To say that this has been a period of extraordinary upheaval would be the understatement of the year.

We’ve dealt with the immediate crises of the pandemic: changing our routines, adjusting to anxiety, working through the challenges of activities that used to be simple. Briefly, we’ve worked very hard just to make it work.

In this season of giving thanks, you’re probably just glad you made it to Thanksgiving. I am. That sense of relief (and expectation) is normal (assuming I’m reasonably normal). This is a nice way of saying that if you’re not feeling all that grateful, you’re not warped, and you’re not alone. 

But let’s think for a moment about where we are in light of where we’d like to be. Growth, in the moment, often feels like a crisis, and it’s only when we look back that we can tell the difference. Are we talking disruption, or is it transformation? What if the pandemic didn’t just disrupt our daily activities; what if it transformed those activities? More importantly, what if it transformed us along with them?

We’ve expanded our capacity to live and work and love, carrying on by other means, in the shadow of a virus. In spite of how things may look at close range, I am convinced that we can emerge from this period better equipped for living, more convinced of the value of what we do, and, sadly, more aware of the inequities in our communities. Will we lose that awareness when things “get back to normal”?

That really is my point as we observe Thanksgiving. As difficult as this challenge has been, professionally and personally, the more we reframe our sense of disruption in terms of transformation, the more we can expand and find ways to get our bearings — and help our colleagues, our families, and each other as well.

Let me put the challenge to you this way: How can we read the narrative we’re living in ways that ground and enrich us and those we touch — while we’re still living it?

Here’s what keeps me grounded. The means has changed, but not my mission. We have resources to keep what we are learning alive, and we can find the courage to translate what we are learning into better lives, better relationships, and better communities.

As you head into the Thanksgiving weekend, take a moment to appreciate your own mission, your commitments, your sacrifices. How have you found your love in the time of COVID?

Take time to care for yourselves as you connect with people who ground and energize you, engage in the rituals of this season, or even use the weekend to catch up on that Netflix series.

And take a little time to live your virtue.