Alexey Tsishevsky,
Executive Director of Handl / Dbrain
I had a very soft and prepared entrance to quarantine mode. Our startup got into Y-Combinator, and since the beginning of the year I have spent almost three months in San Francisco. It was a bit like a lockdown, because we lived and worked in one place, and almost all the communication was on Zoom. I am wildly fortunate to be living with guys who are not only technology professionals and researchers, but also have an applied interest in the topics of "healthy longevity", mental health and spiritual growth. Once in London, already in a real lockdown, I built some of the new rituals and habits into my regime.
In California I gave up alcohol, in London it returned, but in much smaller quantities. I started doing functional training, bought two clubs of different weights and weights. Built in English classes in the work schedule. Serials were replaced by meaningful lectures (MasterClass, "Synchronization"). I started to get high from cooking. Earlier in Moscow, I almost completely switched to the delivery of ready-made food, and now I prepare breakfasts and dinners, trying to use healthy ingredients. During this time, you can listen to audiobooks or lectures on work. For the last month and a half, I have been practicing 36-hour fasting once a week. For me, this is more of a mental practice: on the very day of fasting, concentration and emotional stability increase, a safe mode appears for discussing sensitive issues and making decisions. I continue to take meditation courses from time to time, for me it has become a habitual disciplining factor that brings me back to practice.
The reverse side of a lockdown is constant anxiety (for parents, for the future, news background), tightness in a broad sense, lack of live communication, tactile contact. Despite the introduction of generally good rituals and habits, the level of energy and emotions in general decreased.
One of the things that helped and helps is acceptance of the situation as it is. At the very beginning of the quarantine, I said to myself: "No, this is not temporary, this is a new reality." Further - a decrease in requirements for oneself, observation, again, of any of its manifestations and states, a little detached and with interest. Now a lot has become sharply noticeable, the gaze has become de-automated: in everyday life, in communication, and in oneself.
For a company, distributed work offers a huge number of opportunities. You can join from any country, look for the best people on the planet and so on, but for this you need to significantly refine the current processes, how we interact, how we feel each other, so that there is no feeling of disunity.
Yulia Vydolob, editor-in-chief of the special projects department, The Blueprint
Even before the quarantine, I paid attention to my diet, tried to eat more or less at the same time, monitor the balance of proteins, complex carbohydrates and vegetables and not allow myself to eat sweets on an empty stomach. During the quarantine, we even had to tighten this schedule: between Zoom calls and the children’s activities, food and cooking had to be planned even more carefully, but the body says thank you. I am glad that this habit has finally taken root.
Even during self-isolation, it helped a lot to make several circles around the house - fortunately, we have a large yard in which you can run 1.5-2 km safely for yourself and those around you. I love working in the office, but the ability to get out of the house for a 15-minute run at any time is certainly worth a lot. Even now I try to "run out" at least two or three times a week. But with food orders I want not to frequent. Of course, this opportunity was very supportive during the quarantine, but it turned out to be not so great to constantly eat from restaurant menus. Firstly, you don't know how exactly the dishes were prepared, it is impossible to predict how much fat, salt and sugar they will contain. Secondly, you start to overeat, because food from the restaurant does not always tolerate reheating well. Thirdly, imperceptibly you are fond of hearty (and fatty) ethnic food: khinkali, pies. So I want to master more easy (both in preparation and in composition) homemade dishes, and leave ordering food for special occasions.
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Lilia Glushchenko, money thinking coach
My life in quarantine was not too different from my life before - I work mostly online, and my clients live in different time zones. But at first I was confused: the long-awaited trip was canceled, I lost money on non-refundable bookings and air tickets, my gym was closed and all the bodily joys associated with it in the form of a sauna and massage, and in addition I began to read the news for some reason. A week later, I found myself in sadness and anguish while watching the series, the scales were already plus one and a half kilograms.
I hate discipline and resist any habits that oblige me to do something. But the quarantine affected this in a surprising way. It was born as an experiment: I wanted to know what if I try to do a light workout for a week without breaks, not for good and good, but out of curiosity. Then I decided to give up sugar, but again, not because everyone was talking about it, but to see how my receptors would react. Further - more: I decided to go to sleep "today", and this led to the fact that the beginning of the day shifted and this added two hours of active life, and now I already wake up without an alarm clock. I signed up for a productivity program, and she introduced a schedule into my life that primarily planned rest and enjoyable activities, and the rest of the time, work and chores.
