A Work in Progress (Men and Relationships)

 I saw a beautiful girl today, take your breath away beautiful … the way only an almost perfect looking woman can do. Nature throws up loads of beauty, it is all around if you choose to look, a sunrise, a lake at dusk, the golden sands of a beach under a brilliant blue sky, a snow capped mountain,the sun kissed ocean, a forest in the summertime. Flowers, insects, birds, animals can all be strikingly beautiful...  but there is nothing quite like a beautiful girl. Looking at her made me sad for the life I led, the one I lost, and the one I nearly had. Left me thinking what’s it all about? Is there any point in plodding on or is my race run. I see nothing but an increasingly, lonely existence with only loss and further hardships in a degenerating society. It is a challenge being a man.

Us humans tend to view ourselves and life as incredibly complex, I honestly think that is an illusion. Life is a series of very simple patterns. The goal being the survival of the whole. The continuation of life.

We are all just flames in a fire...and the fire!? leaves on a tree...and the tree!? is a raindrop still a raindrop when it falls into the sea?

If you see yourself as part of a whole rather than a single human the insignificance of you as an individual is unsettling. The paradox of that insignificance though, is that you are like a mini life sustaining planet yourself! Currently there are around 1.5 million microscopic bugs living on your skin. The blood running through you is like the rivers and seas on earth, with your heart orchestrating the tides.

It has been estimated there are around 8.7 million species of plants and animals on the planet...

At any time, it is estimated that there are some 10 quintillion (10,000,000,000,000,000,000) individual insects alive.

There are around 6,400 species of mammals so us humans make up a very small amount of the individual life forms that contribute to the whole.

We greatly over value our species and under-appreciate all others, yet we are all linked. The miraculous force of life that is within us is within all life on the planet.

Earth itself has a comparable place in the solar system to that of a microscopic bug currently living its life on your skin.

Every ending signals a new beginning, every beginning is the start of an ending, So with that in mind are beginnings and endings even a thing does life just rumble along on a continuum?

Life as a whole, the life that all living things play their role in perpetuating, is all about  patterns and programming.

Weather patterns, societal patterns, individual patterns, emotional patterns all designed to ensure life is continuous, us humans play a very tiny role in that. Paradoxically within life's simplicity is great complexity.

Think of a typical day in your own life, how much of that day consists of following a series of patterns. The older we get the worse it gets, our bodies are comfortable with patterns, we do not like change but then because of this every day becomes very similar.

The problem we face is that the simple programs for us as individuals and us as a tiny part of a whole create great mental conflicts within our minds, conflicts as to how we interact with each other and conflicts within the various human tribes.

There is an argument that free will does not exist, that it is an illusion and we are all slaves to our patterns, our programming. The patterns implanted in us from when we were born from parents, school, society, peers and the patterns passed down in our DNA from over hundreds of thousands of years. Programming from when we were still very much part of the food chain.

The two basic needs in humans, the things our brains are primarily set up to get, programmed in from before we were even human, are food and sex. Food to keep you (as an individual alive) alive, sex to keep the species, the collective, the whole sustained. Life begets life.

On a personal level, I have been alone for the vast majority of my adult life. The most mentally stable I have ever been was when I was married,  I was a happy person who had sad times. Whereas as a single man I am, and was always, a sad person who has 'ok' days. I have been lucky in that I have always had enough food but when I was married I also knew I could have sex. Knowing it was available (even if it was just with my gay ex-missus) had a hugely positive impact on my contentment and mental well-being. 

It is really difficult to get this across but if you had gone without food for a week and you suddenly stumbled across a room filled with beautiful people and beautiful things and the only food in the room was one bowl of porridge on a table in the corner the only thing that mattered, in that moment, would be that bowl of porridge.

It is another example of our patterns creating an all or nothing existence for most males. Over time, much as I enjoy the company of women, I have found it virtually impossible to have female friends whilst I am single. It is very difficult to have a relaxed healthy friendship when all you can really think about is the ‘porridge’ if you get my drift.

