Values

Discipline, Loyalty & Big Dreams: A Conversation Between Fruitloop and Maxime What does it take to become Vice Champion of France in gymnastics, earn a place in engineering school, and plan a Master’s degree in the United Kingdom—all before your mid-twenties? According to Maxime, it’s not just talent.It’s values. In this lively mentorship conversation, Fruitloop…

There are two things that can instantly make adults philosophical: power outages and politics. This week’s Lunch began not with lofty reflections, but with electricity—or rather, the absence of it. Fruitloop casually mentioned that she might not have power for the afternoon. Which, in South Africa, is not drama. It’s a normal Thursday. Frank’s brain…

On a gray, rainy afternoon in Germany and a sweltering 35-degree afternoon in South Africa, two women log onto their weekly session. One has a heavy workload and a sick colleague. The other has birthday party planning, a messy kitchen, and a laptop that didn’t even get switched on yesterday. Welcome to the real-life balancing…

In her professional life, she has often taken on extra tasks. Marketing questions. Pricing issues. Things that were not originally part of her job. She did not feel exploited. She felt curious. She learned. She was even a little proud that they asked her. It meant trust. In private life it is different. It is…

The Mayor opened the call in his usual way: a little practical scene-setting, a little weather, and then straight into the uneasy heart of the theme. Ritesh was still joining from Bengaluru, while Ismar was already present from Campo Grande, where the day had started bright and hot — 27°C at nine in the morning…

When I ask myself what is really important in my daily life, I don’t have to think long. The answer comes immediately. It is my wife. She is my backbone. My Rückgrat. She is not only my wife, she is my friend. I can talk to her about everything — really everything. That kind of…

Rediscovering Core Values Through Conversation On an ordinary school evening—between exams, packed scout bags, and the promise of an upcoming holiday—a quiet but powerful conversation unfolded. It wasn’t about grades or schedules, but about something deeper: values. Honesty. Courage. Self-discipline. The invisible forces that shape who we are long before we can name them. Sarah…

By the time the recording light blinked on, confusion was already in the room. Frank was confused. Natalie was half-visible at the far end of her living room in Seoul. Someone had moved a table. Someone had changed a plug. Someone else had disappeared entirely—then reappeared, cheerfully, like a magician who’d forgotten the order of…

For people of my generation, values were never something we talked about. They were part of everyday life. We learned them at home, at school, at work, and in the community. We did not analyse them. We showed them by how we behaved. In my daily life, it is important to do what feels normal…

There’s something quietly intimate about talking about clothes. Not trends or brands, not what’s “in” this season, but the real stuff: why we reach for certain jeans on a Tuesday morning, why a dress can feel like armor—or like a mistake—and how much of our inner life ends up hanging in our closet. This conversation…