Dear friends and patrons!
How is it with the fear of a catastrophe whose size you don’t know? Tell me, what was it like for you during the war, with the bombs? How did you deal with death and its arbitrariness?
Yes, what are we actually like? What was different? Was it different? Yes, it was different.
Death was not fictional, with “it could be that”, it was a reality and was counted in millions. It was known and people knew what horror looked like. The fear was real, it was part of a sensible life strategy.
The virus, the pandemic today, is different. It gives more room to the “it could be that” and therefore more room to the imagination – and thus to neurosis – than its sick sister. The number of deaths is probably smaller, but the fear of possible disaster has not shrunk accordingly.
Any advice – how to deal with it?
If there is one: stay on the ground! Do what is necessary and possible. Recognize facts and orders of magnitude. Give little room to speculation, especially not to worst-case scenarios. Don’t be afraid of being afraid! Give preference to uplifting, good news. Knowing that there will be a time afterwards when we have to (and will!) get on with our normal tasks.
Yours, Dr. Werner Waldmann
