#148 - Preparing for a life post COVID-19

Beyond the Present Podcast

As we get closer to the end of the pandemic many of us are wondering how will our lives change after the pandemic and whether we will experience some permanent changes once life goes back to normal. In this episode, we will discuss this very issue and offer our prognosis for the situation.

Daniel's Social: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danmolgan/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/Danmolgan LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-molgan-41812352/ Pouya's Social: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pouyalj/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/pouyalj LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pouyalajevardi/ Episode Transcript...----more----

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

pandemic, life, emission, crisis, problem, people, vaccines, literally, world, technology, months, future, article, ready, managed, major, earthquake, living, fact, hope

SPEAKERS

Pouya LJ, Dan

Pouya LJ 00:09

Hello, and welcome back to yet another episode of The BTP podcast joined with Daniel Mulligan as always, how's it going, buddy?

Dan 00:17

What a man, buddy, glad to be here with you. Life is great. We're hearing a lot of good news from around the world. I mean, England was the first country to reopen up the first western country to open up, basically, and we're hearing some pretty good news. And based on what we've heard so far of global travel, as we restore, and the level of optimism going up all across the building, so the place that you know, that were hit the hardest, including Europe, which now there's a lot of, you know, sign of hope, basically. And the US, obviously, will be out of this mess. And in a couple, perhaps, three, four months. So that'll be a great news generally couldn't be happier and more excited about the future, the summer is coming. Last one, not the best summer of all, but this one probably going to be a lot better. So the hope is rising. And we are extremely hopeful for the future, basically. And I couldn't be any more grateful about how we have managed to, you know, come along so far. And hopefully things are getting much better, haven't you, man, I heard some stuff about Canada, you guys are probably hopefully going forward a little bit slower than many other development development societies. But still, you guys are making progress too, I guess. Right.

Pouya LJ 01:24

Yeah, it's a it's a bit of a problem with having vaccines in hand to be able to vaccinate people. It's not it's not a it's getting better. But it has been slow. So that's the that's the major hurdle, I suppose. Here in Canada. But yeah, it's it's coming along. Slowly. But surely. Now. Yeah. So I was talking about on this subject we were going to talk about for today's topic, we're going to talk about what are the things we should be doing to prepare because it's going to be a different life the same, the same way we have developed ourselves to adapt to the news situation of dealing with the pandemic, we're going towards the world towards a world, which it's not necessarily the same as before, but it's going to have elements as before, and maybe some argument and an upgrade at once. So what are the things that an individual should do, that may not be even thinking about that should prepare themselves help prepare themselves for a future post pandemic? Hopefully, that is prosperous. And

