If you are a young parent, there comes a time when you'll be explaining to your children how babies are made. You might buy them a book with child-friendly illustrations or give your own talk (you will still probably ask Google for help or buy a parenting book to find something age-appropriate). And so the "big reveal" will probably feature something like this:

Babies are made when a male sperm meets a female egg. Each man has lots of sperm cells stored in his testicles. A woman has internal organs called ovaries which release one egg each month. When a man and a woman make love, sperm travel from a man's penis into a woman's vagina. Man's sperm cells compete with each other to reach that one precious egg. Only the fastest and the strongest sperm manages to get to the egg and impregnate it.

There is another way to tell this story:

A female egg is sitting in the uterus and looking at all the male sperm cells swimming towards her. She selects one sperm she likes, temporarily lowers the chemical barrier, sucks the sperm in and raises the barrier once again so that none of the other sperm can get in.

Scientifically speaking, I have described exactly the same process, but notice how different these two stories are. In the first story, we have a "princess" waiting to be "rescued", and we applaud male strength and agility. The female egg here is passive, while the sperm is the noble warrior doing all the work.  In the second story, it's the female egg who is in control. She is there screening the candidates, making the selection and putting up her defences against the unwanted intruders. She isn't a "princess", she is the boss.

For me, this is a powerful example of how gender bias controls our everyday narrative. Until I heard the alternative story of conception (on BBC Woman's Hour), I have always thought about it as a male sperm contest. It's like suddenly realising that virtually all movies released in the last century starred glorious men with women in supporting roles. It's the same bias that we apply subconsciously when praising boys for their strengths and girls for their beauty. Everyday gender bias is invisible until we start paying attention.

It's 21st century: our society is finally focussing on the problems of gender pay gap; lack of diversity in business and arts; gender discrimination in sports and gender bias that exists in the seemingly neutral science and technology. What we need is to examine our language, especially when addressing children, who, like sponges, absorb prejudice in the environment they grow up in. Please remember to praise girls for their wit and strength and boys for their sensitivity and compassion. When discussing husbands or boyfriends, it's time women stop using such expressions as "Sam is helping me about the house" because Sam (bless him, he sounds like a keeper) is only doing his fair share of running a household. Try to notice when you are saying "Football World Cup" referring to men's football because it's time to be specific whether we mean women's or men's game. 

Many of us - men and women - want equality of opportunities and are hopeful for change. Yet change isn't something we should be expecting to come from the top. Our politicians, employers, filmmakers and scientists need us to act in small but meaningful ways to change everyday behaviour and narrative. They'll follow suit. Young parents, we are all relying on you. 

A new exhibition has opened recently at the British Museum in partnership with the St. Petersburg Hermitage Museum. Scythians: Warriors of ancient Siberia is a fascinating discovery of culture and customs of the ancient nomadic warriors, who flourished on Siberian plains between 900 and 200 B.C. Archeologists working in Altai in Western Siberia found a rich collection of jewellery, clothes, weapons and religious artefacts in brilliantly preserved tombs thanks to permafrost. One of the items exhibited by The British Museum is a woman's boot, dating back to the 400-300 B.C. It is intricately decorated with red fabric, golden thread and miniature crystals.  A helpful caption explains that looking at the boot we can see that it must have been customary for Scythians to sit cross-legged on the floor, otherwise why would the shoe soles be so richly decorated. Exhibition curators also pose a question: "What would historians learn about you from your clothes?"

The question is presumably aimed at children visiting the museum, but I too found it fascinating. What indeed will the future generation make of our clothes?

One obvious conclusion would be that we have too much stuff! A recent Telegraph article quoting the Great British Wardrobe Report commissioned by Ariel found that on average Brits spend £1,042 on their wardrobes per year. An average woman (man) owns 95 (56) items of clothing and only wears 59% (62%) of them regularly. Thanks to convenient online retailers such as ASOS and Boohoo and discount chains like Primark and TK Maxx, it became really easy to shop. Marketing specialists employ an army of influencers and social media tricks to encourage us to take our credit cards out. It's true that many speak today of sustainable fashion and decluttering, yet overall we are the generation of walking wardrobes, shoe collections and shopaholics. I truly hope the humans have peaked, and that the next generation will opt for a capsule wardrobe of sustainable, breathable and colour-changing variety.  

Zooming into London, future anthropologists would probably take note of the sheer variety of garments.  One could spot a Sikh wearing a turban, an American tourist with a Harvard sweatshirt, an Italian with a fitted monogrammed shirt and a Nigerian woman in a bright dress heading into church on a Sunday.  Personally, I stopped taking any special notice of unusual outfits on the streets of London. To me, diversity here is a given.  

