“Your shroud will have no pocket” means you can’t take your possessions with you after death – so enjoy life while you can.

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Every time when state-owned enterprises pretend to be private commercial entities, it’s like an introvert pretending to be a talkative person at a party.

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“We have few resources; fear is the only thing we have in abundance.” I don’t know who said it, but I like the logic behind it. If you can tame your fear and put it in service, it becomes a great fuel for achievement.

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“Wolves are fed by their legs.” I’m not sure if this English translation of the Russian proverb is as graceful as in the original. Wolves must keep moving to survive – if they stay in one place, they starve. For me, it’s an episteme of social mobility.

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Trees die standing – 3 words that feel like a whole novel about dignity and resilience in the face of challenges.

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Maslow’s pyramid – the pyramid of life’s meanings. For some, life’s meaning revolves around pleasures like food and sex; for others, it’s found in serving others.

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Meanings of life – there are many. Some are chosen by many, like caring for your children, and others are embraced by only a few, like saving a nation. Which one have you chosen?

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People often cry as they grow older, becoming more sensitive. Yet few realize they are mourning their fading lives – they simply don’t say it aloud.

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I’m going to make a few controversial statements, but I believe they deserve to be heard and considered. I think that God, or nature – depending on whether you’re religious or atheist – wants people to behave in certain ways and avoid certain behaviors. For the things we are meant to do, there’s often pleasure involved. For example, God wants us to procreate, so he added pleasure to the act of sex. He wants us to eat to have energy, so he made food enjoyable through taste. On the other hand, there are things we’re not supposed to do, and pain is often associated with these. For instance, we’re not meant to marry close relatives, and this is evidenced by the genetic diseases that sometimes arise from such unions.

Then, there’s society. Society also has expectations for us – attend school, graduate from college, find a job, marry, buy a house, and so on. God, or nature, typically gets what they want from us by our twenties. Society, however, demands more, usually until our forties. After that, we’ve essentially fulfilled both sets of expectations. We’ve done what God or nature intended, and what society required of us. And once we hit a certain age, we find ourselves left to our own devices. Yes, there’s still residual work related to what God or society wanted from us, but, in general, we’re no longer needed in the same way. We’re left to ourselves. We’re alone.

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