Last spring, around mid-March, I suddenly became very anxious. Not that I’m generally calm, but at that time I started feeling short of breath and experiencing a kind of panic just walking down the street. Things seemed to be going well: we had settled into a new apartment with a tenancy agreement finally secured not for 12 months, but for a full two ye…

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Do come to see!

With the main role played by talented Ukrainian 12-years old (native English speaker, though) Ewa Dobrzynska, the daughter of Olga Mukha, whom you might know from PEN Ukraine, PLAST London, and PEN International.

I must also say, things went slightly wrong w…

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It took me a couple of weeks to be able to write about it – which probably proves that a little distance is sometimes needed to see more clearly. But as we’ve discovered, seeing, knowing, acknowledging – none of it really matters. Would it make any difference if what we saw was a bit less clear, or if what I’m about to say were a bit more emotional, wit…

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More and more often I notice how memory smooths over the recollections of what my life was like after the start of the full-scale invasion. Events that unfolded chaotically, overshadowed by fear, haste, and the sense of having zero control over the situation, now begin to seem dynamic, adventurous, and full of striking decisions and dramatic observations. At times they even turn into those precious experiences that cause a kind of nostalgia, a cozy sense of having lived through something vast and important.

Such distancing from how broken everything was – and still is

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Two weeks ago, I had to give a post-show talk at the theatre. Five minutes. I had everything ready: a sharp, shrill speech lasting 4 minutes and 40 seconds, plus 20 seconds…

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Until now for me it’s always some mess with Father’s Day. This year I was sure it already happened (in Poland maybe, or in the US?), as some people posted on socials those touchy texts or photos (or heart-breaking stories of being deprived of a father figure), and I believe I have sent something nice to my daughter’s father, but then on Friday she came back from the nursery with a postcard she made and asked me, what we gonna do for Father’s Day on Sunday?

I ask myself what the f*ck we gonna do every other day during the last three years, but that sounded more like quite an explicit demand.

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Shortly after Donald Trump took office for the first time, in 2018, I went to the U.S. as a teaching fellow for one of the honorable university programs. I lived in a hotel on campus, had a J1 visa, and tons of paperwork for every move – be it a lecture or a poetry reading off-campus. I had a bank account and received my monthly allowance and honorarium…

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Long story short: the laminate on some of the kitchen drawer panels was coming off, so when I made an offer to rent this flat, one of my conditions was getting that fixed. The landlord approved and accepted. There are millions of YouTube and TikTok tutorials on how to fix that, let alone the fact that my kitchen is from IKEA, and it wouldn’t take much to replace all the damaged panels. But the managing company could not manage.

The visit of the handyman was finally scheduled for today, between 09:00 and 13:00 – not the most convenient time slot, but I didn’t really have a choice.

He came at 8:40, anyway. He went to the kitchen, which was full of evidence of a four-year-old making coffee (she decided I’m not allowed to make coffee, I can only order from her cafe service via an imaginary phone), an omelet, and having her breakfast in a rush to get to school. There were crumbs, stains, some cucumber on the floor, the sandwich that I was asked to make but was later rejected, all her plates next to the sink (since the sink is too high for her to put them in), some milk spilled on the table, and one ballet shoe. No surprise, I was having my second coffee in the living room.

The handyman looked around the kitchen and said, “My wife would never leave it like that.”

“It’s a pity I don’t have a wife,” I said and smiled. I had no big intentions – just wanted to turn it into a friendly joke while making it clear that I wasn’t interested in his review of my life in general or of my kitchen in particular. But he looked at me

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The Slovko – the Ukrainian equivalent of Wordle – of that day was війна – the war – and we all guessed it on the very first try. Somehow, I…

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In my part of the world – post-Soviet countries – children were taught to be convenient, especially girls, but boys too. We were expected to be quiet, obedient, not talk back, keep our opinions to ourselves, and fear punishment. We were kissed by stinky old aunts with no right to turn away and had to eat food we hated because it was impolite to refuse.

Later, some of these children were suddenly offered an unwanted dick or an abusive relationship, but we were not taught how to say no. Convenient children became easy victims because they were obedient, quiet, afraid of being punished or denied.

I am so proud of the 46 people who have spoken up and testified after years of humiliation, sexualized violence, and abuse. And I am terrified because I know how many more have endured and are enduring the same.