Zooming even further, I would probably nominate my friend James for a future anthropological case study. You see, James has recently bought two pairs of vegan shoes. (We used to call this "fake leather" but veganism has crept into all sorts of aspects of our daily lives.) The scientists would determine at once that James was a dapper vegan who worked in the City (who else wears brogues?). 

Perhaps it's too early to talk about the historic significance of the 2017 fashion. Instead, I'm inviting you to travel back to Russia in the 1990s. The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, and Russia was tentatively trying out free trade. The first wave of Russian solopreneurs travelled to Turkey and China where they had bought lots of cheap textiles and brought them back to Russia in giant zipped plastic bags. Open-air markets sprung near train and bus stations all over Russia. Solopreneuers displayed their goods with even less thought that Primark or TK Maxx do today. Even in harsh winter months women would try on dresses and jeans in makeshift changing rooms behind a plastic curtain. Visiting such markets became the favourite pass-time not least because for once in their lifetime, former Soviet citizens were overwhelmed with choice.

Inevitably, women opted for brightly coloured clothes, as if to banish their grey-coloured Soviet past.  Counterfeit designer garments with frequently misspelt labels were a popular choice. I too had a bright green crop top with black letters D&G imprinted on my chest. It was mildly scandalous to wear that to school at the age of 15 but most teachers had no will to fight our obscene taste. They also shopped at the same markets, and perhaps looking at young girls in mini skirts and tucked-in checked shirts, they secretly wished that they too had had a chance to dress so boldly back in the days.   

Men were undoubtedly the main victims of the 1990s fashion in Russia. Many wore sweatpants and trainers to the office or on a night out. A must have accessory in those days was a golden chain - its thickness signalling the relative importance of the wearer. Mafia boys in Ekaterinburg wore ludicrously thick gold chains with newly cast orthodox crosses and matching thick golden bracelets.

Curiously, despite all that newly found abundance, people still wore the same things. I remember that at some point many girls wore identical black, stretchy miniskirts; then we swapped them for thin and shiny black leggings. Men bought tight-fitting, black, wooly hats which acquired an obscene name pidorka (I dare not translate it). I suppose that we may have evolved since the cave days but tribalism is deep in our DNA as is the desire to belong. 

Thankfully, Russian dress sense has recovered, and I dare say that you'd spot more stylishly dressed women on the streets of Moscow than London today. My biggest regret is that I haven't kept any of the gems I had worn in those days. I'd open a museum called "Russian Fashion of the 1990s" where one could try on garish outfits and take Polaroid pictures home. There'd be queue, I tell you!

This summer I spent a couple of days in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. It's a charming city, which gets scorched by the heat during hot summer months. In the evenings local residents and tourists fill up the centre of Yerevan, walking up and down the Cascade, an outdoor collection of modern sculptures from all over the world, donated by Gerard Cafesjian, a wealthy American benefactor with Armenian roots. You'll find visitors posing by Fernando Botero's works and snapping sculptures by Barry Flanagan, Lynn Chadwick and Jaume Plensa. In fact, even away from the Cascade, walking through many Yerevan's parks, squares and avenues, I kept bumping into monuments, commemorating Armenian and Russian writers, poets, architects and scientists. It felt as if the old town is a treasure trove of Armenian cultural heritage. I liked it very much.

Come to think of it, every city probably has a monument or two it becomes associated with. There is a Little Mermaid in Copenhagen, which transports me back to my childhood, spent reading Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales. There is the Statue of Liberty in New York, but also a Raging Bull on the Wall Street in Manhattan. There is Motherland Calls! (Родина-мать зовёт!) in Volgograd in Russia, commemorating the battle of Stalingrad in the Second World War. There is Romulus and Remus statue in Rome depicting a she-wolf nursing two brothers. And of course, there are plenty of religious monuments of all faiths all over the world, which also speak for the local customs and traditions. Every monument - be it sombre or playful, old or new - is a cultural symbol which echoes national values.

