Gen Z, The Corona Diaries: Adding New Skills

By Robbie, 19, Los Angeles, California

I think it’s kind of ironic how excited and hopeful everyone was for the year 2020, yet within the first three months it seems that every single thing imaginable has gone wrong. With fires in Australia killing a bunch of animals, Kobe Bryant’s death, and a deadly virus forcing everyone to stay in their homes, I feel like we just can’t get a break. I had always seen movies about viruses like and thought that some sort of virus would affect the whole world someday, but I never thought that it would happen as soon as it did. Now that it’s here, I’ve had more than enough time to look for some sort of silver lining.

I feel like a lot of people pride themselves on having a constantly booked schedule, which keeps them from doing a lot of other things. Everyone always wishes that they had more time on their hands to pick up a skill that they’ve always wanted to learn, to find a new hobby, or even to invest more time into themselves. Now, we’ve gotten our wish -- even though it’s probably not exactly how we had hoped for it to happen -- I think that we should use this time to our advantage. Since quarantine started, I have started working out at least once a day since I have nothing else to do. I’ve even gotten a lot better at cooking in the last four weeks. I’m also teaching myself a new language. Long story short, I’m trying to come out of quarantine with more skills than when I went in. I think everyone should try something new right now, and if all you’re doing is watching Netflix all day and going on and off of Instagram, you’re doing quarantine totally wrong.

The Coronavirus is going to change the world as we know it once we go back to “normal” -- even though it almost seems like staying in your house all day and only seeing your friends on facetime is the new “normal”. I think that the way business is done is going to change drastically and many things are going to go digital. I also think that people are going to realize that there are so many things in our lives that we have taken for granted. But most of all, I think that we are going to value our relationships with one another a lot more once this is over.

This moment in our lives is going to be one that I’m sure we are all going to remember forever, and I think that it will be a good reminder to us in the future of just how lucky we are to have the simple things in life. I think this is the reset that we have needed.


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