Holding on to Hope in Hard Times

What if we presented you with an entire episode showcasing the beautiful ways that people are banding together to provide love and light during this grim time of COVID-19?  Now, more than ever, we are seeing creative individuals injecting hope into our world. Join us as we bring balance to our lives by highlighting some of the amazingly good things we’ve seen from our neighbors near and far.

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Imagine Yourself is hosted by Lanée Blaise and Sandy Kovach. Lanée is a TV writer and producer, motivational speaker and podcaster. Sandy is a radio personality, voiceover artist and podcaster. They come to you from the Detroit Metro area and invite guests from all over the world to help encourage you in your health, career, faith journey and more!

Transcript

Sandy Kovach  [00:00:00]:
Through hard times and happy times, we at Imagine Yourself want to be here for you. During this challenging time, we are going to try to bring you hope and coping tools. And because of social distancing, in this episode, we are not in the same studio, so you may notice a difference in sound quality, but hopefully not in the quality of inspiration we're trying to So once again, we ask you to join us in Imagine Yourself.

Lanée Blaise [00:00:28]:
Welcome to Imagine Yourself, a podcast focused on bringing some light. I'm Lanee.

Sandy Kovach  [00:00:35]:
And this is Sandy. And, Lanae, we continue to try to bring light through this crisis.

Lanée Blaise [00:00:42]:
Absolutely. We are going to try to somehow imagine a way To not ignore, but to balance out some of these truly saddening and dire situations that are going on out here By actually recognizing and celebrating that there are some good and loving and Even fun things that people are still doing for one another during this crisis.

Sandy Kovach  [00:01:09]:
And you know what? It kinda reminds me of the stories you would hear from back when our country was at war in World War 2. And you'd hear them maybe from your grandparents Or you'd read about them and just the way people banded together. I mean, we're seeing people in industry. We're seeing individual people. And, of course, we're seeing our medical communities, our first responders, and so many others out there, and just ordinary Day to day moms and dads and citizens just really treating each other well, doing wonderful things for each other.

Lanée Blaise [00:01:45]:
Sandy, here's the thing. I believe a lot of us never imagined that we would have to go through something this hard and something that even resembled anything like they did back in World War 2. I don't know. This brings to light some really beautiful things. I know that you were kind of encouraging me To make sure that I did notice some of the beautiful things. And speaking of, like, World War 2 in those times, there is this video that was out On the news about a 100 year old lady in a nursing home, and it was her birthday. And even though she was quarantined, Her family members came to her window. They were definitely there, whole 6 feet or 10 feet back.

Lanée Blaise [00:02:27]:
Mhmm. And they sang happy birthday to her and celebrated her. And this is just an example of not just banding together, but celebrating that there are still Good times and still people that we love and still things that we need to reach out and do for each other during this time.

Sandy Kovach  [00:02:46]:
Yeah. I agree. And there's a Video, I think I shared it on our Facebook page, of these moms that were all dressed up like dinosaurs. And I'm not even sure what neighborhood this was. It was. I got it from the Detroit Free Press page, so I'm thinking it was in the metro Detroit area, but I'm not even sure. Any neighborhood USA. Yep.

Sandy Kovach  [00:03:04]:
They're all dressed up in dinosaurs, and they're handing out cookies. I mean, they're putting cookies on people's porches, you know, and then they're waving, continuing to social distance, but it just brought smiles to so many faces. And then when that was shared online, of course, you see these ladies walking around in dinosaur suits. You know? It makes you laugh too. Now it's none of this is to make light of what's going on and what people are going through. It's only to spotlight how we can keep each other not only laughing or in a better mood, but also to support. Here's another thing. Beaumont Hospital is doing to something called home beams for Health care teams, and they used to do this thing.

Sandy Kovach  [00:03:42]:
Beaumont is a hospital system in Detroit, and they have a few different locations. And on Christmas, They would always hold up lights for kids that were in stuck in hospitals during the holiday season. Well, now they're going to be having people on their porch every evening at 8 PM, they say. Families are encouraged to step outside on their front door and shine a flashlight toward the nearest hospital. And then there's literally things like board workers making these face shields for people that are actually being sent to hospitals. And I read a story about, A grandma who gets up at 3 AM every morning drives all the way across town to work in one of these factories. So from the just the little things to the actual things that are, that are impacting. Right?

Lanée Blaise [00:04:25]:
That's true. And that's the part you are showing Examples of how communities can still band together and still be together although apart. I know that's a big paradox, but My husband's family, they're all in Florida. He's from Florida. They all live in Florida. And there's a community near his, where his mom lives. You think about the school children who, whatever that last day of school was for them, they probably didn't really get to say a proper goodbye. They didn't know what was happening.

Lanée Blaise [00:04:56]:
So these schools, the elementary schools decided to have a parade. And they would have the teachers stand outside, like, 10 feet apart from one another in the parking lot, and the parents could drive the kids around the little parking lot circle and wave to their teachers and put signs in the window of their car, and the teachers could hold up signs. It was just a way to do a simple connection For children and their teachers, that was their moment.

Sandy Kovach  [00:05:26]:
Yeah. That's

Lanée Blaise [00:05:27]:
That was their way to show their appreciation.

Sandy Kovach  [00:05:29]:
That's beautiful.

Lanée Blaise [00:05:31]:
Yeah. There are so many beautiful situations. Did you hear about the biggest one, in my opinion, was, DJ D Nice Had a quarantine dance party on Instagram live. It was like a couch party. Over a 160,000 people, including Oprah J. Lo and Michelle Obama, all these folks doing a virtual party to just uplift everyone, and his quote was, Music has always been the great escape.

Sandy Kovach  [00:06:03]:
Yes.

Lanée Blaise [00:06:04]:
And that was just fun. Still remembering you can try to grab some fun, you know, in in the midst of all of this Hard stuff.

Sandy Kovach  [00:06:16]:
Yeah. And the celebrities, you know, you're talking about that. John Legend, Charlie Puth, some of these other people doing concerts. I just saw something online. Daughtry is doing something. I mean, just name your artist. Right? They're doing these They're doing that. Whether it's Instagram or it's they're doing it on YouTube or Facebook live or whatever, and you're getting these little peeks into their homes and they're sharing, and museums are doing virtual tours.

Sandy Kovach  [00:06:42]:
Their movies are being like, that are in the theaters are being made available online for, you know, purchase, I'm sure, but still. Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:06:50]:
I don't know that I have ever felt so on level and so connected in just a normal human way With famous celebrities. Right. I I see them sitting there in there, you know, on they're on Instagram. They'll be in their pajamas. One of them the other day I saw, she's sitting there trying to deal with her 4th graders, and she's like, I didn't like long division back in the day, and I still don't like long division. You know? Why do I have Learn all this over again with my kids, and I'm Women full. It is just so endearing to see everyone from other countries, From other lifestyles, from everything going through exactly the same thing that we're going through. I'm not saying that it's a good thing that we're going through, but the good part that I can take away is that everybody is going through it together.

Sandy Kovach  [00:07:41]:
Yeah. And it's making people I put the question on our Facebook page. Can you tell me some stories? One of the most simple but beautiful stories came from Kathy who said that she just notices okay. She has a, like, a little encased porch that she sits on. And she just people are walking by in the neighborhood, and she just engages them from a distance, and everybody is friendly. But when was the last time you walked around the neighborhood and just talked to whoever was passing you?

Lanée Blaise [00:08:10]:
Been a minute. Because usually, it's only if you knew them already.

Sandy Kovach  [00:08:14]:
Yep.

Lanée Blaise [00:08:14]:
And now it's not. You're just happy to see another person outside of your home, period. So I have 5 sisters And 1 brother. And one of my sisters is self isolating all by herself. Women? And it gets very lonely. She's not in a state near any of the rest of us. And even if she were, I don't know that we'd be hopping to different houses. But My sister, Blake, decided to set up Zoom video conferencing for all of us siblings.

Lanée Blaise [00:08:48]:
And and she has Zoom happy hour and Zoom game night with, like, charades in categories, and she has Zoom Lockdown life where we talk about, you know, what we're doing in our you know? And it's all of my siblings, and we are gathered together Many nights. Lots of nights. And it's better than we've ever done before as far as keeping in touch with each other, and It really did start because she wanted to make sure that she was not all by herself.

Sandy Kovach  [00:09:17]:
Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:09:17]:
All day. And this is a way to bring people virtually into the room with her.