This is where women have a huge advantage over men, when it comes to emotional/mental stability, they know sex is available. They don't experience the same intense feeling of lack. Of course women get lonely but in general do not tend to get so emotionally isolated from society. A man's solitude is filled with turmoil and cruelly debilitating self talk.

Women have far greater value to ‘the whole’ than men, women are essential in sustaining and creating new life. It explains why, from the beginning of the history of out species, it is men go to war, sadly they are expendable. Unfortunately this has led, in modern times, to a very large number of males being surplus to requirements, which leads to many seeing themselves as pathetic.

So we have a situation now, where the world is changing rapidly with very negative consequences for many but with a specific set of challenges for men and the battle within them as individuals and their role as part of the whole. The hard-wiring in us all to perpetuate the species. For all those single males what, if anything, can be done to help?

1 in 3 men now regularly go a year without sex. I am fully aware it is not such an immediate need but if we equate the lack of physical affection with lack of food. It would be like saying to a starving person… ”Other than food, what would help?”

Throughout human history women have been programmed to find the strongest mate and then nurture their young.

Men are programmed to compete and copulate,to have sex with as many women as possible so that a percentage of their offspring will survive. 

This creates the all or nothing society we live in where the currency at a base level has always been sex.

Life would be much easier if we could have more control in who we found physically attractive but there is very little nuance in those decisions. The survival of the species takes precedent over whether someone has a brilliant personality. For men physical beauty lures them in, whereas women are drawn to wealth and power.

There is another paradox though although women have a greater value in perpetuating life, women only have a finite number of eggs, at a certain age they will have completed their role to ensure survival of the species, the whole, their work is done and they can relax and enjoy the experience of being an individual whilst continuing to nurture .The programming concerning creating life, sustaining ‘the whole’ often subsides. They are no longer in a state of conflict.

Men on the other hand don’t stop producing sperm, therefore the desire to sustain life, that basic drive, does not dissipate to the same extent and the internal conflict still rages.

We are a tribal species so throughout history men have fought and died in wars. Wars are perhaps a natural way of keeping the male population down. It could be argued the frustration’s around finding a mate contribute to male’s propensity for violence. Certainly many single men have very little purpose in their lives, a massive motivation deficit and for many a constant battle with frustration and feelings of lack. Perhaps at some point in our history this is how religion arose to combat that primal drive for sex and consequently companionship, physical affection and a purpose.

A wonderfully prolonged period of peace in the west and a huge change in working patterns has created a new set of problems for men. The lack of manual work and the huge financial advances made by women have created a society where, increasingly, only a very small number of the most powerful richest men hold any interest for women. This is a result of the basic patterns around the female as part of a whole rather than an individual, the primitive programming that dictates a female needs a male capable of protecting her and giving any children the best chance of survival. The strongest most powerful males.

As a consequence the most powerful/richest men get their choice of women. These men have absolutely no reason to commit as they are presented with a conveyor belt of females looking to make a trade. Sex for a relationship. The rich powerful man just needs to have sex with as many women as possible so some of his offspring survive. He has absolutely no reason to commit and in fairness his programming his goal, re the survival of the whole the continuation of life, is being met.

Once women realise this, the narrative is that all men are bastards and only want one thing! That is only 50% true, men also want food.

So it is likely the people who have the best chance of getting all their needs met are powerful males. The rest of the males are by and large surplus to requirements.

A bit like sperm really, the strongest swimmer gets to fertilise the egg the rest get to splash about a bit, maybe take a trip down a thigh but are doomed to die. As with males the vast majority of sperm are surplus to requirements.

To get an idea of the of the internal conflict in men the biggest killer of men under 50 is suicide. Men between the ages of 40 and 50 are at the greatest risk. This makes sense if a man has not found a mate by the age of 40 he is starting to lose hope, loneliness becomes intense. It is also around this time marriages breakdown causing more men to be challenged by solitude and isolation and a lack of purpose. Not having a partner and the family group that comes with it seems to be a real struggle, which would perhaps go some way to explaining why Christmas is a catalyst for many suicides.

