"Persistence is the path to success." (Charles Chaplin)

"Persistence is the path to success." (Charles Chaplin)

Let's look at this time as an interval of life. Realizing that some beautiful things are much more stunning when they are still imperfect than when they were created to perfection. An opportunity to think and rethink. Nature continues to work. The birds continue to sing, the rivers continue to run and the sun continues to shine. This is a beautiful opportunity to reconnect with nature and enjoy everything that is most beautiful. Difficult days have always served to appreciate the good. This time it will be no different. Take a few minutes of silence and look around. If you look closely, you will find many reasons to smile and thank. As Augusto Branco wrote: “Finds courage in pain and challenge. In this life, only the obstacles that we are able to overcome are placed in front of us ”.
I'm an ordinary citizen. I know nothing relevant about this pandemic, so I understand that I should have the humility to let myself be guided by whom, although not knowing everything, and being also learning day by day, surely knows much more than I could ever know - even if I bothered to listen to everything (and I don’t hear it), that I was gossiping on the internet about how much is speculated around the world (and I don’t). In this matter, I live the serenity of those who trust only what the health authorities tell us to do, in addition to what common sense advises me. And, as was said in other times, whatever will sound. “Determination, courage and self-confidence are decisive factors for success. If we are possessed by unshakable determination, we will be able to overcome them. Regardless of the circumstances, we must always be humble, modest and stripped of pride. ”(Dalai Lama)
Without nostalgia, life goes on and is recorded in news. Here and there we can and should talk, call friends and take a “look at the news”, some that are worth reading, watching or listening to on websites, and knowing how to distinguish reality from lies! We all know that only those we want to deceive us, that this new normality, which is the most abnormal normality of mine already proves age, as of many of my friends, is still to last and that, for now, we still haven't managed see the day we all dream of! And so, let's follow what Fernando Pessoa said: “Close the door, change the disc, clean the house, shake off the dust. Stop being who you were, and become who you are. ”
The moment of enormous importance has come to reflect that we either live excessively confined until a few days ago, showing care and fears that were not justified; or can we now expose ourselves excessively to the risks that remain in the air? We have to be clear between the first and the second moment, there is an obvious lack of coherence and sense. It is about common sense, which I want to speak now and here, and I would like to leave a note. We imagine that the anguish of loneliness, added to the tensions of confinement, leads some of us to an idea: if a quarantine of almost three months has passed, without symptoms, the most likely is that if we are not infected, the step is small and the temptation is great, to return to “do the same”. Don't do that (many people are not respecting the rules of social distance (I observe it daily) and that this will generate more contagions that are perfectly avoidable). It can be tragic! And I remember, as Jean Paul Sartre wrote, “All men are afraid. Who is not afraid is not normal; this has nothing to do with courage ”.
It is still too early and the situation is still too uncertain for us to “relax, suggesting to citizens the existence of a normality as false as it is dangerous. One thing is the imperative need, which forces millions of Portuguese to take risks to go to work; it is quite another to suggest that they can freely spend their free time, as if the danger has passed. Did not pass. We will be well advised if we are aware that "the time we spend on moralizing problems is what we lose to understand them" (Daniel Innerarity, Spanish philosopher, on pandemic management)