PUT AWAY THOSE ROSE COLOURED SPECTACLES... SOMETIMES

February has always been The Month of Love, whether or not you've ever bought into that one. Some have traditionally celebrated with wine and candles in a romantic restaurant - which isn't so easy nowadays, what with an alcohol ban and a national curfew. Some prefer movie dates - also not advisable, and not always possible. And others prefer to do date night at home - as long as your delivery guy can get to you on time (again... we're living in a time of curfew).

Hmm, so maybe 2021 isn't the time to celebrate The Month of Love. Maybe February needs to be the month of something else.

Maybe it'll be the month where we reach our fitness goals in the living room that's become a makeshift home gym. Maybe we'll master that dish we've been trying to cook since lockdown began. Or that new hobby we've been promising to start. Maybe this is Bucket List time, provided the items on the list comply with extended Level 3.

Or maybe none of these things will happen. And maybe that's okay.

Not to get too serious or anything, but there's a new buzzword doing the rounds on social media called "toxic positivity". I'm not usually one for buzzwords, but even I have to admit there might be something in it. Basically, it's about the pressure of "needing" to be grateful and optimistic all the time and finding the silver lining in every curfew and alcohol ban.

Or, in optometric terms, it means not having to always see the world through those rose-coloured spectacles.

It also talks about the pressure of doing something "useful" during this time, so we can come out of Covid and boast that we can crochet now, or build birdhouses, or speak Swedish (though there aren't many people to converse with in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg). It's the pressure to "find meaning" in every moment we're living through... and to be so admirably positive about it all.

Psychologists have written articles about it, and they make it clear that positive energy is a powerful force. No one - they say - is suggesting that we let go of every rose-coloured optimistic impulse. What they're saying is that being relentlessly positive introduces the risk of squashing all the other feelings - and ignoring them.

What usually follows could sound like a bunch of cliches, but the kind that have become cliches because they contain some element of truth. You know... take the good with the bad. Take it one step at a time. Don't be too hard on yourself. And don't compare yourself to anyone else.

It's easy to get preachy here, and it's also easy to swing the other way completely. To be clear, no one's saying stop with the handmade scarves. And no one's saying give up on that dream to cook the perfect duck l'orange. But sometimes noodles in a cardboard cup are okay too. And the birds of the world don't need a new birdhouse every day.

So then, maybe this is The Month of... what? Well, maybe we don't need to decide now. Or at all. How about we set aside those rose-coloured spectacles, and just see where it goes?