There’s a bittersweet argument between the world of academic science and social psychology. Psychology is like a younger sibling vying for the attention of its parents. If you take an active interest in the subject you will most likely disagree with me. It’s long been a running, underlying, unsaid disposition about the credibility of psychology as a legitimate science and thus it remains pondering it’s beginnings in the world of the ‘Social Sciences’.

I recently got out of a serious relationship, some 3-4 weeks ago. I say ‘got out of’, no, I fell out and hit every emotionally scarring branch on the way down.  Me and her used to massively disagree on the world of science, and she always felt a lack of respect from my side of the table upon her beliefs. This, I hasten to add, was by no means the reason the relationship ended. But she believed hardily in the paranormal, ghosts, spirits, ‘energies’, reincarnation – and bar the latter point I believed everything on that list to be superficial and a discredit to scientific work and evidence. But it was important to her, and I loved her, so I held my tongue. I would hate myself if I said anything that made her doubt her own beliefs because it’s not about winning, it’s not about evidence or facts (not even really good ones) its about you.

Nelson Mandela spent thirty years in a cell not much larger than the breadth of a mans arm span, because he believed in the equality of life. They took thirty years of his life away from him. He read the Victorian poem ‘Invictus’, by William Ernest Henley, to himself inside that cell, he then walked out of prison on Robben Island ready to forgive the people who put him in.
One of my housemates has diabetes, he’s 20 years old, and found out in May of 2010. I cannot tell you how inexplicably proud of him I am that he manages everyday to take his serious condition and laugh in it’s face. We play games with it, about guess the blood sugar level and we joke, both in good and bad taste. He even made a Facebook event called his ‘Diabeteaversiry’ for when the time comes when it’s been a year since he was diagnosed.