Dan 02:29

exactly, man, that's exactly what we're hoping for. And I guess right now, we have somehow gotten used to form that new norm is not something that can be strong, especially when it comes to social kind. However, the pandemic did have a lot of positive sides too. I mean, like, we've seen some terms of remote work, which has traffic and emission. Ever honest with you, I was recently finishing my vehicle pulled up put a review soon on social media called you know, how to prevent another plane Oh, and other climate crisis. And in reality speaking, I was really surprised, I thought, I feel like you know, this pandemic really helped the environments and reduce the emission, but base the first that I found in the book, at the impact of the pandemic, on the environment, it was minimal, it was less than 3% emission that was reduced overall, which showed that the majority of the emission in the world has not that much to do with moving around and a you know, complete lockdown can't necessarily reduce the emission that much was for me, I feel like you know, what, there was this conspiracy theory, these guys as well stop moving around, so we can reduce the the emission but in reality, the pandemic itself did reduce the entire global emission by less than 3%, which wasn't even you know that much. So this was not one of them. However, the pandemic definitely did teach us a lot of great lessons. Well, mainly, remote work is indeed possible. And many employees could be as efficient working at home, as opposed to just you know, going to the office, and I'm pretty sure that this is gonna be one of those hybrid things where we'll be having a future where companies are going to offer more such hybrid approach to working that is, I don't know, let's say half the week we'll be working at home, the other half of the office and so on, this is definitely going to be a great thing, but I'm pretty sure this pandemic is gonna make some major changes in the near future. And this is going to be the beginning of a new approach towards life. However, we've had all these things for socialists and they'll and wearing masks. This also happened with a flu pandemic. And like this, they tend to live in the present moment most of the time, and kind of like, as we've been somehow struck by some sort of natural disaster being a major hurricane being a storm. After an earthquake, if you've seen these families who have suffered from hurricanes, especially in the coastal areas, or those who have served from earthquake, the first few, let's say days or weeks or months after the event, they're strongly involved with it, then after a while, they forget that there was a patent, basically, a tornado or an earthquake. And the same thing, of course, will happen with a pandemic. Yes, it is true that this has already caused a lot of change the way we live our lives, but then again, human nature and look at their history and knowing that this was not by any means the first plague anybody ever had to deal with looking at things will tell us that this is just one of those major events that happened, and people will just go back living the way they want it to. So I don't think that dependent per se, make a dramatic shift in the way we live our lives. The rest of our you know, life, because this is not the first pandemic. And unfortunately, by that, by the way, it looks probably won't be the last either. And looking at the history tells us that many societies who thought that this was the end of it all, and that this one pandemic, or this one World War, or this one, tsunami is the end of it all, probably, this is not going to be the case, because I've seen this happening over and over again. So people probably about when who declares they spend it because over space, as you probably know, people are in this momentum of oh my gosh, I still got to do this. So it will take approximately three weeks to about a month or two for most people to get used to a new situation, which means I can assure you now, by this time, this is declared over by nearly a show, almost in less than perhaps a month, maybe two, most people are back to living their lives probably very differently. And if you feel like this is going to change, I don't know social context, you are completely mistaken. Because in reality, people are now going to overdo most of those things that used to be forbidden. Obviously, it's human nature, you want to somehow go for it and knock ourselves out basically, right. So for that reason, I see no change the way we you know, do and socialize at all, what I might see is the exact opposite, we'll see a major surge and the increase in terms of these activities that will occur. However, politically, economically and professionally, we're going to be seeing some changes. The first you know is going to be the airlines, I mean, are these guys going to be actually change their entire plan of traveling, we are definitely going to see some increase in many goods and services that are related to tourism, traveling and so on. So all of these things are going to play a role. So even the trend will be more in demand, the price will also be much higher. The same thing applies to hotels, and so many other industries that were hit hard during the pandemic. But more importantly, we have to look at the political changes in this system, we've seen a major political failure. And I really loved the last article by noble Hurry, who actually mentioned this in detail in his latest article that he posted. I wish I could this pandemic was more a political failure than any other type of failure. So we're gonna see some major changes, I hope by governments to learn from this experience and prepare themselves for the next outbreak. But in reality, I don't think that this is going to be like one of those things that will change life forever. Because we have seen plagues and pandemics and outbreaks repeatedly throughout, you know, human history, we've seen that life simply moves on and everything goes back to normal afterwards. And that's what I personally would like to thank. But then again, there's always going to be a factor factor that how we can take advantage of this and how we can actually get ready for the next outbreak. But I'm pretty sure that most of us are now going to be ready for the next pandemic a lot more than we used to. But still, it's not backed up by governmental support, then that simply will be all in vain.

Pouya LJ 08:55

That's absolutely correct. And I have to read I haven't read the latest article by Yuval Noah Harare, I didn't know there is one. So I got you got me interested there.

Dan 09:06

You can check it out. It's pretty good. Actually, it's a free article. And is he published it on a multi multiple journals. And it fully explains because he's a historian. He's seen these things throughout history a lot. So he describes the fact and it's a very wonderful article proventil all of our listeners to actually check this article out.

