Social distancing is becoming our new normal
In parts of the world, like where I live, events have been canceled, schools are closed, bars have shut down, and restaurants are facing restrictions – we are in the depth of social distancing.
I am sure you may be going through a similar situation in your community.
If you are working from home or just following guidelines for social distancing, it can be a huge change in your lifestyle.
Before now, staying at home was reserved for when you got sick (not trying to prevent the spread of an illness despite being healthy). Then it typically lasted a few days, definitely not weeks.
Since this is new to everyone, to help with our adjustment, I decide to gather some ideas on how to stay social while social distancing. Many of these ideas are staying social with technology, if you have not been social this way, now is the time to dive in headfirst.
Below you will find 20 different ideas on how to stay social. Stay open-minded and try something new!
What is social distancing? The definition and sources for more information
I do not want to spread any misinformation, so I will share some definitions from the CDC and a few other good sources for educational purposes.
Basically social distancing is being asked of people who are not sick with the Coronavirus, nor have they been exposed to it in any way (at least to their knowledge) to stay away from others. For social distancing to work, people actually have to make the effort to practice it.
According to the CDC, the definition of social distancing is:
“Social distancing means remaining out of congregate settings, avoiding mass gatherings, and maintaining distance (approximately 6 feet or 2 meters) from others when possible.”
For more information visit: CDC – Risk Assessment
The average person is being asked to stay out of public places much as possible and to go out only when absolutely necessary. When you do go out stay six feet away from those around you.
This includes when you are in line at the store. For example, if people are too close to you in line leave space between you and the person in front of you and keep your basket behind you. That should give you a six foot buffer.
Plus, as others see you practicing social distancing they will do it too.
While isolation and quarantine are for people who are sick or have had exposure to the virus.
According to the CDC, the definition of isolation and quarantine:
“Isolation separates sick people with a contagious disease from people who are not sick.”
“Quarantine separates and restricts the movement of people who were exposed to a contagious disease to see if they become sick.”
For more information on isolation and quarantine visit: CDC – Quarantine and Isolation
If you have stress or anxiety about what is going on the CDC has some tips which include connecting with others (see our 20 tips below on ideas to connect) and taking breaks from news on the pandemic: CDC – 2019 Coronavirus Managing Stress and Anxiety
This article by health.com does an excellent job of explaining What is Social Distancing—and How is it Different Than Self-Quarantine and Self-Isolation?
Here are 20 ways to stay social while social distancing
1. Reach out to all the people you know, especially those who live alone
First things first, take care of those in your life who live alone. With the elderly at a higher risk than most, make sure you reach out to the elderly in your life.
Make a list of the people who you want to reach out to and start contacting them. You reaching out to them will remind them that someone cares, and you are looking out for them.
Of course, ask how they feel and their health. After you get the coronavirus-talk out of your system, try to talk about other things going on in your lives.
2. Join a group on Facebook
Active groups on Facebook can provide social interaction for hours at a time (depending on the group). Choose a group that you would like to learn from or choose a group that can use your experience or expertise. Rather than guessing what people want to know about they ask directly.
For instance, I am in a breastfeeding group, and women always have questions that luckily I can answer. They just happen to be questions that can be answered from daily experience – something a book might not mention.
3. Call, FaceTime or video chat people you usually text
Do you have people in your life who you keep in touch with only through text? As in you never call them, and you rarely see them in person?
We all have those contacts on our phone like that. It is kind of how friends become acquaintances. Now is the time to rekindle that relationship.
Try to call someone new from your past each day. Learning how they are getting through these times and what is going on with their life will be interesting. Double points if you video chat them!
4. Write letters and mail or email someone
Crazy idea, but if you have some stamps in your house, you can write a letter and mail it! Okay, maybe not too crazy, but it is probably something you may not have done in a long time.
If you do not have stamps, you can always email a friend.
Writing can help you organize your thoughts and ideas.
If your friends’ inboxes are like mine, it’s filled with businesses (usually trying to sell something). I can’t remember the last time I received a lovely personal written email from someone I actually know. I would imagine most of us are in that position, your email will definitely brighten someone’s day.
5. Find canceled events that are now happening virtually
Canceled events are being turned into online events or virtual experiences. An example is our local library, they had to cancel all of their weekly storytime gatherings. To make up for it, they started reading and doing their puppet shows live on Facebook, and people seem to enjoy it.
Be on the lookout for other events as they begin appearing online more each day.
6. Watch a movie with your friends and family while on a video chat
Do you enjoy going to the movies with your family? Well, you can still do that. Chose a movie you want to watch and have everyone log into a group chat so you can view it together.
7. Start a Facebook watch party
On Facebook, you can have watch parties, it is when you invite others to watch a video with you. It can be a live video or an old video you choose. On your personal page, you can choose to share the invitation publicly or only to your friends.
If you are pregnant and getting ready for a baby in your life, here are more posts you may enjoy:
♥How To Love & Care For Your New Mom Body
♥Surviving Breastfeeding in Public: Tips & How to Prepare
♥Contraction Pain Uncensored: What the Agony Feels Like
♥ First 24 Hours After the Birth of Your Baby: More Details Than You’d Want to Know
8. Get social on Instagram with Not A Power Couple!
There are tons of things you can do on Instagram to get social. It is basically a place to share experience and express yourself through photos.
