Four Things I’ll Be Doing During Self-Quarantine

As our world continues to drastically shift amid this global pandemic, I am certain many of you are internally making these remarks to yourself: “I am so bored”, “there is nothing to do”, “I have to find a way to distract myself”. Despite us all being advised to stay indoors, away from our jobs, schools, and general social gatherings; there are still plenty of alternative options to indulge for the sake of our so-called boredom during this crisis. For myself, I have elected to participate in four things that will (hopefully) help maintain my sanity, while also stimulate both internal and external growth while awaiting this chaos to subside.

1. Keeping Calm (Please, Do This)

Yes, the virtues of patience and temperance are not easy to preserve; especially considering all of our lives hold some sort of uncertainty right now. However, let me tell you that panic will not shutter the illness, nor accelerate the incubation periods and vaccine progression. So basically, were screwed until further notice, right? Not quite, as everyday new developments arise of recovered patients and testing aggression in countries such as South Korea, Italy, and Singapore. These articles spotlight signs of virus spread decrease and positive community response to public closures. To be clear, while these reports show a positive outlook towards “flattening the curve”, it is not indicative of a step towards complacency. Even these reputable reports are to taken for what they are. In this time, I will be practicing avoidance of speculation and negligence. As the great Andrew Carnegie once uttered, “Speculation is a parasite feeding upon values, creating none”. With this said, the steps I will be taking in order to avoid speculation is: following social media feeds and updates from only reputable medical experts, official government accounts and statements, and not confirming any information from commercial news without ensuring fact connection. While some tasks may be more tedious than others, it will be beneficial for my conscious and will suppress any overconsumption of unwarranted noise while isolated. Perhaps more importantly, during these times where levels of anxiety and frustration can deeply foster; be sure to check in with your family, friends, close colleagues, and anyone who you feel to trust. Fear is a real and active evil, so call that loved one, to connect during this overwhelming time.

2. Information Growth

Now, I know many of you are going to want to yawn and close the link when I tell you I’ll be reading during this time, but please bear with me. Let me be the first to confirm the notion that reading a book isn’t always the most entertaining solution to boredom; but I’ve come to realized that maybe I was just reading the wrong books. While I enjoyed the Hunger Games or Rich Dad Poor Dad, just because they’re widely recognizable books does not necessarily mean I should’ve read them by default. So far this year, I put in the time and effort to research facets of my life where I felt a desire for improvement. From there, I stumbled across author Ryan Holiday, and his published works intertwined with business, motivation, and interestingly the stoic philosophy. Currently, I am reading Holiday’s 2014 book The Obstacle Is the Way, and Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, whom Ryan Holiday was inspired by to write about stoicism. For when my eyes are tired from reading; some podcasts I will be listening to are: The Joe Rogan Experience, The Tim Ferriss Show, and 99% Invisible. While consuming information is faster through reading than by listening, podcasts provide a balance for me to avoid overload and remain engaged to sensational content.

3. Physical Growth

This may be tricky, as the grocery stores have looked like a zoo (stop hoarding toliet paper, water, & chicken); but when there’s a will there’s a way. I am using this as an opportunity to improve my nutritional and even financial habits. With some grocery items in shortage, I’ve been careful in deciding which food items will last me a couple of weeks without having to make multiple trips to the market. My approach has been: buy a week’s worth of eggs, fish, and any other preferred (available) meat, refusing to eat anything else until those products are gone. The reason being, these foods are most perishable, therefore saving my rice, pasta, oats, cereal, or even frozen foods will help significantly during the early stages of distancing. Not only will it help with any hunger in the long run, since carbs are filling, but also will save money in the coming weeks as well. Additionally, I’ll be cutting back on unnecessary snacks and beverages to break the cycle of consistent consumption, and even then, avoiding name brand snacks and beverages for the sake of simple saving. In turn, the biggest challenge will be to avoid eating during moments of boredom, and eating past 9pm. I’ve come to realize when I ask myself out loud “Am I really that hungry?”, the majority of the time I find the discipline to walk away from the refrigerator or pantry.

*BONUS: Even though the gyms are closed, I will not be skipping out on my workouts. This is a time for me to really commit towards a small daily fitness routine. For this, I purchased some dumbbells for the house; and will continue to run daily (Nike Run Club app is a great tool to planning out daily run objectives, big or small).* “A mile a day, keeps the anxiety away”.

4. Financial Growth

Lastly, the most difficult growth to achieve during this time, will be financial growth. Perhaps growth isn’t the proper term to use, but rather be stable in budgeting and my literacy. Hopefully soon, I will publish a post about the details of my budget strategy, but for now I take the approach of 50-25-15-10. That’s 50% necessity, 25% variable wants, 15% investing, and 10% giving. During social distancing, the wants will be cut significantly, and therefore I will be reallocating those budgeted funds towards my investment portfolio and giving. Now, I am no means a financial advisor, but the only advice I will give to my readers is to begin researching potential businesses to invest into. Warren Buffett says that, “you are not buying stocks, you are buying a business.” In that approach, I do not purchase stocks because of the price or name; I purchase because the company has a forward vision and the business model to back it up. The key is not to be speculative, have confidence into where you are placing your money and run with it. To leave off, there are many people in this moment who are experiencing economic hardships much stronger than yours or mine. While, I definitely do not suggest giving because you feel pressured to, I would recommend being wary of how you spent your money in the coming weeks. It’s my money, I get it; but the highest human act is to inspire and be a servant to others. Hopefully, these small acts of giving will translate to bigger blessings for others and ourselves upon the horizon.

-Cagen