If there’s something strange in your neighbourhood…

Blog Post #9

If there’s something strange in your neighbourhood…

…who you gonna call? Well no, ghostbusters will not be coming to the rescue this time.

My last blog post touched on how I had been self-isolating after returning from a trip to Australia, despite arriving 23 hours prior to the implementation of the original travel restrictions. I was upfront with the client of my upcoming contract and made them aware of my recent movements. They advised to push the project and my arrival back 1 week. However, in that subsequent week new travel restrictions were put in place, and thus, I was greeted with 14 days of self-isolation. Alas, at that point I was already on Day 5! However, as we all know, New Zealand swiftly entered a 4 week lockdown….

Aside from the overseas trips I had to cancel, which I alluded to in my last post, how have these recent developments impacted me personally? Well, one would summarise the impact as minimal, at least in the short term. After e-meetings with my client I was given the green light to deliver the first phase of work remotely. So that meant I needed a different office space. As my sister is in NZ temporarily, and my mother is here visiting, we have ended up in the lockdown together. Day 17: sanity still in check. However, my original desk set-up for the initial self-isolation was no longer suitable. Working in the open-plan living area was not an option, not only was it distracting but it was not fair on the other two. It was the eve of the lockdown and I headed straight to the local Warehouse; I managed to secure the last office chair and a suitable desk. Time to create a working environment conducive to productivity…

…or so I thought. Working from home is such an appealing concept, yet is it sustainable? Does productivity improve, decline, or remain constant? Can this be the new normal? Ultimately, it’s only been a couple weeks, but what I have learnt, personally speaking, is it requires a transition. Moving from full-time, office-based work to fully remote and working from home simply is not easy. It has required me to adjust, it has required me to create routine, it has required discipline. But didn’t you have these before George? Well sh*t, when tennis players move from grass to clay is it a simple transition? F*ck no. It has been challenging, and I have shared this with my client. Am I hitting 8-9 hours of productive work each day? No. Who wants to be in their bedroom 17+ hours a day?! Not me, but suitable office space for me is limited. We’re all going through similar challenges, some people are more adaptable than others, and some are realising that working from home is just not for them. I’m keen to hear any tactics for maintaining productivity levels at home…?

Over the past week or so I’ve been reflecting on the current situation. As is typical with the news, they largely focus on the negative, which in a time like this, is quite difficult not to isn’t it? For someone who does not follow the news, over the past 2 weeks I’ve been checking in daily, multiple times. Genuinely, I have not followed the news for many years; certainly not on a daily basis. Call me ill-informed, un-educated, irresponsible, it’s a decision I stand by. I think with age this stance will change, but for now I am content. From time to time I’ll scan the major headlines on BBC News, or perhaps if I’m travelling to a country I will scope of the current situation. Or has there been a flood? I’m on to it pretty quickly, but that’s just personal preference. When reflecting on the Covid-19 Pandemic, my attention has largely been focused on the positives, both personal benefits and collectively as a society. So I thought I would share with you, some of my current throughts. First up, society…

Society
1) Climate Change
I won’t delve into the science or any recent stats, but it goes without saying the change on global emissions appears to be significant. Will this Pandemic give birth to the most significant behavioural change this generation, and perhaps the world, has ever seen? Possibly, but it will require significant and consistent effort. It will be interesting to see what new policies and laws may arise from this crisis. We now have firsthand evidence that it is possible, but can it be sustained?

2) Physical Health
‘George, how is physical health going to improve when everybody is in lockdown, where the majority of people don’t have access to their usual activities? Not everyone likes running.’ Well my friends, the stats speak otherwise. I have never enjoyed running, the feeling afterwards? Absolutely. The actual activity of running? Nay-nay. I’ll talk about my running later on, but first the people. I have been ‘using’ the activity app called Strava for many years, a large proportion of that time being inactive. However, each time a Facebook friend downloads the app I get an email notification. The increase over the last 2 months, particularly the last 3 weeks, has been exponential. I was so intrigued that I actually plot the data. Looking at the graph you can see the obvious spike, and we’re only 11 days into April!! So yes I have based the increase in physical health purely on one stat alone, arrest me.