In my secondary school, there were girls who were “dating” teachers – specifically, theatrical arts teachers and one world history teacher. These teachers were close to their thirties, and the girls were 15. They were obviously having sex. Not only did we, their classmates, see this as completely normal, but we also considered the girls super cool and lucky. We envied them. We were all, of course, in love with these handsome, confident men in positions of power. I can’t describe how that makes me feel now, at 38, as a mother of a girl, having learned a bit about what is what.

In my first year at university, there were girls who had affairs with professors. It was considered a good arrangement – those girls never had problems with exams or dormitory placements. They were 17 or 18, and the professors were – well, some 40, some 60. How does that look to you? And those are just the cases I personally observed.

I have never been sexually abused or drawn into power-imbalanced relationships, and after all these years, I have come to think that was just pure luck. True, I didn’t care much about exams, protection, or popularity among classmates. But I was a poet girl, naïve as fuck, a dreamer, a child. I was taught to be convenient, to keep quiet. I was also lonely, seeking love and belonging. When I read My Dark Vanessa some time ago, I was terrified by how similar I was to that girl when I was 15. Maybe I was slightly smarter and less fearful, but I was so easy to manipulate that it was only pure luck – a happy coincidence – that no seductive teacher or predatory professor targeted me.

I also had four close friends at that time, all boys, all older than me – three were 19, one was 24. We were real soulmates, close and focused on the same things (music, poetry, art) despite the age gap. One of them has since passed away, and the other three and I remained friends until our thirties, when we eventually drifted apart. But the way I felt around them as a teenager – cared for, respected, seen, recognized, and safe – set a standard for how I wanted to feel with people close to me. That, too, helped me avoid trouble. Again, pure luck to have them.

But I remember exactly when I stopped trying to be convenient. I was 28. It was 2014, the war had just started, and it involved – a deeply personal story – one asshole boyfriend and one psychotherapist who broke professional ethics. It was an unpleasant experience.

I arrived on one of the last planes to take off from Donetsk airport, and he picked me up in Kyiv. We had never met before, but I needed to be in Odesa that same day by early afternoon, and the only way was by car immediately after landing. It was early May, the hottest (in every sense) time of spring. The air was tense; life felt on edge. We had just come out of the dramatic Maidan winter, and we knew something huge and life-changing was coming.

He brought me coffee and took my backpack. He gave me long deep look, his eyes were dark. As we walked to the parking lot, I realized we were holding hands. His hand was strong and warm, and an electric current passed between us before we even reached the car. We got to Odesa, did what we had to do, and shared a bed at night – but just purely hugging, exhausted and exhilarated. In the morning, we went to see the sea. We thought of staying another day, but I hurt my foot on the beach, and he said he’d take me back to Kyiv. We left an hour before 46 people died in a fire after the ‘United Ukraine’ rally was attacked by about 300 pro-Russian separatists.

He held my hand as he drove the first 250 km and my knee the other 250 km. In Kyiv, we went straight to my place. It was

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The thing is, I was born in the Soviet Union, so I know one shouldn't ignore red flags – this is f*n dangerous. Two weeks before Christmas, we moved homes, and by "we," I mean me and my 4-year-old. That was tough given the rental market in London, bureaucracy, switching schools, and all. I also had a lot of work (end of semester –suddenly, all the people from programs you might have even forgotten you teach or consult on needed you to read, comment, or check something at once). Add to that all the Christmas events for my daughter (there was A LOT, each demanding a new costume, rehearsals, and traveling somewhere with three connections at peak time). So, I noticed a couple of red flags signaling that I was close to burnout.

When I notice that, I learned to switch to "priority mode." I set priorities for literally everything I’m going to do, but there’s a trick: whatever is not Priority 1 is Priority 0 – and it can be skipped.

Sorry, but despite how grateful I am to every single subscriber and reader of this tiny blog, Substack became Priority 0. But here I am, back, and you can consider "Priority Mode" one of the useful tools to organize your time.

And here, I’m sharing more. If you constantly lack strength, energy, time, and resources to improve your life, this is for you. The miracle of organizing is about gaining that strength. These recommendations require very little effort to follow, but they help you support yourself and not only maintain but also multiply your resources.

Previously, I shared ideas on how to deal with Daily Routine, Work, then Managing Stress and Creativity (which includes a useful bonus – an easy guide on Checking Your Reality). Today, we’re diving into Decision Making and Responsibility and Relationships and Interactions. Enjoy!

Decision Making and Responsibility

1. Make a

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