Pouya LJ 09:25

Fascinating. Yeah, I will certainly do that myself. And we'll link to that in the comment in the comment section at the end of the comment section but the description section of the episode. Okay, so very, so we're moving forward. We're moving past has has Well, besides the obvious, I suppose, has there any been any lessons for you personally, or for other people that you know of, that you would want to take from this pandemic moving forward changing so maybe not completely going back to normal, but adding to what's going on? Because as you know, you, we are meeting you, and a lot of others are very interested if there is hardship, if there's progress past it. It's useful, right? So we want to make use of it that says, What are the things that you think we can take from this pandemic? And that not from the for sure, there is a governmental aspect in preparation for the future pandemics, but on more of a personal level, perhaps, or individual level?

Dan 10:26

Very well. And I agree with you completely. I think this pandemic did teach us a lot of great lessons. I think that the psychological damage of this pandemic was far more than its impact on the lives of people around the world. We've had, of course, unfortunately, a number of deaths that were beyond what most modern societies could actually have. Because we have advanced medicine and having to deal with all these deaths, as we know in the year 2020, and 2021. It just makes no sense. We are at such a level of development in terms of medicine. However, again, in this article, Harare talks about this. And he says that this plague and pandemic, given that we think it was the worst thing that ever happened, because most of us have no experience of a major pandemic in, you know, modern history. So the last one goes back to 1980s, way before any of these, you know, technologies were there. And at that time, nobody even knew what the virus really was. I mean, they are calling a flu, but there have has been no real evidence of exactly what the virus was because the medical technology did not actually do anything about it. But this time around, not only we could exactly identify the virus know exactly what are the problems? What's the antibody like and have it generally show that our advancement technology has definitely helped us a lot in this regard, which is why in terms of what we did with a pandemic wrong, most of it actually goes back to a policy and not technology. For that reason, I don't think that this pandemic necessarily was poorly handled from the medical sector. Because I mean, the idea of just having a vaccine ready for mass distribution less than a year is just, you know, it's the first time It's never happened before, for the first time in history. And a novel unknown virus happens. And a year later, we have the vaccine, multiple manufacturers have worked on it. And boom, it's like literally going to Macy's and Walmart, you get like, you know, you get like all the flavors to get like the different flavors of the vaccines, if you will. So that was like really incredible, personally, to see how much we've made progress that we literally have now options. I mean, in certain countries. I mean, right now you're in Canada, you literally can pick up, it's just like buying your tariffs from God Damn, it's like buying it. I don't know, internet provider. So you can see like, well, you got Johnson and Johnson here. And then we got AstraZeneca here. And then we got, for example of Pfizer here. And then we got Sputnik v here. So literally, that not only we did not fall behind, we actually made so many different vaccines available in less than a year. And that was just incredible. So we have to Hale and admire our medical progress. This is just quite unprecedented. So that's the good side of it. But obviously, in terms of policy, as a whole from store, we've seen as always how politicians disappoint. And we've we saw how this was handled. Probably I as of now, especially from the year 2020. I cannot think of a single nation that handled this pandemic. Well, politically Not a single one. I mean, if you think of any single country, they could have done things much better, but they didn't. Because the world worldwide, none of us were ready. You're now in Canada, we know that the Kenyan government is you know very well, in most cases. But even the Kenyan government failed in this regard. Because Sure, sindhya happened during the Trump administration, the same thing happened to Europe. We thought Germany was way ahead. And now look at Germany. Dude, these guys have been locked down since November. Are you freaking kidding me? So this is what we've realized that technology won't solve most prompts, if politics is in the way and fortunately, this is going to teach all of us in the future to be prepared for an individual level. But from my perspective, I think that every basically difficulty is at the same time an opportunity. And we saw the fact that this pandemic could somehow be productive for some people, yes, many lost their jobs. Unfortunately, you know, the psychological tool was extremely heavy, particularly among the the extroverted population. So it was very difficult it still is because we're not adequate yet. But at the same time, it taught us that technology can help us I mean, the very fact that we use, you know, Internet technology to have our lives, you know, moving forward, that was just incredible, because if you look at the history, this was not the case. I mean, in the past when a flu pandemic occurred, this had to create the need for another world war two compensate for that, you know, economic damage, because at that time, there was no such thing as zoom. So if you shut down the city, you also close and shut down the economy. But we saw that During this time, we actually managed to keep the economy's running Despite all these limitations, so we should look at the positive side as well. And on a personal level, as you pointed out yourself, we also really, yeah, man, I mean, it's possible to go through difficult moments of, you know, human history and still come out stronger and able to, you know, survive