First time I faced this particular question (among a large amount of others when you move between countries) was when I moved from Belarus to Israel. For those who don’t know, Belarus is a country in Eastern Europe with a Slavic-family language that uses Cyrillic-based left-to-right alphabet, while Israel is a country in the Middle East with a Semitic-family language that uses its own right-to-left alphabet. Two opposites, nothing in common, nothing similar.

Here comes the first advice that I would give to people. Sure, if you made some decision like I did and move or at least travel a lot between countries then you already know it. To succeed you should be inspired and excited by what you’re doing, and it will work best if you’re sincerely interested in getting new cultural and other experiences and learning different languages just by the fact of it or thankful to other factors of yours. We will not get into linguistic details, although I would be happy to do this here too. It is simply far from the most important thing to notice here.

I love learning new things, and it makes sense to me being a developer, and I think it lives somewhere inside me from the moment I was born and pervades my life.

We all know about Culture Shock Stages, or Cultural Adjustment Phases, or call that curve whatever you want, but I will omit all around the curve here for brevity. So, I began going through the curve too, no doubts. If you don’t know what it means, I strongly recommend taking time to look up and read.

What helped at the first stage, I believe, is the combination of a desire to live in a new, possibly better place for myself (see “Where are you from?”) to explore another world, being passionate about traveling and learning about things and people (see “Passion is superpower”), being honest and comfortable with myself (see “Enjoy The Time Spent Alone”).

I took a Hebrew language course because it was the part of the program that I participated in. It began with another shock of the educational approach they had there but soon it became better, and I want to say it became a fun and pleasant experience. It also helped me to get a dozen of new connections, although these were all Russian-language speakers.

Here we come to the second point. People come together and create all these communities and diasporas. For those who care and who want to have it around. For me, it would mean Belarusian / Russian-speaking communities / diasporas. I do not want any of these. I do not want to speak my language all the way in a country that has everything or at least something different. It just doesn’t make sense to me. I have moved to new countries not to search for a diaspora and find myself stuck quickly, but to explore new culture, new people, new traditions, new cuisine, and everything else related, to deep dive into new exciting experiences and opportunities, to have that cultural exchange. This is what I crave for and live for. To enjoy the life and develop myself. In a broad variety of directions.

The next problem was that the Middle East is too much different. After some time, although I had this thought before, I realized it is not for me. Period. This part of looking for what do I want can be a long post on its own. The excerpt of that period of my life experience is that I liked several things but we talk about people here today, and I wanted to find new connections among both local people and other foreigners.

Soon I found some communities, speaking clubs, meetups, and events on the internet. I have always loved such things, and I began to took participation without any hesitation. Sure, it is always nervous at least at first but after a couple of events you feel better, more relaxed, and open and ready to communicate with people more confidently. The only thing left is the language barrier. This little detail. You know what, we have the English language! It allows you to not only communicate with the world but learn other languages too from native speakers step-by-step. This way I could practice Hebrew while having English and at times even Russian as a fallback. That’s how you begin to build your newer network in a place you knew nothing about (I mean, in terms of communities) before.

Nobody can find and make you new connections instead of yourself. You decide.

The story unfolds when I decided to move once again. All by myself. To Portugal. There is no need to describe why Portugal specifically but I want to emphasize once again that I knew nobody here and I even haven’t ever been to Portugal before, the closest country was Spain, which is not the same.

I chose Lisboa to start with, and I think it was a perfect choice. Lisboa has everything you can think of, and there is also a whole community of digital nomads, any kinds of meetups, events, activities, networking opportunities, etc. The fact that this became my already second big move also made it a little easier to go through and understand how thing work to know what should I do to find people.

One opportunity was to go with Russian-speaking communities for obvious reasons, the opportunity that I didn’t want but began with. The Russian-speaking surf community became the most important and impactful to me at that moment, and I’m really grateful for that. I’m still part of you, and I’m happy to see how it grew and continues to form and develop.

The turning moment is the unexpected post about a surf social program for people looking to change something in their career or start their own project. It came through the surf community mentioned above. Who would foresee that! Such a program turned out to be a ticket to to dive into the local culture and make connections with quite a lot of local people and not only that, but to get to know the country much better, how it works, how it lives, what are various aspects of economics, labor market, history, and others. It exceeded all my expectations and changed me as a person and my life for the better.

I can say to anybody for sure to go for any good opportunity you see for yourself. I thought the same before, and I was afraid before too, I felt shy and unconfident but it is just not worth it, and as soon as you outgrow this you will find yourself in a much better state than you could imagine.

