Author: zsolt

  • What’s wrong with dying today?

    Oaxaca –  Lorena Rodriguez The plane shakes as we hit turbulence. I sit by the window so I can see the tip of the right wing wobble like a piece of paper in the wind. My involuntary reaction is fear. I grab hold of the seat in front of me and keep looking at the […]

  • Accomplices

    She looks divine.     I take her hand and raise it gently. She smiles.     I take her to the dance floor and turn her over with a swift pull. Her back is close to my chest. I sense the sweet, fresh aroma of her hair. A few seconds pass as I watch […]

  • By the side of the road

    If you’d get up very early in the morning in the Hungary of the late ‘90s and early 2000s and drive on one of the main roads towards Budapest, you’d notice people standing by the side of the road. Hundreds of them. Wearing ramshackled working clothes, holding their supermarket nylon bag containing their lunch, they […]

  • Listen to the child

    I’ve happened to eavesdrop on a kid’s phone conversation today. I was working in my living room and couldn’t help overhearing this kid next door talking to her mum and family on the phone. She was speaking on the balcony so I couldn’t have stopped listening even if I’d wanted to. But I didn’t, because […]

  • Embrace uncertainty

    Our brains are hardwired to prefer certainty to uncertainty. We feel safe when the world around us is predictable. In our professional lives, we prefer the job that offers more security at the expense of freedom, creativity and a sense of purpose. In our emotional lives, we prefer a bad relationship to being alone, because […]

  • Being comfortable with being uncomfortable

    She’s gorgeous, intelligent and knows herself better than I will ever know myself. She completely owns up to and accepts who she is. And in her case that’s a lot more difficult than it would be for most of us. She has a part that, if not accepted but fought, if not acknowledged but ignored, […]

  • Man’s search for meaning – Viktor E. Frankl – Book review

    RATING: ★★★★ The book starts with a vivid account of the author’s experience in natzi concentration camps. It’s an interesting, subjective and yet scientific, point of view that can introduce a new perspective even if one has heard countless survival stories. One of the key points this part makes is that human suffering is absolutely relative. […]

  • Buddhism without beliefs – Stephen Bachelor – Book review

    RATING: ★★ The buddha was an ordinary man who realized that people suffer from all sorts of things, most of which suffering can be eliminated by becoming aware of the root cause and letting go of it. And then, cultivating this awareness by sitting in silence and breaking the random chain of thoughts our minds play all the […]

  • Sex at Dawn – Book review

    RATING: ★★★★ The book challenges the standard sexual model and offers an alternative way to think about how our ancestors may have lived. It focuses on sexuality, but goes much further and paints a pretty comprehensive picture of probable prehistoric human life. It’s a long read, but also entertaining and the boring bits are easy to skip. […]