In the animal kingdom, especially mammals, it is the survival of the fittest, the strongest male gets to mate the rest are cast off to either the outskirts of the group or to live a life of solitude.

In human society up until very recently the male’s role was to fight, hunt, work hard at being a provider and often be the disciplinarian on returning home.

So you look at how basic life is, at all the patterns we live by and wonder what are emotions, what purpose do they serve?

Are they like religion just there to give ourselves a greater sense of importance, an illusion to set us apart?

On one hand I think they are just another pattern, something we construct to enable us to see ourselves as individuals. However, when I think about animals, especially our pets it is clear they too have emotions. So is that inherent in all life!? I think very basic emotions probably are… happiness, sadness, fear, courage. I think the rest are a construct, moulded by parents, teachers, peers and the values of whichever society you are born into.

Although it does feel like Western Society is being recklessly dismantled by our puppet governments, it is interesting to look at where this prolonged period of ‘peace’ got us. Especially when we look at Mental Well-being.

We are given, and cultivate for ourselves, unrealistic expectations, these expectations prevent us from living in the moment. The stories we were told as children were of handsome prince's winning the hand of the princess. The prince had to prove his worth fighting evil in haunted forests, many tried and many failed, turned to stone or eaten by trolls. Is there a message there that winners get the girl, losers don't.

It does feel like women have an inherent value , while a man's value has to be earned.

OK this may sound somewhat crude but the earliest professions for men centered around hunting, foraging, providing, fighting and defending. Men became Farmers, Hunters, Soldiers. One of the earliest professions for women was prostitution. There was and still is value in just being a woman, where as I say a man has to prove his value and so many men today are isolated, lonely and lacking direction. How do we as a society instil a sense of value in men.

There is a loneliness epidemic and that should not really come as a surprise, many people are unhappy and again that isn’t really much of a shock. The rules we live by do not help us, they are falsehoods. We are much more basic and shallow than we like to think, in part because we are sold a series of lies.

Post 'me too' we are constantly told men should not objectify women while at the same time the internet has provided a safe space for hundreds and thousands of women to objectify themselves in front of a camera and make fortunes doing it. Good luck to them, it just feels a bit sad though. A fantasy will always beat reality.

We live in a world where we are told to celebrate diversity, a world of pronouns. People are divided into tribes based on colour, gender, sexual orientation, religion, politics, mental illness (where there are so many conditions we are running out of acronyms), physical disabilities, age... the list goes on so celebrate diversity but stick to those who are like you. Group think encourages disharmony it is much easier to hate another tribe than to hate specific individuals.

As a species it feel like we are on a precipice, as a collective the advancements made in technology this century seem to be causing us to regress collectively and individually. As I said at the start we are way more insignificant than we like to think. There is still hope though but it means being humble looking at the commonalities, not just with our species but with all life, we are all in this together and if we just look it is easy to see all life is linked...we have loads in common.

As an example if you look at our bodies, they are ever changing but unique all appearing very different. Think about the bodies of the people in the various diverse tribes, we are encouraged to see differences but then start looking at the commonalities. We all have hearts, lungs, stomachs, brains, limbs, blood running through our veins, skin, limbs, hair, teeth, mouths, ears, eyes, nose we can all touch, taste, smell, hear, communicate. Yes of course we should celebrate diversity but our true strength is found in commonalities the things that unite us

ONE life ONE love ONE tribe

 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'?

The Story of Steve and Sally

 I have known my mate Steve for getting on 40 years now, we met at the ice hockey and have remained good friends ever since, our lives have had much in common, one of the things that united us as Brothers in Arms well Losers in Arms really is that we both consider ourselves absolutely useless and up until this year for 50% of us, luckless with women. 2022 has been quite momentous for my best mate...

On the 24/1/22 I had to go to hospital for a CT colonoscopy i had refused point blank to have a camera shoved up my arsehole. I had convinced myself i had cancer. The 24th of Jan is always a sad time anyway as I am always reminded of a beautiful human being called Lynn who died on that date.