To help people stay positive, we decided to start a “30 Day Stay Social While Social Distancing Photo Challenge.”
We hope you join us! Make sure to share your photos with us on Instagram @notapowercouple_v, so we can love all your pictures! This is a challenge for us too because we pretty are bad at being social!
- We will share the image below on Instagram the day we publish this post so everyone can get ready
- Day 1 will start the next day
- You can follow along on our account page or begin on Day 1 when you read this post!
- No matter when you start, we will be on the lookout for your amazing photos, just tag us @notapowercouple_v, and we will get social with you
- Get your friends and family involved too
- Below are our hashtags to use daily – hopefully, they will inspire you!
- Save this image to your phone for reference:
9. Go live on Instagram
You can also go live on Instagram and let your followers know what is going on with your life. The cool thing about Instagram stories and broadcasting live is that your content gets shared at the top of your followers’ feed above all the photos. That helps get your message out immediately.
10. Get social on Skype
Do you use Skype? If you have not used it for a while, you can dust it off and try it out again.
One great use for it is while you work (if you are allowed). If your coworker is signed into Skype while you guys are at work, it can help your efficiency.
You can chat, share photos, share files, share your screen, make audio calls to each other, make video calls to each other, and conference call with multiple people. It is easier than stopping what you are doing and getting on your phone. It works well when you are working on the same assignment too. You can tag team and figure things out faster with a variety of tools to communicate.
If you are not allowed to use Skype at work, ask if your organization approves of any other similar communication tools.
11. Get social on Pinterest
Get pinning! If you want to get a bit more social on Pinterest, you can comment on some of your favorite pins and start following other people. People who make pins for Pinterest work hard – not only creating their content but also making the perfect pin for you!
So it would be really nice for a content creator to hear some positive feedback from someone who enjoys their work.
12. Get social on YouTube
You can do the same on YouTube – if you are always watching someone’s tutorials or videos, it would be kind of you to reach out to them. You can thank them, ask a question or answer questions they have in their comments.
For some reason, the people who comment on YouTube seem extra brutal, so positive comments are needed. Making content for YouTube is probably the most difficult of all the social media channels, so give those Tubers some love.
13. Create your own videos for YouTube
Do you want to learn how hard creating video content for YouTube is?
Try it out!
Make a few videos, and post them on your channel, see how they do. Who knows, you may have a viral video on your hands.
14. Watch people on Twitch
Are you familiar with Twitch? It is an online platform created exclusively to stream live content. Gamers made it extremely popular by playing their video games live for the world to see.
However, it is more than just video games; it is chatting, arts, cooking, performances, crafts, and even eating. Signing up for Twitch is free, but if you really get into it, you might want to see what the paid accounts have to offer.
15. Play online multiplayer video games
You have options to play with other people online through Xbox, PlayStation, and on your PC.
There are additional social platforms for gamers like Mixer and Discord.
In essence, they all have different capabilities; if you are interested, take a more in-depth look into what they have to offer.
16. Actually comment on articles you read on websites or blogs
Content is continually being created online by people who are usually dedicated to the topics they cover. Some people make money off of their website, while many do not.
Next time you go to a website and find their content valuable comment on their posts, especially if their advice helped you out in some way.
Another way to interact with websites is to like them through social media and share their content with others. Trust me, they will love you for it.
17. Write honest reviews of products
You know how you depend on the reviews for products before you buy anything on Amazon? I am sure some of those reviews have stopped you from purchasing a product or two that would not have lived up to the hype.
Now you can help out others. If you bought something, share your review of the product to let others know how much you love or hate the product. People will be appreciative of your honest opinion.
18. Writers and readers try Quora or Medium
Quora is a site where you ask its online community questions. Then the community works hard to provide a good quality answer. This is like Yahoo Answers – but on steroids and with standards.
It is an easy way to find answers to your random burning questions, and it is also easy to get lost in all the questions and answers. You can get social by answering questions, liking answers, and commenting on answers. You can ask questions too.
Medium is a type of blogging platform, its kind of like having a blog but not having to work on the logistics of the website and marketing. It hosts huge writers so you would be in good company. People actually pay to read the site.
19. Talk to your neighbors
Odds are your neighbor is home too these days. If you see them outside you can have a little chat from afar.
20. Find out if anyone in your community is in need
If getting social through technology is not something for you, reach out to local non-profit organizations to see if they need help with anything. They may require work to be done that you can do from home. Or they may need monetary donations.
Community organizations are typically suffer during rough economic times due to a lack of contributions.
Attention new dads! Find more in-depth advice here:
Final thoughts
Everyone has a talent or expertise of some sort, whatever you are good at use it online. Teach, share, consult, mentor, and provide value somewhere.
If you feel like what you do best is not something that can be translated for online use, then figure out how to help people in another way.
As we face the unexpected, it is clear that the best way to stay social during social distancing is to help others.
If you have extra time on your hands, there are plenty of ways you can interact with others and possibly make their day by being kind. If you are tired of the constant bad news and negative attitudes, your positive input can help everyone’s online experience be a little better.
Get social now, and if you want to share with us at Not A Power Couple – it would definitely make our day.
