Living with COVID-19: Living (together) with COVID-19
How can we still live and work together when our beliefs about vaccination are not the same?
The impact that COVID-19 has had on our lives is immense. In order to move forward and learn to live with COVID-19 as part of our everyday lives, we must accept that there will be those in our lives who choose to not be vaccinated.
Here are some suggestions on how vaccinated and unvaccinated people can effectively live and work together:
- Agree to disagree. Understand that you do not share the same views on vaccination and accept it.
- Be open and honest. It’s important that you are able to respectfully share what you are feeling and why, so that you can work together to find solutions. Talk often and don’t let the little things go, because they become big quickly.
- Leave your emotions out of it. That means not letting fear, anxiety or anger guide our response to others.
- Define the level of risk you are willing to take: will you only meet outdoors; or in a larger room, distanced from each other, wearing masks? Only you can say what makes you feel safe.
Finding our “new normal,” takes time and effort, like all things that are worthwhile. What’s important is that we are moving forward together and making sure that we find common ground to stand on.
As much as we’ve all been living with COVID-19 for the last two years, we are now in the process of doing it together.
