“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”

– Leo Tolstoy

Something is definitely true in Tolstoy’s quote and certainly many people would agree on this saying. Changing is hard and needs a commitment most people struggle to find and a constant motivation most people struggle to maintain.

I was not convinced of it but over the years I’ve become more and more confident with the idea that people can change with a little help. You may say I’ve become more naive which is usually counter intuitive as with age most people think you become more cynic. However I have grown a certain confidence in the human kind keeping in the back of my head that going back to old habits is a strong temptation.

We are today the spectators of something extraordinary: the world has changed before our eyes and before us!

We were confined in our little world and we started to see the world change, we were amazed with the most beautiful scenes nature could offer us and yet we’ve deeply desired “going back to what it was”.

I do believe that some of our old habits are important and essential to lead a healthy life and I would never want to be locked up in my house without event the possibility to see my family. But I also believe that we cannot be indifferent to what happened.

It’s not about learning a lesson, neither about learning to live with COVID-19. It’s about being creative and change our lifestyle so that we can adapt to a new world, hopefully a better and healthier one.

COVID will most likely continue to be there just as other viral diseases. What we can do is contain the situation in a way that people have access to healthcare when they catch it.

If in order to do that you have to wear a mask in the supermarket you should! It’s not a freedom matter, it’s a responsibility matter: your freedom ends when you do harm. And harm is not necessarily something violent: you can harm with neglect.

If in order to have less severe cases pollution should diminish we should all make an effort to contribute to that! It’s not a matter of believing or not in global warming theories, it’s a matter of believing in the natural changes all over the world when people were confined.

This doesn’t mean that nobody will get COVID-19. But talking about mass immunisation is a bit controversial after what happened in the UK and in Sweden. This means that, at a certain point, most people will be immune either because they got it or because we’ll have a vaccine.

I strongly believe that in 2020 we are capable to have a strategy to fight COVID-19 other than just limiting ourselves on discussions over masks. Countries should have a plan on how to deal with COVID-19 that does not simply involve going back to the way we used to do things.

Never like today, young people can make a difference and change in order to live in a new world.

Changing needs creativity so get creative and start changing!