and thrive during this pandemic. I mean, the same pandemic made life perhaps easier for certain people as well. I mean, like, they could simply I mean, I just talked to one of my friends who were just today, we had one of our, you know, group sessions, basically. And he's like, dude, I just love this man. And I don't have to, I think from now on, I only work online and I don't, I can just work in my underwear, man is pretty cool. I love to work in my underwear, man is so much more comfy. So for that reason, we are going to see a major shift towards renewable energy, green energy using that technology, instead of just you know, reducing carbon emission, these are all going to be some of the good facts that will be left after the pennant is over. However, from my point of view, the biggest, you know, reminder of this pennant pandemic for us is that our politicians doesn't matter where you are living right now, you could be living in one of the world's most developed society, and who live in one of the world's Least Developed societies. And you'll see that in the end, it doesn't matter how much technology is available to if policies are not in place to help you to protect you, then we'll see the disaster that we saw, especially early part pandemic, most countries, so I hope that we as we leave this pandemic behind, you know, around the world, we develop awareness regarding policy, and we will prepare ourselves for these such events, because they might happen again, I mean, that's just, you know, part of life. So if we get ready to deal with that in the future will will then hopefully, we will somehow not repeat the same mistakes that we made during this pandemic. And on a very personal level. Obviously, if you have gone through the panic so far, you can look back and say, you know, what, I just went through 12 months of almost everything bad that could happen to human human being right. So you got you got loneliness, you got lack of a social life, you got a lack of entertainment, you got lack of human contact. So if you're right now listening to us, you have, you know, and you've done something with your time during this past 12 months, then congratulations, you're really are a superwoman, or a Superman, because it says, You should literally pat yourself on the back, like, dude, I just went through 12 months of the pandemic, and I'm still here. And you should literally pat yourself on the back and know that you have accomplished something wonderful. Maybe some of your friends right now are not with you because they committed suicide, because they lost hope, because they just stopped, you know, following their goals. And they instead started drinking heavily, right? So for those of us who managed to go through this penalty, the least damage possible, I mean, everybody's going to get damaged in this situation. There's no doubt about it, but some of us got damaged less. And I believe that is exactly what matters for us. Because if you are one of those who got damaged less, and he actually managed to accomplish something, perhaps you focus more on doing your term papers before the end of the goddamn semester for the first time in your whole life. Or perhaps you manage to work consistently on your projects. And to delay, maybe maybe be more on time, because now everything is online, so you don't have to be late and you can blame the traffic. So there were a lot of opportunities for us to go through this pandemic, knowing that it is possible for us to simply work hard and to get the results. So you can look back at this and say, You know what, I did something big here, man I, I have, it's like for our generations, you know, the millennials. For us. It's like our grandparents, or grand grandparents who went through the World War experience, we are facing with something that is actually technically and logistically more significant than a World War, because during a World War, there are many nations that are just simply just neutral, and you can live their normal. So what we saw in the pandemic, we, our generation, we should literally be proud of this because most of us youngsters especially, we went through something that most of our grandparents couldn't even dream of going through. But we did it and that requires recognition. And we have to know that if we could do this, if we could go through such a hell called the COVID pandemic, we can do almost anything else. Because if you feel like this was the last crisis of your life, I got a bad, you know, bad news for you. And the fact of the matter is that life is a series of problems, like the ocean waves, and they are but occasionally interrupted, not by a peaceful sea, but by tornadoes. So life basically is problem, problem, problem, problem, problem, problem, crisis, problem, problem, problem, problem, problem, problem crisis. So this is the wave of life like the wave of the ocean, right? And we will go through with this throughout our lives, and most of us we are on the second half of that crisis, but that doesn't mean that it's going to be the last crisis. In our lives, socially, politically, or even personally, and knowing that we could go through this crisis gives us the confidence to know that we can go through any other prices. And the fact that we've managed to, you know, somehow hold on to it and not give up like all those who unfortunately committed suicide or, you know, gave into drug abuse or heavy drinking. Those of us who didn't do that, we know that we are ready for the next wave. And guess what's going to be the next wave once we finish the pandemic? problem, problem, problem, problem prices, problem, problem, problem, problem, crisis. So you just went through one crisis, hopefully, we're gonna finish this one again in next eight months, if you are living in the Western world, or in the next 14 months if you're living in the developing world, but ultimately, we will get out of this. And once we do we have the confident belief in ourselves that yes, we did it. We went through this, we survived and thrived. And we are ready for what? That's right. problem. Problem. problem. Problem. problem. Problem price. Oh, yeah.

