EDITOR, The Tribune.

Is your mind like a torture chamber during this pandemic, zapping your creativity and taking you down?

I have been a manufacturer for 30 plus years. And in that time have been in many stressful situations.

We all have.

But since the pandemic hit, I have experienced a whole new level of stress, anxiety and emotions. And I know I am not alone.

This pandemic has robbed both life and quality of life.

I can tell you personally that my emotional state has been like a roller coaster. One day I am hopeful, then the next could be gloom and doom…although really nothing has specifically changed to sway me either way!

Then I had an epiphany about something... I asked myself:

What scene was my own mind playing out?

What was my internal dialogue?

When was I most prone to going down that dark path?

What triggered the dark thoughts?

I was, at times, turning my mind into a torture chamber… Allowing my thoughts to overtake my emotions… not realising that I alone had the power to escape.

I remembered something I read years ago by a prominent author:

“We don’t see things as they are, we see them as We are.” - Anaïs Nin

So we see things through our own filter, be it negative or positive (hence, the half full or half empty glass).

So I am now focusing on my mind, what it sees, what it thinks, what it eats…as a means of emotional survival.

“I have known a great many troubles, most of which never happened.” - Mark Twain

Ugh… the places we allow our thinking to go, worrying about things that mostly won’t ever happen.

STEVEN KASZAB

Bradford, Ontario.

October 12, 2021.