By: Marionette Macasinag

Before the pandemic, we used to be with our friends, colleagues, family, minding our own business. But with the current situation, it is as though it implores each of us to make a change. Of course, we always try to survive each day for our loved ones, but if there is something more significant this health crisis has ever taught us— it is to preserve humanity, to preserve what is left of us.

This is the best time to lift each other up. Let us alleviate the stereotyped mindset that we need to have more to help others. It can be through our chosen field or even simply through our day-to-day commitments. How we treat others is the least we can do perhaps. As a person, we treat everyone fair and good but how about a little upgrade? How about we treat each other better for a start? It could be a smile or a small talk to a stranger we have just met or an extra pay for the driver along with a compliment, “thank you for the ride”. A shortened period for a usual 15-minute transaction for clients with so much at hand for a day is already a relief.       A little effort is enough to let them know that their existence is valuable too, as we all are.

This pandemic is a call for us to be more compassionate and more humane than our old selves. This time, we also have to live for others. All of us have suffered a lot of losses for the past couple of years – a job, a colleague, a friend, a loved one. But no matter how dark it is, there is always a light at the end of a tunnel, as the saying goes. Yes, we could not regain what was already lost, but the hope and faith that it has instilled in us are the greatest traits we can have as we continue with our lives. Hope that someday everything will be back in its place again and the faith that whatever happened in the past and what awaits in the future, God will never cease to love us.