Illogical bank rationale

San Ġwann, located in central Malta, with a population of 12,500, is ranked as one of the 10 most populous Maltese towns. By and large, it is very well served by a number of retail outlets and service providers.

Alas, HSBC does not feature among this array of providers as, in its cost-cutting exercise during the pandemic, it decided to close down its branch in this sprawling town. I still cannot understand the rationale of this decision taken by the HSBC management.

Has reaching out to its customers ceased to be one of its mission statements?

Saviour Rizzo – San Ġwann

Justice

The spat between the ombudsman and the university should be resolved by asking one question: “Was justice done by the candidate?”

Carmel Sciberras – Naxxar

Losing touch with our inner peace

An appealing contrast between nature and man-made material – one of the displayed artworks by Mary Attard.

May I be allowed this space to divert from politics, business matters and controversies?

We are all caught up in the drama of life which is certainly not in short supply these days, in the form of wars, mass migrations, economic challenges, pandemics and conflicting ideologies. These in themselves are stressful enough and many tend to find ways of escaping this onslaught of negativity through addictions like food, trends, shopping, gossip, constant travel, soap operas, chemical substances, sex and other superficial alienations.

And, without realising it, all these are robbing us from really being alive. Such alienations make one dead to life, rendering one to become hypnotised and numbed. Who is caught up in such dramas mistakenly thinks that they are truly in touch with life but how disillusioned such an attitude is!

In dealing with our dramas, we miss getting in touch with our true selves and get lost and entangled in situations that do nothing for our inner peace.

Many think we are a body which happens to have a soul or spirit and our goal is to satisfy our physical appetites. But, in reality, it is the other way round. We are spiritual beings who happen to have a physical body and feeding our soul is more important than tending to our bodies if we aspire to live a fulfilling wholesome life.

We clutter ourselves with overthinking, material things or hedonistic lifestyles thinking that abundance of such things is more fulfilling when, actually, these same things are more entrapping and stressful in maintaining them for fear of losing them.

The point to be made here is that, in the pursuit of all these alienations, we are losing touch with the simple fact of appreciating life in its raw simplicity.

We are oblivious of nature’s sounds, moods and its various manifestations. We are part of the same fabric of nature and are dissecting ourselves from it. We can connect with it through quiet times, preferably in solitude, which should be given prime importance in one’s life.

A lack of such spells creates chaos in one’s psyche and a never-ending chase for futile goals.

“Why are you unhappy?

“Because 99.9 per cent of everything you think and of everything you do is for yourself – and there isn’t one” – Wei Wu Wei.

At the end of the day, we are just pure vibrating energies  fluctuating between high and low states of being. We go from fascination, joy, frustration, awe and all through the various emotions we allow ourselves to experience.

This realisation enticed me to reflect it in my current artworks displayed at the Wignacourt Museum, in Rabat until the end of May, where I invite viewers to note the various levels of ‘vibrations’ a person can experience like wonder, stillness, fantasy and even rage – that is the core of a human being’s true nature and being in touch with it is what makes us truly integrated within ourselves.

Mary Attard – St Paul’s Bay

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