Anyway I had the procedure and though I wriggled and squirmed a bit it was ok and i was later given the all clear.

Now as it was January me and Steve were both still pretty miserable after yet another lonely Christmas for both of us. Steve had got himself a friend called Sally though who he had spent New Years Eve with, just as friends, though Steve often told me how much he thought of Sally he was convinced she had no'romantic' thoughts for him though, which i thought was understandable...both myself and Steve are what's known as 'nice' guys. Frustrated fella's cursed with spending most of our lives in the friends zone. Let me tell you it is really shit being a nice guy as the 2021 version of Steve would testify. So one night Steve was driving home along the North Bank cursing the mundane reality of his existence. Why is my life so boring he thought I never have anything exciting happen nothing really good nothing really bad just terminal dullness. Well somebody somewhere must have been listening.

I love numbers Steve was born on the 22 of Feb 22/02 and 2022 was going to be the year Steve got to experience extremes!

As I say on the morning of the 24th of Jan I had been in hospital little did I know that at the end of that same day Steve would find himself there too.

The next morning I got a phone call, bloody hell Steve's about early I thought as soon as he spoke i knew something was up ... "I am in hospital mate they think I have had a heart attack" Now this is a fella who had ridden 2000 miles on his push bike the year before, so I was a bit shocked, it was difficult to process, I didn't know what to say, what can you say? "Fucking hell mate" I said "Are you sure?"

Steve explained that he had woke up feeling terrible and had rang an ambulance and was now waiting for further tests. I have to be honest I thought he would be ok, I mistakenly thought it was more likely to be a panic attack brought on by stress.

As it turned out the doctors reckoned Steve had, had a heart attack maybe 10 years earlier, how he had been managing to do all those miles on his bike with a damaged ticker was a minor miracle.

So there was me thinking Steve would be out in a couple of days and he ended up being in hospital for around a week before being transferred to Papworth where he had heart surgery. Of course in the early part of 2022 covid restrictions meant Steve could not have any visitors and emotionally it was taking it's toll.

He had his son and me to talk to on the phone but it was clear he was finding it really tough the one bright spot for him was that Sally was also talking to him regularly, which was a blessing without her, he would have driven me mad i think. In times of great stress an attractive woman can give a bloke hope in a way mates can't.

Before Steve went for surgery and with the thought in his head that he might die in theatre Steve made a last call to Sally and blurted out that he loved her.

I know this because he did not die and was able to tell me what he had said later that day. Oh shit i thought nice guy rule no 4 never tell your female friends you love em! It rarely ends well.

So after what was probably around four weeks Steve went home he had a monitor set up in his bedroom so his heart could be constantly monitored by the specialists at Papworth he had been looked after very well but understandably he was depressed and struggling. I never told him at the time but it was emotionally tiring trying to help him through it. He was in a house on his own frightened and with very little motivation to carry on. 

One particularly bad day when I was really worried I got in touch with one of Steve's hero's from ice hockey, Kenny McKie, who was absolutely brilliant and gave Steve a call, which proved to be a massive help at the time, it jolted Steve out of his cycle of depression, relieving some pressure, providing a bit of hope.

For Steve though something even better was on the horizon. Sally had been to visit him a couple of times Steve would tell me how much he loved her but would never tell her his true feelings, even though I pointed out he had right before he thought he was going to die, however for a few weeks nothing was said then one morning I got another phone call...right away I knew something had gone on.

"Sally has told me she loves me mate!" Well that is quite a turnaround for a bloke who a few weeks earlier had been moaning about nothing ever happening to him.

Dear reader I am sure you realise that confidentiality and my friendship with Steve and now Sally forbids me from retelling much of what Steve told me that morning but after both revealed their true feelings for one another Sally stayed the night and it became clear the surgeons at Papworth had done a good job with his heart!

From that point they were a couple Mr & Mrs B they are perfect for each other a match made pretty close to heaven as my best mate had to nearly die in order for them to get together. Personally I think she saved his life this year and he now has a brand new much improved one.

