It’s that time of year again – my ‘guilty pleasure’ Britain’s Got Talent is back on ITV in the UK. 
I caught up on the audition stages last week and was incredibly touched by Father Ray Kelly’s rendition of the R.E.M. classic (a 7 minute clip including his introduction to the panel before he sings):
I was at a CIPD Sussex Branch Conference on the Future of Work yesterday which was excellent.
One of the speakers, Leatham Green (whose session I really enjoyed) showed a couple of short, very funny and thought-provoking YouTube clips about how we copy other people’s behaviour even if we don’t know why or it doesn’t make any sense. I’ve written about this phenomenon before in my post: ‘The Psychology of Unwritten Rules’.
I thought I’d share these clips with you now because I really like them and hope that you will, too – the first is just under 4 minutes and the second just 2½ minutes – and I think both are well worth taking the time to watch for the entertainment value alone.
The first one is a social experiment:
This is a quote from author Amanda Prowse which I heard recently on Channel 5’s ‘The Wright Stuff’.
She talks a lot of sense, and you can tell I liked what I heard that day as she also features in my previous blog ‘All Her Possessions Fit Into One Carry-on Suitcase?’. 
On this occasion she also talked about ageing. She’d noticed how much time (and money) she was spending dyeing her hair and getting Botox injections – all to avoid signs of growing older. Continue reading ““Ageing is a Privilege.””
I smiled when I heard the author Amanda Prowse on TV recently, 
having been asked if it were true that all her possessions could fit into a carry-on suitcase, reply:
“… all of my possessions can fit into a 2.5 litre plastic box.”
As if this weren’t impressive enough, she then went on to say that when she travels anywhere she takes only 3 outfits with her:
“… one in the wash, one to wear and one spare …” Continue reading “All Her Possessions Fit into One Carry-on Suitcase?”
TV and radio host Fearne Cotton talked openly this week about her own depression in a short (only 3½ minutes) BBC podcast.
I was particularly struck by what she said about us “… doing that awful compare and despair sort of thing…” Continue reading “Compare and Despair”
How much – or, how little – do we need? How much do we want?
How much (of anything) is ‘enough’?
Last year I wrote about the UK Channel 4 programme ‘Life Stripped Bare’. Simplifying and de-cluttering are topics that crop up fairly regularly these days and we might think they’re a recent phenomenon fuelled by trends inspired by TV programmes and self-help books.
But not so – I found this in ‘On the Shortness of Life’ by Seneca, the Roman philosopher and statesman (c.5BC-AD65) translated by C.D.N. Costa: Continue reading “Simply Enough”
Struggling to make decisions about what to buy friends and family for Christmas this year?
With less than three weeks to go, the pressure may be mounting – and funds running short.
On BBC Breakfast this morning there was a discussion about ‘The Four Gift Rule’ and I found a BBC article online about it, too. Continue reading “Something they want … or an IOU?”
Even if you don’t celebrate or mark Christmas I think it’s hard not to be aware of it or affected by it.
Here in the UK I’ve seen Christmas cards in the shops as early as August and, as I write this, it’s early November and momentum is gathering…
The giving and receiving of gifts is a key aspect for many of us and huge amounts of time, money and thought go into them. Continue reading “Christmas Presents an Issue?”
Whole People 