I have depression and anxiety and the pandemic ended up helping me a lot. Yeah, the isolation sucked, but it did help my anxiety a bit when I stayed to myself.

During that time of reduced anxiety, I was able to introspect a bit more without external stressors and was able to identify some trauma that led to the depression and anxiety -- something that I wasn't even aware was affecting me.

I really don't know how to actually deal with said trauma, so I'll be going to therapy for that, but I think the lessons I learned and the benefits I gained will stick with me since I'm taking concrete steps to deal with it now that I've identified a problem.

Without the year long pause we all went through I'm not sure I would have had the time to sort through my brain so thoroughly.