Self-Knowledge
An Interesting Life Rather Than a Happy One
We typically assume that the ultimate aim of all our efforts is to have a happy life. And judged on…
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Emotional Skills
Giving Up on People Pleasing
The people pleaser needs to learn an unusual and little-mentioned art: that of giving up on people.
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Emotional Skills
The Benefits of Forgetfulness
We are rescued from many of our sorrows not by active solutions or nifty work of the intellect but by our reliable tendencies to forget.
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Leisure
The Wisdom of Liming
On the Caribbean islands of Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago, there’s a skill which is widely revered, which has been…
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Leisure
Reasons Not to Give Up
In one of the upper rooms of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford hangs a picture by a minor Danish nineteenth…
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Sociability
The Need – Sometimes – Not to Complain
We know so much about the importance of complaining; of standing up against problems; of pointing out what is wrong;…
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Leisure
The Pleasures of the Underground
There are moods – of dissatisfaction and loneliness, panic and despair – when the very best counsel we might be…
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Self-Knowledge
Is There Something Wrong – or Am I Just a Very Miserable Person?
We can spend a lot of our lives angrily focused on just how hopeless and awful many things are: this…
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Leisure
Why Small Pleasures Become a Bigger, Not a Smaller Deal, the More We Suffer and Age
There’s an apparent paradox in the way that the longer we have lived, the more appreciation we tend to develop…
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Relationships
A Crucial Sign That Someone Is Worth Going Out With
There is one sign that more than any other indicates that someone may well be a rewarding and trustworthy person…
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Relationships
There Are No Small Issues in Love
We are sometimes let down by an unhelpful idea about how big an issue needs to be in order to…
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Select themes
Leisure
The Wisdom of Liming
On the Caribbean islands of Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago, there’s a skill which is widely revered, which has been…
View
Leisure
Reasons Not to Give Up
In one of the upper rooms of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford hangs a picture by a minor Danish nineteenth…
View
Sociability
The Need – Sometimes – Not to Complain
We know so much about the importance of complaining; of standing up against problems; of pointing out what is wrong;…
View
Leisure
The Pleasures of the Underground
There are moods – of dissatisfaction and loneliness, panic and despair – when the very best counsel we might be…
View
Self-Knowledge
Is There Something Wrong – or Am I Just a Very Miserable Person?
We can spend a lot of our lives angrily focused on just how hopeless and awful many things are: this…
View
Leisure
Why Small Pleasures Become a Bigger, Not a Smaller Deal, the More We Suffer and Age
There’s an apparent paradox in the way that the longer we have lived, the more appreciation we tend to develop…
View
Relationships
A Crucial Sign That Someone Is Worth Going Out With
There is one sign that more than any other indicates that someone may well be a rewarding and trustworthy person…
View
Relationships
There Are No Small Issues in Love
We are sometimes let down by an unhelpful idea about how big an issue needs to be in order to…
View
