If pain shared is halved then is joy shared doubled?  Since I wrote my article “How do you make sure that joy does not slide off the agenda at your workplace?”  I have spoken to a number of clients who are self-isolating and we have discussed that this is absolutely essential to stem the growth of the virus but they have also discussed the impact of this action on them personally.  We have problem solved together what people can do for themselves and also for their team over this period whilst people are working from home.  With each person we have talked about joy and everyone has been keen to explore this topic because at the moment it seems so elusive.  One client lamented that she could not get to the gym and so had sent her husband out to buy hand weights, we have talked about skyping rather than calling people just to see someone’s face, we discussed gardens, jigsaw puzzles and pets.  We have also spent quite a bit of time talking about food and what people have stockpiled….or not.  With some clients we explored recording the joy or just what went well during the day at home or maybe some funny moment.  One client sent me her diary entry at the end of the day which amongst other things included the choice of cold garlic bread for breakfast and memories of an old Kath and Kim episode which also considered whether there was enough toilet paper.  

Even for someone like me who is not in isolation and is still able to pretty much go about my every day, walk my dog, go to yoga, go to the shops it really made me smile as these are heavy times.  It made me think perhaps we can collect this joy and share it.  I recognise workplaces are too busy with the logistics of the impact that the virus has created.  However, I thought what I could do is collect the joy that you have while working from home and share it on my Instagram.  So, if you would like to share some of the joy from your day working from home please send it to me  ([email protected]) and I will share some of these on my Instagram page @sharondarmody.

We can get through this together let me know the thing that made your smile today,