20 Life Changing Things To Do After Lockdown

Here are 20 new and original life changing things to do after lockdown.

I don’t want to be another one of those people who say that the end of Lockdown is now in sight, but…the end of Lockdown is now in sight. Hoorah.

Apart from writing articles about life change stuff, I have been quietly compiling a list of things to do when the world finally swings back to something like normal.

After reading it back I realise that many of them are wonderfully impractical and expensive and kind of assume that we are all hanging around in the ether with bags of cash and bags of time just waiting to do all the stuff that we currently can’t do. Maybe more of a wish list than a practical to do list, let’s not give a second thought to how on earth we’re going to do all this stuff, here are 20 life changing things to do after lockdown. You don’t have to do them all at once!

Life Changing Things To Do After Lockdown

Ronnie Scott’s

Ronnie Scott’s is a jazz club in Soho in London and I’m grateful and amazed that it’s still there. Somehow, and quite miraculously, it’s managed to survive the test of time. It’s become one of the premier venues on the international jazz circuit, but you don’t have to be a fan of jazz to enjoy it.

An evening at Ronnie’s is an evening you will never forget, and it may just change your life. Everyone who is anyone has played there and it hasn’t changed an awful lot since Ronnie himself introduced musicians with his unique blend of jazz, jokes and warnings about ordering the Spaghetti Bolognaise. Quite wonderfully, it’s still on the menu.

Wherever you are, get to Ronnie Scott’s. You wont regret it.

Cancel Your Supermarket Delivery and Shop Local

So, after lockdown, you won’t need to have your shopping delivered to your door, right?

Is it just me or is anyone else getting a little fed up and concerned about the power that supermarkets and large online shopping empires now seem to enjoy? During lockdown our local supermarkets provided the sole social activity, but as soon as we’re free I’m going to cancel all deliveries and may even walk to the local shops and buy real things, from real people, in real shops, with real, old fashioned cash.

Supermarkets aren’t as super as we once thought they were. Let’s vote with our feet and remind them who put them where they are now. As Phil Oakey said, “I (we) turned you into something new…But don’t forget it’s me (us) who put you where you are now. And I (we) can put you back down too.” Well said Phil. Prophetic words indeed, although I’m not sure he was thinking about Tesco at the time.

Opera

Go to a Mozart opera, ideally The Magic Flute or Don Giovanni, and read the programme notes before it starts so you know whats going on, or at least get the general gist of the plot, and then sit back and enjoy. It doesn’t have to be expensive. The Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, London sells unsold seats up in the higher galleries for five pounds each on the day of performance. It must be one of the great bargains of all time, all that opera, the very best in the world, for a fiver.

The Beautiful Game

I know, I know, not everyone is obsessed with football, but to be sitting in the middle of a crowd cheering on a home team is a wonderful experience. It doesn’t matter if you’re watching a top flight team, or a non league semi professional match the experience is largely the same.

I used to go to support Chiang Mai United when the ticket prices were just thirty pence each. The home crowd at the 700 Year Stadium was wonderful and didn’t stop cheering and chanting from the first whistle to the last. The spicy pepper grilled chicken and an ice cold bottle of Chang Beer at half time wasn’t bad either.

Circus

Most circus people live a life that many might refer to as, an alternative life style. By definition they are nomadic, and live outside the structures of health care and social welfare that are common to most of us.

Over the past year I have wondered more than once how they have managed during the various lock downs. They certainly wont be receiving any subsidies or government hand outs and largely live from hand to mouth, from show to show, on a small percentage of the money taken at the box office.

I’m looking forward to a trip to the first circus I see after lockdown. Bring on the clowns.

Life Changing Markets

There will be a market of some kind near you, whether it’s a Boot Fair, a Flea Market, a local Farmers Market, a covered Pannier Market or a good old fashioned mixed market. I can’t wait to stroll around market stalls enjoying the excitement of wondering what you will find next. It maybe bunches of farm fresh carrots straight from the field or unwanted vintage fishing equipment. Whatever it is I’m in the market for markets.

