Turning Trying Times into Better Times
By Mary Kaitlin Enright
If I had a penny for every time I heard about and lamented over these
trying,
unprecedented,
difficult,
unpredictable,
strugglesome,
lonely,
painful,
surreal
times, I’d be rich.
What would I do with all of that money?
More so, what are we going to do with this experience of 2020?
We’ve all heard it before: 2021 will be better than 2020. That hope, it seems, is keeping us all afloat. But not to burst anyone’s bubble (believe me, I don’t want to pop it—I’m in it too!), I’ve felt challenged lately by a few questions I have about that statement:
2021 will be better than 2020.
1. What does this ever-ambiguous and vague concept of “better” mean? What does it look like?
Is it all rainbows, butterflies, concert festivals, and gatherings of more than 10? Or a return to what the world looked like in 2019 B.C. (Before COVID)?
2. How do we achieve better?
Will it just fall into our laps? I doubt it. So we need to do something, right? But what? What are we going to do to make it better? Anything?
As a second semester senior approaching her college graduation, I’ve reflected a lot during the past few months over these questions. I’ve reflected about what these questions of “better” mean for the final stretch of my undergraduate education, and my subsequent entrance into the frightening yet exhilarating post-graduate, real, adult world.
If you would’ve checked in with me about this reflection a year ago, it would probably look a little different. I’d be reflecting about how I was going to work my a** off to secure the perfect job in the big city, and how I was going to thrive, like a social butterfly—no, a social unicorn, into the magical realm of social actualization as if that were the true top of Maslow’s hierarchy.
Yet, that isn’t exactly what my recent reflections actually look like. I, like many others, am reflecting more predominantly on what it means to be a senior trying to celebrate her last semester amidst a global pandemic. I am reflecting on what it means to be a student graduating into a COVID economy, and how it will impact my ability to make 2021 “better” than 2020.
And so, I sought inspiration in no other way than how a marketing major does best: through the thoughtful and powerful vehicle of advertising. Thanks to a video that AdWeek’s Kyle O’Brien called “starkly different than in years past,” the incredibly creative and insightful Google--Year in Search 2020, I realized that my ability to make 2021 “better” than 2020 is about much more than just me and my last year of college. 2020 was the birthing place of issues and challenges far beyond my little Villanova University bubble that require action.
Suddenly, the things that mattered to me so much before—landing a job that pays well and will set me up for conventional definitions of success, and having what I thought was a “bountiful” social life (many friends, even more followers), for, of course, no other reason than to “make the last semester count”—are unimportant.
What do they call a realization like that?
“Epiphany (n): a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience.” (Thanks, Dictionary.com)
I, like many others, have become a part of what they are calling the “epiphany economy.” I spoke to Kristine Rose, SVP of Marketing at Kemper Sports, about what the “epiphany economy” refers to, and what it means for you and me. “When the world stopped,” Kristine shared, “people stopped their normal routines….” And this, quite simply, “made everyone stop and think. The things they once thought they needed, they realized they actually don’t. They also realized that there are things you need in a time of crisis that they hadn’t thought of before.”
And so, the attention economy that we have all gotten used to has given birth to this “epiphany economy” in which we are adjudicating what is truly worthy of our attention. Vacations, time with family and friends, our favorite products, our healthy (or occasionally unhealthy...) habits, our passion projects, etc., etc., are taking precedence over those things now deemed less trivial. That—the crux between what we thought we needed and what we really need—that’s the epiphany.
That distinction doesn’t stop at our consumer behavior. These epiphanies have the power to enact behavior beyond our economic spending, but also with regards to the greater good. Social justice issues, human rights movements, the ecological crisis, the war on poverty and hunger, etc., etc., can take precedence over those issues that are, too, less trivial. That’s precisely that point at which we can think about how exactly we can make 2021 better.
So, what did you realize in 2020? What was your epiphany?
Was it something big?
Like your love and need for quality time with your family and friends?
Like working on/in something you’re passionate about?
Like taking care of your health—not just physically but mentally and emotionally?
Like the fact that the only person whose acceptance or validation you really need is your own?
Like the fact that human rights should not be in question—or rather, in challenge—in the 21st century?
Like the fact that our world is dying and maybe we should take care of it?
Or something else? We have all had our own little epiphanies in 2020, and whether big or small, personal, community-bound, or worldly, they are powerful motivators of action and change.
So, I dare to ask you (and myself):
How are you going to use your epiphanies to make 2021 better? How will you take the lessons of 2020 to become more informed, empathetic, and proactive members of our world?
I’m not sure yet how I will, but what I do know is that I want to be a part of the epiphany economy. Do you?