In general, these months in isolation showed, in my opinion, the obvious: that online cannot replace friendly hugs, we do not go to restaurants for food, we are important about connection with nature and the opportunity to travel. And that life is constantly changing.
Sergey Afanasyev, Executive Director of Sberbank Private Banking
Little has changed in my life during and after the quarantine. I continued to attend work almost all the time, except for a couple of "experimental" weeks when I tested (and quite successfully, by the way) work from home. But I decided not to renew the remote mode for several reasons. First, I stopped feeling at home. In my life I try not to bring work issues into the house at all. Home is home, these are my books, my dogs, my comfort and a place to rest - physical and moral. Secondly, visiting the office means maintaining my usual rhythm of life, which has developed over the years. Third, it is pleasant to drive through empty streets. I also read a lot. Including I always read on trips. There were no trips (except for suburban ones) either abroad or within the country, well, I read at home. For me it has always been and is - a favorite habit, the highest form of relaxation,creativity and self-development.
I did not think and do not think now that global self-isolation was supposed to transform the world. Major changes require capital foundations (social, political, economic and cultural) - the global pandemic (at least so far) has not affected these fundamental foundations, unless the economy has suffered, and that much less than many feared.
And before, and during, and after self-isolation, I am guided by the principle: do what you must and come what may. This is a deep enough thought, if you think about it properly.
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Andronik Khachiyan, art director and co-owner of the Dom 16 club, designer
I met quarantine with my father - my mother was sent to the dacha due to the poor condition of her lungs, and someone had to cook food for my father - that's how I learned to cope with soups. Now I cook more often than I order or go somewhere - a completely lost habit of 10 years ago. It came in handy when at the beginning of May I began to live in an apartment with my new neighbor, the musician Andries. He does not eat meat, cheese and other animalts, we cook vegetable stews, have breakfast with vegetables, make salads from vegetables with vegetables, spreads from vegetables - in general, we do not deny ourselves anything. During the quarantine, I did not drink either my favorite cognac, or my dear port, or summer prosecco. I drank only IPA, and then not more than two bottles not every day. I found out that I don’t miss bars and parties (and I’m a noble dancer and flirt),and the winter habit of drinking daily did not show up at home.
For more than ten years I have shielded myself from buying PS, admitting my gambling addiction. And at the very beginning of the quarantine, the purchase of a projector entailed the purchase of a set-top box, which took a couple of new video services. Yes, I hung up for a week, but after two months I spend five hours a week on games, and I watch movies and TV shows every three days, not drunkenly - two or three episodes. As I did not fit my computer after the delivery of one project, I still don’t want to. I have been feeling it superfluous in my life for a couple of years now, but I could not get off this needle, oil was flowing through it. I hope that the habit of earning money while sitting at the computer will leave my life.
I zoomed a little, I was not drawn to big parties. And I'm already used to video calls tete-a-tete, for a long time we have been living with our best friends in different countries. I am glad that I got into the habit of calling them more often, inquiring about business and health.
For two months with my father, we managed to go through all the stages of acceptance in a very easy way. And we got out of quarantine after hearing each other. Everything went towards this before, but we had not communicated so closely for a long time, and this cohabitation was perceived as a gift of fate. There were no grievances left, everyone understood and accepted each other. I began to discuss any emerging issues in relations with loved ones more.
I confess that I was not happy with the end of the quarantine, and not because this is nonsense, but because I am too active in life, but here I managed to settle down, do some repairs and have fun at reduced speeds. Well, in general, this is an amazing time, of course: the whole world goes home, people stayed with themselves and with loved ones.
My new habit is to sit at home and arrange it or play cards with Andriesh, chat, fool around, joke and, of course, listen to his music and his students from the Higher School of Economics. Therefore, after work I immediately rush home and am in no hurry to leave it in the morning.
Dasha Utkina, doula, co-founder of the #berezhnoxebe community and presenter of the course on preparation for childbirth for professionals
All my work, except for accompanying childbirth, went completely online. And I want to stay in this format at least until autumn. I really like that in my life now there is no subway and crowds of people - a small paradise for an introvert.
