How can communities stay engaged during a global pandemic?

This week, some members of the track team had a virtual “track meet” over Zoom. While I was initially skeptical about what that would mean or feel like, as I’ve been feeling unmotivated because there’s no competition, it actually felt really good to get back to competing. For our “meet,” we did a broad jump contest, modified shuttle run, and a high-knees/jumping jacks contest for endurance. While these events didn’t replicate the environment of a track meet, or were even that difficult, trying to beat each other and put all of our effort into a single action in the hopes of winning felt really good. It helped me reconnect with the sport.

From that experience, I realized that in considering how communities can stay engaged during this time, it’s important to remind ourselves and each other why we are doing what we’re doing. After watching the Ted Talk this week that I wrote my CR about, I realized this even more because that’s what it was about. While I’m not currently competing for track, or will be in future years, reminding myself of how good it feels to push myself and get more out of myself than I thought was possible helps me stay motivated in this time.