The habit of comparing ourselves unfavourably with other people damages our self-esteem and wellbeing even during the best of times. When we experience more challenging times, it can take very little to make ourselves and our lives feel really rubbish.
It wasn’t quite so bad in the olden days when there was only limited exposure to the lives of others, seemingly so much more successful and interesting than our own. At the present time it is hard to escape the bombardment of words and pictures and images which suggest that all the people we know (and some we don’t) are having a brighter, better existence than us.
Values are the ideas that define the way we view the world. They are the abstract notions on which we base our judgements of what is important in life.
At particular periods in all our lives, it isn’t possible to have face-to-face contact with the people who matter to us. It doesn’t matter that much these days, we say blithely, because of all the possibilities for voice and video calls. We can still see each other. We can still talk to each other. In fact, we can see and talk to more people in more ways than we ever could IRL.
You might wonder what would be the point of writing a letter during this period of forced separation and constrained activity.
The contours of our lives have changed in the coronavirus lockdown or shelter in place. For now, we don’t have the regular rhythms and rituals which give shape to our days. Without the activities which normally punctuate our waking hours, we are faced with a shapeless mass of time which we need to mould into a recognisable and manageable form.
For years and years, the practice of making fun of fat or thin people has been a staple of cartoons, picture postcards, film and television comedies, books and stories.
The phrase ‘the generation gap’ came into common usage in the 1960s. It referred to the lack of understanding between the older generation, born earlier in the century, and the new tribe of teenagers and young people which emerged after World War Two.
The Oxford English Dictionary has asked the public to contribute examples of the work-specific language — slang, technical terms, acronyms, ‘in’ phrases — which is current in their profession.
Once upon a time, way back in the day when there were only two television channels available and they were both in black and white, the only people interested in exam results were those directly involved. The results arrived at your house by post, in an envelope addressed to you, the exam candidate, and could be opened when and where and how you chose.