How to stop feeling guilty for wanting more than the people around you were taught to want
I am familiar with a different kind of guilt that doesn't announce itself loudly.
Popular topics
Writer
Ainura Kalau is a writer at Silicon Canals based in São Paulo. Born in Central Asia, she lived more than a decade in Malaysia before settling in Brazil — a path that gives her natural fluency in how innovation ecosystems differ across continents and how people, capital, and policy translate between them. She writes about cross-border technology, emerging-market dynamics, and the lived experience of building from outside the dominant hubs.
I am familiar with a different kind of guilt that doesn't announce itself loudly.
May 7, 2026
"Have it all" is one of the most expensive lies feminism ever sold women.
May 7, 2026
The kitchen was quiet in that particular Wednesday-morning way, after the school run, after the coffee had been made and forgotten and reheated.
May 7, 2026
Surveys of older adults consistently surface a quiet pattern: people who spent decades building lives around providing, caregiving, and obligation often report difficulty naming what they actually enjoy once those roles loosen.
May 6, 2026
I’ve been trying to protect my attention lately—not in a dramatic, “digital detox” way, but in the realistic way most of us mean it: I want my brain to feel like it belongs to me again.
Feb 25, 2026
I’ve been thinking about the exact moment doomscrolling flips from “I’m just catching up” to “why do I feel weird in my body.” For me, it usually happens late at night in São Paulo, when the apartment is finally quiet.
Feb 25, 2026
I’ve noticed something in my own circle, even though most of us are nowhere near fifty yet.
Feb 25, 2026
“Single and thriving” is one of those phrases that sounds like closure: a neat explanation for why life feels good as-is.
Feb 25, 2026
A lot of the foods that quietly shape a teenager’s day don’t look like a problem.
Feb 25, 2026
The first time I really noticed how “food” can behave like a product designed to override your good sense was during one of those São Paulo weekdays that runs on rails.
Feb 25, 2026
Japan's first female prime minister is set to be formally reappointed after engineering a mass cabinet resignation — a procedural manoeuvre that reveals as much about the fragility of her coalition as it does about her ambitions to reshape the country's economic and security posture.
Feb 19, 2026
In 2025, the language of therapy jumped the fence.
Feb 15, 2026