Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
Edited by Ashley Hay, Griffith University, $27.99.
The COVID-19 pandemic has changed everyone, mentally, in some way. In the first months of 2020, the vibrations of the Earth changed. Life quarantined, life socially distanced, meant ‘the hum of daily life has quieted’, as National Geographic put it.
“The pandemic has disrupted different lives in different ways”.
Ashley Hay points out the stories in this collection only represent a “small subset of the mental, emotional and practical ways in which people have experienced and navigated their world”. Some of the accounts are confronting; some invite readers into experiences that are very raw. Some are funny, some are hopeful, some despair. “One quality that runs through and links them all is trust, an emotional and logical act that creates an opportunity for readers to meet narratives they might find personally familiar and narratives far beyond anywhere they have found themselves.”
Questions being asked are relevant: what state am I in and how much is it a reaction to the state of the world today? States of Mind examines the ways we think about our psychological, existential and political condition.
It’s no wonder apprehension and despair are on the rise not only in Australia, but across the world. It’s said digital media has shaped a ‘pandemic of loneliness and disconnection; ideological extremism is widening our divisions and threatening our democracies – and all the while, the wellness industry is spinning everything from mindfulness to minimalism into big business’.
GR72 explores the parameters of our cognitive landscapes and effectively answers the question about where this leave us, through the prisms of the personal, the philosophical and more.
How do these forces help or hinder our mental equilibrium? What salves do we seek for our own survival or simply to make ourselves feel better, from medical interventions to personal reinventions? Challenging times are ahead of us.
