Valentine's Day is out there with fire, arguing about who forgot what, and pretending not to look at who clicked on your Instagram story. Every year, in a big way, the day reminds us that we are all still very committed to love, maybe even irrationally so.
Growing up outside Manchester, Sunday dinners at our house were an event. Not because we had fancy food-it was usually whatever Mum could stretch from the weekly shop-but because that's when everything stopped. Dad would turn off the telly, my sister would put down her magazine, and we'd all squeeze around our small kitchen table. Those conversations over shepherd's pie taught me more about life than any expensive holiday ever could.
Throughout the week, keep an eye out for all the habits that keep you on edge - like waking up super late, putting off projects, leaving texts on read, driving around on E - and make it your mission to stop. Get the gas, answer your friend, set the alarm. Even if you just change one thing, it could relieve some pressure, and add some much-needed structure into your schedule.
Last December, I was standing in front of a wall of bottles, paralyzed. Not because I don't like wine. I do. I was paralyzed because the entire experience was designed to make me feel small. The sommelier energy, the gatekeeping language, the implied message that if I couldn't name the terroir, I didn't deserve a good bottle. So I did what I always did: grabbed the same safe choice, went home, and told myself I'd "branch out next time."
It sells us the idea that joy and celebration are a must; yet for many, it can also be a season of amplified loneliness, grief, and interpersonal conflict. It intensifies the pressure to consume, yet still gives us the possibility of being creative and sustainable in our giving and receiving. It offers us the opportunity for new beginnings, as much as it can remind us of how difficult it is to change, even when we want to.
Thanksgiving, as it tends to be celebrated, is the most honest American holiday: all appetite, no apology. Every other event on our civic calendar asks us to remember something noble, or to mourn something tragic, or to celebrate something grand or abstract, but Thanksgiving just asks us to be hungry together, and then to eat. In any year, this would be a potently simple path to commonality;
Hail Thor! The priestess and her heathens, standing in a circle, raised their mead-filled horns. We were gathered in an unassuming spot in a pine forest outside Stockholm. This was our temple, and the large, mossy stone before us was our altar. I was relieved to see that the animal-based sacrificial offerings were long-dead and highly processed. A bearded man reached his tattooed arms into his backpack and raised a red, horseshoe-shaped sausage to the sky.
We've said it before and we'll say it again: the way you do yoga is the way you do life. In addition to your actual time on the mat, this reality is reflected by the yoga habits that accompany your practice. That pre-yoga cup of tea that must be sipped from a certain mug, the music played en route, painstakingly adjusting your mat so it lines up with the floorboards...these micro moments combine in a regimen that can border on ritual.
Halloween is all about fear. It's about scaring others and being scared - not just unapologetically, not just without the shame that typically accompanies or follows real-life fear, but gladly and eagerly. Halloween beckons terror just so we can laugh at it, and at each other and ourselves. Throughout the rest of the year, fear tends to strike suddenly and unannounced. That surprise factor, tripping up and felling even the most mindful and well-prepared among us, might be fear's most potent fuel.
These are all signs you have rage built up in your body, and it needs somewhere to go - and according to Mia Magik, an intuitive advisor, one of the best ways to let it out is through a "rage ritual." It's something she talks about in , her new book. It offers a modern approach to mindful living with the use of daily practices that can help you live a more authentic life.
When I was leaving London for Melbourne, my eldest sister-in-law told her kids not to forget the tradition to throw a bowl of water behind me as I stepped out the door. Just a small splash on the ground, a gesture older than borders. La har azaab po aman se, she whispered in Pashto under her breath may all hardship stay away from you. The little ones giggled and waved their goodbyes as they spilled the water, somewhere between shy and amused.
Between now and the winter solstice, write down 13 things you'd like to see happen in 2026. Don't write them down as "I wish," "I want," or "I'd like," but rather "I have" or "I am" statements, she specifies. You might do one or two a week, making sure they feel true to you and are things that hold meaning. When you're done writing one down, fold it and hold onto it.
For one, a lot of the projects that go well are the culmination of months or years of effort. Indeed, sometimes by the time the project is officially deemed a success, many of the participants in the project are tired of it. In addition, successful projects rarely have the equivalent moment of crossing the goal line where it suddenly gets classified as a success.
The Shanxia Cultural Station serves as a cultural threshold, bridging everyday life and the temporality of celebration, enhancing community engagement through its design.