To be concise, there was a lot provided there. It lasted more than a month. We had various lectures, group sessions, coaching, mentoring, individual sessions, surfing, yoga, assistance in finding a job and/or implementing your ideas. Completely free. It took place in Nova SBE, that is a cool place I haven’t known about before, such a modern university, and the campus is large.

I have changed a lot. Someone wrote about me that I’m outgoing. For me, being not outgoing and being an introvert are two different things. I don’t know which term is better here, because I am an active person and I am interested in different events and meetups and it has always been like that, since the beginning, and yes, you can say that I was outgoing in that sense, but I still remained an introvert. And now both are just changing. I mean, I’m becoming both more outgoing and more extroverted. At some point it came to such a neutral position, ambivert, I understood it, I considered myself that way and worked on it myself, independently, and now it’s even better. It was just always difficult for me at first, I was usually not sociable at first, but then with people I spent some time with, I became sociable, that’s why this image was formed, but now the situation is changing, and it’s becoming easier for me to start with them right away, with strangers, it’s something I think is really cool and something I was afraid of, didn’t know how to do.

I always considered myself an introvert, but now the behavior is changing, and principles, and approaches, and views, and attitudes, I don’t like this word, I believe that I don’t have attitudes about myself, but some blockers may have been there and are there, but it’s getting much better and I feel like I’m getting more self-confident, and I like it.

I understood and then became sure that I became much more fluent and better in speaking English and expressing my thoughts along the way, without even noticing, and the accent became a little better, I think. When I realized this, I was shocked at myself that this happened and became a little more cool when I didn’t do it on purpose. More than anything, I think it’s about the confidence that skyrocketed with the program and connections, when we also began to just talk to each other quite a lot during breaks. And I love it! Even without actively learning Portuguese just yet, I learned a lot of new words and phrases from Portuguese speakers and began to understand some of it, so passive learning is a thing too!

My decision to join the foreign group program and everything that happened afterwards was so good, which I did not expect, did not think that it could be like that. At surfing on one of the last days, when we were in the ocean, the coach wanted to ask each of us what we consider the most important thing we got from participating in the program. I got a lot, but the most important thing I called “confidence in myself”.

I can say I learned how to find new connections and new friends by myself. I continued on my own keeping all the contacts and people I’ve met, and I made even more progress and found more good connections afterwards. Now it feels more natural to me than it ever was. I became much more of a sociable and outgoing person.

While others hesitate and all what they usually do is thinking about the question, reading something on the internet, and listening to the podcasts on the topic. I advise you to try to come out, it’s very nice afterwards! A completely new experience, the main thing is not to sit at home and wait for everything to happen by itself.

The conclusion and the moral of the story is the following. Start socializing and changing. Communicate in English. There are a lot of different events for parties, meetings, dating, communication, you just need to make a little effort, look on the Internet and go out. Without any criticism, I just know it from myself and my friends, so I wrote the main advice. If you do nothing, then nothing will happen.

I moved completely alone, there is no one here and I don’t know anyone (I didn’t know anyone when I moved). After a couple of months of getting used to it, exploring different places in the country and activities that became interesting to me, there are a bunch of multilingual acquaintances in different cities, a couple of new friends and a couple of joint communities for activities, including among the Portuguese. I even found a close person. It’s been a year since I moved Portugal, and I don’t experience any problems with loneliness. And this is even without Russian-speaking communities.

It may seem silly, but be happy! Anyone deserves to be. Enjoy life! Think positive, be grateful for what you have, feel the vibes, and everything else will come by itself.

Art

• https://chrysalismag.org/

Blogs

• https://sojka.io/

Books

• https://penbelarus.org/
• https://gutenbergpublisher.eu/
• https://kamunikat.org/
• https://bellit.store/
• https://byprosvet.org/
• https://sovabooks.pl/
• https://alfavit.eu/
• https://czytajswoje.com/
• https://vyraj.club/
• https://knihauka.com/
• https://slowianka.edu.pl/knihi/
• https://www.instagram.com/thekrama.store/
• https://audiobooks.by/
• https://knizhnyvoz.com/

Culture

• https://budzma.org/
• https://tradycyja.com/
• https://maldzis.world/
• https://domtvorcau.com/
• https://wir.by/

Dictionaries

• https://slounik.org/
• https://antykalka.org/
• https://verbum.by/
• https://www.skarnik.by/
• https://starnik.by/
• https://drukarnik.app/
• https://bydialects.org/
• https://www.bielmova.org/
• https://belazar.info/belsoft/compdict.php

Movies

• https://kinakipa.site/
• https://screenka.com/
• https://anibel.net/
• https://kaviarnia.com/

News

• https://novychas.online/

Podcasts

• https://belaruspodcasthub.com/
• https://www.vandra.by/

Poetry

• https://litradio.link/
• https://stihi.by/
• https://rasciajenne.com/
• http://fihury.org/

