'Did I Miss Anything?': A Man Emerges From a 75-Day Silent Retreat to Find the World in Shambles

This is exactly what happened to a man belonging to a Buddhist monastic community in Vermont. In mid-March, Daniel Thorson decided to go on a 75-day silent retreat that would effectively cut him off from societyfor a prolonged period of time.

Think about everything that has happened since early March. The spread of the deadly COVID-19 coronavirus overseas, rules and regulations put into place in order to better protect ourselves and others. The ever-growing unrest of a population confined to the indoors.

Daniel started up his phone and a mere two hours after he emerged from his cosy cabin where he unknowingly participated in self-isolation, he logged onto twitter. He proceeded to tweet:

I'm back from 75 days in silence. Did I miss anything?

Dan is a podcaster and philosopher in addition and in addition to his Buddist practices he likes to engage a lot in conversation with his audience as well as keep up with all of his favourite political, philanthropist and inspirational figures.

When he logged on to browse the history of tweets and articles about the events that unfolded over the days he spent away from the world, he never thought that the coronavirus would have been able to bring an entire planet to its knees in the way this virus had.

Daniel now has to navigate a world in which so much has passed him by. In an interview with a New York Times reporter he stated:

While I was on retreat, there was a collective traumatic emotional experience that I was not a part of.

A profound statement, seemingly hinting at regret that he was unable to experience an event that has brought so many people together across the globe. He continued on to discuss a certain peculiarity regarding what used to be simple interactions such as bumping into someone at the grocery store.

I would turn a corner in the grocery store, and someone would be there, and they would recoil,” he said. “I haven’t installed the COVID operating system. At first, I was, like, whoa, what did I do?

Looks like he's still got some catching up to do. But perhaps receiving this information all at one time can be a good thing and give us a new perspective on all that's been going on in the world this year.