Verified by 
Coronavirus Disease 2019
What Can We Learn Psychologically From the Coronavirus?
Let's not waste a crisis.
Posted April 5, 2020 Reviewed by Ekua Hagan
I don’t think there is a person on this planet, unless they’ve been sequestered in the jungle or some remote spot in nature, who hasn’t been deeply impacted by the coronavirus. No one alive today has lived through anything like it.
I want to share some things I’ve learned in the three weeks since I went into shelter-in-place and began seeing all my clients via the internet. In no particular order, it includes the following:
1. Most people are rising to the occasion and acting for the common good, united by a common threat. We’ve all seen the video clips of neighbors singing from their balconies together, read articles about food drives and different initiatives to help those hurt by the virus, and my experience in crowded stores is that people are uniformly friendly and warm while waiting in line. Sure, there is the occasional viral video of fighting over toilet paper, but my impression is that we’re uniting in our higher selves, not our lower nature.
2. It’s a profound lesson in not being in control. Most of us give lip service to the understanding that we have only limited control in the world and in our lives. We say, “Yes, I know,” and go about trying to manage our schedule, getting upset at a traffic jam that makes us late, or having to fight through a crowded store. This virus has been a profound lesson in how little we know and how little we control. It’s not just a mental abstraction; it’s a lived reality, and it impacts us deeply and profoundly.
3. We are impacted more than we realize. Working with people remotely, I almost uniformly have to help them tune in to how much they are impacted by all that is occurring. It’s hard for me to describe what it feels like, but it’s akin to someone walking in a fog and not knowing it.
When I help them connect to the anxiety, fear, or other powerful undercurrents, there is almost always a clearing—after a moment of connecting to the disturbing feeling. I say to them: “Think about it. Seven billion people on this planet are all feeling anxious about something uniformly threatening. How could that be happening, and we not pick up on it?”
4. We truly are part of a collective matrix. Connected to number three, this virus is showing us in a very profound way how interconnected we are and how we survive and thrive together, or we suffer together. One person alone can infect hundreds, undoing the work of thousands who struggle to socially isolate themselves. The experience is made easier by knowing we are not alone in it. And the petty differences between people or countries drop away when we’re united together against a common threat.
5. Regression happens to us all when we’re stressed or threatened. Regression is an experience of going back to an earlier form of functioning, a coping strategy we developed (usually as children) that we’re most comfortable with in stressful situations because we have the most years of experience using it. So if you find yourself suddenly becoming more controlling, or more checked out, or more (fill in the blank), be compassionate with yourself and recognize it’s how you’re coping with the stress of the unknown. The more you are accepting of whatever your regressive style is, the more freedom you will have in whether you control it or it controls you.
6. Our core issue becomes more visible during times of stress. Connected to number five, this is simply my way of saying that we all have a psychological fault line. During everyday life, that can be less visible, like a crack in a dish that has been expertly repaired. But under the pressure of this new reality, the fault line becomes much more pronounced. Your oldest and deepest issues will come up to the surface. It’s a great time to deal with them in a new way, as the more mature and stronger individual you are today.
7. Minorities have a different set of fears with the coronavirus. I have a Moslem client who said, “I’m happy everyone is hating on the Chinese instead of Moslems for once. But I do worry what will happen when all these people with guns feel threatened. Who will they turn on?”
An African-American client said something similar. “I don’t trust the mob,” she said. “When push comes to shove, and we’re not just fighting over toilet paper, I’m afraid for a lot worse.” Certainly, we all hope it doesn’t come to that, and so far, as I said in number one, I think this is bringing out the best in people. But I can understand those who don’t feel they can trust a mob looking for someone to blame.
8. Skype/Zoom/FaceTime is no substitute for in-person contact. I’ve been doing telehealth for years, and I always felt it was about 95 percent as good as in person. What I’m learning from doing it fulltime is that it’s exhausting, because it requires a lot more mental focus, and there is something intangible in the in-person experience that just cannot be replaced.
9. Don’t waste a crisis. We will always remember this period of our lives and will tell those who come after us about it, like stories from the Great Depression or World War II. It’s an incredible opportunity for those of us who don’t have to worry about financial survival to take stock of the lives we were leading and see what we can let go of.
The enforced shutdown is a bit like going on a retreat. It’s a chance to see the best and the worst in ourselves and to learn to enhance the one and let go of the other. How do you want to remember you comported yourself during this time?
To find a therapist, please visit the Psychology Today Therapy Directory.
