When my son was about five years old, we once stopped behind a garbage truck. With the absolute confidence of a five-year-old, he said: “When I grow up, I want to work on a garbage truck.” I asked him why. His answer surprised me: “Because they don’t need seat belts.” I have thought about that sentence many times since. So often, we live our lives strapped into invisible seat belts. We stay in jobs we no longer love. We remain in relationships, roles, or routines that no long

The sense of foreignness that many migrants experience, at least at the beginning of their journey in a new country, seems, at first glance, to contradict Turner’s concept of communitas. Turner (1957) described communitas as a sense of belonging to something greater, something beyond the individual. It is the joy found in shared group experience. It is a collective feeling in which the group itself acquires meaning. What is interesting is that this feeling sometimes emerges w

By Dr. Efrat Tzadik Imagine a six-year-old girl who has recently arrived in Belgium. In class, she speaks little, frequently scans the room, holds her body tense, and keeps her hands close to her sides. When the teacher addresses her, she offers an uncertain smile, looks down at the floor, and remains silent. The teacher wonders: Is she shy? Does she not understand? Or has she simply “not yet connected”? But perhaps she is communicating - just in another language: the body la

In Judaism, we are now approaching the second evening of Passover. It is actually tonight. According to Jewish tradition, this is the moment when the Red Sea parted and the Jewish people crossed through it. It is also a time associated with miracles. The story begins with the Jews standing before the sea perhaps feeling despair, doubt, or even regret for having left Egypt... There are moments in life when we find ourselves standing before our own “Red Sea.” A place where th

Dr. Efrat Tzadik At the beginning of my academic journey, I conducted research on pilgrimages to graves but not necessarily pilgrimages...

An international conference. One of the participants speaks enthusiastically, lightly touches the arm of her conversation partner,...

Imagine the following scene: You are in a work meeting with a team made up of people from different countries. One of the participants...

Between Biology and Culture: The Role of the Smile in Reducing Otherness, Building Trust, and Creating Interpersonal Bonds in Migratory...

Human relationships are complex. Lately, I’ve been seeing more and more teenagers and adults in my clinic who describe a sense of "social...

“Niksen”is Dutch word meaning doing nothing. I tried. Honestly, I did. The past academic year was intense: multiple projects, studies,...

When a child opens their heart – we should be there to listen. A lesson that wasn’t written in the curriculum. Yesterday, at one of the...

"But there are those who take a monopoly on wisdom They know better than me They know better than you What’s good for me, what’s good for...

"Do you want coffee?" or maybe "Do you want to drink coffee?" or "Do you have time for coffee?" You could also say "Hi, I’m Efrat, nice...

a few thoughts... Finding myself again. Discovering things I didn’t know about myself. Understanding things that happened in the past...

I know... I do so many things... 168 hours that I need to fit everything into... actually, not everything... just what is a priority for...

This morning, we celebrated Purim in a small organization I manage. I decided to dress up—just something small—but the moment I put on...

I’ve received many requests regarding my answer to a post on the challenges adolescents face when integrating, so I decided to write a...

Many people ask me how to preserve an identity for our children. My answer starts with a question: What do you want to bring into your...

There’s a saying in French: "Slowly, the bird builds its nest." This was one of the first sentences I learned in French class, and it’s...

In a previous post, we discussed the challenges of illness and relocation. In this post, I would like to share some practical ways to...