How quarantine changed my life

Personally speaking, in the latter of 2018 and 2019, when I hardly update my posts in this blog, I was working very hard in my company in which I joined in 2018 summer. I rarely enjoyed yoga nor running that now I love the most, nor planned traveling or went out to cafes nearby that I loved before the work got so busy.

Probably, a move in 2019 fall to my new apartment closer to my office was also one of the reasons I couldn’t handle the balance of work-life, as I wasn’t able to adjust to the new environment very soon. In the past 1 year and a half, I’ve been saying “I’m busy”. When people asked me what my hobbies were, I always answered “I can’t think of anything (because what only I do is working)”.

All of a sudden, at the end of February 2020, I was forced to work remotely, and soon quarantine started around the world. In most countries, people became unable to go out of home, needless to say, to travel abroad. Here in Japan, where there weren’t any lockdown measures but the emergency statement only, going out was regarded as a lack of common sense.

Due to this situation where travel is not allowed and less busywork (due to a frozen budget), I could stop in a busy life and think about what my life should be like. Also, I could have time to think back carefully about what and how the past life was. I remembered about this blog, which was originally my personal travel blog, hasn’t been updated for a long time. I started posting again and newly changed the design.

In this post, I am going to write about my new habits and how my way of thinking and lifestyle has been changed.

I like exercising – running, workout and yoga

Even before, I was a runner who could finish some half marathon competitions. I was also a kind of yogi who went to Yoga retreat alone for twice in a year. Still, I couldn’t say my hobby was running nor yoga because they weren’t things that I daily do. I only did them sometimes.

However, since the middle of March, I started a workout and running almost every day. I also participated in the online Ashtanga Yoga class in May. These habits became completely my daily routine rather than a hobby, and I continue doing all of these exercises until now.

I am an early bird

These exercising habits explained above made me wake up very early in the morning. I could fall asleep very soon and deeply and not only my body but also my mind is very clear and positive in the morning. My old excuse “I am busy” has gone, and now I have enough time to have exercise and prepare meals for breakfast and a lunch box for myself before start working.

Before, I slept for more than 7-8 hours and still always very sleepy during the daytime. However, now I can get up around 5 am without setting an alarm, sleeping for about 6-7 hours. I feel very clear not only in the morning but also in the day time, too.

I choose what I eat

Eating habit is related to my exercising. I went to the personal training where the teacher taught me not only about how to do work out physically but also about nutrition to have balanced meals every day. Thanks to that, now I can choose balanced ingredients for my body and really enjoy cooking.

And more

Besides these three basic new habits – exercise, sleep, eat – there are a lot of new things around me. I started using a planner book to write down what I learned for the day and to plan my monthly, weekly goals. As I mentioned, I started blogging again and re-started learning a foreign language that I loved before. I also became to have an interest in decorating my room which I hadn’t had any single interest before.

Thanks to the positive side of quarantine, I became good at time management, and as a result, I can have a good work-life balance in my life. And now I like it very much.