Continuing To Make Personal Strides
While it may be tempting to want to use this time to set big personal goals, it can be disappointing or frustrating when you may find that you just don’t have the energy needed to achieve them. What was perhaps a large ambition in the morning to master a musical instrument or read a large novel can wane shortly after embarking on the effort, which can be disheartening. It can be especially frustrating as you may feel you “now have the time to finally” hone-in on these large efforts of self-improvement, but then later lack the motivation to even attempt them.
Be Good To Yourself
It’s important to be forgiving of yourself when you find yourself falling short of ambitious personal goals, especially during this time. While it may be easy to blame yourself as having a lack of focus or self-discipline, it’s important to realize that on a larger scale that we are all experiencing a collective trauma, which naturally takes its toll on each of us. The bigger end goal for everyone is to emerge from this trying time physically and emotionally well.
If you are struggling with attempts to achieve larger personal goals, it can be fruitful to immerse yourself in smaller, easier efforts that can add up to get you to the place that you feel that you’ve used this time wisely and effectively for self-enrichment. There are now many more free resources online that allow you to:
- Follow pursuits of interest to you,
- Learn something new,
- Stay physically active,
- Listen to audio books* ,
- Virtually visit beautiful places around the world,
- Visit online with friends and family, and
- So much more!
(* The author especially enjoys this option at the moment, and finds that reading along while listening to an audio version of the book helps set a good reading pace!)
Free Online Resources
Free Audio Books:
https://www.audible.com/ep/FreeListens
A large selection of classic and contemporary titles, along with children’s books are currently free to listen to.
View Free Opera Performances:
Immerse yourself in classic performances from The Met. Different performances are made available online for 20 hours a day beginning at 7:30 p.m. ET, until 3:30 p.m. the following day.
Free College Courses & More:
Eight Ivy League schools are offering hundreds of online courses to the public for free to audit. Here is a list of of more than 400 classes that are available in subjects as varied such as
- HOPE: Human Odyssey to Political Existentialism from Princeton University;
- Machine Learning for Data Science and Analytics from Columbia University;
- The Science of Well-Being from Yale; and Gamification from the University of Pennsylvania.
You can also enroll in college courses through the educational platforms Coursera and EdX. You can learn more about the courses available here.
Home Exercise Courses Provided from Gyms:
Many Gyms are offering free online exercise programs to follow from home.
- Planet Fitness is offering “Home Work-Ins” streamed live at 7 p.m. ET daily on its Facebook page.
- Yoga: Some sites that are now providing some online classes for free, including Core Power Yoga and Down Dog.
Virtual Museum Tours
Many museums have made virtual tours available of their collections. Find a list of them here.
The Beautiful Outdoors
Right now, at least 32 of the United States’ national parks are available for viewing thanks to Google Earth and
Google Arts & Culture, including the Grand Canyon and Yosemite. Check out a full list of the parks that you can tour virtually here.
Visit with Animals
Both the Monterey Bay Aquarium and the San Diego Zoo have both pre-recorded and live footage of their animals.
You can see a full list of animal live streams here.
Virtual Friend & Family Visits
Online platforms like Zoom and Google Hangouts are an easy way to have facetime to spend time with people you miss. Or you can even organize a group happy hour, and sign on at the same time to meet online together.
Telepsychiatry Help
If you are feeling that you may need professional help during this time, we invite you to contact American Behavioral Clinics, which is able to provide you online care through their teletherapy program. Many insurance companies are currently waiving joining fees at this time so that people can get the help they seek. Contact ABC here for more information and to get a FREE phone consultation.
Existing Patients and New Patients, Call us to schedule an appointment, get a prescription refill or just to ask a question:
New Patients ONLY - Want to contact us through a form? CLICK HERE to fill out our contact form.
