CAMILLE VILLAR

Lifestyle Asia Cover Personality (July 2019)

There were a lot of lessons learned from this experience but the most important ones would be: First, never take anything for granted. Things like getting my coffee in the morning, ordering my favorite pizza, and being able to take my son out. Even going to the bank and paying my bills without fear, or being able to see my friends and hug my parents. You don't realize the importance of these things until you are unable to do it. Even as we go out and give help to others, we have to take precautions for everyone's health and safety. During this self-quarantine, I have remembered to find joy in the little things as well.

Also, I have learned to tune things out. I have found that if you listen to every idea, everything on the news, or read everything about the current situation—you can become anxious and even depressed. I have learned to focus only on what important and what is within my control. I have found that you cannot solve every problem. To just do your best every day and help as many people as you can. I find that now is not the time to point out what can be done better or needs improvement— we all just need to do our part and work towards a solution. Let us all just follow the rules, have faith, and pray. This will one day be over. I can’t wait to celebrate that day with all of you.

To all the frontliners—there are no words or gestures that could aptly express how grateful we are for all your work and how much we admire you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. I hope that we can somehow make things easier for you.

I will definitely continue to show my appreciation and gratitude for all our frontliners after everything. This is not just for our health workers, military, and policemen, but I extend this to those who face difficulty every day getting to work just so we can go to the supermarket or have food to eat. They are all the unspoken heroes of our situation.

This has taught me that there is really no room for destructive negativity and pettiness. I will always be reminded not to spend time pointing blame but rather working towards a solution.