From Stagnancy To Growth: A Pandemic Recovery Story

The pandemic was a period of social isolation that I would consider the low point of my life so far. Besides the gradual development of my interest in Japanese art and culture (as described in my last blog post), I still spent most of my days doing basically nothing. Sure, I willed myself to finish my homework early in the day, and during the online school semester, I managed to drag myself through the day, doing what was asked of me. However, other than that, I remained generally stagnant in terms of my own personal growth and development of new skills. The isolation meant I couldn’t meet new people, so I was restricted to interacting with my tight circle of friends from my middle school over calls while we played video games for long hours. Playing video games, whether with friends or alone, was basically the only activity I did each day, besides the occasional walk, school, and the basic necessities of life.

        This was my way of life and routine for the majority of the pandemic, and originally I was content with this way of living. If anything, this lifestyle was very lax and fun, and I convinced myself that enjoying life in the dire, depressing atmosphere of the pandemic was an achievement in itself. I was oblivious to any consequences that may arise for maintaining such a humdrum routine and lack of novelty; I only perceived the constant dopamine I received from interacting with both my friends and video games. And, since I kept up with my schoolwork, no problems appeared, and I took that as a sign that there was no need to worry about anything. I reasoned that this way of living balanced work and play; as a reward for finishing all my schoolwork, I got to indulge in playing video games with whatever time left in the day.

However, towards the end of the pandemic lockdown, as things slowly started to open up, I realized that this lifestyle was not sustainable. As I entered my first years of high school, I realized that before I knew it, I’d have to graduate and go to college, the first step into adulthood. I looked at my other classmates and realized just how behind I was when I witnessed the feats some of my classmates had already achieved. This pressure showed me that the way I approached life needed to change; I wanted to grow to become a stronger person.  

However, the consequences of such an extended isolation caught up with me as I realized I was unable to change. Through my lack of experimentation with other activities and exposure to novelty, I found that I had become plagued by a fear of trying new things. While this was a pre-existing fear of mine, it seemed to expand exponentially as a result of the pandemic. After all, why would I want to abandon the comfort of my reliable, consistent routine? I also found that coming out of the pandemic I lacked any social skills whatsoever, rendering me unable to initiate conversations and make new friends. As a result, I had to desperately cling to the middle school friends who came to Uni with me and to rely on other people initiating conversations with me. However, I noticed my old friends slowly drifted away, forming their own new friend groups, and I realized waiting for others to talk to me was a slow, painful process. These observations only presented more signs that I needed to change, that I needed to grow and evolve just like those around me. But I couldn’t. My brain had become programmed to the pandemic routine I had followed for years. I wanted to grow, but I couldn’t let go of my old habits. I wanted to get better, but I didn’t want to fundamentally change, at least not the “good” parts.

This inability caused me to critically question myself. Oblivious to the detrimental influences of the pandemic, I wondered why I couldn’t seek out opportunities, try new things, and learn new skills like I saw my acquaintances do. Why couldn’t I be as good at things as my peers were? Maybe it has to do with talent. Maybe I lack the traits it takes to push myself forward and beyond. Maybe I’m just destined to be average. I didn’t want to accept these thoughts, so I urgently sought a solution to boost me forward.

Ironically, video games, which were one of the reasons I got into this situation in the first place, were one of the things that first led me towards the path of personal growth. In particular, a game called “Friday Night Funkin’” proved that I had what it took to improve. Friday Night Funkin is a rhythm game that involves playing songs in which you and some other character rap battle with sounds rather than actual words. The gameplay involves following along with the arrow patterns displayed on the screen that go in rhythm with the song by pressing the corresponding keys (much like Dance Dance Revolution, but with a computer and keyboard). The game contains a variety of different songs with arrow patterns of differing complexity to master, as well as plenty of modifications from the community to add more diversity to the game.

Friday Night Funkin’ set me on the path to personal growth. Through playing the game constantly for months, I went from a complete beginner that couldn’t even beat the tutorial without making mistakes to a master that could ace songs with intensely complex patterns. As I looked back on my journey of playing this game, I realized that, much like what I did in this game, I have the ability to improve in anything I set my mind to, as long as I have the proper motivation to do so. And from there began my journey to let go of the old habits holding me back and to rebuild the parts of myself I lost over the pandemic.