Science

• https://scholarsforbelarus.org/

Source: https://overcast.fm/+2-B9nqcDQ

Description

In this episode, my guest is Robert Greene, multiple New York Times bestselling author and expert on human psychology and behavior both at the individual and group levels and in the context of relationships, careers, and society. We discuss how to find, pursue and achieve one’s unique life purpose, and how to best learn from good and hard experiences along that journey. We discuss power dynamics in relationships, the different types of human communication and the interplay between seduction and vulnerability. We discuss how to find the right romantic partner, improve healthy self-awareness, the link between anxiety and creativity, and pick ideal mentors and role models. Robert also discusses his recent stroke and what he has learned from his near-death experience about motivation, urgency and appreciation for life. Listeners of all ages will benefit from Robert’s insights on navigating the process of building a deeply purposeful life and enhancing one’s relationship with the self, others and society.

Excerpts

Being a human being is not easy as opposed to an animal because we are born and nobody gives us like a directional. Our parents might be a little bit, our college, teachers, mentors, etc., but generally we’re on our own. And it’s a very very difficult process. You wake up in the morning and you don’t really know what you can do, you can choose 12 different paths, it can be very confusing and overwhelming. When you find that sense of purpose, when you find what I call yours life task, everything has a direction, everything has a purpose, your energy is concentrated, it’s not just like you’re going down a single narrow pathway, it’s not like life becomes boring. It’s actually the most exciting thing that can ever happen to you, because you never have that lost feeling. You wake up in the morning and go “yeah, that is what I need to accomplish”. I genuinely wish that everybody could find that kind of internal radar. It’s not easy and I understand that.

When you’re born, you’re a phenomena, you’re unique, your DNA has never occurred in the history of the Universe. You are one of a kind. That is your source of power. To waste that is just the worst thing you can do in your life. What the power is, is finding that uniqueness, what makes you you, and how you can mind that, and how you can deepen into it and use that to create a career path.

• Impulsive Voices
• 5 Forms of Intelligence (Book Mastery by Robert Greene)

You make a choice based on the need to make money. Everyone needs a lot of money. Not everyone makes that choice, but some people do that. I understand that need, you need to make a living, but that is a very bad path, because you’re not connected emotionally.

Identify your primal inclinations and accept yourself as you are.

How do you find that when you get older? We have to go back, dig and dig further to find on what to focus and return to our internal compass and stick to it.

The Process of Self-Discovery

Try different things and don’t frame yourself. Get the feeling in as many forms as possible. Find the current, you will feel things go easy and everything is connected.

A lot of intelligence is not verbal. You absorb things. Both what you love and what you hate are important. You have to practice, and that gonna require love to it. Energy and motivation can come from pressure.

There’re things that excite you in a quick way where you have to relieve some tension, and there’s entertainment and pretty immediate gratification. Then there’s a larger picture of something that will give you fulfillment over years to come. So you can feel that when you’re older and you can pay attention to it. A lot of the times we’re paying too much attention to the immediate pleasures of life, what is considered instant gratification. And that’s what we’re graving for. The process is deeper than kind of I like that thing or I don’t like that thing.

The problem in the world today is that you’re not paying attention to yourself. You’re not inside your own head. You don’t hear those voices. You don’t hear what you like and don’t like anymore. Because there’re so many other distractions going on. You’re always tuned to what other people like because you’re social media.

As opposed to disengaging, backing off from that and looking at yourself and going through the process of “It is not me, I don’t like that”. These are definite signals that you should pay attention to, they mean this is not a good direction, this is a waste of time for you.

In general, I tell people self-awareness, being able to hear those voices to understand that your frustration is telling you something. You should understand why you’re frustrated, why you’re not liking your career, why you’re not happy about where you’re going is the key to everything. If you’re can listen to where these emotions come from then they’re useless, they’re not teaching you anything.

When you’re truly connected you have that sense of flow and three hours can pass by, and you’re not even aware of it. So time is totally subjective experience, it can be extremely slow and tedious, and you feel very depressed, or it can pass by, and with it passing by you’re not even noticing it, and it’s a wonderful experience. When I’m deep in my writing I’m not aware of the time passing, I’m so involved, so immersed to deeply deeply pleasurable experience of time, it is sublime.

Power Resources

When we talk about power it is a resource, it can be used or not used. It can be expressed in different ways and can be accessed in different ways. When we talk about power a lot of people embrace themselves, think this is about manipulation and so on and so forth. Actually there is power dynamics, for example between mentor and mentee, teachers and their students, and both have power. In a romantic relationship there is a power exchange, there are yeses and noes, there are maybes, there are some contracts like “I do this because I want to”, it is about being safe and feeling safe, or make an illusion of feeling safe, and all sorts of complicated human dynamics.

