What happens to us when we go through a crisis? Can we emerge from it stronger, or is that utopian? Should we see the crisis as an opportunity? Philosopher Natalie Knapp answers these questions with some surprising answers.
Whathappens in people when they are confronted with crises?
People experience these situations very differently. I know twins who had to spend a lot of time in bunkers as young girls in Berlin during the Second World War, the same story, the same family and yet both experienced the crisis very differently and also emerged from it very differently. One was strong and full of life, the other is still depressed today. The experiences we have in such moments and how we later evaluate them has a lot to do with our own perspective on life. But of course it also depends on how existential the crisis is, how many different challenges there are to overcome at the same time and what resources we can fall back on.
Many people are currentlyunsettled, what advice can you give them?
It is of central importance to re-evaluate the feeling of uncertainty. Because uncertainty does not tell us that we are doing something wrong, but only that something is developing in our lives or in our culture that we do not yet know and for which we do not yet have a routine. When we feel insecure, we are called upon to pave a completely new path, and insecurity is a helpful feeling to feel our way forward step by step on new terrain. You have to keep checking whether the ground is still firm and, if necessary, take a different direction.
Whatopportunities do you see in the coronavirus crisis?
In times of crisis, much more can be achieved than usual because everyone involved recognizes the need for unusual solutions and creative twists and turns.
Due to the climate crisis, we are already living in a time in which a lot has to change if humanity is to remain sustainable. But far too little has happened so far because nobody likes to change their habits. It is therefore a huge opportunity to use the impetus provided by the coronavirus crisis to initiate long-overdue changes for a more sustainable way of living and doing business. Whether this will actually happen depends on many factors. It will very much depend on whether government reconstruction programs are linked to climate programs.
Do you haveany ideas on how people can retain the current sense of optimism, heightened awareness and sensitivity in order to be able to tackle reconstruction in a positive way later on?
The greatest danger in a crisis is that people wish everything would quickly return to the way it was before and therefore invest a lot of energy in ensuring that nothing moves. But the potential of instability lies precisely in the fact that it creates movement and enables change. So it's not about knowing now what will happen afterwards, but about using the time of crisis to grow into a greater openness.
Crises are moments in which life renews itself. Perhaps you remember Richard Linklater's movie Boyhood. There's this wonderful final scene: the young man has left home and is going to college. He's sitting outside on a hill with a friend and she says to him: "Everyone always says: make something of your life, make something of every moment. But I don't know, somehow I think it's the other way around. The moment does something to us." This is especially true for times of transition or crisis. They transform us.
That is why it is not primarily about getting to grips with the upheaval, it is about having an experience. Such experiences change our view of the world and something new arises from this change within us. It's not something we do, but something that happens to us. In these moments, we are the seed for the future, the moment benefits us.
Formany, the coronavirus crisis is above all an economic crisis that needs to be overcome and then things should continue as before. Only a more conscious society can counteract this. Do you have any tips on how to prevent people from falling back into bad habits?
Unfortunately, you can only replace bad habits by training yourself to adopt more helpful behaviors. This is because it is in the nature of the human brain to favor habits. For example, most people have been accustomed to comparing prices since childhood. If they realize that the price of a carrot grown organically on a small farm cannot be compared with that of a mass-produced supermarket carrot, their brain will still continue to compare the two prices and consider the organic carrot to be excessively overpriced. You can only overcome this if you make clear value decisions and act differently until it becomes an attitude. Unfortunately, a few weeks are not enough. But it helps enormously to connect with like-minded people who have already made the desired attitude a habit.
My colleague Ariadne von Schirach once said: "Humans are the only animals that can build a house they don't want to live in. We have to start building houses that we want to live in. And that means doing something to make the world a better place. Every day.
In addition toprofessional groups who now have much more time, there are also those who are struggling with a large multiple burden (financial worries, childcare, stress at work...). How could these people also see an opportunity in the crisis?
The term crisis comes from the Greek and originally referred to the moment in a feverish illness when it is decided whether a person will emerge stronger from the experience or die. The crisis is a real challenge for the entire system. That's why I don't really like to talk about the crisis as an opportunity, because for many people it sounds as if you have to know what the opportunity is in the middle of the crisis. But initially it's just about getting through somehow. And only much later will we see what has grown out of it.
Howdo you personally perceive the crisis? Have you already discovered positive aspects in it?
The silence. When it came, I felt like I had been waiting for it all my life. It also means that everyone is no longer constantly thinking about shopping and the consumerist background noise in people's heads has stopped. This has created an atmosphere that I find life-giving, a greater expanse in the air, in my feelings and in my thoughts. I would never have thought it possible for so many people to focus on more important things than shopping and getting things done in such a short space of time.
And, of course, that the water in the canals of Venice is crystal clear and the fish have returned, that the sky over the Chinese city of Wuhan is clearer than it has been for decades, that nature will recover so quickly if we stop exploiting it and that we are able to change faster than we realized. These have been the most important lessons I have learned from this crisis so far.
About Dr. Natalie Knapp
Dr. Natalie Knapp is a philosopher, speaker and publicist. She leads seminars, advises managers and gives talks on coping with complexity, crisis as an opportunity and how to make friends with uncertainty. As an author of popular non-fiction books, Knapp has published "Der unendliche Augenblick: Why times of uncertainty are so valuable", "Compass new thinking: how we can orient ourselves in a confusing world" and "The quantum leap of thinking: what we can learn from modern physics".
