“Growing Beyond Fear of COVID-19” by Philip Kakungulu

We have been blessed by the sharing this very important and timely tool from Ken Seidu our Nigerian Peace Warrior. I remember his courage in the Nairobi Training of Conflict Transformation Trainers of 2018.  Ken and a group of Peace Builders from Nigeria and the United Kingdom developed this tool about the different zones we may find ourselves in or choose to enter related to the COVID-19 crisis.  They were inspired by a tool on Comfort Zones and Discomfort Zones in experiential education (to see how Training for Change uses the Comfort/Discomfort Zones tool, click here.)

     Every day we are flooded with more information in our news feed about this pandemic and it gets very scary the more you think about it. Ken’s tool is very important because something much worse is spreading very fast; its FEAR.

     I have witnessed down here that the fear of COVID-19 is more dangerous than the virus itself. I learned from Mylinda Baits (one of our Global Peace Warriors) and First Aid Arts for the Heart that when you are in fear, a reactive part of the brain called the amygdala takes control of your actions. For example people are storing up all these piles of food because they have entered into a fight-flight-freeze response. When you are in this reactive state, your body produces a steroid called cortisol to help you handle stress. However, cortisol significantly weakens your immune system.

     When we are stuck in fight-flight because of worries or anxiety, the body is wasting a lot of energy thinking it might die at the current moment. All this energy which has gone now makes our bodies weak and more vulnerable. People need to know that being afraid literally makes one more susceptible to getting sick. When a person is in a state of Fear one becomes selfish in a self-protective state, thus losing the capability of thinking or having empathy.

     I think that under learning and growth we need to encourage people to focus on things they are grateful for, and these can be things which others do not have or share. People must practice taking note of the things they are grateful for until they actually start feeling grateful. It is important to turn off the news and turn on personal connections.

     Lastly, people should know that feeling brave during scary times is much easier than they thought. A study by Dr. Alvaro Pascal-Leone indicates that “Our brains do not know the difference between imagination and reality”, we can choose to be courageous, bold, and confident simply by imagining what that would feel like. This means that How You FEEL is Your Choice. Your thoughts produce your feelings and this means you have a lot more power over your feelings thank you think.

     Again thank you, Ken, for sharing this tool.

     Here is an Arabic version of the COVID-19 zones passed by a peacemaking friend from Lebanon:

One of our Global Peace Warriors, Ildephonse Niyokindi from Burundi, translated the COVID-19 Zones tool into French: