TANGIBLE ACTS OF KINDNESS

Hello,  

We hope that you, your loved ones, friends and colleagues are staying safe. 

New uncertainties emerge daily to cloud our minds. Exactly how many parents can we now see in person? Will schools reopen in June and should I send my kids? What will eating out be like? What will my return to work be like – and even more so when, let alone if, it will happen?

Today’s heresies are tomorrow’s orthodoxies. The unimaginable – say, the state paying millions to stay at home, or homes being found for all homeless – becomes a temporary new normal.

Amidst the bewildering swirl, what are the still small points that anchor us? We suggest three:

Restless ingenuity: As individuals and companies our creativity and adaptability is burgeoning, ever more important. We’re figuring ways to navigate this odd new world. Perhaps loved ones develop new craft skill. Businesses radically pivot from restaurants to food delivery, or schools to PPE makers, or the inspiring collective act crowd-funding to support arts organisations – multiple stories like these promoted on social media and lower down on this newsletter by us with #ExeterTogether  

Companionship: One paradox of the pandemic is that we have never been further apart yet closer together, via Zoom and FaceTime and TikTok and Houseparty. And more. Friendships strengthened, rekindled, extended – and needed. 

Tangible acts of kindness: Thousands of volunteers, giving their time. People collecting shopping for elderly neighbours. Companies fundraising for charities, seeking to offset their desperate shortfalls. 

Fair play to them all: we salute you.

And for us with Exeter Living, it has been some elements of these. Our magazine and events are suspended for now. But our role of promoting the best of the city endures through sharing on social media the good that people do. And we’ll be running Tales From the Lockdown in our new free-to-everyone virtual Exeter Living Business Clubs – insights into how people are navigating personally, professionally and managerially. 

By helping charities through these Business Clubs each time. 

We’ll also be seeking to help companies and employees with practical advice in our new, free Business Surgery webinars as part of these Business Clubs. 

We’re all learning, all trying to do what we can. Let’s remember these days of support, of thoughtfulness, of experimentation. 

And let’s make sure that the good endures.

#ExeterTogether – always…

Steph, Jane, Greg and Exeter Living team

#ExeterTogether