13 People Explain How The Pandemic Has Shifted Their Priorities

After month upon month where so much was in flux but our day-to-day experience felt like a boring version of Groundhog Day, our sense of time has been altered. One year since the first lockdown and it feels simultaneously as though so much and absolutely nothing has happened. But in between the nothing and so much, and beyond the constant swelling of grief and anxiety, many people have found room to reassess their life and what they want to change.

Lockdown has given many people the mental and physical space to really get into every facet of life: from thinking about career and location to how you spend your time or money, nothing has been overlooked. To put it bluntly, the pandemic made abundantly clear what so many of us had been ignoring: life as it currently is isn't making me happy or fulfilled.

We spoke to 13 women and non-binary people about how the pandemic shifted their priorities, the steps they took to make (big or small) changes and how they see these changes fitting into a post-lockdown world. In the year since the first lockdown we have lost so much, but many have gained a new perspective and a new optimism for the way they will live when this finally ends.