Die Sache mit den Selfies: Leben oder Posen?

Selfies sind mittlerweile ein Teil unserer Social Media Existenz. Wir, bzw. viele von uns (ich auch ;-D) machen sie mittlerweile ständig und überall: vom Wohnzimmer bis zur Konzerthalle. Selfies werden oft als oberflächlich und Exzess der Selbstdarstellung verteufelt, doch nicht alle sind so. Ich persönlich mache gerne Selfies, weil ich es mag mit der Kamera zu spielen, versuche dabei aber auch, mich selbst etwas auf den Arm zu nehmen. Schließlich sind diese Selfies doch auch irgendwie armselig: man hat nichts besseres zu tun, als ein Foto von sich selbst zu machen? Ähm…ja, traurig.

Ein weiterer Aspekt ist die Verfremdung der Bilder. Filter und die Wahl der Perpektive sind noch harmlose Werkzeuge, um sich selbst ins beste Licht zu rücken. Richtig hart wird es, wenn ordentlich retouchiert wird. Ist es nicht furchtbar, wenn man eine Person trifft und merkt, dass sie komplett anders aussieht, als auf ihrem Facebook-Profilbild?

My Fav Hairstyle Tutorial & Blogging in German

Hey guys, first of all, there’s gonna be a big change on this blog: I will blog bilingual! In the future, you will find English AND German articles here.
I hope you will enjoy the change (especially my followers in Germany, Austria and Switzerland).

This morning, I found this great hair tutorial for long hair. It’s really hard to find cute updos for long hair, and I hope this one will do it for me. The lady in the video is gorgeous, by the way!
If I manage this today, I will share pics on my FB: Facebook.com/adiek84sblog

Easy Updo for Long Hair:

Feel The Rush? Slow Down Your Life Before You Trip!

Today I stumbled upon this article in the Wall Street Journal:

“Once a week, members of a Wellington, New Zealand, book club arrive at a cafe, grab a drink and shut off their cellphones. Then they sink into cozy chairs and read in silence for an hour.

The point of the club isn’t to talk about literature, but to get away from pinging electronic devices and read, uninterrupted. The group calls itself the Slow Reading Club, and it is at the forefront of a movement populated by frazzled book lovers who miss old-school reading.

Slow reading advocates seek a return to the focused reading habits of years gone by, before Google, smartphones and social media started fracturing our time and attention spans. Many of its advocates say they embraced the concept after realizing they couldn’t make it through a book anymore.”

The article depicts with a very clear example how life has gotten ahead of us: we hurry from one appointment to the next, we eat fast, we cut down information into tiny little snippets so we can take in as much as possible. The world is racing by while we try to adapt our habits to keep up. The result is discussed in magazines all the time: stress, burn out syndrome, depression. Neither the body nor the mind is capable to live the life we force upon it.

The Importance Of Being Alone

When you talk to friends or family about their biggest anxieties, being alone is often one of them. When you’re in a relationship, you fear abandonment, when you’re single, you strive to find the next guy (or girl). Being alone is equaled as being a failure. You’re not in a relationship because you’re not attractive enough, sitting alone at home on a Saturday evening means you don’t have any friends, etc. This is a failure of society. It is automatically assumed that the lack of company isn’t the person’s own choice.

One of my friends from highschool used to always have a boyfriend without any breaks in between relationships. She has a history of abuse in the family and I assume that during this time of growing up and finding one’s self, she wasn’t ready for being alone with herself yet. It was years later that she texted me suddenly she had been single for a while, sounding like she had just reached her biggest accomplishment.
Being at peace with yourself, knowing yourself, knowing your weaknesses and strengths gives you a security for conflicts during every day life – at work, in a relationship, in a friendship or with haters – that you cannot achieve when you haven’t “found” yourself yet.

From Under The Dome to The Strain: How Adaptions Are Taking Over TV

In times when the Vampire Romance was taking over young adult female’s hearts, the release of The Strain in 2009 started a refreshing new trend in the genre: Vampire novels going Horror again with new modern characteristics. Guillermo del Toro, director of Pacific Rim and Pan’s Labyrinth, and Chuck Hogan created a masterpiece with their debut trilogy. Vampirism as a disease which transforms their hosts into brutal monsters taking over the world – a great mix of Vampire fiction with a post-apocalyptic backdrop. Only a year after, in 2010, Justin Cronin released his first Vampire novel The Passage – a tome that spans over several eras after a similar post-apocalyptic invasion of the undead and also the first novel of a trilogy.
Now, in 2014, Cronin’s final installment of The Passage Trilogy has yet to be released, but The Strain has already taken over another medium: the TV Screen.

Movie Review: Maleficent

When I went to see Maleficent I expected a simple and slightly boring Disney movie, but what I got was so much more!
The re-imagining of Disney’s Sleeping Beauty tells the classical tale from a different point of view: it is the tale of the antagonist – the evil fairy Maleficent.
Angelina Jolie is starring as the main character, while Elle Fanning stars as Princess Aurora. Sam Riley, Imelda Staunton and Sharlto Copley can be seen in supporting roles.

Movie Review: “Godzilla” – The Cons of a MUTO Picnic in San Fran

Last weekend I went to see THE movie of the year: “Godzilla”. Apparently half of humanity saw it as well, cause my Facebook timeline has been full of “Godzilla”-themed statuses since its release day. Considering that I love action movies, especially with big monsters, I had high expectations. Did it live up to them? Before you read this review, be aware that it contains major spoilers!

Book Review: Learning not to drown by Anna Shinoda

Two lessons. That’s all I had. One from Luke: learn to float. One from Peter: a basic crawl stroke.[…]Dad’s idea of teaching me was throwing me into the deep end and yelling, “Sink or swim!” Mom refused to help, using her disgust for the lake water as an excuse.

With her debut novel “Learning not to drown”, Anna Shinoda tells the heartbreaking story of a young girl trying to cope with the criminal nature of her brother while her family fails to support and understand her.