Sandy Kovach  [00:09:24]:
Zoom is really a big, it's I saw this meme, and you know how Scooby Doo back in the day, they would reveal who the the real villain was. They would unmask the villain, And the villain behind the coronavirus is unmasked as Zoom. They're actually behind it because they're dropping from this.

Lanée Blaise [00:09:44]:
Blown up. Yeah. I know.

Sandy Kovach  [00:09:46]:
There are certain businesses that have definitely blown up, but we're thankful for them. We're not disparaging them in any sense of the word at all. But yeah. Zoom.

Lanée Blaise [00:09:55]:
I like Zoom and just conferencing in general. My husband's family, they're doing conference calls where we do prayer circles, And then we also have these photos family photo swaps where we'll text each other old photos of each other. And then even the memes, like you said, The the funniest meme I saw recently was for people who have been watching Netflix constantly lately, and there's this image that comes on the TV screen. It says, You have now completed Netflix. It's like, oh, shoot. What am I gonna do now?

Sandy Kovach  [00:10:25]:
I've been on every show.

Lanée Blaise [00:10:28]:
Yes. There's still laughter's important. Laughter, kindness to others, all these things. These are base family walks and family talks are important, And we are having the time to do it, I guess, in the midst of of something bad. We've got some People who've become really creative and really connected and really genuine. Because, Sandy, have you noticed that more and more people going through this, they seem like they want to do something for others instead of just wanting to get something from others all the time.

Sandy Kovach  [00:11:02]:
Right. They're not trying to sure. There's gonna be times where you do sit around and do But they people are actively looking for ways to bless people, and whether it's Health care workers or, First responders or it's your neighbor down the street.

Lanée Blaise [00:11:16]:
There have been people who I don't know if you've heard. They've been sending lunches or coffee to some of the hospital workers, People encouraging, of course, to support small businesses and to say thank you to these grocery clerks who are Really, face to face with the public, there's people sewing protective masks. There's also this weird balance too between lots of people appreciating nature more, but at the same time using technology In a positive connecting way also. Those are kinda opposite.

Sandy Kovach  [00:11:51]:
Definitely. I mean, there's nature is one of the things we can still go out and walk. And as long as you're social distancing, it's something that's available to us that we can do. It's like the only way to get out of your house sometimes, If you're not working. Yeah. So I can definitely see that they're appreciating nature, but they're also embracing Technology because that's the only way that we're able to communicate with people. So I saw this cute thing online that some moms were doing. I guess they all go on a parking lot, and they open up.

Sandy Kovach  [00:12:25]:
Maybe they're in SUVs or vans or whatever, or and they're sitting in their back seats, And their but their their trucks or their their cars are, like, distant 6 feet away from each other, but they are still within distance that they can talk to each other. And they're all sitting around in this parking lot. And, I don't know.

Lanée Blaise [00:12:41]:
Each other. I know. And they

Sandy Kovach  [00:12:42]:
know each other. Yeah. I mean, you're not gonna be just like Yeah. I suppose you could, like, get a parking lot together, but that doesn't sound like it might be very good. Then it could end up being, like, an actual party where you're not social distancing. But if you've got, like, a group of, your mom runs from your school or your kid's school or your church or something like that. And church is too. Here's another thing.

Sandy Kovach  [00:13:03]:
My church and your church and, like, most churches are all doing it online now, whether it's Through YouTube or Facebook live. Facebook live makes it so easy for even the smallest churches to go, and what a great opportunity to reach people with hope.

Lanée Blaise [00:13:18]:
That's true and and that may bring more people in than physically walking into the church like we used to I have definitely been giving lots of gratitude for our online church services, but I don't know if you know this. I'm gonna get to group lead by very first ever online virtual women's bible study.

Sandy Kovach  [00:13:39]:
Oh, really? Through Zoom? Or

Lanée Blaise [00:13:42]:
I don't even know yet. They haven't given us the details, but it's in the works for next month because we realized that April is gonna be kind of a a wash. So people are just really thinking outside the box and really stepping outside of the normal comfort zones To get these things accomplished, and I love it. I am really excited about it. I don't know, Sandy. I, I do see good things. I don't know if you saw as far as globally, Spain, which has been hard hit. There was a video circulating of people on their balconies in Spain doing a sing along of the national anthem and of some Praise and worship songs and just of some uplifting songs in general, it almost brings you to tears.

