It’s COVID season and everyone is expected to stay indoors, we must have missed our social lives. We know a lot of us are not used to being at home, not doing anything, or not moving about visiting friends or meeting people. What has been helping you to beat the time? What do you do when you wake up in the morning till in the evening when you sleep?

On this episode with host Comfort Uwakhonye read as Nigerians share their coping mechanisms during this period and learn how you too can make the best of this time indoors.

Playing Football and Watching Movies

Tunde called in from Kaduna. He is a Corps member staying in a barracks. His own way of coping is to watch movies, press phone and sometimes play football. Staying within the barracks means compliance to all protocols, no one goes out. and whenever they do, they have to wash before getting back into the compound. There are mobile sanitizer stands for everybody coming into the barracks to use to wash their hands and then get checked by the NCDC.

Staying healthy

One of the coping mechanism we can all adopt is staying healthy. You can look for any exercise that you think works for you. And for exercising you don’t have to go outside to exercise, you can exercise in the comfort of your room, in your own little space.

Also ensure that you feed your mental health by engaging in healthy conversations with family and friends, that can help you at this time. If you are not staying with your family at this time, you could reach out to people via video calls.

Try not to stay alone for too long in other not to slide into depression. It doesn’t mean get people to come into your house. You can speak to people or video call.

You should also do well to eat good food, ensure you are not just taking in junks that will be injurious to your health. Do not sit down for too long so you won’t store fat and calories where you don’t want it. Try to walk around every other hour.

Do things that would help you discover yourself, your strength and weaknesses.

Try to do things that will help you discover yourself. All of those things you’ve always wanted to do, dreams of learning one thing or the other and you could discover other talents in the process that are hidden. Do those things that will help you discover your ability, your strengths and your weaknesses. You will be awestruck at what you can achieve or the things you can do if you dedicate time for personal discovery, seeing yourself in the mirror.

Plan for the Future during this time.

Remember to also plan for the future during this time. The times are uncertain and we do not know what is going to happen in the next week, in the next  month or next two months. Estimate it and be prepared so that if this happens you can do this, or if this happens you can do that.  While you are idle in a time like this, project where you want to be and strategise how you can attain that level.

Reading

Emmanuel from Yaba wakes daily to do prayers and scriptural reading which enables him to face the promises of God and thereafter I do some reading, I am very excited about reading. A friend of mine introduced me to an app where you can read whatever.

Thank you for the tip Emmanuel. You could look out for reading apps on Google play store or iTunes.

Do those things you’ve always longed to do

If there are some skills that you are looking to learn, there are places where you can find them. Some skills you can learn during this period are:

1. Digital marketing skills. You can go head to Google Digital Skills for Africa to start the process as it is actually free. 

2. Excel is also another skill that we can pick up this season. Head to Microsoft Excel help center to start your learning process.

When the learning process becomes too long you can spread them across.

3. For free online education we have Coursera.

4. Then there is EDX.

5. Then we have Khan academy.

6. We all know Udemy, you can learn something from there as well. 

There are more but the above were drawn based on  an anlysis of top 10 tech skills in demand in 2019. You can take up some of these courses on any of the learning sites mentioned earlier.

We believe that these comments and tips would be useful to you at this time. Speak to people and keep yourself busy at this time. If you have any other suggestions that would be helpful to others do let us know in the comments section.