New Me”, “This is going to be my year”. Yet now we are seeing these types of memes:

I LOVE the song “Yesterday”, down to the story behind Paul McCartney calling it “Scrambled Eggs”. There are so many renditions out there from Elvis Presley, Tammy Wynette, Ray Charles, Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson, Boys II Men and even just recently Billie Eilish singing it at the Oscars during the Awards’ “In Memoriam” segment. But my favorite, forever and always will be The Beatles version.

“Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away”...I think many people are thinking that these days. Wondering why they complained about 2019 so much when 2020 started off with a virus that is causing a global pandemic. However, I would be lying if I didn’t say there were things that happened in 2019 that made me want to put 2019 in a box, wrap it with duct tape and stick it on a shelf.

I created a vision board at the beginning of the year and said in January that 2020 was going to be a year for me to thrive, grow, rise and have breakthroughs…and I still feel that way despite the devastating world issues right now. I don’t know what tomorrow will bring, I’m just trying to stay as positive as I can while giving myself grace when I do get a little frustrated or scared of the unknown. We can’t change what has happened, but what we do have control over is how we respond to this situation, like anything that happens in our lives.

One thing (ok one of the MANY things) that I have learned in the past two years through my roller coaster of life is that I’m no longer going to look back and “long for yesterday”. What happened in the past happened, we can’t go back and change it or fix it, we also can’t go back and relive the “good times” in our pasts. We can grow and learn, we can fondly remember the good times and curse the bad times, but we need to remember it’s the good AND the bad in our past that makes us who we are today. And not just who we are as individuals, but worldwide issues in the past (even the bad) change the future for the good. Just like we can’t hit the fast-forward button, we can’t hit the rewind button either.

I personally am choosing to live a life where I am no longer longing for yesterday. However, I don’t think the song is JUST about longing for yesterday, my interpretation (just my own opinion) is that those lyrics are reflecting not only on the past but also the looking ahead to the future. If you are only longing for yesterday you will always be living in the past.

The last words in the song,“Oh, I believe in yesterday”. If you google the meaning of those lyrics, everyone has their own thoughts on what these mean. I choose to think that believing in yesterday also means believing in today and believing in the future and what is to come.

Maybe rather than longing for yesterday in a “bad” way in the sense that it is over, maybe it’s longing for what you realize wasn’t really that bad, like those out there now realizing that 2019, although full of ups and downs, wasn’t ALL that bad.

Perhaps you miss getting your kids ready for school and packing their lunch and drinking your coffee in the car on your way to work. You’re longing for that mundane monotony that you took for granted. Maybe longing for yesterday is helping you realize that once you are able to start doing those things that made you fret or complain, you will be appreciating them with a smile when you are able to do them again.

During these times, perhaps there is a metaphorical shadow hanging over all of us. Let’s not long for yesterday, let’s do our best to persevere in the present together, be prepared for the changes that are to come and look at the future with optimistic anticipation and hope.

Remember to take care of yourself during these unknown times. Yes, you might have children to tend to, dogs that need walked or perhaps you are on the essential list and still working every day. I’m going to throw caution to the wind and suggest that today, you put the oxygen mask on yourself first. Take those deep breaths, find something small (or big) to be grateful for and rather than longing for yesterday, look ahead and think of one way that this global situation is going to change something you do differently, for the good.

This global pandemic is changing life as we know it. For some more than others, but for all of us in ways that we don’t even know yet. I believe in yesterday, but I also believe in today and tomorrow.

We Got This!

XOXO~

 

 

 

 

 

 

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