Middle age crisis?!

"By the time you are 35, you will realize that you are no longer needed: who would date a middle class man in his thirties who has absolutely nothing to offer?!"

One of my last sessions with a therapist ended with this sentence. She hit me really hard with her words. Not because I believed her, but because of what and how she said it. She told me she was a pusher which is why she tried to offend me, kind of open my eyes, but I refused to believe her.

What can I tell about myself? I just turned 33. I have had 5 failed relationships, switched from one job to another trying to find something I really enjoy, wanted to write a book and had 15 pages of text finished, but then I ripped them apart and threw them into the garbage bin. I think this is where the list of my failures ends. Fine, I could have become somebody else if I really tried 10 years ago by pursuing my career as a writer, but I didn't believe in myself back then. Is it my biggest failure? Probably.

However, here I am now, writing for the 30 or 35 people who read my blog from time to time and actually enjoy it and support me which is more than enough.

At this point of my life I finally decided to look fear into its face and take a moment to think about what I really want and what makes me happy. For too long I have tried to help others with their problems, their dramas, their pain.

If I take a look back at my life... I really wasted my young years by doing things that any lost soul out there would do - I didn't save any money, I was partying, was too lazy to read the books I have bought.

Only a few years ago I realized that I have really missed a lot of things battling against depression, low self-esteem, alcoholism, loss of people who I have loved and cared about it. And it became kind of a circle, I could not get out of it. Every day would feel the same. Get up, work, go home or a bar, spend all your money there... And this has been happening for the last 10 years.

Why does it take so long to realize that you need a change? You live in your comfort zone and too scared to get out of there. I have to be honest, I was scared to death to make a change. Do you know what I did first? I bought a ticket to Saint Petersburg. A city with millions of people. In the end, it was a great experience, one of the best cities I have visited in my life. Then one by one, I started to visit cities in Finland, Sweden, Europe... It became easier and easier to travel alone, to enjoy yourself, expand your comfort zone.

Last year I felt broken (emotionally) again, so I took a chance at therapy. I went there once for help and support and I did not really get what I wanted. Instead, I felt more fucked up than before going there. I threw up at home after that session. It ended with a sentence that I won't be needed by the time I am 35 years old. Was it a wake up call?

It wasn't. It was a great opportunity to realize that I have been healed. Healed by myself, friends, support I have had. But mostly by the chances and risks I have taken to get where I am now. Emotionally and mentally I am happier than ever because I know that by the time I am 35 life will be even better and I will still be needed. I don't need a therapist to tell me that. Or anybody. I will be needed, because I need myself for myself. To expand my comfort zone even more. My strength. My passion for things I love the most.

Live. Love. Dare.

10 reasons to become a waiter.

1. If you think you are ugly or unattractive or don't have manners, don't worry, within weeks you will have another point of view.

2. Same goes for stupidity. Basically, anything. There will be times you might be feeling a bit insecure or sad, but don't worry and remember, there are no stupid questions, only stupid people.


3. You will get free alcohol even when you don't want to. Trust me. I have been there.


4. The kitchen is like a church for you. Chefs are like priests, basically. You can go behind closed doors and tell them anything. They will laugh with you or... at you. You can decide for yourself.

5. The salary is almost as good as tips. So why bother getting tips at all? Sure, it's an extra, but why sweat your ass around, when you are getting paid anyway.


6. The diet. You will get fit in no time simply because there is no time to eat. Only drink. Drinking is good, remember that.


7. Gossip. You do not need Hollywood TV anymore or Facebook news feed at all. Imagine of all the gossip you will hear from your colleagues or about colleagues. Especially about the colleagues who you are secretly planning to stab after the shift.


8. If you are working for a chain of restaurants, you might or will learn that your cooking ain't that bad after all. Even if one minute noodles is all you can cook.


9. You don't have a degree in psychology? No problem. Some if not most of the customers think else wise. They will open up about their love life or how many drug prescriptions they have etc. And it is included in the bill, do not hesitate to mention that.


10. You thought you knew it all? Did you know there is an avocado allergy? Vegans in a steak place? People who do not like food at all?! Do not worry, you will learn it by heart in no time... or kill someone.


If these 10 reasons do not motivate you to become a waiter, then I do not know what will, honestly..?! ;)

20 years of Spice.

"The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long, and you have burned so very very brightly"

First of all, this is a writing of a fan, but also a person who is trying to look at things unbiased since I am not 16 anymore. Those days are long gone.

8th of July marks the 20th anniversary of the first Spice Girls single Wannabe. 5 ordinary girls dominated the world within months. They are not best singers, best dancers or best actresses, but they had a message and chemistry and maybe that is why they became this huge all around the world.