For months in the forest with children, their illnesses and a lot of work, I fell in love with the regime. At 9 pm, everyone in bed is listening to a book, and the quiet hour is a great thing that parents need too.
For the first time I cook breakfast every day. Became a guru of cheesecakes and pancakes. Daughter bakes space cinnamon buns that added 5 kilos to me. Apparently, because of them and the fresh air, I suddenly react normally to coffee. Now I have a morning ritual: put on a geyser coffee maker, warm coconut milk and even make froth. Before, I drank only chamomile tea and was jerky anyway.
I also discovered the pleasure of idleness, when the children are laid, and you can chat on the veranda with a girlfriend or just look at the stars, listening to the birds. In between calls, it turned out to be cool to play badminton in the wet grass, barefoot to the bourgeois songs of the SBPCh.
It seems that I began to try less and have more pleasure. I'm not sure if this rhythm works in the city, but in the forest I am very comfortable.
Ivan Vasiliev, restaurant columnist, DJ
During isolation, he tried his hand at strength - for two months he completely gave up alcohol and began to practice intermittent fasting. In a couple of weeks, it went from 18/6 (18 hours of hunger plus 6 hours when you can eat) to 20/4, which is pretty tough considering my difficult relationship with food. It turned out that even if you just don't eat at night, you can quite gracefully pull yourself up in the lateral area.
In parallel, on YouTube, I accidentally found a set of exercises from Johnny Sins and repeated them at home for a month, as a result, the weight went up, but I explained everything by the fact that I gained muscle mass. During the breaks from pumping the press, I learned to bake bread using the simplest recipe found on the Internet, and out of five times the first was the most successful. As soon as I was allowed to leave the house, I returned to walking and found 90 km in five days.
After a long self-isolation, I am still afraid of a large crowd of people and watch with horror how people massively lose their sense of security. I would sit at home a little longer.
Cecile Pleger, actress, television personality
The main habit acquired during self-isolation is playing sports. I started testing various workouts from YouTube. And since my nature is exhibitionistic, I began to arrange live broadcasts on Facebook, where I tried to repeat the movements of the coaches. It saved me - it turned out to be good for both body and soul. Now I am constantly playing sports and dancing and am not going to stop.
And I, like everyone else, began to wash my hands more often. I didn't really pay attention to it before. I developed a bad habit of drinking wine every day, but I've done it before. So I cannot say that I acquired something bad during the quarantine. Of the good, I also want to note the following. In order not to turn into an amoeba, I decided not to wear slippers at home, but beautiful sneakers. And I really liked it, I decided to do it always.
Den Grishin, Information Technology Consultant
To be honest, two months of self-isolation is a very short time for a person of my age to discover significant changes in the organization of life. And yet, this period introduced those adjustments that might not have happened at another time.
Slightly original, but I'm used to being in the process of self-education. Not a day without a webinar from any training program.
I had to learn the skill of self-discipline. External landmarks and timelines were replaced by internal ones: there is no more autopilot, only manual control.
The life of a hermit and an introvert has brought him into the habit of constantly wearing sweatpants. It turned out to be very convenient.
I started talking to pets. Of course, they began to answer me (no, not in human speech). Now I have a project team at hand.
But most importantly, I started talking to myself. And it is this habit that I would like to leave in the first place. Now I know more about my own needs and ways to organize my life in a confined space without losing interest in it.
But sweatpants are worth saying goodbye to.
Danila Antonovsky, co-founder of the Yasno online consultation service with psychologists
Self-isolation turned out to be a very interesting time. Being locked in four walls, people, perhaps for the first time in their lives, met with themselves - with their emotions, fears, internal conflicts: in general, with everything that they could previously drown out with some household chores, work, travel and so on. I think it was not easy for everyone, but the result was different. This allowed someone to finally listen to their desires and focus on what is really important for them (be it a sport, a hobby, family or moving out of town), while someone, on the contrary, was distracted from the important and flooded with excess.
