We sat in my mother’s favorite café and drank a latte macchiato with lactose-free milk. She looked deeply into my essence with all the love and tenderness she had. She gently took my hand, and with tears glistening, she met my gaze and told me.

I came to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, one of the most amazing and beautiful places in Bayern, and in Germany in general. This is my second time visiting this magical city for a day. Last time I promised myself to buy a ticket and have a full visual experience. Two years have passed and I did it….

This year, again, was rich in different experiences, both positive and negative. Negative experiences changed me and my life. Positive experiences left me with hope and good memories.

My dear mom,  Last year you asked every day and almost every hour when Christmas would be…. You did not already hear or see… That was very painful for me to accept that you were losing connection to this reality, and that your soul was preparing you for the other realm…. One day all of us were sitting with you and you told: “Today is ultimately Christmas. Let’s celebrate!” It was not Christmas, the time was approaching the New Year as today.

I ultimately found an apartment in Karlsruhe….

It is acceptable to tell success stories, but very few people dare to tell painful stories of rejection, despair, and failure. I saw only 3 posts on LinkedIn from Ukrainian women who shared openly the uncomfortable truth - they cannot find a job. Living in Germany for me the fact of unfair and challenging experiences to find a job as an immigrant or a refugee is vivid; especially for women. I know a lot of Ukrainian women who were in top positions in Ukrainian and internation

I should confess that my first meeting with the city in June 2025 was bad, that day was my first appointment for the apartment viewing. I did not like the city at all at that time; even more, I was returning from the apartment to the train station and weeping: “I do not like this city, this is the ugliest city in Germany, my tiny Hof is even better.” After months of searching for apartments in all nearby cities near Ettlingen, I began to shift my mindset: “Maybe Karlsruhe is

Sounds like a fiction about the future, but it's already a reality....

Climbing the Seven Sisters was the toughest hike I’ve ever done. I saw only stunning pictures on the Internet, my sister’s photos from Beachy Head Cliffs, and heard her stories, that was my knowledge about this God’s masterpiece…. If I knew the truth, I would not go the whole path; my fears would stop me.

National identity is what distinguishes one nation from another, what makes that nation unique and authentic. National identity is a multidimensional complex of components; it is formed by historical, cultural, political, and social factors. In my opinion, the most pivotal component of national identity is LANGUAGE. A native language gives power, strength, and energy; it unites a person with his/her roots and ancestors.

I finished the first module of resilience and adaptability at McKinsey Forward Program. The most important insight is I lived through an exclusive traumatic life experience that forced me to become resilient and adaptable and through the life-learning process I made almost all the conclusions on my own that I studied in this module. I am very thankful that my chaotic experience now is structured and framed with business words and categories. So, I studied adaptability and res

On the first day of a full-scale invasion, I realized my mom had already metastases and I did not have any other decision to help her but only flee to another country to save her life. 

After more than two years of inner fights and resistance to change I surrender to health issues and just accept life as it was, trying to adapt to new conditions and rules. After several weeks of my acceptance, a new life test occurred - early morning 24th February 2022 the full-scale invasion into Ukraine began. 

It was very uncertain, unpredictable, and challenging for me. It was a full blackout when I was numbed, my body was numbed, my mind was numbed. 

What feelings do you have when you hear the word “anxiety”? Is anxiety about weakness or strength, vulnerability or courage for you? Do or d

In the chaotic and turbulent world full of uncertainties in the manifestations of wars, floods, fires, earthquakes, cancer, deaths,

I was born in an average Soviet Union family, poor and deeply brainwashed with fear and soviet rules. My sister and I were rebels, my mom...

Today is the 40th day since you passed away. It looks like that only last weeks I ultimately understood that you are not here anymore in

I live in a small city in Germany, Germans used to live in cities with 9.000, 20.000, 40.000 people,

After 2,5 years I ultimately changed my refugee visa for a working visa in Germany. Today I went to Landratsamt, showed my ID document,