Steve's Dad died some years back. When his Dad was at school though he had a friend a little girl who whenever she got upset always went to Steve's Dad to look after her. The little girl grew up to be Sally's Mum.

Maybe that night when Steve was driving along the North Bank his Dad was looking over him. "I can help son but there is gonna have to be a bit of pain first."

So Steve went back to work on 24/10/22 after being off from 24/01/22 (I love the coincidences in numbers)

Mr and Mrs B are happily doing couply things going to garden centre's, visiting relatives, making plans for Xmas, visiting craft fairs where they forage for cakes and they are incredibly happy.

I am happy for them too and sometimes it is hard to be happy for other people when your own life feels like a bit of a fuck up but I am really happy for my friends The Browning's two people who seem genuinely made for each other.

HAPPY CHRISTMAS Steve and Sally

Have a Happy (and slightly more mundane 2023)

What if? Originally penned in 2013

 What if the bible and particularly Jesus should never have been interpreted literally.

Think about the story of Noah, when the floods came Noah did not just cram the ark full of people, he saved the animals too, all the creatures were important.

So what if the story of Jesus is a warning, passed down through history.

What if Jesus was meant to be seen as a representation of the earth. It isn’t really a massive leap, for if we believe that an almighty being created the earth then we could say the earth is the child of the creator. The bible tells of the miracles that Jesus could do, look closely at your surroundings and you can see nature’s miracles every day.

The bible tells us that Jesus is always with us, well if he represents the earth, he is.

We are the only living thing that does not live in harmony with nature, our arrogance makes us believe we are better and our lives more valuable than any other form of life. We treat the planet the animals and our fellow man appallingly. We act like a spoilt child, we think we can take and destroy without consequence.

In the bible it was the people who were given the choice as to whether Jesus should live or die and the people chose to destroy him. Maybe that is why Jesus is represented in the form of man, perhaps the message is, if we do not change we will destroy ourselves and when we are gone life will thrive again without us. That is the resurrection.

This puts the responsibility for our future purely back on us, we should strive to be better, kinder, honest and considerate we should respect our surroundings and build a better future and if we could do that it would be a proper miracle.

Who am I, Who are you Who are we

 Our bodies are made up of 40 trillion cells, each cell contains 100 trillion atoms. Every day 330 billion cells die and are replaced. That means that every 100 days all our cells are replaced. Our bodies are forever changing the body you were born in is very different to the one you are in now.

In order to replenish our cells we eat on average 2kg’s of food a day 730 kgs a year.

We drink on average around 3 litres a day 1,095 litres a year

Our hearts pump over 6000 litres of blood around our body every day. 5 litres a minute. 2,190,000 litres a year. Our heart beats 100,000 times a day 36 million times a year.

For everything we consume we produce a similar amount of waste...that is every human on the planet...there are also all the animals working through similar cycles!

There is some miraculous purification process going on.

There is only a finite amount of water on the planet! The water here now is the same as when the dinosaurs existed.

All animals are made up of at least 60% water, us humans are 60% water.

Our brains are 75% water

Our lungs 83% water

Our hearts 79% water

Our blood is 83% water

We breathe 11,000 litres of air a day over 4 million litres a year. The typical composition of the air we breathe is 79% nitrogen 13-16% oxygen and 5% of the air we breathe is water which comes out at over 200,000 litres of water a year.

One sleeping person will exhale half a pint of water back into the atmosphere overnight.

The water cycle talks about Collection (we think of oceans and rivers) Evaporation, Condensation and Precipitation.

The amazing thing is we are all part of that cycle water flows through and collects in us...in every animal. We are all linked the water that flows through you is also in the rain it flows through your friends and family, through the animals, flowed through people we have loved and lost.

So in a body that is miraculous, forever changing and acts like a little eco-system with it's own water cycle, where does our sense of self come from. The atoms, cells the air we breathe the water we drink the food we eat all leave our body in a relatively short period of time. So when we die does our sense of self leave to, do we have a formless weightless spirit/soul that enters our body at the start of our life journey and exits at the end?