Join a Conservation Society

We don’t really have to wait until the end of lockdown to do this. I think the last year has made us all look at ourselves and the world in which we live and wonder what on earth we have been doing over the last hundred years or so. Until very recently it feels as though we have done our best to mess it all up.

I’m not a massive fan of joining stuff, but it can’t really be denied that an organisation with a membership of 100,000 people has a little more clout than just me. I don’t think it matters what conservation group you join as long as we all sign up to at least one, and try to get others to do the same thing. If we are all actively involved in conservation there’s no one left to mess stuff up.

Also, while we’re about it lets put pressure on schools to put conservation on the syllabus.

Go To Thailand

This is one that maybe a bit tricky, and also expensive, but hey, it’s only money. Having lived and worked in Thailand for many years I am happy to confirm that it is definitely the most interesting country on earth. By the time you leave the airport in Bangkok you would have walked past more flowering orchids than you have ever seen in your life, not to mention a massive shrine and spirit house which accommodates the spirits which lived on the land before they decided to build a whopping great airport on it. They have to live somewhere right?

If you are already in Thailand, remember how lucky you are and enjoy every moment. If you would like to know what it’s like to live in Thailand have a look at these books:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Alex-Gunn/e/B07P6P4HDX?ref_=dbs_p_ebk_r00_abau_000000

The Natural History Museum London

Don’t you miss museums? What’s your favourite? Having thought this through over several minutes I think I would have to plump with the Natural History Museum in South Kensington, London. I think it’s the architecture that gets me and the fact that it hasn’t really changed since I was a child. It also contains some wonderful things such as the oldest known material on our planet (a meteorite from another older galaxy) and a cabinet stuffed full of birds including the improbably named, but dazzling, Beautiful Nuthatch. I expect it got bullied by all the other nuthatches in the nuthatch playground for having such a showy offey name.

The Lake District

The Lake District in northern England is quite astonishingly beautiful and we should all go there as soon as possible. I ventured there many years ago and believe it or not, it did change my life.

The trick is to avoid the well known tourist areas, like Lake Windermere and Derwent Water and head instead to one of the lesser known of the sixteen lakes, such as Loweswater in the north west. It’s quite magical. Park your car in the little National Trust car park at Maggies Bridge and walk clockwise around the lake. It’s not an arduous walk and will only take up half a day, if that, but the tranquility and the astonishing beauty will change your life, guaranteed, or money back.

Ice Skating

My aunt is an retired Olympic ice skater. Ice skating certainly changed her life in a very big way indeed. She once told me that unless I learned to skate, my life would forever be stunted and lacking. I think we all know what she means. Or not.

However, if you have never been ice skating you really should go. It’s probably the closest we can get to flying, and we all want to fly around the world like superman right?

Tagliatelle of Oysters

Food and cooking has now become so massive that entire worlds and empires are created and sustained by an endless parade of TV chefs, Michelin starred restaurants and celebrity cooking competitions.

It’s often said that the whole cooking revolution was kicked off by the now famous Marco Pierre White in his small restaurant overlooking the top of Wandsworth Common in south London. He says that the one dish that cannot be improved upon and is the perfect dish of all time is a Tagliatelle of Oysters with Caviar. As soon as all the shops are open again, I’m going to look up the recipe, buy the ingredients and make it. I’ll tell you how it works out.

Kew Gardens

Kew Gardens is a botanical garden on the outskirts of London. Whether you enjoy plants, or botany or gardens or not, you can’t fail to be impressed by the massive tropical glass house and the collections of rare and beautiful plants. Despite being on the doorstep of one of the busiest cities in the world it is amazingly tranquil, which I guess is part of it’s charm.

Even if it doesn’t change your life it will change your week, and for the relatively small admission price, that can’t be a bad thing.

