1…2…3…run to the wall! Freeze! Playful parenting

There was a time when the word parenting would cause me to either roll my eyes or shrug. It was a time when seven hours of sleep a night, instead of at least eight, had the destabilizing potential of a hurricane, a time when the clear voices of children in the park would compel me to grab a book and read under my...

The stranger in your home

You must run. You only have a few days, perhaps only minutes, to pack all the things you can take with you. You don’t know whether you’ll arrive at a safer place, or whether anyone will welcome you, or whether you’ll ever return home.

The original meaning

Before I started looking for the meaning of life, I thought I had already found it. Or, that it had been given to me. In the world I came from, the road was clearly laid out. My life's major events were all mapped out, and precious little was negotiable.

The fascination of eternal freedom in a communist regime

The biggest surprise of 1989 was the speed with which the communist regimes in Europe collapsed. Their collapse occurred as quickly as their establishment. Two personalities played an undeniable role in undermining a communist regime that seemed to be eternal.

“Are you as old as you feel?” The factors of successful ageing

The factors behind successful ageing have been the subject of research for decades, but the subjective side of ageing still needs to be explored. Because successful ageing is more than an attempt to defy age and its frailties, it is a process in which, in addition to losses, benefits need to be taken into account—not just those delivered by good genetics or a...

Indian soul night

One night, thousands of miles apart, two young women of the same age made a decision—a seemingly trivial one, but one that would seal the fate of one of them.

Hope matters

People can’t live on bread alone. They also need hope.

No one deserves to have that much money

In a dilapidated shack in Nairobi, a young woman makes her confession to the BBC reporter eager to hear her story: “I don’t know why God allows some people to be poor while others are rich.”

How to strengthen your willpower to make the best decisions

To have willpower does not mean saying you want to do something, it means to actually be doing it—André Maurois

How to be a good listener

The portrait of a good listener contains skills that are formed over time, through an honest interaction with others, motivated by the desire to understand and help them.

Love and the second “Yes!”

They have read that love lasts for two or three years, and although they’ve gathered every possible argument why it wasn't the case for them, they couldn't get the possibility out of their minds altogether.

In a complicated relationship with work

Even if our "relationship with work" is often a complicated one, about which we do not always have the best feelings, we should remember that our jobs are more than just sources of income.

“I am because we are” | Dignity in fellowship

Nelson Mandela, one of the most iconic figures in the fight against apartheid—the system of racial segregation enforced by South Africa’s white minority government—spent 27 years in prison for his commitment to dignity, equality, and justice.

Loving yourself, flaws and all

In a society that is more concerned with form than substance, character ranks second. It is the power of the image that dictates things.

Shame and its traps

I must admit, I was a shy child. Shame is a lesson well learned. However, I don’t know if it is always correctly learned.