Self Love

Its been more than 2.5 months now that we have decided to self-quarantine ourselves and it's going to be June in a few days and we are still nowhere near normalcy. 

In past months we all have gone through numerous emotional changes. I felt anxious, lonely, nervous, scared, and other gamut emotions many times and it was a difficult time, I still feel these emotions sometimes but since we are deep into this quarantine so, emotions are also learning to be stable now accepting what's normal. 

One thing I have learned in this COVID situation is that I love my company, with all the flaws I still enjoy spending time with myself. I am realizing that I am way more resilient than I give myself credit. 

I learned that we can't control everything so don't focus on those, its easier said than done but when practiced it makes things a bit easy. 

We spend so much time working because there is no line differentiating work and personal life, and most of us get carried away. But taking a break, scheduling downtime is very critical for us, we can't function on autopilot mode. We need to be self-compassionate and give ourselves time to rejuvenate. It's very important to make us efficient and accomplish more. 

Finally, on days when I feel down and find myself stepping into an abyss of negativity, I try to remind myself of everything I am grateful for, all the blessings, everything I have done, things I have accomplished, and what made everything so wonderful. 

Screen time for kids- How much is too much?

This vacation time is normally for visiting grandparents, seeing new places, meeting cousins, and trying new things with grandparents. As kids, we used to wait for our summer vacations to go out and enjoy our vacation without the fear to complete homework for school. Playing for hours, and hours.

But with the current situation, forget about vacations we are all confined in our homes with very limited activities to do and things are even crazier when you have kids around. 

We adults somehow try to convince ourselves to stay at home or to forget our worries in our chores, work, Netflix, or just random Instagram scrolling. But for kids, they don't have all these things as distractions.

We normally plan our day with kids to include reading, some writing activities, drawing, board games, workouts, structured and unstructured playtime. Sometimes I let them help me in house chores, cooking but even after all these kids still feel bored and need something more to do.

At that time like any other parent, I normally give in to screentime. Sometimes it's educational series, sometimes just a random cartoon they want to see on Netflix. But I often find it challenging to understand how much screen time is enough for kids. If they are watching something good should I let them see for more than an hour or should I stop them?

We have some rules for screen time but then I wonder that these rules are for normal times and these are not normal times so should I let them break the rules and let them indulge little more. Sometimes I let them but often I try to maintain a cap on their screen time. 

But even after so many days in quarantine, I am unable to decide how much screen time is appropriate for them now in this situation.