“Citius, altius, fortius” (“Faster, Higher, Stronger”) – the famous words spoken in 1894 by Baron Pierre de Coubertin on the creation of the International Olympic Committee. Today they’re more relevant than ever, but their meaning has been subverted. The desire to improve athletic performance is still a noble quest, but too often it leads athletes at the highest levels to overdo things, to lose their way and commit excesses including…
Who wouldn’t want to be fit and well? It’s certainly a reasonable desire, but today’s society has made well-being, fitness and health into an obsession reinforced by media such as publicity, television and magazines. The number of people affected by hypochondria is increasing with every passing year, reinforced by new weight-loss programs, new dietary supplements, and new products to make you look younger. This obsession with having a perfectly healthy…
Behind many instances of memory loss lie addictions, whether to psychoactive substances, or to technology, or a food-related addiction. All forms of dependence, whether physical or emotional, have an effect on our mental state. Each addiction has its own effect, and some are lot nastier than others… Addiction to psychoactive substances As we said in our article about psychoactive substances, drug addiction has undesirable effects and is particularly harmful to…
When solitude hurts… It’s well known that “man is by nature a social animal”. This famous maxim is attributed to Aristotle, who seems to have been blind to a huge chunk of reality, because today more and more people complain of loneliness and try to escape it. They have developed defence mechanisms to guarantee that they’re always in company – multiple romances, total submission to a partner, living with their…
When we walk around shops, all of us sometimes see things that we would like to possess. In a world full of consumer goods, and limited money to buy them, sometimes that desire to possess can become an impulse to steal. However, few of us act on such impulses. Kleptomaniacs are different. Kleptomania refers to a mental health condition where the sufferer is unable to resist the impulse to steal…
Money, whether you analyse it to the last detail, right down to Georg Simmel’s The Philosophy of Money, or whether you have only a purely practical view of it, is a universal exchange medium which builds both our hopes and our anxieties. In this article, we’ll look at what happens when a person has a pathological relationship with money, one which falls within the category of addiction. When money burns…
The standards of beauty vary from one culture to another and at different times in history. In western societies, for a long time having fair skin was synonymous with aristocracy. The idea is that if you have bronzed skin, it’s because you often work hard outdoors, so you belong to the working classes. Until the end of the 20th century, members of the upper classes protected their skin from sunshine….
Models who show off their ultra-slim figures on the catwalks of Fashion Weeks, the war waged by cosmetics manufacturers and their miracle products, the bikini manoeuvres joyously recommenced every year by the media, and so on. In a society where looks are more important than personality, it’s clear that cosmetic surgery still has a great future, to the point where a new concept has emerged in recent years – cosmetic…
I’ve recently had the pleasure of meeting Haluk Piyes. This multifaceted Turkish-German actor/director is also a social counsellor who specialises in the struggle against drug abuse and high-risk behaviour on the part of teenagers. Haluk Piyes is not just an actor in his prime, but also fully committed to his cause. He’s an artist, but also a man with a heart. He candidly told us about his work with…
An interview with Naomi Isted, fashion and beauty columnist, TV presenter, and blogger. Even if a Shopaholic slumbers in each of us, we all know that the bill for compulsive shopping, or rather the monthly statement for that little piece of plastic, can be quite painful. Marketing lessons teach the techniques to create new needs and some students remember the lessons quite well. Designers do not hesitate to play…