Overwhelmed by simplicity
Social upheaval, an identity crisis, the sexual revolution, experimentation with drugs, and Eastern philosophies distanced entire generations in Western Europe from conservative values and faith. However, in the same 1960s and 1970s environment, Marijke and Bernard Beranger found something better and more lasting.
Food for life
A lot is said and written about food, and a fair share of the promises we make are related to it. We might decide to eat more healthfully or perhaps we wish to diminish food waste. Unfortunately, our promises are often quickly forgotten, because destructive habits are hard to forsake. There are, however, people who have found ways to transform not just their...
Argumentum Ad Hominem or how you attack yourself when attacking others
In an argumentative discussion each party involved must be able to express their point of view without constraints, discrimination or other interferences. This is, in fact, an important prerequisite for the effort to overcome differences of opinion. In practice however, often things are far from this ideal. Not only do interlocutors not respect each other’s right to free speech, but they also resort...
Does divorce make us happier than continuing in an unhappy marriage?
At the age of 27, for the first time in my life, I worried that time was passing too fast. For the next few years, the speed with which most of my friends were getting married was the next source of concern.
25 million reasons
The Caribbean has long been considered paradise by many tourists. For many of those living there, however, the images of lofty palm trees, white sandy beaches and crystal-clear waters mask an underbelly of drug running, gang-related violence and prostitution. Human trafficking is an issue many nations are struggling to cope with, and the Caribbean island of Trinidad is no different.
COVID-19: A hundred remedies for solitude
I open the window and breathe in the air, trying to guess the weather. Floating around, mixed, are scents and miasms alike; it's hard to decipher these intricate clues.
Overcoming boundaries without crossing the line
I was a young student looking for a good paying job to support my family and my studies. On that day, I found myself in the head nurse’s office at the nearby nursing home for the elderly.
Scars that heal
He had made the mistake of asking the doctors for a mirror. Terrified, he saw a monster reflected in it. Lying on the hospital bed, after the doctor left, he pulled on the tube he thought was keeping him alive. He had no reason to live.
Rest for our souls
What we do in our free time reveals who we are when we step out of the whirlwind of daily tasks. But the projects and relationships to which we devote our free moments also reveal who we will become. At the end of the journey, people see the value of every second much more clearly, and often realise that rest—physical rest, but more...
Our resilience and the need to be “like little children”
Every day, we are surrounded by the resilience of developing characters and it’s almost impossible not to be touched by their beauty and fragility.
Stuck in childhood | The Peter Pan syndrome
The fascination of the universe of childhood, with its multitude of stories, experiences and impressions, is unrepeatable. As adults, however, we are often unaware that monsters may lurk in the shards of that magical past, hidden among dreams, memories and kites, ready to reactivate and injure us, while simultaneously anaesthetising us with a familiar sense of déjà vu.
Small changes and their remarkable impact
Changing habits is like tightrope walking: an exercise in which the balance is always fragile, but it is the small changes that pave the way to truly remarkable results.
The song of happiness
Happiness is a song that we love but rarely sing anymore. It is that familiar children's song that we sang all day every day when we were little. We loved its tune, and it loved us back. We used to live within that melody; it was our default mood. Life was essentially good and it was good to live our life in this...
The war in Ukraine as a struggle between interpretations
It has been said before that the wars of the 21st century are hybrid wars, in the sense that, in addition to the environments in which the hostilities have taken place until now–land, water and air–a fourth environment has appeared: the virtual one.


























