"It's not healthy to avoid conflicts"

Always thought about children

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"I have always thought about having children. Maybe one day... My Estonian lady friend will be a marvellous mother when the time is right. Just now I can't really see myself in this magical act of life-giving and birth, particularly in Estonia where I only understand a few words of the language.

"Society demands that you have to get married at the age of 20, have children and live together for the next 40 years. I can only say that that's not for me. There are other interesting and fulfilling things to do.

"Two close friends have an unbelievable three-year-old son, who has totally changed my view of children. Earlier experiences told me that children cry and whine all the time, and to look after them you have to give up all the pleasant things you want to do yourself. But Edwin's basic needs are completely satisfied: so it's not me that has to look after him - he looks after me. We can spend whole days together and discover new things to do, and exciting games - it's such a wonderful privilege!"

Sometime in his teenage years there was a period when he was weighing up the possibility of becoming a priest.

"It's possible that the things I'm doing now are the realisation of that dream in a humanistic way. I could say that I'm a pantheist: "god is everywhere", or the "cosmic flow". Anyway, it's totally different from the Christian 'God' who dictates to other people what's good and what's bad.

"I wouldn't say for a moment that I understand the universe: but I would say that I understand its power at least enough to do things which others think are impossible.... to encourage people to understand what is standing in the way, and how to overcome it."

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