So what kind of values come to mind when we hear about a new monument to Mikhail Kalashnikov, the designer of the infamous AK-47 automatic rifle, which is to be unveiled in Moscow in September 2017? The 7-metre sculpture is said to cost 35 million roubles ($538,000). Don't get me wrong - Kalashnikov was obviously an ingenious designer, but even he was tormented by his own invention. In a letter to the head of the Russian Orthodox Church before his death in 2013, Kalashnikov wrote that he was haunted by the thousands of deaths his invention was responsible for. “My spiritual pain is unbearable,” he wrote. “I keep asking the same insoluble question. If my rifle deprived people of life then can it be that I … a Christian and an Orthodox believer, was to blame for their deaths?” It's not Kalashnikov that unnerves me - it's the commemoration of his gun, the weapons in general, the cult of war and, inevitably, of murder.

What kind of city or its government chooses to put up a monument which celebrates the act of killing? I imagine taking schoolchildren to see the new statue and instilling in them - what exactly? You see, I have been brought up on the cult of the Second World War, everyone in the Soviet Union was. We read books and watched films about the Great Patriotic War, the exceptional sacrifice of our grandparents; we were taught to hate fascism, to worship our heroes and to be ready to die for our motherland, should the need arise. And it so happened that later mere boys, who had been spoon-fed war stories, were sent to Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989 and then returned to their mothers in zinc coffins. To add insult to the loss of grieving mothers, there was nothing remotely patriotic about that war.

And so I have been hoping all this time that the cult of war has been fading in my home country, but the opposite is true. The new statues being erected in Russia are commemorating Stalin and now Kalashnikov. I see that and I understand it, but I can't accept it. My own values have changed.

If I were asked to come up with an idea for a new monument for a city I live in, here is what I'd suggest. Recently I spent a day at a Central London hospital, which for me was an oasis of unreserved kindness. I have been incredibly well looked after even despite the long wait and the nervousness about being in a hospital. It's as if the staff were wired differently from the phlegmatic, chronically stressed Londoners one accounts on the tube every day. My nurse came to London from the Philippines.  She works 12-hour shifts four days a week and a short shift on her fifth working day. A short shift means an 8-hour day. She was cheerful and gentle. She taught me what dedication to one's work really means. She was the model of empathy. She made me want to cry from the sheer gratitude to be showered with so much kindness. And so if I were to commission a new monument in London, it would be a work of art dedicated to a NHS nurse. Something life-size and approachable. Children would be taught to value our healthcare staff, diversity and kindness. And I hope adults too would nod with gratitude passing it by.

As for Kalashnikov in Moscow, I'm sure it'll serve its purpose and instigate fear cultivated by the current Kremlin government. I can only hope that one day Russia will earn its respect through its achievements in science and technology, education and healthcare, art and social justice.  

Right now a couple of friends and I having a pretty heated discussion about the upcoming UK elections: some are supporting Labour and its socialist policies, others are criticising Jeremy Corbyn and are querying his ability to execute the Labour manifesto. Debates on Facebook are a little bit pointless because everyone knows that your comment may be removed if your friend feels offended by it. Or worse: you yourself may be un-friended in one click. Another problem with arguing on Facebook is that typically you may be juggling several things at once like tinkering with a spreadsheet and typing which means your brain is never really fully engaged with either activity. Finally, a lot has been written about the silos environment created on Facebook, and it's very true: however different our views are on Jeremy Corbyn, ultimately my Facebook friends and I have a lot more in common than not. We are mostly in our 30-40s, well educated, independent and well travelled. We could learn something from each other but when it comes to truly opposing views or new information, social media isn't the right environment to challenge your views.

The best way to get yourself better educated is to read. Well-researched and elegantly written non-fiction books and long-reads published in reputable media offer an opportunity to consider matters properly, to digest the facts and to form your own opinion in the absence of social media buzz. Recently I came across a number of start-ups which summarise business and self-help books and deliver bullet point digests to those who "don't have time to read". I was astonished that these apps are gaining popularity. Who are these people who want summarised conclusions such as "sugar is bad for you", "meditation is good for you", "it's all about the feedback loop" without understanding why? Who are these authors who have spent years researching, writing and editing books and then agree to have them abridged into sound bites? Apart from getting all the facts right, reading in private (as opposed to social media reading) allows you to hide your ignorance, take time to think and make your own (as opposed to popular) judgement calls.

I recently read Sapiens, A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari , which could well be one of the best books I've ever read. If you haven't read it yet, order it now - you won't regret it. In his book Harari takes readers on a 100,000 year journey from the time when homo sapiens were just one of the homo species (alongside Neanderthals, Denisovans etc.) and to the present day when modern science (bio-engineering, cyborg engineering, nanotechnology, etc.) suggests that soon homo sapiens (us!) may disappear as the new species evolve to replace us. Last time I read about Neanderthals was at school and I was surprised to discover that we didn't evolve from them. Instead, about 50,000 years ago, Sapiens, Neanderthals and Denisovans were almost (but not quite) entirely separate species. Modern anthropology suggests that Sapiens drove other homo species to extinction (because Sapiens had superior social skills and technology - they cooperated, hunted and fought better than other species). Sapiens did the same to animals. It is us who have destroyed much of the the indigenous fauna of Australia and the Americas. I probably would have tried to hide my ignorance at a dinner party but reading a book gave me time to catch up on prehistoric genocide. 