How would you define power in terms of functional definition like in interpersonal dimension? Why do you think power is so essential to all relationships? Why can’t it be something else?

The way that I define power is I try to take it away from that negative context that many people define, and I bring it to something very primitive and very primal: the way that human being is wired, the feeling that we have no control over our environment, now the sense that you have no control over your career, over your children, over your parents is deeply deeply immiserating, and it compels us to act in certain ways either attempts to find positive ways of power or doing what you call coward ways of getting power, you know, passive aggressive, what traditionally passive aggressive means. So it is deeply wired in us that we want a degree of control over the immediate environment and immediate events. We can never have complete control, and the idea of complete control is nonsense. It will actually be very ugly because you want a degree of letting go, certain circumstances come in, etc., etc. So, the sense of you want to feel like with other people and relationships, that you can influence them, that you can move them in certain directions either to get them to love you and treat you better or either just stop annoying and irritating behaviours, or either wake up, do fine and do productive activities, etc. You want to have the ability to influence people, to move them in certain direction either in your interest or their interest. We are embarrassed by our desire and our need to control, every human being has it. You can’t just force people in the direction. People are tricky, they are wearing masks, they pretend to do one thing, they say they do the thing and actually do another, they have their egos and they can react in ways you don’t expect.

Power is kind of invisible realm that envelops society. People are battling each other and struggling in it but no one is like talking about it, no one saying “this is exactly what I’m trying to do”.

When you enter the social world and the career world you’re not expecting these battles, no one taught you, no one trained you, parents don’t train you, nobody trains you, and you make mistakes, and you realise how critical people are, if you’re a sharky character, there’re certain percentage of them, you realise “wow, I can deceive people, I can manipulate them and get what I want, I can pretend to love them and they will fall for me, I can do all that other stuff”, but for most of us, the 95% of us who aren’t sharks it is very disturbing to enter this world and suddenly see all that invisible power games, no one gives you any advice or helps you. Take it out of the realm of it just trying to dominate the world, and manipulate, and exploit, and abuse, it is inside of you, you have this need, and your suppression of it will only make it come out in passive ways, and you’ll be able to control certain things.

Learning the subtle little dynamics of power is extremely essential because we are social animal. It doesn’t mean that you’re gonna get dirty, that you’re gonna suddenly go out there and manipulate the hell out of people. Most of the power is about defence, how to defend yourself from the sharks out there, how to defend yourself from making classic mistakes, like outshining the master, like talking too much, like arguing with people instead of demonstrating your ideas, on and on and on. It’s not an ugly thing, it’s actually makes your a better social individual.

Power is definitely connected in some way to that inner sense of what you’re meant to do, and you feel it with ease and connection that comes from it.

To achieve the pleasures that are awaiting you you should let go of your defences, of all of your natural resistance factors, and opening yourself up to other people is the key to not just a romantic relationship, but to career success, to mental energy, to creativity, to being open in general.

Emotional and intellectual connection

The sense of finding people whose qualities you admire. We don’t learn from people just by following their ideas, we pick up their energy, their spirit. It is not verbal, it is kind of a non-verbal communication going on, you’re internalising some of the positive qualities that you saw in them, and finding this series of mentors, how I call it “surrogant parents”. You can’t choose your father and mother, but you can choose these ideals for you, these mentors, you can kind of rewrite your family history, but it has to be someone that you connect to emotionally and intellectually, and it has positive qualities you wish for yourself.

A mentor relationship takes work, it takes courage, because you have to actually go up to somebody and physically ask for their help, and a lot of people say “I’m afraid of asking the support of powerful person, to be their mentee”, so it involves a sense of social courage where you have to literally engage with another human being who you admire, who you think is powerful, so it’s building your social skills, etc., but it’s a skill you develop, you can’t just follow someone, you can’t just watch their lectures, you have to engage with them, and you have to get over some of your fears and your anxieties in the process.

Engaging in various “tools” that they recommend is tremendously helpful, like curing about a book is great, reading a book is even better, thinking about a book they read is even better than that, and then writing down your own ideas that’s the big win, translating in a number of different endeavours.

You want to be able to think for yourself. So you’re not just absorbing ideas from other people and kind of mimicking them, kind of learning the exteriors of their ideas, you want to digest them and have them slowly becoming your own ideas by interacting with them, by creating and putting them through your own lens.