Sandy Kovach  [00:14:33]:
I know. And they you know, they're doing that in Inly, and some people are doing some stuff like that here. The whole play on the porch thing that our company is doing, the radio company they work for, they pick a song every day and everybody goes out. And even if it's just holding your phone up with whatever song. I mean, it could be anything from the national anthem, but I think and I think, like, they're doing Latest one is living on a prayer from Bon Jovi. But how fun is that song Women everybody

Lanée Blaise [00:14:58]:
I mean, that's the little anthem of its own, and I did see that on the breeze On their, website and on the, on Instagram, I like that. It brings a little smile to my face thinking of People joining into something good.

Sandy Kovach  [00:15:13]:
Right. And connecting it through social media. And there we go. You know? Social media being used For wonderful things these days, we've gotta have good information. It can't all be good news stories and memes and Things like that. We do need to stay informed. But if we don't get some of this balance and we get sucked into that vortex of just, Okay. What's the bad news of the day? And then we're just waiting for the next shoe to drop all the time.

Lanée Blaise [00:15:42]:
I agree. That's exactly why we had this episode today because it actually takes effort to balance it, I believe. Because I have a friend who reached out to me the other day. All the people in her household have contracted coronavirus. Wow. And She is actually the only one who has it. You know, she's the mom, and she's been Health, and we I had to be grateful for that because she's able to still operate things, and she's trying to keep distance from her hubby and her kids. But at the same time too, even In her situation, she still asked if I could send her a little fun video.

Lanée Blaise [00:16:24]:
So I sent her a TikTok video Of me and my husband and kids doing that little dance. I don't know if you've seen it. It keeps popping up where people dance, and then they jump to the side, and the next family member Yeah. She wanted that. She wants me to try to send her those little things each day because she's cooped up in her house with sick folks Thank god, but not needed to be hospitalized, but they are sick. And she still wants a little light in her life. Wow. And It's balance.

Sandy Kovach  [00:16:55]:
Yeah. Harder and harder to get these days, but at the same time, people are working for it, and people are stepping up. I just Really feel encouraged by what people are doing for each other.

Lanée Blaise [00:17:07]:
Yep. And for kids too. They're encouraging kids to go out and do old school, like, sidewalk chalk art work and sidewalk chalk Oh, yeah. And inspirational messages or painting rocks and leaving the little painted rocks in different little Fun areas that people might notice on their walks. There's all kinds of things to still keep hope going.

Sandy Kovach  [00:17:31]:
Even Hallmark wants to get in the game. They are saying that if you visit their website, you can get some free cards To send out old school. It's called Reading card. Hallmark care enough, I think. And they'll send you a free pack of 3 cards if you go to their website website. And so even if you have people, like, maybe you have older members of your family who aren't really into being online. In addition to calling them, you should also maybe think about that. Because we're talking about Zoom, and we're talking about this, and we're talking about that.

Sandy Kovach  [00:18:02]:
There are definitely folks who, are in the older generations who aren't quite as comfortable with technology. And, you know, wonder of wonders, our phones actually do make phone calls too. And we don't usually use them for that. It's usually text messaging or social media. But, have you picked up the phone and called more people these days?

Lanée Blaise [00:18:20]:
Yes. And especially, like you said, my older aunt one of my uncles, he said you had the nerve to just Text me. You gotta call me. He said we said, I'm old folks. You gotta call me. I said, okay. Let me so we got to Talk and catch up, see how he's doing because, again, he is by himself in his home, and It gets lonely. And then there's another aunt who we're thinking of, like because you mentioned that part about cards.

Lanée Blaise [00:18:49]:
Her situation is she's at a point she's not even really great with the telephone or anything, and she's in a nursing home. And we're thinking, what if we write letters to her? Like you said, old fashioned things, but write letters to her, send it there, and let her just read them because she's not even that comfortable with A smartphone.

Sandy Kovach  [00:19:09]:
So Okay.

Lanée Blaise [00:19:10]:
We really have to check-in on on folks. And I have talked to people I had not talked to in years The past few days, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends from high school, that part has been delightful.

