Hemofarm Foundation has started a new cycle of panel discussions ‘A Cup of Coffee with a Psychologist’ which will, as before, deal with topics of interest and concern to a large number of citizens, and due to the current pandemic these discussions are organized online and available to everybody who is interested on the Foundation's YouTube channel. The first topic of this year's cycle of panel discussions was lust for life, which is primarily reflected in the need of the whole society to return life to normal as soon as possible, and its main conclusion is that during the pandemic we learned in different ways that we cannot live alone and that the meaning of life is in connecting with other people.

How much we really long for life and how the pandemic affected us, was discussed within the latest panel discussion of Hemofarm Foundation ‘A Cup of Coffee with a Psychologist’, by Prof. Aleksandar Baucal, PhD, psychologist and full professor at the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade, Maja Lalić, creative director of Mixer Festival and Miodrag Miki Ninić, frontman of the band VIS Limunada. The moderator of the forum was Dragan Ilić, psychologist and journalist.

'People are social beings and throughout their lives they connect with others in various ways, which is a characteristic of every quality relationship and mental health. It may surprise us that we miss it now, because in regular circumstances we have a lot of opportunities to practice it. In situations like this one, it is easiest to notice what used to be present, because it is now impossible for us. At the beginning of the pandemic, the key thing was to save life, but none of us live life just to be alive, but also to participate in things that are important to us. It is certain that this desire for life, which fulfills us, will force us to return to what was important to us before,' said Prof. Aleksandar Baucal, PhD. Additional information on this topic can be read in his blog 'Life after corona: no one knows, but we can assume', which he wrote for the blog of Hemofarm Foundation.

What we are all thinking about today is what actually awaits us after the end of the pandemic, and when life returns to normal. Will we all look and be the same, or will everything we have experienced and survived change us, but also society itself?

'I expect that there will be a new acquaintance with a large number of colleagues that we may not have seen and are not our most intimate friends, but we need them. I believe that we will become better people because fear makes a person think about all the missed words or beautiful moments. It is lust for life and we will all try not to let such things escape us again. We will be aware of every moment that causes us pleasure or beauty, which we may have taken for granted before', believes Maja Lalić.

Miodrag Miki Ninć said that he hoped that ‘one of the effects of this period that we have experienced during the last year will be awareness and understanding that we should try to create a better picture of better quality of our everyday life, but also the future.’

Hemofarm Foundation, Institute of Psychology at the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade and Art Commune Dorćol Platz launched the project ‘A Cup of Coffee with a Psychologist’ in 2019 to point out to the public that mental health must be cared for as well as physical and that there are solutions to ‘problems’ if we seek the help of experts in time. So far, 18 panel discussions have been held.

You can watch all panel discussions at YouTube channel or official page of Hemofarm Foundation.