Contributed by: Curt Fowler
How Are We To Live in a COVID-19 Age?
“Mistaken for our mother, [Nature] is terrifying and even abominable, but if she is only our sister—if she and we have a common Creator—if she is our sparring partner—then the situation is quite tolerable.” – C.S. Lewis
C.S. Lewis wrote the following piece in 1948 as a response to the fear of nuclear war gripping the world.
Please read it considering our current situation. What can you learn from Lewis’s timeless advice?
In one way we think a great deal too much of the atomic bomb. “How are we to live in an atomic age?” I am tempted to reply: “Why, as you would have lived in the sixteenth century when the plague visited London almost every year, or as you would have lived in a Viking age when raiders from Scandinavia might land and cut your throat any night; or indeed, as you are already living in an age of cancer, an age of syphilis, an age of paralysis, an age of air raids, an age of railway accidents, an age of motor accidents.”
In other words, do not let us begin by exaggerating the novelty of our situation. Believe me, dear sir or madam, you and all whom you love were already sentenced to death before the atomic bomb was invented: and quite a high percentage of us were going to die in unpleasant ways. We had, indeed, one very great advantage over our ancestors—anesthetics; but we have that still. It is perfectly ridiculous to go about whimpering and drawing long faces because the scientists have added one more chance of painful and premature death to a world which already bristled with such chances and in which death itself was not a chance at all, but a certainty.
This is the first point to be made: and the first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things—praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts—not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.
My thoughts? Life comes with a death sentence. We cannot outrun death and we cannot decide how or when we are going to go.
Regardless of the current turmoil, we should live our lives to be a blessing to our fellow man. Right now, we can be a blessing by following the guidance from our national and state leaders. Our inconveniences have and will save lives.
We can love our families, call a friend, sew a mask, give to charities, or bring groceries to a neighbor. We can tell those we love how much we love them and how we cannot wait to hug them again. We can take care of our employees like they were our own children.
The most important point I get from Lewis’ writing is that we cannot be paralyzed by fear. We must enjoy every moment God has given us – which we cannot do when we are worried about the future.
And, we must know that what God has planned for us will be amazing and beyond anything we could comprehend.
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Curt Fowler is President of Fowler & Company and Director at Fowler, Holley, Rambo & Stalvey. He is dedicated to helping leaders build great organizations and better lives for themselves and the people they lead.
Curt is a syndicated business writer, keynote speaker and business advisor. He has an MBA in Strategy and Entrepreneurship from the Kellogg School, is a CPA, and a pretty good guy as defined by his wife and four children.