Sandy Kovach  [00:19:24]:
You can really enjoy conversations Sasha's talking about back in the day and get your mind on things and connect and do things that you we just never would think to have time for. I'm thinking of somebody that one of these people, and I I have probably you have them in your life too. That once you get on the phone with them, they just love to talk and talk and talk, talk, talk. And I'm somebody that just text me and, you know, let's just have a short conversation. But I found myself enjoying talking to those people. And I'm thinking, what's wrong with you? Why couldn't you make time for that before? You know, it's not bad. It's not like you don't like talking to them. It's just like, oh, I'm so busy.

Sandy Kovach  [00:20:04]:
All all I can do is text. So

Lanée Blaise [00:20:06]:
to kind of support you on this, you have been legitimately busy. Before, you did have to go out and Pick up this and do that and go here and have my parents there, and I get it. And so, like we said, besides the people who are Absolutely slammed, like the Health care workers and the grocery store clerks and utility workers and people like that. Other people really are for better or for worse. Sometimes it's because, unfortunately, because of the the job market has slowed down their home, but There is nothing we are not in control of this. So like my friend said, there's nothing she could do. So she's like, Lanee, send me some fun videos to lift my spirits because There's nothing really Health,

Sandy Kovach  [00:20:53]:
you know, that

Lanée Blaise [00:20:54]:
you can do for me. I feel like we are at Takeaway time because these are some good takeaways right here.

Sandy Kovach  [00:21:01]:
Yeah. Alright. What else you got? Anything besides what we've talked about here?

Lanée Blaise [00:21:06]:
Okay. Big takeaway, and it rhymes. We pray every day.

Sandy Kovach  [00:21:12]:
Yes.

Lanée Blaise [00:21:13]:
That that's the big one because, you know, we pray, we exercise kindness. I know in in Proverbs 21, it says whoever pursues righteousness and kindness will find life, righteousness and honor and I just see so many people out here doing the right thing there is plenty to worry about, and there's plenty to pray about. And there's there's a lot to cry about, like, literal tears about right now. But we want to make sure that everyone takes a little extra time to just revitalize your spirit And to I don't know how many people now give true appreciation to things as basic as being able to breathe. Having shelter, having food. My husband went bananas at the grocery store the other day back when when we that 1st grocery store trip back around mid March.

Sandy Kovach  [00:22:11]:
Yes.

Lanée Blaise [00:22:12]:
And he bought everything, Sandy. I think I'm telling you by how I found this can called lasagna soup.

Sandy Kovach  [00:22:19]:
Lasagna soup. Lasagna soup. I've never even heard of it before you told me about it.

Lanée Blaise [00:22:24]:
It really just, we get real creative now. So if I do make it, I'm gonna I don't know. I'm gonna take off a can and, like, bake it and sprinkle some cheese on it. Something like that. But, But overall, we just ask you to use everybody could use their own creativity and their own special way to spread light To anyone in their circle. And like you said, remembering the people who were older in our communities and the people in our family who We hadn't reached out to in a while for no bad reason or anything. It's just we've gotten too busy. We encourage people to reach out Reach out to us on our website, imagine yourself podcast, and tell us some of the good things that you've seen personally.

Sandy Kovach  [00:23:08]:
I would love to have more stories because we get some of them obviously via social media or through our own circles, but there's so many things happening out there that would just bring light to other people if shared. So if you have something like that, you know, share a picture, just share what happened, and feel free to go to our Facebook or Instagram or Twitter or you can even email right through imagine yourself podcast, but we'd love for you to get in touch with us. And we will keep trying to, share as well. Like, I put the dinosaur thing on there. I think there's some other things I can put up too. Just, let's have fun and Okay. Maybe having fun isn't the right word. Okay.

Sandy Kovach  [00:23:53]:
Let's be lighthearted as much as we can with our time while we do realize that this is a serious situation, and we follow the instructions to shelter in place, and we are there to support those who cannot do so.

Lanée Blaise [00:24:07]:
Absolutely. Overall, besides praying and, like you said, lifting ourselves and others, imagine yourself Focusing on some of the loving things going on in this world to help balance out some of the hard things that are going on right now. Hold out hope, and remember, we are in this together.

Sandy Kovach  [00:24:29]:
Thanks for listening. We'd love your feedback. Go to imagine yourself podcast.com to send us an email or connect with us on social media. Take care of yourself, and join us again next time when we'll have something new to imagine.