Go Skiing in the Alps

This is another one where I forgot all about the constraints of real life, such as money and time.

Quite inexplicably when I was at school, which was a bulk standard rough and ready comprehensive, our science teacher organized a rather ambitious school trip to go skiing in the Alps. I have never forgotten it and never will. Thank you Mr Healey.

If you have never been to the Alps and spent the morning skiing among the most devastatingly lovely scenery on earth you have a life changing trip in store for yourself. The good news is that over the years skiing holidays have become more affordable, so that it’s not just school kids from bulk standard comprehensive schools who can enjoy it.

An English Country Pub Garden in Summer

If you have never sat in the gardens of a quiet, old fashioned country pub, sipping a glass of wine or pint of beer at 10 o clock at night watching the bats come out and the last of the daylight draining away you have another wonderful treat in store. Maybe not enough on its own to change your life but it’s certainly getting there. It’s something you will never forget.

Change Your Life In an English Country Pub in Brightlingsea Essex photo

Harrods Food Hall

Harrods Food Hall is amazing. If you haven’t been, just get there as soon as everything is open again after lockdown. I’m never sure which food hall is my favourite. I love the fish and the meat section but also the sweets, and chocolate, oh and also the grocery section with the fresh sushi and home made pies and pastries.

The Harrods Food Hall is the best in the world and has been unchanged since its re-opening after a fire in 1883. Try to get there before some dummy of an retail executive has the bright idea to modernise it all and in so doing destroy the very thing that makes it so wonderful.

Life Changing Things To Do After Lockdown 101… Fly a Plane

This is the ultimate life changing thing to do. It did actually change my life.

There’s a flying school near you somewhere, where for a fairly modest fee you can go up in a tiny light aircraft with an instructor. You’ll probably go up in something like a Cessna 152, which is the aircraft equivalent of the old Citroen 2CV. They will probably try to sell you more flying lessons, but you only need to do this if you get bitten by the flying bug during your first 40 min lesson.

Once you’re up in the air, it’s fairly straight forward, and as long as you are not visibly freaking out, the pilot will probably let you take control of the aircraft for a few moments. Do be careful though, as these few moments do really have the potential to change your life, and the next thing you know you’ll find yourself taking the 6 written exams and building up your flying hours in your own pilots log book.

This has to be one of the most popular life changing things to do after lockdown by a very long way. Chocks away Ginger.

Standing Order to Charity

It’s often said that the way to change your life is to change the lives of others. There’s certainly something in this. We make sure that 5% of the price of any Life Change Holiday goes to Viet Ping Children’s Home in Chiang Mai. If you popped in and gave them a visit you would do the same thing.

Giving to others without any expectation of anything in return is a very Buddhist thing, and also very good. If nothing else it will certainly be one of many life changing things to do after lockdown.

Scuba Diving

I’ve been scuba diving once and I can safely say it did actually change my life. I had no idea how wonderful it was to glide along in a crystal clear sea with all the wonders of the ocean swimming along side me. A little bit like ice skating, scuba diving feels close to what it would be like if we could flap our arms and fly off into the bright blue yonder. Try scuba diving as soon as you can after lockdown. It will change your life.

Make Time To Do The Things You Love

Lastly, lets all make a promise to ourselves to make time to persue the things we love. I must admit that I’m rubbish at this and will find myself slaving away over a hot lap top rather than spend any time doing the things I love to do, such as gardening, cooking and writing. It’s so easy to suddenly look back and wonder where all the years have gone and why time seems to be so very short when it comes to doing the things we love.

So having just written that paragraph, I’m going straight outside to transfer a little rosemary cutting that I took on Christmas day and has now got several lovely vigorous white roots into some potting compost. Let the post lockdown good times roll.

Thanks for reading and enjoy life after Lockdown.

If you would like some help thinking about your life after lockdown and the changes you want to make have a look at our online programmes just here:

https://thelifechangepeople.com/online-counselling/

Alex