Psychology

Although we may not like everyone, we want everyone to like and accept us. We raise our eyebrows suspiciously if someone treats us with indifference or, worse, with hostility. We feel misunderstood and rejected. And the feeling of rejection is as intense as physical pain.

I was only 13 when I first experienced it. My three best girlfriends handed me a letter. It said they no longer wanted to be my friends. The only reason given was, “The guys pay you too much attention.” After delivering the letter, they simply shunned me.

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.

“Many people feel out of touch with their feelings. Counselor offices and publishing houses have proliferated thanks to the need to help people to improve their communication skills, to restore their self-confidence and to help them relate to other people.” – Sir Ken Robinson, Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative

What do you do when a relationship no longer feels right or doesn’t meet your expectations? Do you try to fix it, or are you more inclined to walk away? Here are a few things worth considering before making the decision to end a relationship.

Arguments must be convincing and, in order to convince, they must be valid—the minimum requirement of persuasion.

In an interview published by Inc.com, 24-year-old Romanian Ovidiu Dobrota, from Oradea, Romania, boasted that his fake news site Ending The Fed had a substantial impact in supporting Donald Trump in the presidential elections. According to a Buzzfeed analysis, his boasting is well-founded.

Of all the evidence that younger generations are living in the shadow of insecurity, depression is the most compelling. Anxiety, which accompanies the daily lives of a record number of young people, paints a picture of a generation that experiences an almost constant lack of control.

If shame were personified, its main characteristic would be its ability to creep into the darkest depths, avoiding any trace of light and any discussion of itself.

“If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone” (Romans 12:18).

Twenty-first century people are bombarded with fiction about romance.

“Mister Watson, come here, I want to see you.” With this message, Alexander Graham Bell and his assistant, Thomas Watson, launched the telephone. The door had opened to distant, personal and instant contact.

Henri Nouwen once wrote about some trapeze artists who became his friends, emphasising the perfect synchronicity between them and the total trust that the one who jumps has when he lets go of the trapeze and remains in the air for a second, waiting to be caught by his teammate. But what if, at the last moment, when it is too late to...

The generation born with the tablet and the smartphone in its arms, but which ends up being exploited by big data cultivators and controlled by radicalization and polarization, can become the generation that implements anti-democratic movements.

We live in an era defined by speed, where everything, from information to personal gratification, seems to be just the push of a button away.