2020s Crises and Change: Your reality (Part 4)

An invitation for sensemaking and re-imagining

The pandemic is the epitome of a complex and volatile challenge facing society.
Its impacts are felt in different ways by different people in different places.
We are all trying to weather the storm.
In our own lives, in our families, in our communities.
The extent to which we can do this is dependent on so much.
On the degree to which we felt secure in our lives before the pandemic hit.
On the assets and facilities and resources available in our communities and across our networks.

Yet we find the landscape shifts quickly and with little warning.
Just when we think we are getting somewhere, everything can change.
Perhaps we hope for certainty but find we have to live with ambiguity.
Straight line paths out of lockdown can feel more like a fairground ride.
A roller-coaster of a journey.
A journey through an unfamiliar landscape.
A landscape that we each experience differently.
Differences that arise out of our own individual circumstances.

We don’t presume to aggregate these differences into a composite set of stories.
To do so would lose the nuance and only be as diverse as the number of stories we could have heard.

We have chosen instead to offer an invitation.

An invitation to explore a map of the terrain.
The map starts from the uplands of the 2010s, of a time pre-Covid-19.
We invite you to explore the impact of the pandemic on this landscape. 
To explore the reality of living in a space that is neither the old normal nor the new.
A liminal space. One of ambiguity, of flux of transition…
To explore notions of a future that we emerge into post-pandemic.

Our invitation is to engage with other people’s realities.
To contrast them with your own.
To see this as a way of reflecting on what you have been through as well as what others have, too.
To look into a social mirror for your own experiences. 

We may all be weathering the same storm, but its effects have impacted us all with varying intensities.
We emerge into the future in a flotilla of different boats with varying degrees of seaworthiness.
Yet we are united in our uncertainty of what that future holds, of what lies beyond the map.
We invite you to explore this terrain, to roam around the landscape and see what it offers for you as you imagine the future, to see what’s missing.

In the time you spend exploring this terrain, we hope you discover new layers and depth to this collective inquiry. We hope you are left with new or affirming insights, questions, ideas, and aspirations for the future

And, at the end, if you have taken away any personal insights or future dreams, or feel inspired to share a part of your story, to enrich this landscape, we offer a space for you to add your story to those of others.

Lockdown Lines

by Ian MacMillan  

When all this is over, what will we remember?
When all this is over, whose stories will we tell?

A siren tears through the morning air
as those who make a difference put the kettle on
before stepping out in to a changing world
when all the old certainties have been and gone.

The tiny local kindnesses that build ad build
The shopping delivered, the window wave
the redrafting of that world ‘unskilled’.
The thoughtful, the funny, the quietly brave.

The bright moon hangs in the evening sky
and people tell their stories o they write them down.
Here is an archive of a turbulent time
from every street and village and every town.

As the days move slowly and the hours run fast
and we stand apart but our hearts are one.
The spirit of these times feels built to last
and we’ll still try to make a difference when the virus has gone.

When all this is over, what will we remember?
When all this is over, whose story will we tell?

Listen to the poem on the BBC website

Sensemaking and re-imagining

There are as many different experiences of Covid-19 as there are people and families. Everyone’s context and circumstances vary and it is this variety and unpredictability that characterises a complex challenge. Everyone’s role in the system and their capacity, agency and power to make change is also different. We believe is vital to acknowledge this as part of efforts to move beyond the crisis.

There is no single truth or narrative to be written but a diversity of experience that should be recognised. In this short piece of work we have identified a few, including:

• How some have lost multiple family members to Covid-19 and others know no-one who has contracted Covid19
• How some have lost work while others have made a fortune
• How some have few internet-enabled devices and no access to broadband while others enjoy superfast speeds on multiple devices
• How some have had to support their children learning at home while others are isolated
• How many hope for young people to create change after Covid-19 and yet they have missed significant schooling, adolescence and rites of passage

In addition, we face a number of challenges, too, such as:

• How to hang on to our hopes and expectations for the future when facing immediate short-term challenges and concerns
• How we might experience a feeling of togetherness while living with imposed isolation
• How to respond to other crises while already coping with Covid-19
• How to seize opportunities for change while longing for a return to normality

Collectively these barely start to scratch the surface, yet they illustrate the challenge we face. If we are to work together to create a better world after Covid-19 we need to find ways of navigating and brokering a way through such diversity of experience and expectation.

Funding partner

2020s Crises and Change

Part 1: Navigating change before the pandemic

Which factors existing before Covid-19 were the most critical in determining its impact on communities and their ability to respond effectively?

Part 2: Transitional space during the pandemic

We set out to see how the pandemic has impacted upon different communities and individuals, to hear their stories of change.

Part 3: How can we navigate an emerging future?

We set out to see if people were already turning their minds to the future, to a world after the pandemic, and if so, what changes they wanted to see emerge.

Find out more – A guide to the terrain