I am not going to bore you with the facts and they don't really matter in this case, but 17 number ones in UK (9 as a group and 8 solo), 55 million records sold around the world - impressive for 5 ordinary girls, eh?

Every child has some kind of an idol. It can be their parents, a friend, an actor/actress, a singer etc. I never really wanted to have an idol, but these girls found their way into my heart and it seems that they are going to remain there forever even though the band hasn't been active for nearly 4 years since their last performance at the Olympics in 2012.

As a 14 year-old teenager I didn't really care for how deep their lyrics were or if they were doing it for fame and money, but as unbiased as one can be, I loved their energy, their music videos, their attitude and how down to earth they were.

There was so much negativity around them, but they just didn't care. They kept on doing what they wanted to do. And that was what inspired me the most, because I kept on going to the dancing classes, although I was the only boy in the class who was a dancer, other boys would practice football and other sports.

However, it took a year for them to win me over. It was summer of 1997 when I was a music video for Who do you think you are and that song won me over.

I love them the most for their music and energy. They have inspired me and helped me through the shittiest days in my life, when I thought I just couldn't make it through - I would put Spice up your life on and jam to it in my room and just forget about everything. It was like a romance that I thought would last forever, but it didn't.

I think the saddest thing for any child is when you realize that your childhood is over. Geri left the band in May 1998 and she totally broke my heart! I wasn't the only one, I am sure. Then she admitted she had bulimia. Melanie C admitted she had an eating disorder and mental illness because of the schedule they had. Victoria was paranoiac about everything. Melanie B had problems with her marriage. I think Emma was the only happy one or at least she didn't go public about her problems.

Spice Girls' legacy lives on. Their music can be heard in commercials, they are mentioned in movies, TV shows, singers admire them, including Adele, who keeps on mentioning them almost in every interview, their slogans are being used in books and newspapers, press keeps on writing about the reunions and other rumors.

I find it really fascinating! 5 girls who were not liked by the press and "serious" magazines still grab attention and are being mentioned every now and then and people still care to make a comment and feedback are mostly positive, which is very interesting.

Personally, I just want to thank the girls for their music and energy and how they helped me through good and bad times with their music, attitude and helped me to build up a character when it was really needed. Thank you for making it last for as long as it could last even though it could have been longer, but it wasn't meant to be I salute you!

Viva forever! Friendship never ends. Girl power!

Zig ah zig ah!

Love is love.

Tomorrow is the first day of the Helsinki Pride. Events will take place around the city and you may find the whole list of them on their website. It is also the first time ever I have decided to do something useful during the Pride week besides hiding and being scared and not accepting who I actually am.

As a protest to any kind of intolerance in the world, but still sticking to the Pride theme, I am going to post a Russian music video per day that has a gay theme in it and is still being loved by millions of Russians and being played on video channels despite the fact that any kind of gay propaganda was banned by the Russian law several years ago. It annoys the shit out of me how two faced Russian show business actually is and people are aware that more than a half of Russian male pop singers are in the closet (or take it up the arse just to remain relevant) and most likely will stay there for the rest of their lives.

No laws, no religion, no bitterness, nothing and nobody can prevent a thing called love. If one really cares who people sleep with and fall in love with, they should really look in the mirror and think why it actually bothers them.

I will start with the video that was a big hit for the band Ruki Vverh! in 2001 and ironically it is the first video that comes up when you Google the band. The script/story of the video was later adopted by a Swedish band Basic Element for their single To you in 2007. Go figure...

Enjoy! It's a really nice song though, brings back so many memories.

Wake up.

Most people I know do not like waking up too early or do not like waking up in general. I used to love waking up. During last months waking up has been actually quite painful. I do not know if it is because of never-ending hang overs, when you wake up and first thing you are thinking about is your location and then checking your phone in case you have done something stupid or irresponsible. After realizing that you do not have his phone number anymore and there is no way you would be sober enough to type a text that would make sense on Facebook Messenger, you get up from your bed and make a cup of tea. Then comes that feeling. The feeling that I call emptiness. All cried out, you just have no power or will to do it anymore. It starts to feel like one of those scenes from the movie "The Holiday" when a woman played by Cameron Diaz just cannot cry. She tries and tries, but she can't.

Then I just wander around the apartment in my clothes that I have not washed for weeks and stopped caring about it after I could not separate it from the rotten food in the fridge. After the tea the thoughts keep on building up in your head. What is he doing right now? Who is he with? Does he have somebody new? Why did this happen? You try to calm yourself down and convince yourself that it is for the best if I do not think too much about it. You pick up your phone and call a friend. A friend, who you know for sure, has gone through the same thing and enjoys drinking and having fun just because there is some kind of emptiness inside, a hole in your heart that you cannot fulfill with anything.

Sometimes I think that I just should go out and pick up the first random person I can find in a club. The result would be too obvious - I would end up hating myself even more. And there will be more crying. More drinking. More other shit that you would have to deal with earlier or sooner.

