Self-Published Features

The shape of social life after the pandemic looks different for everyone. But for many of us, something subtle shifted during those long months indoors. Spending nearly two years inside our homes changed more than our schedules—it altered our relationship with time, space, and the quiet rituals that filled our days. Morning coffee became a moment of grounding. Evening walks turned into forms of decompression. The ordinary quietly gained significance. What once felt like routi

Photo by Planet Volumes on Unsplash ill be the first to admit that, up until recently, I used the terms gut instinct  and intuition  interchangeably throughout my adult life. In the back-and-forth of personal reflection, common storytelling, and general socializing – perhaps describing a previous intense emergency or discussing what motivated you to walk away from something that wasn’t serving you well – it’s easy to see how the terms seem similar to the untrained ear and min

Photo: UnSplash.com In 2026, most people have made living in the most efficient, quick, timely, and effective manner their ultimate goal and something of an extreme sport. The art of taking one’s time, of savouring routine, of reconnecting with the beauty of the mundane, of disconnecting, appreciating, and taking a step back to what things might have felt before the mania of ultimate accomplishment has taken a backseat, especially in Western culture. Among these routines exis

Travelling the globe and scratching off as many locations off our bucket lists as we can have turned into a combination of an extreme sport and a benchmark of ultimate life success. With the rise of social media over the last decade or so, people of all ages seem to be competitively travelling to some of the most expensive, far-away locations imaginable and publicizing almost every detail. Becoming culturally well-rounded and educating ourselves about the art, people and cust

Photo by Natalie Blauth on UnSplash The feelings evoked by the perceived availability of a wide selection of people, places, or things in life that we consider stylish, beautiful, emotionally fulfilling, practical, delicious, or status-enhancing can be compared to similar feelings evoked by love and narcotics. If we're talking about only the pre-virtual era, this feeling could have been triggered by walking into a large department store that smelled like designer fragrance an

“The Death of Clubbing”, they say, is imminent upon us. Who would’ve thought? As a late-thirties millennial, with memories still fresh in my mind of the way things used to be, I’d be lying if I said the words didn’t sting. Hailing from the generation that experienced immense bonding, youthful connection, platonic and romantic love, and, to be honest, came into their own through their twenties and early thirties spent in and around club culture, this new turn of events causes