Hi! My name is Igor Zuev. Here’s my story. 

Since early childhood (with a break for student adventures in London) I’ve been living in Riga (Latvia) and as time goes by I'm falling in love with my city even more.

I didn’t get a degree in economics and political science – I graduated much later, and this time studying philosophy and mythology. 

At the end of 2020, I celebrated the 10th anniversary of my career in the Latvian financial sector, where during the last few years I was managing investment funds and allocating capital. With the start of 2021, I've started my new professional stage in the Big Four professional services firm. 

In 2018, following the advice of my mentor, I began to consciously develop my writing skills and launched the Telegram channel called «The Mismatch». I regularly work on the ideas for new essays, but I do not publish so often as I get carried away with my fascination about the topics and inevitably go down the rabbit hole of learning as much as possible about them. In 2020, I launched a personal blog, and at the beginning of 2021, I created a newsletter called The Links’ Cream of the Cream.

I like to learn and test what I’ve learned on myself – in short, I enjoy developing. A strong impetus to this was once given by meditation, which I continue to practice. I read a lot – about 30 books being started on an ongoing basis on topics from symbolism to Chinese medicine; and I write a lot – publicly (on the blog and channel) and personally (in journals of various formats and regular reviews). I practice Eastern martial arts and health routines. Lying on the couch on a Sunday night, I like to put on a documentary on mastery or Kurosawa's samurai films. I'm a runner. Not so long ago I got interested in hiking and I dream of going on a long hike somewhere in the mountains of Tibet in the near future. Last but not least, I drink a lot of pu-erh tea. 

I run this blog to share the fruits of my pursuits on topics and tasks that are important to me — both in finance and in relationships, self-development, health and everyday life. These fruits are needed to put into order the islands of responsibility in your life. 

Welcome! I hope you’ll find things to try out for yourself and they will bring positive change to your lives.