So who am I

Who are you

Who are we?

Is a raindrop still a raindrop when it falls into the sea?

What is for sure is life is a miracle that very few of us appreciate as we should.

“Be like water my friend”

Life...It is a mental workout

 

                                                 

Here's the thing everyone has a body and every body is unique. The array of diversity in individual human beings is massive.  We come in various heights, weights, colours, shapes, sizes and all our bodies have varied capabilites some can run fast, some can swim, some can jump, some people are very athletic others not so much. Some are strong some are weak, some clumsy,  some are agile . Like I say our bodies are unique but then think about this due to the fact our cells are forever breaking down and regenerating even our own bodies are constantly changing. The body I have now is very different to the one I had when i was five or twenty one, my favourite body was the one I had in my forties, me and that body had a lot of fun. I am not so enamoured with my current body. 

Whatever our bodies look like they are all amazing in the things they can do. The ability to  see, hear, touch, smell and our bodies are brilliant in learning new things walking, running, cycling, driving a car, typing on a keyboard, writing, learning a sport and when our bodies learn new things, although it might take a while once we have mastered something we never forget...imagine trying to forget how to walk, ride a bike or drive a car. We tend to learn new tasks through repitition by doing something over and over again then something clicks and once our body has mastered the task it is like right I have got this, I can do it automatically, you just give me the signal. 

All our bodies are like that and here is another crazy thing despite the fact our bodies are unique they all have loads of stuff in common. The foundations the basic structures (though there is nothng basic about it we are all miracles) are the same. For the vast majority of us we all have arms, legs, eyes, ears, nose, teeth, heart, lungs, kidneys, hands, feet, fingers, toes, skin, hair, elbows, knees, blood etc etc This means we can all do the same kind of physical activities just to widely different levels.

I cannot run as fast as Usain Bolt or as far as Mo Farah but I can run. I cannot play football as well as Harry Kane, but I can kick a ball, I cannot fight like Fury or Joshua but I can throw a punch, I cannot race a car like Lewis Hamilton or race a bike like Chris Hoy but I can drive a car and ride a bike and if I want to improve what my body can do i have to train it. If I want to get fitter I can join a gym, if I want to learn to play an instrument I can take lessons the same if I want to learn to dance, put the work in and you can improve. The harder you work the easier things get,

So what about our minds? I have always been fascinated by how our they work, and for simplicity...in my own head i imagine our minds to be similar to our bodies all unique all constantly changing but having loads of things in common the foundations the structures as with our bodies are the same. So we all experience the same emotions just to different levels, we all get fearful we all get anxious, we all feel joy and sadness, despair and hope in our own unique way but we experience the same things.

I was thinking the other day, in the things that we do and the decisions we make, everything is prompted to varying degrees by our flight or fight response. It is that simple.

So when it comes to understanding ourselves and each other we should always pay more attention to the things we have in common as opposed to the things that make us different. We all have skin, what does it matter what colour it is. After all we all have blood and nobody is that fussed about it's colour. 

I love all the contradictions life throws at us on one hand we are unbelievably complex whilst at the same time quite simple and so obviously similar and I believe we are all linked. Diverse yet with so much in common. Think of raindrops, millions of individual raindrops falling from the sky but what happens when they fall into the sea?

In the same way our bodies learn new tasks like walking. cycling, driving  and learn them in such a way that once learned they are not forgotten... we create mental and emotional patterns in the same way, again just like new physical tasks these patterns become ingrained within us, largely through repitition.

Now one of the things I have always been frustrated about when it comes to our bodies is that we have no control in who we are physically attracted too. It can make life very complicated.

When it comes to our mental patterns what is very frustrating is that our minds do not distinguish between helpful patterns of behaviour and those types of behaviour that hinder us and that too makes life complicated.

As I say in the same way our bodies are forever changing and learning then the same goes on with our minds, so who are we? Who is the real me... I have a unique set of foundations and structures but then I have behavioural patterns shaped by every judgement that has ever been made about me, moulded by the society I live in where I constantly receive messages around how I should behave, what success looks like, what failure looks like.