Ideas can be either alive or they can dead. An alive idea is something that enters your brain from an external source, a philosopher, an article of somebody you admire or somebody you hate, and then you absorb it, you think about it, and you decide “I’m gonna turn it around into this, and I’m gonna make it alive, gonna make it something that’s part of me”. Another part of an alive idea is you have an idea that comes from a book or a project or something about the world, and you go “maybe that’s actually not true, maybe the opposite is true”, and you go through a process, you cycle through it on and on, and you reflect on it, and you refine this idea, and maybe it turns into its opposite. Through the process of reflecting, and correcting, and revising it you turn it into something living, something alive within you. What prevents people from going through that process is basically anxiety, because I think how you handle anxiety is the most important kind of quality and it will determine whether you will be successful or whether you will find your career path or whether you won’t be able to. Anxiety is the signal to you that you don’t understand something, that there is a problem out there that you can’t resolve. What happens to most people if you’re insecure is you clum onto something instantly easy to get rid of your feeling of anxiety: “I don’t understand this problem, oh, it must be A, A must be the answer because this person said that”. So you don’t develop the ability to think, you don’t have the ability to go to the next level. If you take that anxiety and you start questioning, you’re able to surmount your anxiety, you go pass it and further and further, you don’t rush for the first available answer that’s out there. You’re able to go through the process of refining things.

In your career if you’re anxious for success and you’re anxious for money you gonna make the wrong choices, but if you’re able to deal with it anxiety and say “maybe I have to think more deeply about where I’m going, I have to come up with other alternatives”, then you can make a much better choice.

The ability to deal with anxiety and to not get into the most instant gratification that you can get is to me a marker of somebody who be creative and will invent something as opposed to people who just recycle all that dead ideas.

I grew up in a small family, basically dad, mum, and me. We had some relatives, but I don’t really count them here. I think that experience is not so common even for Eastern European countries where we tend to have small families with one or two kids.

Now on the reflection I can think that the way it was and it is has shaped me and influenced me much to the point that from time to time it becomes difficult for me to understand how others cannot imagine their lives without always being a couple with someone or without anyone by them who has been around since their childhood or adolescence.

I don’t really care because it became almost so natural to me to love myself and time spent with myself only, but the more I think about it the more I like the path I have and somehow managed to choose without choosing anything, at least from what I think and feel to myself, which probably doesn’t look like this from a perspective.

I remember myself wanting to get this experience of moving to a new country to live in a new place where I don’t have any connections, anyone whom I know, no even distant relatives, no friends to be completely alone (which is not bad), to be on my own to feel the life, because I believed and still believe after almost 3 years of this that may be this is the only way to have opportunity and time to deeply understand yourself, what you have, what are you values, what are you principles, and what you can do and deserve.

Of course there are ups and downs, some stories are less successful, others are more successful, but the point is still there.

You need to be comfortable with yourself and be honest with yourself. Changes are part of the process.

Remind yourself more often about the quote above. The best way to live for me is to be in the process on the level when you don’t think and don’t need to think about whether you’re with yourself only or not, because it means that you reached the bar, you’re truly comfortable and honest with yourself.

And so, being alone doesn’t mean that I give up on people or refuse to connect with people. Also doesn’t mean that you should. It’s the opposite, it’s like living in your me-time most of the time in your life but also be quite flexible and open to opportunities to spend time with someone or make relationships of any kind!

The objective is to better understand what the idea that each one has for himself is.

A lot of people don’t pay enough attention to having their me-time, and then it can dramatically result in not being able to be on their own when something happens, either good or bad, when they need to know and understand how to do something that their close people don’t have experience with, don’t support or whatever, which leads to not being able to pursue the things the person wants because it restrains them.

Another point here about living in your me-time is that if you’re comfortable and honest with yourself you’re ready to always count solely or first on yourself and not anyone else, you can but don’t have to depend on anyone, and in my experience, when I came to this, I understood that I enjoy the things I want to do and the things that I do much more than before, because I don’t need to think about counting on someone and their plans. In the example of attending some event of course I like to invite some people I care about but at the same time I think about myself first, what I want to have and feel, and that I will attend anyways regarding of whether someone else I invited will come or say to me in the last moment that for whatever reason they’ll not come.

It breaks this mentality of always catering to someone before caring about your own.

Here is one example where you can read more of what I’m writing about to deliver the thought: https://old.reddit.com/r/CPTSD/comments/g8bmm5/i_feel_very_obligated_to_cater_to_peoples_needs_i/

It was an issue for me when I was younger, even though I didn’t understand that. I’ve become more vocal over the years and no longer strive to be a people pleaser. Before anything, I strive to please myself. Sometimes you have to get a little comfortable with being “mean”. Although it may not come naturally, you can teach yourself to care for yourself the way you care for others. That includes setting boundaries, having uncomfortable conversations and just being true to yourself and your desires.

I wish you stick up for yourself. Don’t feel bad about the others. You aren’t mean, just stating your boundaries, and asking they be respected. You’re allowed to take up space. You’re allowed to need things and to lean on the people you love for those things!