Pouya LJ 20:59

All right. Okay, so that sounded optimistic. I want to say, All right, I'm just kidding.

Dan 21:05

This is optimistic, because this is the life and the whole point of life is to go through problems, problems, problems, problems, problems. Yes. And to grow from it. That's the right attitude. The whole point of life is to grow from all these experiences. And once you realize that it is your job to solve problems. I mean, name one person who has no problem or crisis, oh, I can think of one, that person is dead. So when you are dead, you got no problems, you got no crisis, right? So life is dealing with problems. And optimism is knowing that despite all these problems and crises, you can deal with it, that the future is always going to be brighter than the past. And that no matter how tough things gets, whether a pandemic a world war or major, you know, technological disruption that will make you perhaps render you obsolete in the workforce, you know, that you are capable of dealing with whatever life throws at you. That is optimism, optimism is not denying the presence of problems or crises. There's like, no, there's no bendemeer. Once you deny that, you're not an optimist, you're an idiot. But once you are now, to say, yes, there are problems. Yes, there are crises. No, the last places, but I am more than capable of dealing with whatever life throws at me, I'm always greater than all the changes that we know will be in front of me. And I have the greater bad, I just went emic, which means for whatever, crash, I will be damned ready.

Pouya LJ 22:39

So that's, that's really good to hear. Thanks, Dan. It's I think it's a was a very productive episode we have today. But before we close, whether any, anything that we missed out that you want us to talk about or summarize,

Dan 22:55

or Well, first of all, the topic very much great face on your cheeks, but also discussed the life after the pandemic. Fortunately, the news is generally positive world wide. In some nations, things are much better than the others, obviously, because I mean, I mean, that's called modern equality, obviously. But as a whole, the world will eventually get out of this pandemic. And most of the predictions marked q4 of 2021. And we will hopefully see that happening in most countries around the world by then. And we discussed how we'll change for getting out of the pandemic. And I said that this pandemic wasn't the you know, the first, nor probably the last. So it's not going to dramatically change life forever, like nothing really does. And we discuss the fact that those of us went through serious difficult, will be able to handle whatever life throws at us with the right attitude, we also find what it means to be an optimist. an optimist is not somebody who denies problems or crisis, nor someone who thinks that his or her current problems the last life is, as we discussed a series of problems only interrupted occasionally by crisis, which means we need to understand this, prepare ourselves for it, and develop a belief and faith in ourselves and know that the future was going to be brighter, because we have just proven to ourselves that we can go through an entire year of complete restriction where life comes to a halt. But hope still continues. And that's exactly we did. And it's going to hopefully teach us in the future to be able to work on ourselves. And if we could go through the COVID pandemic survive and thrive through it, we can do anything.

Pouya LJ 24:33

Perfect. That's very good to hear. That's very positive, I think. Yeah, despite that, hints that might suggest that there's negativity. It's not ultimately Oh, yeah, it's very optimistic. Yeah. My point of view. Again, thanks. As always, Dan, for joining us. My pleasure. And thank you everyone for listening and tuning in and until a later episode, have a good one.