For me personally, self-isolation has changed the mechanics of interacting with colleagues. I have always been a supporter of working in an office - it seems like it sets a certain structure, information is quickly and freely transferred from employee to employee, and so on. However, over the past three months, I have become convinced that the office is an atavism, that it is completely unnecessary, that meetings in the zoom are as effective as personal ones, and in general - that a remote team is much more efficient, convenient and enjoyable.
Katya Fedorova is the
author of the Telegram channel Good morning, Karl! and co-founder of Superkiosk agency
Before quarantine, I lived in an insane rhythm, when there are five meetings and two parties a day, new projects are constantly discussed, and at home there are always friends who “just passed by”. And then it all ended in one day, and in the first weeks of self-isolation it was so hard for me that I wanted to walk in circles on the ceiling of the apartment. It was even worse that none of us knew when it was all over.
I can’t boast that I did sports intensively, mastered a new language or read many smart books.
But at some point, I began to live for today and, it seems, for the first time in my life, allowed myself not to be a strong cyborg, who is doing well and who will now settle everything. It turned out that to stop denying your vulnerability and that of your loved ones is a very rewarding and liberating experience.
And when you stop constantly thinking about which mountain you need to conquer next, you start incredibly enjoying such simple things as drinking coffee with a friend on a bench in the yard.
Also, I have never spoken so often with my friends who are scattered all over the world, and I hope to keep this new habit forever.
Ruslan Aliev, yoga instructor, producer, dreamer
I romanticize everything, even the most ordinary things - the opportunity to walk barefoot on the cold grass on the outskirts of the metropolis, dine at a restaurant with friends, find a new beautiful alley, and then bring a friend there. All this is the "dance of life", and communication is a source of inspiration, so I thought.
Within a week of "house arrest" my mental state was overflowing with 50 shades of gray. And this is the first habit - to listen to yourself, to notice yourself. I fired a bullet out of town, and spent the next months of isolation there. Where I found new habits: every day walking in the woods or near the beautiful Pleshcheyevo Lake, going to the bathhouse, diving into the font.
When I returned to the city, I noticed that I began to save more, and I intend to practice this further.
I feel that when everything that was part of the usual way of things was "taken away" from me, I found myself.
Masha Arzamasova, blog author @masha_davay
Since I've been working for myself at home for over five years, little has changed for me. I used to wake up when I wanted to and worked at home. In addition, I live alone, I do not have a family and children, so what was difficult for many (schoolchildren who study remotely, or toddlers who constantly require attention) did not affect me.
What was extremely difficult: they demanded that I give up the habit of walking a lot. I spent a week in bed, literally not getting up from it, and then I became a malicious violator. Every evening, when it got dark, at about 8-9 pm (it was March-April) I went outside and turned on the izi.travel application (guides-applications in different cities). I used to use it in Europe, but it also worked for the center of Moscow.
It was hard without sports. I regularly go to the pool and could not replenish it. I had to go to my mother out of town - there I began "Boniface's vacation": I rode a bike, walked, even climbed trees.
I began to cook a lot. I subscribed to the account of my friend Vova Chistyakov, the chef of the BURO TSUM restaurant, who posted a lot of video recipes in quarantine. It was so great! I myself cooked restaurant-grade food at home. Now I even have my own specialties. I'm not sure I would have gotten to cooking without quarantine. Even on Easter, she baked cool cakes (I have never done something like this in my life).
From the funny. I have a special specifics of work - sex blogging. So, the information that sales of sex toys rose on self-isolation was true. And since I constantly review such gadgets and receive a percentage of sales, I suddenly began to receive very large royalties - they have grown significantly. When there is demand, it is reasonable to make an offer. I started producing many detailed test drives. And now sales are growing, we need to offer people something. I decided to test all the lubricants that were sent to me. There were 15 of them. To understand the product, it is good to try each one more than once. In general, can you imagine how much I had to “work on my own”? And while I lived in my apartment, there were norms. But at my mother's dacha it is more difficult. So as soon as I saw that my mother was going to dig into the garden (this is for two or three hours), I understood:"Well, that's it, you can start!" Then my grandmother arrived and it became even more difficult. From my observation post on the balcony, I looked: "So, mom is in the greenhouse, grandmother is in the garden, it's time!" Later I returned to my Moscow apartment and decided to consolidate my habit of doing reviews.