As a youngster I was always told I wasn't good enough and that  I couldn't do things as a result when I became an adult for a long time I could not work out why I experienced a type of paralysis that stopped me doing things I really wanted to do. A classic example of this was when it came to asking out girls who I felt attracted to, a voice in my head was saying 'you'll never do it, you'll mess it up, she won't be interested in you' then sadly for me the flight response invariably kicked in and I ran away.  Looking back, I was always encouraged to favour flight over fight.

Unfortunately I was also bullied at school, I didn't reach puberty till I was 17 so going to an all boys secondary school was not pleasant. As I say I got bullied and I was constantly in flight mode so from there came my patterns of suicidal thoughts. Even though I would try to escape and hide from the bullies they always found me. After months of this I started to think about suicide, it is logical really, it is the ultimate hiding place the one place they won't find me, like I say though sadly that creates a pattern that just as with driving a car for my body... my body doesn't forget how to drive a car... my mind never forgets my suicide pattern. So annoyingly I have to face those thoughts whenever I am in a situation I find challenging, or often when I am feeling lonely. I think for the majority of people feeling lost and lonely go hand in hand with dark moods.

So how do I look after myself, well in all seriousness, I have always struggled with human society I feel it is built on lies and is corrupt but I am still here because I love life, I love the wonder of it, the mystery and I am absolutely fascinated by it and especially by how our minds work. Rightly or wrongly I feel I understand a lot and I think I can convey that to others in fairly simple terms.

I had ten years where I didn't work I spent most of my time on the internet trying to understand myself and unintentionally, in doing so, gaining a greater understanding of others.

We have to treat our minds in the same way we look after our bodies, I find it empowering to know I have a great deal of control as to my mental strength and fitness in the same way I have control over my body.

We don't have to join a gym to improve the fitness of our minds though because life is a mental workout and it is fascinating.

I have a few things that I fall back on to help me stay healthy.

Number One a quote by Voltaire

"Doubt is an uncomfortable condition but certainty is absurd"

 I love that quote it has been a massive help to me over the last 5 years. If you think about it you can only get extreme emotional or physical behaviours, if you have certainty in a particular belief,  zealous religious beliefs or fervent political leanings... without misguided certainty you cannot have extremism. Yet other than dying none of us can really be certain of anything. We definitely cannot be certain about what anyone else is thinking. Or whether our opinions are more worthy than anyone else's. I have loads of opinions but I am not certain of any of them.

Number Two

"Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change"

Like most humans I find it far easier to have negative thoughts and it is far easier to be lazy, sad and unmotivated than energetic happy and hopeful.

Let's think about negative thoughts, what fuels them. If 19 people tell you how well you look today and one person tells you, you look a state. It is more than likely you will focus on the one negative comment. So change the way you look at things and the things you look at change. 19 people said you look great, that is a good day...a bloody miraculous day in my case!

There is a narrative around today that says other people are responsible for how we feel about ourselves, they can certainly have an impact but ultimately we have the control and the stronger and healthier our minds the more control we have and the less impact others have.

Quick example 10 people in a day tell you, you're a banana. Do you go home worrying that you may in fact be a banana and you never knew? Of course you don't.

10 people in a day tell you that you are ugly, that's gonna be upsetting but only because we let it upset us. It plays on our doubts and insecurities but the same people who said you were ugly also thought you were a banana...so what do they know, really? 

Another example, I hate walking into a room full of people on my own, I feel a failure, society has told me from a very young age that successful adults have a partner as a result I feel incredibly insecure and I see myself as a loser who nobody will want to speak to. Here is the funny thing though I am quite comfortable delivering a presentation to a room full of people. I quite like performing but I don't see a room full of say 30 people. I see an audience as a singular. Change the way you look at things, the things you look at change and in turn so does the way you feel.

Number Three

The metaphorical million pound question.

I will let you into a secret, I have never been a fan of recovery language. I am much more into empowering language, encouraging positive self talk. Henry Ford said "Whether you say you can do something or whether you say you can't...you're probably going to be right."