It's impossible to take time to think about the role of capitalism in the foundation of the modern society because just merely saying the word makes some people's blood boil. Yet capitalism in its objective sense is nothing but an economic or political system in which means of production and distribution are privately owned (as opposed to owned by the state). Harari is able to explore the merits of capitalism dispassionately as a good academic should (and newspapers never will). The media are unlikely to ever say something like "I don't know", yet Harari examines the proliferation of patriarchy in all medieval cultures of the world, examines its possible causes and finally admits that none of the theories which attempt to explain why is it that men rule the world makes much sense. "If, as is being demonstrated today so clearly, the patriarchal system has been based on unfounded myths rather than on biological facts, what accounts for the universality and stability of this system?"

Much of the book is dedicated to religion. This is the matter we can hardly discuss in depth in a conversation. This is because it is very personal. Yet when Harari compares world's most prominent religions side by side, it becomes clear why Buddhism is today gaining popularity in the West. I would not want to be converted to any religion by some missionary, yet reading about a religion which recognises that human suffering is not caused by devil or relieved by god, makes me pause and listen. Buddhism is based on the idea that suffering is a human condition: "no matter what the mind experiences, it usually reacts with craving, and craving always involves dissatisfaction. When the mind experiences something distasteful, it craves to be rid of irritation. When the mind experiences something pleasant, it craves that the pleasure will remain and will intensify. Therefore, the mind is always dissatisfied and restless." Buddhism teaches to accept things - sadness, pain, joy - as they are, to live in the present and to practise meditation to help us do that.  It helps that modern neuroscience confirms the benefits of mindfulness Siddhartha Gautama had been banging on about around 500 BC. 

Let's fight the fake news and post-truth, sound bites and click bates by reading books (unabridged). It takes time, attention and dedication to read a book - the opposite is true for the Daily Mail headlines. To say that you don't have time to read is to say that you don't care about the sharpness of your mind or the quality of your judgement. I am convinced that readers (not zealous men of faith or driven entrepreneurs or ambitious politicians) is the one modern tribe that makes this world a better place.

You might be surprised to learn (I was!) that self-help books have been published in the US since 1776. It was Stephen Covey who had written about studying eighteenth century books, articles and essays on self-improvement, popular psychology and success in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. It turns out that back in the days scholars were focussing their attention on such postulates as integrity, humility, fidelity, temperance, courage, justice, patience and modesty as the foundations of success. Covey sites Benjamin Franklin's autobiography as a good representative of the historic personal development literature. "It is, basically, the story of one man's effort to integrate certain principles and habits deep within his nature." Covey concludes that those early self-help books were based on "character ethic". 

Shortly after World War I the dominant view of success in the US shifted to what might be called "personality ethic". "Success became more of a function of personality, of public image, of attitudes and behaviours, skills and techniques, that lubricate the processes of human interaction." We recognise this paradigm easily because in the past 100 years this latter view of success and personal growth hasn't changed much. We are still taught "positive mental attitude", "fake it until you make it", "sink or swim", etc. And more specifically, there emerged hundreds of books and "quick fix" courses on how become a "killer salesman" or "get any date you want". These tend to be manipulative, deceptive and devious - quite the opposite of the "character ethic" of the previous era. 

It's not that there is something wrong with learning how to speak in public by faking confidence before it becomes natural or how to write good copy by tapping into popular psychology. It's just that taking a step back and looking at the bigger picture shows a bleak worldview of people trying to outrun each other in the short term and ultimately failing to reach deeper, more important values in the long term. Consider this: an ambitious salesman learns a trick or two and enjoys success in the office before his habits of deception and cutting corners seep into other areas of his life. Before he knows is, he becomes a serial cheater and his idea of looking after his health is taking an aspirin the morning after the night before. By 45, he is deeply unhappy and unwell, his sports car and luxury lifestyle notwithstanding.  

Covey refers to "personality ethic" self-help literature as a band-aid which works well to fix things temporarily but which cannot solve deeply rooted, chronic problems or bring long-term success. His book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People attempts to draw our attention back to the core principles of integrity, humility and "win-win". 

