Elena Agafonova

​ Coach | Author | Happiness Explorer 🌱 ​

Letters of Change A weekly space for happiness, self-trust & the art of living well ​ Let’s begin gently

Hello and welcome, Reader!

This week, I turned 58.
And as always happens on birthdays, my phone lit up with messages from all over the world: friends, clients, partners, colleagues, readers, followers. I felt deeply touched by every single one of them. Truly.

The week itself was beautiful. Time with my family. Long walks. Wonderful food. A visit to a marionette theater, I had dreamed of for years. Life, in its quiet generosity.

And yet…
The most meaningful conversation of the entire week was a two-hour call with one person.

We speak once a year.
Between my birthday and hers.
When life slows down just enough to let us really talk.

We speak German, her native language and my first foreign language, one I still love deeply. And every year, we begin exactly where we left off. As if no time had passed at all.

No warm-up.
No catching up.
No explanations.

Just presence.

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The Quietest and Strongest Kind of Friendship

Today, she named what we have in one simple German phrase:
“Ausgewachsene Freundschaft.”

There is no perfect English equivalent. But it means something like:

A friendship that has fully grown.
Passed all its fragile stages.
No longer needs constant proof, updates, or maintenance.
It simply is.

We don’t need regular contact to know we are connected.
We don’t measure closeness by frequency.
We rely on something deeper than habit.

And what makes it even more meaningful is this:

We once worked together for five intense years at a German travel agency. We went through deadlines, restructurings, pressure, laughter, exhaustion, and shared victories. Life in motion. Not always easy. Very real.

Since then, our paths have unfolded wildly differently.
I moved from my homeland to Georgia.
She stayed in Germany.
Now she is considering moving to a Spanish island for the next decade of her life.

Today, laughing softly, she called us both “Auswanderer” — voyagers. People who leave what they know and follow life into unknown territory.

And she’s right.

We are both, in our own ways, still on our next chapter journey.

We don’t know when we will meet again.
Or where.
But we know that next December, we will speak again. And time will disappear between us, just like always.

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What Mature Friendship Teaches Us

This kind of connection teaches things no quick bond ever could:

That closeness is not noise.
That love doesn’t require constant reminders.
That some people live quietly inside your life, without asking for space, without needing it.

It also teaches a certain emotional freedom.

You don’t cling.
You don’t chase.
You don’t fear disappearance.

You trust.

And trust, at this stage of life, feels like one of the most precious skills to have learned.

A Gentle Relationship Inventory — Your Invitation This Week

Not a quiz.
Not a task.
Just a quiet reflection:

• Who in your life do you trust without evidence?
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• Who would still be there even if you disappeared for a year?
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• Who do you not need to “stay in touch” with to stay connected?
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• And who might be quietly waiting inside your heart, untouched by time?
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You don’t have to act on these answers.

Just notice them.

Sometimes awareness itself is a form of reunion.

​

With warmth and birthday-week calm,

Elena

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A Small Postscript, If You Feel Like It 🤍

This week, another long-term project of mine has also quietly entered the world:

A Year of Gentle Transformation: 52 Reflections for Growth with the Seasons

It’s a guided journal for slow, intentional change—the kind that happens through noticing, not forcing.

If you feel called, check it out

Paperback on Amazon

or

Ebook in my online shop

It can be a gift for yourself.
Or for someone who, quietly, is already on their next chapter journey.

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