What can indie hackers do in (these) times of uncertainty?

I was heavily influenced in the past week, thus my routine was wrecked. Starting to get back into the zone.

Practicing stoicism is a fantastic way to reframe everything happening in your life.

Unless you are sick or have serious immunity problems, you’re mostly likely going to suffer emotionally rather than phisycally in this C19 crisis.

Panic doesn’t actually help anyone. Take these days to appreciate what you have. We take life for granted and that’s why such an event puts things in perspective.

In general:

I try to remember that this situation will very likely last a long time. That means a fight or flight response isn't helpful. Being chronically anxious is bad for your immune system and probably not great for productivity either.

Being productive is a contribution to getting the economy back on track. Taking care of your immune system is a contribution to stopping the spread of this virus.

Therefore, even though it might feel weird under the circumstances, it's super helpful to practice self-care. Be extra diligent about eating healthy, exercising, limiting alcohol/etc. Call a friend and chat, look at adorable pictures of kittens, watch something funny. Have a cry. Google self-care or happiness hacks, try whatever might work for you.

Follow the news regularly in case something changes, but try not to binge or constantly refresh. Be careful with social media, especially twitter. Easy to lose yourself in a stream of poorly thought out angry/fearful rants. Ration yourself if you have to.

Do whatever you can to help, but be extra careful about not burning out. If you try to stay in "crisis mode" for months/years, you'll likely burn out or experience a form of caregiver fatigue and not be of help to anyone.

Also what innov8or said. We're good at building things and solving problems. Our entire society needs to adapt to:

1. Dealing with the virus itself.
2. Dealing with social distancing and occasional social isolation/quarantine.
3. Entire industries have temporarily near-vanished over the course of a few weeks, with an enormous effect on the economy. People need help adjusting, and the more vulnerable need help period.

If you have time to spare, make yourself useful in solving these problems. Both because they need solving and because doing something useful often relieves stress.

Edit: not saying you should feel guilty over anxiety, just that it's justified to put effort into reducing it

Not to sound morbid but there is plenty of new opportunities out there. That is the heart of the entrepreneurial soul. Solve problems, deliver pain remedy. Plenty of pain around. Some ideas...

People need;
Deliveries
Anti viral products
Work from home IT support and solutions
Long life food
Social isolation support and more online connections

Expect cash and money systems to suffer and crypto to rise like a Phoenix.

I feel a bit anxious as it seems everyone is giving stuff for free.

It seems like people forget indiehackers need to earn money as well.

I'm a bit worried about being demonised for charging for products.

Besides the things already mentioned in this thread: be of use to others. Start with your family, then your friends, then city, etc...

I created this list of coronavirus risk reduction tactics for my family two weeks ago, and am now attempting to contribute to other similar projects such as flattenthecurve.com.

I am fortunate that my day job is stable for the foreseeable future. My side project doesn't have a huge sense of urgency either.

Most of my concern is in regards to my parents. The biggest killer in old age (when it comes to cognitive health) is isolation and boredom. I have mixed feelings about social distancing as a result. Damned if you, damned if you don't. I can probably still visit them (I am a homebody anyway), but my brother, who can't WFH and interacts with people for his day job, probably shouldn't.

Do your duty to the community. Try and help. Maintain your personal discipline.

Great answers! I’m also suffering from anxiety, because things are uncertain and also some are just pretty bad at the moment. If I manage to go into build/make mode, I feel much better.

What also helps me a bit is making plans. Like, now that my onsite workshop business is dead, I focus on making remote workshops.

Our house might not be build this year, so I make a plan B for that. Once I have all my plan As, Bs and Cs I try to put it a side as best as possible and only reevaluate when things change.

One step at a time, one minor improvement to the MVP. If I get tired, I work on something related to it but maybe part of version 1.0 or 2.0 so as not to fully "disengage" from learning in the direction that will serve me best long term. But minor depression does creep in.