I read his book in January 2017 just as Donald Trump had been inaugurated as the 45th President of the US. It occurred to me that Trump embodied everything that Covey (who had first published his book in 1989) had detested. Trump is the author of The Art of the Deal, How to Get Rich, Think Like a Billionaire, Think Big and Kick Arse, The Way to the Top, to name just a few of his books. These are bestsellers! It's no wonder a ruthless businessman with no morals or personal ethics was elected to lead the US. We should be wondering why so many Americans were surprised about his victory in the first place. Similarly, it's time to realise that populism in other parts of the world (whether it's "right" or "left") is the result of our culture becoming so obsessed with quick fixes and miraculous promises (I leafed through The Times on the tube yesterday and came across an ad which suggested that turmeric cured cancer.) It's our view of success - in its every facet - that desperately needs to be re-examined. 

You reap what you sow. It is now time to ask ourselves some difficult questions. When France goes to the polls tomorrow and Britain a month later, let's try to consider the impact of our vote on the lives of our brothers and neighbours. UK's vote to leave the EU was the selfish outcome for other members of the club who had enjoyed peace and economic cooperation for decades since the World War II. I'm not saying that we should not be putting our own agenda first, but I do believe that we ought to be taking a wider view and multiple factors into account when making decisions which impact other people (and our planet as a whole). And when I say "we ought to", I mean we can no longer afford to do otherwise.

I'm currently reading a book called The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey. It was first published back in 1989 and sold over 10 million copies. The book was recommended to me by one very impressive young woman called Amanda, who had rowed from California to Hawaii in a self-supported all-women boat back in 2014, having had recovered from glandular fever and myalgic encephalomyelitis (M.E.). The book, like many of its genre, is geared to North American readers in its style, but it has plenty of substance. Unlike other management guidebooks, it focuses less on gimmicks and personal gain and more on what Covey calls "character ethics": success underpinned by such values as integrity, fairness, patience and honesty. 

About a hundred and fifty pages into the book I found myself reading about time management, something I considered trivial, but Covey's observations changed my mind. "Time management is really a misnomer", he writes "the challenge is not to manage time, but to manage ourselves." Covey notes that we spend our time on four types of matters:

1. Urgent and important: think dealing with a crisis and rushing to meet the deadline
2. Not urgent but important: planning, developing new opportunities, working on our goals (such as exercising and taking time to cook a meal to lose weight)
3. Urgent but unimportant: answer email, attend a meeting / conference call
4. Not urgent and not important: social media, Daily Mail, online window shopping, pointless tasks

It's easy enough to see what's urgent and what's not, and it should be similarly straightforward to recognise that working on your professional or personal goals and investing in your relationship with people who matter to you are important. We would probably all agree that we should be spending most of our time on worthy, long-term matters, while being flexible enough to deal with crises as they arise and reward ourselves with occasional #foodporn on Instagram. Sadly, many of us end up putting out fires (urgent and important) day in and day out and then procrastinating until the next disaster looms large. 

I'd be the first to admit that when I was working in corporate environment, my work often involved crisis management. I'd praise myself with being the "doer", the problem-solver, the deadline-driven person. I'd get a hit of dopamine from crossing a juicy item off my to-do list. Perhaps I internalised this habit at university where students behaved like Pavlov's dogs, dealing with one essay crisis, having a breather and then pounding onto the next one. Many jobs are fuelled on stress, and some professionals even take pride in thriving in the Red Bull-drenched environment. As a result, some suffer nervous breakdown, others get seriously ill from a burnout.

People who spend their time on unimportant matters tend to be unhappy. Covey writes that such people don't set long-term goals, they often feel worthless and victimised, drift from job to job and find it difficult to commit. If you see your job as doing what you are told without some bigger vision or purpose in mind, then you are bound to feel deflated. Ask any junior in an investment bank or anyone stuck in a job which doesn't address his or her values, ambitions or purpose. 

What's interesting is that when Covey asked his students what's stopping them from spending most of their time on what's truly important, most said that they recognised their priorities and they were even fairly good at organising themselves, but their problem was lack of discipline. They planned their week well, then drifted. Covey says that the main problem is putting first things first - setting goals, working out what's truly important, understanding our values. I agree. Once you get your priorities straight, saying "No" to pointless meetings, coffees, engagements and work becomes easier. 