If you continually tell yourself that you're not good enough and you can't do things  then those messages become a self fulfilling prophecy. I use the million pound question to combat some of my unwanted but automatic flight responses.

I first used it when I dabbled in hypnotherapy people would say "I want to quit smoking but I can't" or "I want to lose weight but I just can't" both of those statements are lies.There is a good reason for those lies though, none of us are comfortable with change and to make changes in our lives takes effort. Telling yourself you can't do something is much more final than saying you choose not to do something. In saying 'can't' you are abdicating your responsibility. If you can't you don't have to try.

So I would ask a smoker "On a scale of one to ten, how hard would it be to go a week without a cigarette?" Most would answer 9 or 10. So then I would ask them the metaphorical million pound question. "If I said you would be given a million pound if you went a week without a cigarette... on a scale of one to ten how hard would it be." Turned out everyone was sure they could do it for a million quid. The question, in a  subtle way, empowers people they are confronted with the realisation they have more control than they thought, it also ties in quite nicely with change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.

So when I feel I am struggling and feel i am never gonna get the hang of something or when i think i don't wanna be around anymore I ask myself the million pound question. "Gary, could you hang on for another week if you were gonna get a million quid at the end of it?" of course I could. 

At the turn of the year I started exercising. I exercise as soon as I get up not loads, just press ups and stomach exercises and though the imagery is not pleasant (so my apologies reader) I do squats in the shower. On the mornings I think I can't be bothered I say to myself Gary could you do it if there was a million quid in it for you as a result I have exercised pretty much every morning this year and it is becoming a helpful pattern. 

Number Four

"Every storm will pass"

 Around ten years ago I discovered a book called the Tao te Ching 81 verses supposedly written in China 2500 years ago it is a beautiful book, packed with wisdom and has helped me massively. I would recommend it to anyone interested in their mental fitness. Verse 23 is one of my favourites and says...

To talk little is natural. Fierce winds do not blow all morning, a downpour of rain does not last a day, Who does this, heaven and earth. But these are exaggerated forced effects and that is why they cannot be sustained...If heaven and earth cannot sustain a forced action, how much less is man able to do so?

I take from this that as human beings we cannot sustain an extreme emotional state, whether that is profound sadness, extreme outbursts of anger and violence, grief, despair, hopelessness. Without any intervention at all those feelings will pass in time, when I get really down I know from 50 years of experience that dark mood will pass and I find that comforting. 

Number Five

"Treat everyone as you would like to be treated yourself" a Buddhist take on this is... "Treat all life as though it were your mother in a previous life."

I know myself really well. I am kind, funny truthful and wise. I know I can also be unmotivated, I am pretty shallow at times and I get bored quite quickly. I am not the most sociable person. However  when I am around people I love them (for around 60 to 90 minutes) and I always try to be respectful, honest and kind. I think respect and honesty go hand in hand but some people can be uncomfortable with honesty, which is sad.

Number Six

Ultimately it's on me.

If I wanted to get get physically fitter I wouldn't give someone else my trainers and ask them to go running for me.

If I want to get fitter and stronger mentally it is up to me, other people can offer advice but my mental state is ultimately on me and I like that.

My happiness and state of mind is not someone else's responsibility it is mine, that is not to say other people can't help they can  and I really appreciate it when they do. By and large though other people only reinforce how I feel about myself. For instance rightly or wrongly I believe I am a good writer better than most... if other people praise my writing it makes me feel good, if they say I am a crap writer I don't care they may as well be claiming I am a banana! Conversely I feel a failure because I am single and live at home with my parents. If people told me I wasn't a failure I wouldn't believe them. Whereas if someone told me I was a pathetic loser it would strike a nerve. However I have got stronger and negative comments do not affect me as much as they used to so one day I want to walk into a social gathering on my own feeling as happy and confident as I did when I was in a relationship. I haven't got there yet but I know it is possible.

Number Seven

I really enjoy writing :-) it is kinda like counselling myself.