Another month has whisked away and I missed the reminders for #WATWB! But here we are with the We Are the World Blogfest to end October 2020.

Sylvia McGrath, Mary Giese , Shilpa Garg, Sylvia Stein and Belinda Witzenhausen are our co-hosts for this time around. Please head over to their posts as well.

There has been much discussion over time about what this year of disasters has been teaching us. Some are enjoying more time in nature. Some have cherished time in their household working on both relationships and the building of the house itself (perhaps even getting rid of things no longer needed!). Others have learned new skills and new ways of learning.

Self

Daniel Goleman, one of the people who raised our attention to Emotional Intelligence, has continued working and puts out a monthly newsletter. He includes some work he did with a coach on how she used emotional intelligence with her clients. Then he adds these:

When you have strong self-awareness, you:

Know what you are feeling, why you feel it, and how it impacts your ability to perform and relate
Understand clearly your strengths and limits, leading to a realistic sense of self-confidence
Connect to your values and sense of purpose, allowing you to cultivate a more meaningful life.

A useful check-in for this year we are having.

Self and Others We Are Connected To

Moving from good news to our self to with others, in the latest newsletter on LinkedIn Goleman includes a video of the piece Bolero, by the classical composer Ravel. But it is another one of the virtual concerts, celebrating people from various places joining in to play and dance.

Here is a screenshot and link.

Part of the good news we have learned this year is that we can still be connected to other people, and their great gifts, even in times of isolation and lack of travel.

Self and Others Different From Us

Goleman offers another video. This takes our awareness to peoples from a culture that may be different from us. The video is a song by Jackson Browne and his band.

It tells the story of a people in Haiti and their resilience. There is a screenshot above and here is a link to the clip. It broadens our compassion and our solidarity to be part of such stories. Thanks to Jackson’s song I need not post a poem this time around either.

Some of the things we have learned this year as we have all lived in a pandemic is to be more aware of ourselves, of others we are connected to, and of peoples in cultures around our world. Perhaps we are coming closer to understanding that we are one world. To me that sounds like good news.

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