Connecting during a Paradoxical Time

On March 15^th I wrote in the IARPP Forum: “At this time in which we are forced to distance from each other, it is of profound importance to ‘stubbornly’ cultivate a sense of connection and community. Psychotherapists cannot work alone, we need a group with which to affiliate and share ideas and values.”

A ‘real’ and previously unimagined fear was the emotion that we were confronted with during the first weeks of the pandemic. A globalization of fear that brings people and mutuality to center stage: each individual becoming essential for the common good along with the critical role of the community in taking care of each individual. We and our patients, more or less consciously, have been immersed in a state of ‘anxiety’. Our task is to try to transform this anxiety into a ‘useful’ state of fear that serves as a weapon to fight objective danger. A paradox comes to mind: ‘We must all practice the COURAGE of FEAR together’.

This emergency, so unpredictable, dramatic and unknown, stripped us of the illusion of control. We have also been confronted the paradox of time. On one side we are ‘racing against time’ to find a cure; on the other hand, we feel the suspension of time, the interruption of usual activities, as we seek to prevent the sneaky invasion of the virus. The subtle invasion of our bodies and our minds.

I was proud of us Italians facing this Tsunami. Healthcare workers delivered heroically and the great majority of people adapted responsibly in a matter of days to the radical changes imposed on their lives. A human warmth and a sense of mutual prudence became apparent as we struggled to keep bodies distant and souls closer together.

Through these months of being socially distant, we sought contact through the exchange of a huge mass of information – a sort of run-up to collective communication, a virtual ‘movement’ – even as we were stuck in a prolonged lonely ‘still image’.

An interesting holding process developed within the community of Italian colleagues of