If someone responds to my needs warmly and tries to help, I feel positive and connected. It grounds me. I’m lucky to know a lot of fantastic people.

If we speak up, explain to the best of our ability what we need, we give the other person a chance to show up for us.

Be comfortable and honest with yourself.

Once we had a session with our main lecturer and organizer, and I want to share one thing, the ending of one of his stories that almost made me cry, because I recognized myself and my life path in these words, and didn’t even think I needed to hear that from someone to feel that I do the right things and to feel supported:

For a small group of people who built a cart for a (race) competition and then crashed it in the first three seconds it was not a failure but a success because there is a thousand of people sitting on their sofas who said they would do better but they didn’t.

So when you think you do or make something useless think about the quote above and realize that you’re already doing more than the majority of people and in any way you got experience that will contribute to your future endeavors.

What does it have to do with passion?

To me these things are related. I never thought about that, but before I heard the quote above I had a moment that allowed me to discover my superpower which is being a passionate person.

Now that I had some time to think about it I realize that passion was my inner driver for more than last ten years of my life and maybe even the whole life when I didn’t know anything, including this word.

I’ll probably write about this more later some day, but the main point is that passion means much more to me than money or anything in between, regardless of personal life or work, and it spreads across all the things I do like tasks, learning, hobbies, etc.

I get inspired from other people like this every time I hear or see them and what they do or just read about them and understand that I’m touching or interacting with something that they made or were part of. I want to be like them, like other passionate people that were able to push the boundaries, doesn’t mean small or big, they don’t stop, because they want to do something to the world and they do those things instead of sitting on their sofas.

I definitely will.

I think it is even a bit a tactless question in our modern world.

It is more about what the other person wants to hear, not what you want to say.

Many people, I believe it is the majority of people, don’t understand why others are struggling with answering because they have never experienced that, they don’t know what is it to move to a whole another country, how much does it cost both in terms of money and all the other stuff like effort, time, understanding, risk, lost, and emotions, positive and negative.

People move a lot nowadays, our minds shifted to how we see “base” country, we are more free and able to choose a country we want to live in and the opportunity to work remotely greatly helps.

Some of us want a better climate and weather (like summer all year round), others look for people and society, just like to travel and live here and there, want to know about cultures, want to learn a language around native speakers, etc., or all these desires combined.

There are also some bad and sad factors, of course, that contribute to people tending to move to another country, may it be economic situation, political situation of any kind, human persecution for any reason, cost of living, and others.

So you have to keep this in mind when you are asking where someone is from. It may be either positive or negative experience for a person, you don’t know them and their backstory.

One more important moment to keep in mind is that a person can get confused by the question because when you changed your base country twice, three times or even more you don’t know what to consider as “from”, like what am I supposed to and what should I say?

You can name your home country, country of origin, your birthplace but I’m of the opinion that it’s not the same. What to consider your homeland is a whole another story.

I was born and raised in Minsk, Belarus. I lived there for 23 years of my life, not exactly because I travelled a lot to different countries and places, but still it is my “country of origin” and it was my homebase.

I lived in some other countries here and there during that period but never for more than one month, so it is not something like immigration and being an expat.

The next stop was Israel. That was an immigration and my new homebase.

I lived in Israel in different cities for about two and a half years.

The next stop became Portugal which is currently is. This is also an immigration but a little different one and my new homebase.

These were all my own decisions. I’m grateful and happy for them. I asked myself and my parents from the childhood about if it is possible to live somewhere else, how would that happen and how would that feel.

Since then, I decided that I want to leave my country of origin and live somewhere else.

Not because something bothered me, or was bad to me, or I didn’t like something (of course there’s always something but that’s not the case I’m writing about) but because I was and I am genuinely passionate about freedom to travel and live wherever I want to, when I want to and how I want to.

There’s so much to explore in the world! I want to learn and know more about the countries, the people, the cultures, and everything in between.

I don’t know what will come next after Portugal if it will.

So how do I answer the question where am I from?

After thinking about it for some time and living through these situations many times I understood that I tend to choose the answer depending on the situation and my inner feelings.

I can choose any variant because I don’t care.

Sometimes I do care, then I name the appropriate country as I feel it suits.

What is more important for me is not the past, not where are you from but where are you now.

This leads us to the fact that I prefer to answer with Portugal (Lisboa, Portugal currently) because this is the place and everything around it, including mental part of the history, where I do live now, what I consider my homebase, what I’m attached to and feel emotional connection with, the bond.

In the end, I think that you should think twice before asking someone a question about where they are from.

I believe it is not important as long as the person behaves with dignity, you can communicate with them and share something in common.

