From Languishing to Flourishing

May 7, 2021

From Languishing to Flourishing

By Father Patrick O'Shea - Lower Hutt

 

I am constantly on the lookout for material that deals with mental wellbeing. Recently two items have come to my attention.              

The first is a newly released Vatican Document entitled Members of One Body, Loved by One Love ( Read here: ). It seeks to address the psychological issues generated by the Covid-19 pandemic and how we might accompany each other through this crisis. I was encouraged by the fact that this dimension of the crisis was given special attention by the Vatican.  

Quoting Pope Francis, it speaks about how people “feel afraid and lost’ in the face of a disease that threatens their physical health and even their lives and has already caused more than 2.3m deaths worldwide. Its analysis reveals how - 

  • The experience of isolation during lockdowns,
  • the disruption of social activities and relationships,
  • the loss of work and the financial burden this imposes,
  • the absence of physical contact and closeness with loved ones,
  • being unable to farewell those who have died or even be with them in their last hours,
  • the uncertainty that all of this produces,
  • and many other factors, 

have raised our pre-existing sense of human frailty and vulnerability to new levels. Most people will have experienced these to some degree. Some have had to endure these conditions for extended periods. This, combined with high exposure to the disease, will have had profound implications for their mental health.   The document also identifies groups that are especially vulnerable like the elderly, detainees, and the homeless. 

In the face of these challenges the document explores how an emphasis on the human dignity of all, social responsibility and solidarity become key elements in accompanying people through this crisis. By making us so acutely aware of our frailties and the fact that a “go it alone” attitude is not going to work we are given an opportunity to rethink our lifestyles, our relationships, our social organisation, and our sense of meaning in life.  There is a strong case for us to rethink our relationship with the planet, which is also in crisis, one for which there is no vaccine. 

In the early days of the pandemic, we witnessed many examples of people responding creatively to the conditions required to stop the spread of the disease and finding alternative ways to stay in touch and lift spirits. Many of these had a strong focus on solidarity and mutual support.  I remember people pausing to applaud and thank health care and other frontline workers. These are not so evident now. Have we run out of stream after all this time?  Or are we in a state that is at the focus of the other item I noticed. 

The New York Times daily briefing referred to a new term used by Adam Grant to capture the sense of stagnation that the pandemic has produced. Grant writes, "It wasn't burnout -- we still had energy. It was not depression -- we didn't feel hopeless. We just felt somewhat joyless and aimless”. He calls it “languishing”. The term resonated with my own experience of life being “on hold”, with many things that we might normally do suspended until conditions change. If that is true here in New Zealand how much more so in the regions more severely impacted.    

The opposite to languishing is flourishing. We can easily see when a garden or field is flourishing.  We notice people who are flourishing and may have experienced this sense ourselves from time to time. The deeper challenge is not just to get thought the crisis but to find ways that we, our communities and our planet can flourish.