How would this different take on time management work in practice? If you realise that your health is important to you, then you will find time to schedule training, rest and relaxation into your busy week. Instead of perfecting your spreadsheet of potential clients, you might actually go and speak to them. If your office culture matters to you, you will allocate time to make it better. If you value friendship, you will do something meaningful for a friend even if it involves carving out time for them during office hours. It's not so much about scheduling time to do what matters, but perhaps looking at things from a different angle. The most efficient person may suddenly appear completely ineffective. You may also realise that a morning of house chores is a worthy investment into the harmony of your home. 

If you feel like sharing your thoughts, please comment below!  

Last week I wrote an article for the Russian-language newspaper Pulse UK about life in the post-truth era. In the new world order we are urged to give time and effort to understand the other side of the argument (Trump vs. democrats, Putin vs. opposition, Brexit vs. Remain) rather than dismissing it as inferior, emotionally loaded or less erudite. I argued that while the post-truth world implied that personal views and emotions might matter more to public opinion than data and facts, it didn't mean that the former should be given equal weighting in a debate. Yes, it is important to listen, empathise and understand another point of view, but not at the expense of having to read conspiracy bloggers (e.g. those who say that the US had organised the collapse of the USSR) or having to listen to politicians spreading malicious lies on national television (take your pick from the Trump or the Brexit campaign) to allure the voters. I'm all for listening, debating and understanding, but let's aim for pravda (Russian for "truth"), especially since we have more sources to turn to these days, than just Pravda (Soviet daily). 

I found myself thinking about the post-truth era beyond politics and current affairs. It seems to me that our world is so complicated and messed up because we all have so many different stories and identities. There is a "9 to 5" story of a sleek professional woman (let's call her Irene), who needs to act strong and prove her acumen daily at work so she doesn't get dismissed as an indecisive, dumb blonde. Outside of work Irene needs to appear soft and vulnerable, otherwise men would find her unapproachable. On Facebook you'll find Irene showing off her abs, super green salads and vacation snaps. You won't know about her battles with anorexia or her mother's alcoholism. You are probably envious of her jet-set lifestyle (and if so, I recommend you unfollow her on Instagram.)

The problem with Facebook-saturated world is that while we have no idea what's happening in someone else's life, we think we do and therefore we compare ourselves to lives of others which are not real. We raise expectations of ourselves, we worry and we beat ourselves up because there is a continuous reference point (social media feed) being rolled down like an endless film in front of our eyes. We know that impeccably arranged food plates or bodies are not real and yet we are drawn to them. We are told it's inspiration. The problem is that there is a fine line between aspiring to be healthier, slimmer, better and feeling low because of the perceived own inadequacy. The dangers of the social media world have been exhausted as a topic, but it's not until now that I thought about them in the context of post-truth.

The truth is that there is only one reality - your own. Only you know how you feel and what constitutes your daily grind. Not even the closest friends and family, let alone colleagues or acquaintances, can see what's really going on with you. You may be keeping up appearances and doing stellar job in the office, but you could be battling demons at home or in your head. It's hard, no, impossible, to expect anyone else to understand and fully empathise with you. That's because, among other things, everyone has their own battles which may range from a noisy electric heater which wakes you up in the middle of the night to a parent with terminal illness. It's not about facts and figures here. It's about how it makes you feel and what it does to your daily reality. It's about you.

I don't particularly like this post-truth world, but one good thing did come out of it. It's that only your truth matters. The US economy may be growing but if your circumstances are dire, you shouldn't be pretending you aren't hurting. If you suffer from depression and sometimes it's just overwhelming, don't expect others to understand. It's your livelihood and it's up to you to do something to change that. It's your life - so live it truthfully and not by the distorted reflection of reality which pops into your head  driven by the word "should".

Yes, this is still Life Tonic and not a graduate recruitment page of Deloitte or McKinsey. It is August, a nightmare time for a freelancer and after a recent conversation with a friend, complaining about his corporate job, I'd like to say a few words in defence of "office moles".

These days, unless you are a displaced migrant or a dweller of Subsaharan Africa, we are blessed with choice the generations before us only dreamt about. The jobs for life are no longer what professionals aspire for and instead we seek meaningfulness, fulfilment and the thrill of challenge. Money and status are still important but these are just some of the values we seek to tick. Job security (along with pensions, private healthcare, etc.) has become obsolete if your news feed comes from the sources geared for the millennials, while volunteering, sabbaticals and social entrepreneurship are selling like hot cakes. 

So much has been written in praise of entrepreneurs and freelancers, taking a "leap of faith", becoming your own boss and (dare I say it...) "disrupting" one's career path that it must feel like a failure to stay in the same job for the last 5 years. 