Some people do not take break ups seriously. They just move on. From one to another. It makes me wonder sometimes if these people have a heart or a soul? Because they talk about their (sexual) partners like they are disposable things. I would not want to feel that way about anybody or that anybody would feel that way about me.

Bottom line is - break ups suck. They suck out all the energy you have, even though, in most cases, it is for the best. You realize that in your head, but not in your heart.

Every single morning I wake up and I stare at my phone waiting for something that is never going to happen. A call. A message. I have to pass this stage. I keep on asking myself, how to do it? And I have to realize that it is for the best. Sometimes break ups are for the best. Whatever you do is for the best. If not for the best, to protect yourself from pain and make peace with yourself, trying to convince yourself that there is something different, better and much less complicated that what it was.

It's time to wake up. WAKE UP. WAKE UP!

The case of imperfection.

Perfection itself is imperfection.
                                                       Vladimir Horowitz



Family dinners. I really hate those.

I used to love family dinners. I was really good in school and my parents would show my school papers to the rest of the family and tell them how good of a student I am and how I am going to be super rich with a beautiful wife, a big house and an expensive car. Thank you for all the pressure, mum and dad.

I never got those things and I do not need them. There came a point when I realized that I did not have to try to impress anybody anymore. I know I am only 32 and I can get those things, but I just do not need them right now and I do not know if I am ever going to.

For the last 10 years I have been asked the same questions all over and over again: if I am ever going to get married, find a better job, do something useful with my life. There are times when I just want to stand up, tell everyone to go fuck themselves and stop telling me what to do, but this is not how I was raised. I listen to their "helpful" comments about my life while thinking about which CD I should buy next and pretend that I am totally agree with their opinions.

At those dinners I could easily see people envy me, because I can do things that they cannot do. I can travel whenever and wherever I can, I am FREE. Basically, I can do whatever I want and whenever I want. I just do not feel the pressure of doing something all the time. Most of my relatives are really short-sighted and judgmental which is something I will never understand. But hey, USSR has done its job pretty well. They have boundaries, they are racists, they do not like anything extraordinary.

This was when I stopped enjoying those dinners. You should feel safe and confident around your family. Instead, you feel like you are in a cage, cannot breathe, want to finish your dinner and just get out as fast as you can.

Why do we have to be perfect around somebody we love and care about? Why cannot we show our weakness once in a while to them? Why cannot we just say that maybe we will not get married or have children or buy a house or an expensive car or other fancy things because it is not what makes us happy in this life. They failed at achieving those things and they try to push you to achieve those things to make them happy.

Nobody's perfect.

Challenge accepted.

Every now and then we get a reminder that we are all just human beings: weak, fragile, humble and not immortal. Usually it happens to people who take things for granted or simply don't have the time to take a moment to appreciate things that they have in life, because most of the time good things in life are free and come to you, if you just let them come to you.

There are weak and there are strong people. But, in the end, people handle things differently. There are people who don't have food on the plate or water to drink and they are still thankful to be alive. Then there are people who can't get a new iPhone as a Christmas gift and they think their life is over. It's all proportional in this world, unfortunately. And for as long as there is going to be two kinds of people, the world will be an insane and unsafe place filled with misery and unhappiness.

Some people are lucky and they don't get challenged by life almost never. Then there are those who get challenges on a daily basis. I think it's all about the attitude. Maybe a bit of luck is involved, but are people really lucky or do they create their own luck? Once again, it's all about choices, I say. It's a chain reaction.

You make wrong choices. You make right choices. Sometimes you make too many wrong choices, but this is how you learn to appreciate right choices. If you would only make right choices, you would learn nothing in this life, because there is no such thing as "only right choices". You need to make the wrong choices to become a person who you are meant to be. You will meet wrong people, you will make wrong choices in your career, school, area where you live etc. Yes, you will. Unless you want to live in a box and never come out of it.

How do I do it? Lately I really like my box. I hide in it every now and then and when I feel like going out of it, I get out, but usually I get back faster than when I get out. People find comfort in alcohol, sports. drugs, partying, traveling etc. I find comfort in work. When something is wrong, I tend to work usually 170-200 hours a month with only a few days off to clean the apartment and shave my mustache. When you start to get a feeling that you're losing it, you just have to do something about it. Work keeps me going. Because when things get tough (in your head most of the time anyway), you are scared to stop and look around. This is when you start to think that things should or could be different, if I would have done this and this then and then. And then you start to make this chain of thoughts and you get that feeling that you wasted a decade of your life on useless things. But then you calm down, you try to tell yourself that we always learn from things and people, even though some of them are not there for you anymore, but this is how life works. Just accept it and wait for the sun to shine once again.