If it is the case then why ask in the first place? You don’t need that information.

Another way I see is stating the question differently.

There is actually one I’m aware of: instead of asking where someone is from ask them where they are local.

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Over my career, I’ve always been a generalist: I worked as an Android developer, as an iOS developer, as a backend developer, sometimes all of those at the same time.

I strive to use the best tools for the job, whatever they may be. If I need to learn a new language, I’ll learn a new language; if I need to understand a new paradigm, I will, and I will do it fast. I have broad experience with different languages, frameworks, libraries, methodologies, tools.

I’m highly adaptable, passionate about technology, dedicated to work I do, and I excel at communicating with both developers from the team I’m in and other teams.

I use Neovim btw.

Yes, Artyom is the correct spelling of the name in English.

In my mother language(s) it is spelled Арцём (in Belarusian) and Артём (in Russian).

You see that “ё” letter? This is where the fun begins.

Let’s take a look at what’s written in Wikipedia.

Artyom (also Artiom) is a male given name common in Russia and other Slavic-speaking countries. The name uses the “ё” letter, which can be transcribed to English as “e” but still has the “yo” sound. Pronunciation is [ɐrˈtʲɵm].

Almost nobody I met throughout my currently 26 years old life could pronounce it right either from the first try or at all if that person is not native in Slavic (most notable East Slavic) languages from my experience.

The people who were the most close to correct pronunciation on the first try were Portuguese people with European Portuguese language which really surprised me.

They are definitely not the only ones but I can’t remember anyone else.

Here is the first thing. Yes, it can be transcribed as “e” but it’s completely wrong in the sense that everyone starts to call you Artem like [ˈɐrtəm], [ɐrˈtəm], [ɐrˈtem] or other similar variations.

Many Russian speakers disregard the letter “ё” in written language and use the letter “e” instead, although the sound of this letter, the “yo” sound, exists completely intact.

I doubted this situation but still I didn’t pay much attention to it when I was younger. Today I believe that we should always use “ё” when it’s placed in the word and not disregard it in the favour of “e”, but that’s a whole another story.

Please don’t call Artyoms like Artems, unless they explicitly use the spelling Artem themselves or ask you to call them like this which means they’re okay with it (I’m personally not).

The Belarusian spelling is Арцём (Artsiom).

Now we need to head to the article for the Belarusian variant of the name. To be exact and honest I believe it is wrong to distinguish the name based on spellings like this because it is still the same name, although it is good and nowadays important to understand where it comes from (loosely related to another article of mine about what country to name when somebody asks you where you’re from).

Artsyom (Belarusian: Арцём), also transliterated as Artsiom, is a popular masculine name in Belarus.

I have never ever in my life seen the spelling Artsyom anywhere. Please don’t use it.

The spelling Artsiom is much more common among the people of Belarus (not sure about Ukraine), we also have it written in our passports.

I don’t know if there ever was another spelling for the name to be used in official documents and passports but that is what we live with now. I won’t go into the details of the standards for romanizing Belarusian language because it’s confusing and complex but according to some of them the only spelling that is used in Belarus for the name Artyom is Artsiom. I have it written in my passport and other documents and I hate it since then. Fortunately, I had the ability to change it to Artyom in newer documents for other countries not so long ago.

The thing is I would love to leave the Belarusian spelling in any of the forms to have that connection with the motherland and be able to show it to others which is another emotional and psychological part of our today’s history but to me it looks ugly, and sounds awful, and makes it even more complicated for non-Slavic languages speakers (first of all for English speakers for me).

A common diminutive form of the name is Tyoma (Цёма in Belarusian, Тёма in Russian, Тьома in Ukrainian).

No doubts about that. I think there’re no more diminutive forms except for diminutive form of a diminutive form. A lot of people call me like that, earlier I would allow only parents and some close friends to call me like that but looks like other people like it and like using it, so it became kind of a habit.

Usually we call children by the name Tyoma, not adults but I’m fine and do also like it, so almost don’t care if somebody uses it to me right after we met for the first time.

However, there is also a problem with that “yo” sound as you can spot.

What options do we have?

We can spell it Tyoma or Tioma, but there’re a few others: Tema, Theme, Tim.

I saw Tema a lot in my childhood but now I don’t, and I want to say not to use it as it’s the same case as with Artem.

Theme is a nickname I once came up with for myself and used it for quite along time, although not in real life. It’s not directly related but Theme also causes difficulties with pronunciation for non-native English speakers, and I don’t want to become Teme, Tem, Tim, or something else. I no longer use it even as a nickname on the internet (for other reasons).

Tim could be a solution to all the problems with spelling and pronunciation above. I saw some Artyoms on the internet and a few in real life who use the name Tim when communicating in English.