3) Mental Health
Now this one is tough to call, especially without any evidence, and I haven’t gone looking for any. I have no doubt many will have their own opinions, many may disagree with what I am saying. Power to you, one thing this crisis won’t take away from you, is your ability to form an opinion. That in itself is a positive. Anyway, I think in general, and I think it’s fair to assume, today’s society is, for want of a better word, soft. Hold up, let me explain. For the most part, and obviously there are clear exceptions to this (the Christchurch earthquakes being one example), but a large proportion of us have not lived in a time of a crisis. We have not lived through a world war, certainly not through the eyes of the front line. We have not experienced a nuclear strike. Nor have we experienced a Pandemic of this magnitude. It is in this time, in this hour, that we are all relying on each other, no matter whether you are upper class or lower class, an essential worker or not, we are all in the same boat, and we are all in this together. As I have witnessed at numerous times over the past 3 years, this country is resilient, this country comes together and unites, and this crisis is unifying us all right now. This is very powerful, and we will come out the other side stronger.

Now to avoid this post becoming a dissertation, I’ll now move on to the benefits I am realising in my own personal life.

These largely relate to physical health and mental well-being. Now although the former began before the other, the latter has become the catalyst and now they have synergised and are deeply interrelated. However, I’ll try address them separately, and without waffling too much..

1) Physical
Since last April I have been plagued (embrace the pun) with a couple of overuse injuries. They both took their toll on me. In hindsight, I was lazy. I should have been more proactive in recovery. I saw many physios and spent upwards of $1500 on appointments and rehabilitation, but I soon became entitled and just accepted my injured state. Fortunately, a year on the injuries have largely subsided, but more importantly my mindset has changed. I have started running again, and this began around the time I went to Melbourne at the beginning of March. I’m not sure what it is about that place, whether it just coincided with being injury-free, or perhaps my active friend who was with me played a role, but I came away from that trip motivated to get back into shape. During that week in Australia me and my friend had been running, cycling, hiking, swimming, and we also threw hours of shapes at the music festival!

When I returned to New Zealand I was looking at my Strava activity app and noticed I had done 4 runs in a week, and that triggered a memory of a running program I came across 3 years prior when I impulsively committed to running a couple half-marathons for charity. Well, incidentally I had brought that book to New Zealand and located that very same program. I’ve decided to give it a nudge, I’m currently on Week 5, with Run 4 coming up on Sunday. The 2nd image coverts the numbers from miles to kilometers. Will my injuries pop up and sting me down the line? Hopefully the 30-60mins of stretching every day will hold them off. Will I actually do a marathon at the end of the 16 weeks? Download the Strava app and follow me: @George Arthur Bowman

2) Mental Health
So how has Covid-19 benefit my mental health? I’m not sure I can directly attribute the virus to improving my mental health. However, the self-isolation gave me more time for reading. I had just finished a book on tactical exercise related to military/combat specialists. This book triggered another memory of an interview I had watched a couple years prior. It featured a former US Navy Seal and what he had achieved throughout his life. I decided to have another look and since I had watched that interview, he had released a book called ‘Can’t Hurt Me’ (few images above). I had recently downloaded the Kindle app and quickly executed an impulse buy. Over 3 days I read this book, making notes as I went. It’s too early to tell right now, and who knows it could be another personal fad of mine, but this book has without a doubt influenced me in very powerful ways. It has made me realise how soft I am mentally. How easily I usually give up. How I have conditioned my mind to often seek the path of least resistance. This book has not only unlocked new potential for me, but it has brought attention to how much potential there is out there, not only just for me but for all of us. Not everyone will find the same in this book as I have. It’s not friendly, it’s clear-cut and it’s aggressive; but it’s powerful. It’s life changing.

That’s all I will say on that.

In other news, I have had another reason to celebrate recently. Yesterday, 10/04/2020, marked the first anniversary of Asset BowManagement Ltd. Whilst I did not start my first contract until January 2020, I created this company back in April 2019 and put in a large dose of mahi. I celebrated by engrossing myself in two of my favourite things: rivers and coasts. I strolled along Te Awa Waikanae down to the coast where I stood on the beach reflecting on the past year, and the exciting things ahead…