If you know where to look, you might have come across some pretty candid stories about what it's actually like to be a freelancer, but let me summarise it here for you. Being a freelancer or an entrepreneur is like crossing a sea in a dinghy: it's exhilarating for about 5 minutes a day and then you feel lonely, scared, under-appreciated and miserable the rest of the time. It takes superhuman strength of character to keep going and while it's worth it every step of the way, it is by no means plain sailing. I am a freelancer, I am happy in my dinghy, but every time I see a ship passing by, I fantasise about being on that deck, sunbathing and sipping Aperol Spritz.

You see, a corporate ship means a monthly paycheque, paid vacation, regular hours, private medical insurance and a pension plan. Typically, you have a boss and if she is any good, she'll help you grow - professionally and personally - while at the same time alleviating your responsibility when things don't go to plan. An office job means spontaneous access to a sounding board, healthy competition, Secret Santa and chocolates your colleague brings back from a business trip to Switzerland. It means lunch which does not require a washing up and a daily commute during which you might meet that special someone just by virtue of going out more. Most importantly, since we are social animals, corporate environment means office banter and communal environment. On the morning after the Brexit referendum I felt utterly miserable and lost. I don't have a partner or even a pet. I would have loved to come to an office where I could share my grief with colleagues and go out for a pint at the end of the day to decipher it all. Instead, I was at home and unable to do any work, I stayed glued to the TV screen, Facebook and Twitter, which was helpful but somehow soulless.

What I am trying to say is that today we are blessed with choice and it pays to take advantage of it. Remember, no-one is judging you (we are too busy judging ourselves), so make sure you re-evaluate where you are on a regular basis, especially if interesting opportunities come your way. Some people thrive in corporate environments and they should make the most of it. Others will never succeed in a large hierarchy, no matter how many courses, workshops and executive training sessions they attend. And there will be other people who can and will do both at different stages of their lives. Don't measure yourself by a common yardstick, be open with yourself and make sure you scratch that entrepreneurial itch or lean back in your swivel chair and stretch, complimenting yourself on being exactly where you want to be. Amen.

​This summer I got addicted to Revisionist History, a new podcast about forgotten or misinterpreted people and events, created and presented by Malcolm Gladwell. If you’ve been reading Life Tonic for a while, you know that I am a big fan of Gladwell (see, for example, Why I wasn’t destined to become a swimmer or 10,000 hours), and his new podcast is as superb as his books: curious, erudite and thought-provoking. 

In one of the episodes, Food Fight, Gladwell invites us to sample canteen food at the Bowdoin College, a liberal arts and science college in Maine. Here is what I’ve copied from the College website: 

"Bowdoin meals are made from scratch by a staff of talented culinary professionals dedicated to providing a wide array of healthy and delicious options, many drawn from a variety of international cuisines and recipes submitted by students and their families. Our dining halls offer vegan options and selections made with no gluten ingredients at every meal, including plentiful salad bars and entrée salads at lunch and dinner. Because we prepare our dishes using mostly fresh ingredients, we have eliminated most trans fats and high fructose corn syrup from the dining hall menus.

We are constantly improving our methods of food preparation and experimenting with new recipes. The Student Dining Advisory Committee meets several times each semester to provide Dining with menu ideas and feedback to ensure we are providing the best service possible."

Indeed, the website displays photos of kale and asparagus, fresh berries and even lobster. Thinking back to my student days when I was waitressing in my College Hall, the best evening meals were lasagne and toad-in-the-hole, while the lunch buffet offered baked potatoes, coleslaw drenched in mayonnaise and soup, which gave me indigestion. Bowdoin food seems unreal in comparison, and listening to the podcast, I was silently congratulating the college for taking such good care of student welfare.

Once Gladwell ensured his audience was salivating, he introduced us to another College, Vassar, which is a similar private liberal arts and science college, based in the Hudson Valley of the New York state, and competing essentially for the same would-be students as Bowdoin. The food at Vassar is atrocious: you won’t find lobster there. However, what you will find is a generous financial aid programme. In fact, it’s the College goal "to make a Vassar education affordable and accessible to all admitted students”. In an interview with the College president, it becomes clear that the College budget (fees and endowment) is heavily skewed towards financial aid at the expense of other areas, such as fancy food.

