In these strange times it’s easy to grow anxious. And with everyone practicing social distancing for the foreseeable future, many of us are feeling lonely and isolated, only adding to the COVID-19 fueled anxiety. Fortunately, living in the age of widespread technology, there’s lots to do by way of a screen. Here are a few ideas, plugged and unplugged, on how to occupy the time when you’ve just heard too much of the same bad news.
1: Gaming
Video games have come a long way since their rise to popularity in the 1980s. Today there’s something for everyone, with the app store being full of fun time wasters and the high end gaming PC/console market offering tens of thousands of games, many of which these days have massive story lines, end up playing out in a cinematic way, and in some cases have days’ worth of content to be discovered. Of course today most games can be purchased and downloaded online with no need to leave the house.
2: Organization
Being stuck at home is as good enough a reason as any to stop formulating excuses and clean up that closet, cabinet or pantry. This could also go a long way towards eliminating cabin fever and making you feel more comfortable.
3: Movie Marathon/Binge Session
Todays world of movies and TV is dominated by streaming services. Most of which have massive libraries of content waiting for you to discover them. With gaming not being for everyone and going outside becoming more inadvisable, a good series can make the time seemingly fly by.
4: Reading:
Being stuck inside for a lot of us these days means tons and tons of screen time. Between online classes and working from home, to much of our viable pastimes taking place on a screen, it can grow fatiguing. Once that happens a good solution to disconnect is to pick up a good book. Hopefully you’ve got some on the shelves waiting to be read, and if not, while it won’t cut down on screen time, there’s a massive number of e-books to be found online. There are also audiobooks which work well if you need something to listen to while working on organization.
5: Driving
This one at first may sound odd, but at the end of the day we all have a breaking point and at some point, we’ll need simply to step outside. One of the safer ways to do so is to step out of your house and immediately into your car. Especially on the right road a drive can be nice and engaging, and I’ve always found it’s a good way to take your mind and focus it only on the present, which can come especially in handy with the overwhelming amount of news we’re getting on the state of the virus.
Times are tough, but we can at least be thankful that since we have to self-isolate and do our best to flatten that curve, we at least live in an era where we as people are more connected to the world than ever before, even when we’re physically alone.