I tried to also use it. Sadly or happily, I’m not Tim because I’m not Timothy, not Timothée, not Timur, and not someone else. I can’t relate to it and I don’t feel the connection, and it only has t and m (two letters) from my full actual name. So I don’t use Tim anymore.

Let’s get to the article for the Ukrainian variant of the name.

Artem (Ukrainian: Арте́м, romanized: Artém, pronounced [ɐrˈtɛm]) is a male given name of Greek origin. It is also used in Armenian with the variant of Ardem in Western Armenian. Artyom (Артём), the Russian version of the name, is often romanized as Artem although the letter “ё” gives a [-tʲɵm] ending sound.

We’ll not talk about Armenian variant, but look what we’ve got here, both Artem and Artyom.

Artyom is mentioned as the Russian version of the name, and that’s true, but it’s the Belarusian version at the same time that is often gets discarded for some reason.

If we look at Ukrainian then Artem is the only correct and proper spelling of the name, and it doesn’t result in using the “yo” sound!

Now that we know that Artem is the name on its own, I’m fine to say that both Artyom and Artem are correct spelling, but please pay attention and take into account that this depends on the person, his language, country of origin, and perception.

At last, we need to visit one more form of the name.

Artemy (Russian: Артемий), sometimes romanized as Artemiy, Artemi, or Artemij, is a full unique form of the Russian short male Artyom.

I also know and saw a few people who have this name and use the spelling Artemii.

I want to stress here that Artyom (Арцём, Артём, Артем) and Artemy (Арцемій, Артемий, Артемій) are two distinct names. Artyom can be used as a short version of Artemy (Арцемій -> Арцём, Артемий -> Артём, Артемій -> Артем) in our languages but the statement stays still.

There are also Artemius and Artemas, but we’ll not talk about them.

Anyways, all of these names have common ancestor.

The name means “dedicated to Artemis” (Greek Αρτέμιος: safe, healthy, strong, thriving, bright, shiny).

The name is derived from the Ancient Greek name Artemios (Greek: Αρτέμιος), the name of the saint Artemius.

Now, what is the solution to proper pronunciation of “yo” sound in -tyom ([-tʲɵm] ending sound)?

It is up to you if you have the name Artyom like me, but after some hours of trying to come up with some short variant and even find something useful on the internet to choose a preferred name I found out Arty to be the most accurate and appealing to me.

Arty ([ˈarti]) has almost all of the letters of the full name Artyom, Arty starts on A and is written in the same way, and, most importantly, Arty sounds similar to Artyom.

I looked up that there is Arty (stylized as ARTY) the musician, DJ, record producer, and I haven’t heard about him and haven’t known anything, but I did like his music after listening to some random tracks (I like house and trance genres for a long time).

I put this paragraph here to state that I don’t have any relations to ARTY and have nothing to do with him.

I didn’t find anything else about Arty as a word (except treating it like related to arts, which I do like) or anyone else who uses this name (to not be confused with someone that I don’t wish to), so we’re done with this.

I’ve used the name Arty for presenting myself and talking to a group of more than ten people for longer than a week so far, and it went smooth and pleasant for both sides (first and foremost for myself).

Conclusion:

• The proper way to spell the name Арцём/Артем/Артём is Artyom (Belarusian, Russian) and Artem (Ukrainian).
• The proper way to pronounce the name Арцём/Артем/Артём is [ɐrˈtʲɵm] (Belarusian, Russian) and [ɐrˈtɛm] (Ukrainian).
• I’m using the spelling Artyom exclusively but I’m good with Ukrainian-speaking people using Artem in spoken language to me but still prefer the spelling Artyom in written language.
• Preferred name for short form and easier pronunciation is Arty. Please don’t use Tim or anything like this (to me).

I hope these extensive explanations based on experience and life made it clear and will help diminish the ambiguity.

kahakai is my nickname that I’ve come up with after realizing I’m starting a new chapter of my life with the new values, principles, and focus. First, I used it on the Fediverse to see how it goes, and I think after several months I like it and feel like sticking to it.

This is a combination of words kaha and kai.

kaha has these meanings:

• A Māori term roughly translating as strength.
• “This way, thus, in this matter, like that, the way that it is” in Hebrew.
• A Sanskrit term meaning “to speak”.

kai has these meanings:

• In Hawaiian culture, the word “kai” holds a special significance. It means “ocean” or “sea” and is often used in greetings and proverbs to symbolize the vastness and power of the ocean.
• Kai is most commonly a Hawaiian boy’s name.
• “Kia kaha” is a Māori term of affirmation or support.

Now the meaning of kahakai should be clear. I like the senses that I put into it, and I hope you can feel that too.