I was looking through a copy of the poetry book I wrote, around 30 years ago, last night (they were originally going to be songs but I have a voice that makes a hoover sound tuneful!)

This morning I watched a video on stoicism, as a result I am starting to think our bodies change way more than our minds do as we journey through this life.

My body looks way different to what it did 30 years ago and it can't do the things it used to and that has happened without any effort on my part. Yet my mind which I have put years of effort into trying to change hasn't altered much at all.

After watching the stoicism video it dawned on me that 90% of us or more know what it takes to be happy and content mentally.

Live in the moment.

Focus on the things you can control.

Be grateful.

Be humble.

Be kind.

Deal with the way things are not how you wish them to be.etc

I am starting to think though that mental health is affected far more by our environment and external factors than it is on what goes on inside us...as I say it feels like our personalities are kind of set in stone and that outside factors  impact individuals to greater or lesser degrees.

I was always at my happiest when I was in relationships I had no problems mentally, loneliness though brings with it real challenges but in both those scenarios my personality is the same.

If anyone became destitute over night some would cope and others me included would collapse but would our personalities change.

If on the flip side I won 10 million tomorrow I would live a great life but again my personality would stay the same it would just be in an environment where it could thrive.

This is interesting with regard to the mental health crisis we keep hearing about, it feels more complicated than it perhaps is.

If I raced 50 meters along a flat track while my fittest friend or even Usain Bolt ran alongside me but in 5ft of water I would win. My 50 meters would be far easier to complete. The respective external factors would have a massive impact.

It feels obvious that a millionaire should have a much happier contented life than a person living on the streets.

I had always thought, that mentally, we should look on the inside for answers but it seems the inside, our minds don't change that much!

Food for thought for me with the job that I do.

 Who the hell am I?

I am so fascinated by this at the moment. We live in a society where next to money we are defined to a great extent by our bodies, what we look like but our bodies are constantly changing and are far more fluid than we think.

100 days from now every one of the cells in your body will have been replaced...so a brand new body...that paradoxically looks older!? That being said you can bump into someone you went to school with 50 years ago and somehow recognise them!

Our bodies consist of between 60 to 65% water, surprisingly males have a larger water content I would have guessed it was the other way round what with women being much softer to the touch but apparently fat contains less water than muscle... another surprise.

So I weigh 76kg of that a whopping 50kg is water, obviously though  that water is not contained in us like say in a bathtub the water is constantly flowing through us we breathe out 0.5kg of water vapour a day along with losing 2.5 to 3 litres a day through pissing, shitting, sweating etc .Get this our skin is 64% water our lungs are made up of 83% water.

So with our bodies being so fluid where does what we recognise as 'I' reside in our bodies and how is it anchored there if indeed we are inside our bodies.

The average human brain weighs around 1.4 kg but it is also 73% water (1022 grams water) that leaves 378 grams. Yet our brains apparently control everything, our emotions, our behavioural patterns, our memories the list goes on and on

The average heart weighs 400 grams but interestingly that too is 73% water (292 grams water) leaving 108 grams.

A human heart beats 35 million times each year!

So how much of our mind and body do we control?

Well mentally how much control do we have over our emotions?

I don't have anywhere near as much control as I would like, I also have very little control over some of my negative thought patterns that are definitely detrimental to my happiness and contentment.

I worry way more than I would choose too. Annoyingly I have zero control over who I lust after, which has proved to be a huge handicap.

Most people are aware now that living in the moment is the key to happiness but that takes conscious effort our conscious mind makes up around 5% of our mind the other 95 is sub-conscious and  that runs on a series of patterns... controlling that with your conscious mind is a tall order.

Physically we can teach our bodies new tasks talking, walking, running, playing sports, manual labour and the more we do those things the easier they become we have a great degree of control.

Then think about the really important things... do we consciously control our brains, our hearts, lungs, kidneys, again there is a huge percentage of things our body just does seemingly independent to us, me, 'I'.

Personally I think all life is very closely linked, I think we are all part of one thing, like leaves on a tree. We are all part of one life cycle a cycle of birth degeneration death regeneration, it is fucking amazing. The water in me today has been in thousands of other bodies.

So who or what am I ...'who said you're a twat Gaz' there is no need for that during the season of goodwill to all men!

The most obvious answer is that once we are born into these bodies we see ourselves as separate, but i think that is an illusion.

How individual are we? Is 'I' and ego the same thing? and like i say where are they located. It feels like ego is a huge driver in encouraging us to see ourselves as separate.

Over the last year at in my job I get into situations where I would say I can feel my brain working there is stuff around solving mental challenges in others  that is really enjoyable. It is like i am aware my brain is having fun, which makes me question... am 'I' located n my brain!? If 'I' am not in my brain then where the hell am 'l'?