I’ve written about the concept of opportunity cost before, but it never ceases to amaze me how often people seem to forget that every choice requires them to give something else up. Fancy college food is a great idea, but it must be weighed against other, arguably more important, subsidies. The British Parliament last month voted to replace Trident, UK’s nuclear submarines, ballistic missiles and nuclear warhead, which will cost the the UK taxpayers over £18 billion. In the age of ubiquitous international terrorism, military drones and cyber wars, I find it surprising that nuclear arsenal gets priority treatment. Looking at the required investment from the opportunity cost point of view, we must realise that Westminster voted to renew Trident at the expense of investment in healthcare, education, conservation, science, etc. Even the main opposition party, which supposedly stands against the austerity, has backed the renewal of the nuclear programme.

Last night I watched a video about Josh Coombes, a London-based hairdresser, who gives free haircuts to the homeless people, who receive a much-needed boost in self-esteem through his generosity. Josh is 29, and I could not help but think about his sense of priority. He could spend the time he gives to the homeless to earn money at a salon or to put his feet up, yet he chooses to do good at the expense of riches or leisure. 

Gladwell implores his listeners to send their kids to Vassar, where equal opportunities for the brightest kids, irrespective of their means, are prioritised above gourmand food. I would only add that any decision, be it over your next meal or the state’s budget, must be weighed up against its opportunity cost rather than just on its own merit.

Here is a link to Revisionist History on itunes. (It’s free.) 

It's this time of year when many are looking for a good holiday read. It might be apt to tell you about the Neapolitan series by Elena Ferrante, four books starting with My Brilliant Friend, which describe the lives of two friends, Lila and Lenu, from early childhood until the narrative ends in their sixties. Both women were born in 1944 in a poor neighbourhood of Naples and tried to build better lives for themselves. The reader is invited to step into a tightly knotted world of neighbourhood relationships, love affairs, class struggle and personal ambitions.

I gobbled up the four books almost one after the other, turning pages with impatience of a reader, deeply invested in the story. The books are terribly translated from Italian with the clumsy, sometimes incomprehensible words irritating the reader, particularly partial to the mastery of the language. The drama of the narrative is subtle although a few events made me bolt up from my seat from the sheer unexpectedness. And yet despite the poor language and the fairly uneventful plot, Elena Ferrante has captured my attention unlike anyone I had recently read. It's because her main characters, Lila and Lenu, especially Lenu, who tells the story, were so raw and honest in their thoughts and emotions.

Elena Ferrante, unusual in this day and age, had decided she wanted none of the publicity which comes with becoming a published author - her books appeared under a pseudonym. Perhaps it's what had allowed her to be so candid in describing female insecurity, envy, jealousy, shame, sexual pleasure and the whole kaleidoscope of vivid and complicated human emotions.  Her mothers aren't perfect, they feel terribly guilty about their lack of aptitude in bringing up children. Lovers disappoint in banal ways. Studious girls take time to realise their own worth. Mother-daughter relationships are difficult. Anxiety, depression and grief frequently take central stage (but the novels aren't dark or depressing, just honest). 

I found myself completely taken by the Neopolitan Novels because, as I had realised, honesty is such a scarce commodity in print. Books and especially newspapers, which are meant to be objective, have long relegated honesty to the bottom of the league of priorities. Facts and experts are apparently overvalued, especially in online media, where the so-called clickbaits rule. There is a view that fiction is something we read to escape the reality but actually, at least subconsciously, we are constantly looking for people, things and emotions we can relate to. It's these books that truly engage us and stay with us for days or even years afterwards. It was refreshing for me to read something so unashamedly bare, that Lenu's turmoils turned from escape into alleviating some weight, which had been pressing down on my chest.

We live in thrilling and simultaneously terrifying times, whether you are British, American, French or Russian; whether you avoid the social media or depend on it. We have access to more information than ever before, yet it is fiendishly difficult to make head or tail of what we are consuming via radio, television, newspapers and Facebook. Many politicians, business leaders, media outlets and even experts (remember being told to eat "low fat" or that eating eggs causes high cholesterol?) have used up all our trust, making it exhausting to try to decipher fact from fiction. A little more honesty in politics, business, parenting and relationships might just alleviate some future crises. Consider a politician saying "I don't know" rather than telling a lie: it may result in a public ridicule, but it may also help to avert a disaster. And if you are tired of all the media bombarding you with lies, get an honest book of fiction for your holiday. It will do you good.

Honest books I recommend:

Elena Ferrante My Brilliant Friend etc.
Svetlana Alexievich Second-Hand Time
Alain de Botton The Course of Love
Richard Flanagan The Narrow Road to the Deep North
Lionel Shriver Big Brother