Social

A smooth sea never gave a skilled sailor, said Franklin D. Roosevelt, suggesting that without hardship, challenges and even failures, we cannot become our best selves.

Pull out the high school years from the archives and carefully browse the file with daily memories. Don’t you think that the details of the clothes, the house, the room, the school, the classroom are all there with hyperthymestic precision?

To err is human. “The only sure way to avoid making mistakes is to have no ideas”, Albert Einstein said.

Mainstream culture has tried to airbrush guilt out of everyday life. It’s the ultimate social faux pas, it seems, to make someone feel guilty—How dare you judge me! Or maybe it’s the penultimate faux pas, because what’s even worse than making someone feel guilty inside is to shame them in front of others.

"Marriage: a book of which the first chapter is written in poetry and the remaining chapters written in prose." (Beverley Nichols)

I recently watched a TV show in which the guests, which included professors and psychotherapists, when asked about the feminine ideal in the contemporary world, expressed opinions that seemed strange to me: that such an ideal would no longer be detectable or would no longer have a purpose, today...

She is an old age pensioner living across the street from my house. But I very rarely meet her. For years she has stayed in her house because of the many serious health problems she has been struggling with.

Streets paved with broken glass, cars burning, shops looted, a vandalized CNN headquarters, street fights, Washington DC under siege, thousands of arrests – the US is "at war with itself", and to probe why has it reached such a point we must look beyond the tip of the iceberg.

#vanlife . . . it’s the aesthetic trend we’ve seen sprawled across the internet in the past decade. The reservoir of photographs framed by flung-open doors or windows onto a glorious, unpeopled view has stirred many an individual’s curiosity.

Starting with biblical stories, moving on to myths and legends, and finally reaching the contemporary film industry, people have always been fascinated by heroes. But what makes us look for heroes? What do modern heroes look like and what do they mean to the contemporary world?

I believe that the illusion of free time seen as a different world, separated from everyday active life, must be replaced by the image of proactive free time– just like a day of work that satisfies us.

Education is not the same as schooling. The role of the family, the group of friends, the community, the church, and so on must harmoniously complement the school's role in this process. However, in the end, anyone who wants to succeed in life will work on their personality and self-education.

Grandparents who play an active role in the lives of their grandchildren enjoy a range of health and well-being benefits—including, according to research, a longer and happier life.

The inability of the mind to concentrate on what one is experiencing in a particular moment has the effect of overshadowing the joy of a day, even when the subject of the wandering thoughts is as pleasant as can be.

"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens" (Ecclesiastes 3:1).