Life & Faith

To “burn one’s bridges” is a commonly-used phrase for a situation of no turning back from one’s commitment. For instance, when a general orders his troops to burn or demolish a bridge that they had just crossed, he is saying that there is no retreat—they have no choice but to fight the enemy or die. […]

It is time to take charge It sounds like a tongue-in-cheek question: “Is there a law protecting parents from being abused by their children?” Increasingly, this question is being asked, not of abused elderly parents, but in the context of parents in their forties and fifties, with abusive children in their pre-teen and teenage years. […]

Conversation about values has featured prominently in my sessions with a couple I have been counselling for almost two years. They came in to try to repair their marriage after the husband’s infidelity—for the second time. Six years earlier, he had cheated on his wife but was given a second chance. The husband is again […]

Connection, compassion, constants “Lest we forget” is often associated with remembrance ceremonies of the Great Wars. It is an appeal to the living not to repeat the mistakes that led to such tragic waste of lives. An estimated 40 million lives were lost in World War One. Unfortunately, humankind soon forgot any lessons learnt—40 years later, […]

Champion runners like Sebastian Coe and Usain Bolt are famous. Ivan Fernandez is less known. Whilst the first two are known for setting world records, Fernandez’s claim to fame is coming in second in a race—when he could have been first. In that race, he had been trailing the frontrunner, a Kenyan named Abel Mutai. […]

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted how we work, trade with others, study in schools, relate to our families and worship God. And because important areas of our lives have been affected, we should all the more think of ways to mitigate its ill effects. I would like to mention two effects on families and suggest […]

As I write this, Singapore is just coming out of its circuit breaker, a period of unprecedented measures of enforced social distancing. Even when the post-circuit breaker phase three ends, life as we know it will have changed. We have been told to be prepared for a “new normal”. What this may mean and how […]

Bearing in mind as I write that this article is scheduled to be published in June 2020, I am trying to visualise what our social environment then might be. I am not good at predictions—my dismal failure with investments attest to this—so let me stick to what I think I know better. When all the […]

Social distancing is one of the strongest tools available to slow down community transmission of the COVID-19 virus. People are not to gather in groups, all nonessential movement outside of one’s home is curtailed, and schools and workplaces, unless deemed essential, are closed. These measures were unheard of barely three months ago. Now, whole cities […]

  Amid the emerging global health crisis, an intense discussion may have gone unnoticed. Whilst the larger part of the scientific community were busy trying to understand how the novel coronavirus is spread or to develop a vaccine, others were trying to find a name for it. Finally, on 11 Feb 2020, the World Health […]

During a recent session with a couple, the wife used a metaphor to describe her view of her in-law troubles. She saw the parties involved as living in separate rooms and her husband as shuttling from one room to another. Their doors remained tightly shut and no-one else was to enter. Her husband quickly latched […]

I occasionally experience a sense of déjà vu – my clients’ issues, circumstances and dilemmas appear similar and yet are not the same. I felt it recently when three siblings—working adults in their mid-twenties to early thirties—came to consult me. A family conflict had led to the two older daughters moving out of the family […]