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Aversion to Light
In Lenten Devotional - 2022
Olivia Knight
Mar 09, 2022
Ellen, you make a really excellent point about social constructs feeding into the "shadows over sunbeams" mentality that is so easy to embrace. So often, we feel like we have to preserve niceness over honest truth and vulnerability. I remember during the very early days of the pandemic, when I would explain to people that I didn't think this was just a two-week "thing" that we were going to go through quickly. At the time, I didn't have all the information, but I was about to graduate with my Master's in a public health field, and I'd taken courses in epidemiology. I would watch as some would try to appease my fears, or maybe their own. When I look back on that time, I think about how my educated guesses about where the pandemic was headed were not nice or convenient, and I can't really blame people for reacting the way they did when I would say something like "I really think we won't get out of this thing until a vaccine is developed." In some ways, though, the joke's on me. Plenty of people have returned to regular daily living, and I'm busy thinking about when the next variant will strike. Perhaps I should take a different attitude during this time of low transmission rates and optional masks and think harder about what "niceness" means in my life and in my own interpretation of the word. Is "niceness" simply the complete avoidance of risk, and am I shutting out opportunities for my family because the nervousness I mentioned has taken over? There are so many ways to spin these words and apply them to different situations! At the end of the day, we're all just doing our best to bring light to the world.
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Olivia Knight

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