Tag: mental-health
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Learning to End the Day
Describe one positive change you have made in your life The most important changes are not always the ones that announce themselves. Some arrive quietly and only later do you realise how much good they have done. Learning to go to bed earlier was like that for me. It does not sound like much, but…
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Telling the Truth Well
How would you improve your community? One way to improve our community is to help people tell the truth more gently and more clearly. That may sound like a small thing, but it matters a great deal. In any close community, people will talk. They will notice tensions, mistakes, weaknesses and struggles. Some information does…
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Going Deeper by Saying No
How often do you say “no” to things that would interfere with your goals? Probably not often enough. My mother’s summation of my life is that I take on too much. I have come to think she is right. I have spent much of my life assuming that I can fit one more thing in,…
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The Things I Come Back To
What strategies do you use to cope with negative feelings? I don’t have a toolkit for coping with negative feelings, at least not in any formal sense, but I do know what fits the way I am wired. Over time I have learned to return to a few simple things. Prayer is one of them.…
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A Kind of Flow
What activities do you lose yourself in? I lose myself in writing, walking, and sport, and each of them impacts me in a different way. Writing often gets hold of me. It can be an idea, a life story, a poem, a short story. Something catches, and once it does I can lose all track…
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The Loss That Changed Me
What experiences in life helped you grow the most? I grew a lot the day I realised I had been scammed. I was older when I bought an apartment as an investment, and I trusted advice that seemed sensible at the time. A friend had recommended a financial adviser, and he showed me a number…
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What He Needed Wasn’t a Lecture
What advice would I give my teenage self? I don’t think I’d give him a grand speech. I’d try to be a person he could trust. Older me: You don’t need a lecture.Teenage me: Then what do I need?Older me: People who will listen properly. People with wisdom. People who take you seriously and help…
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Tall, Dark, and Silent
If there were a biography about you, what would the title be? The first thing that comes to mind is something someone said about me years ago: “Tall, dark and silent.” It was meant playfully, not cruelly, but it probably caught something true about how I occupy a room. I’m naturally reserved. I don’t speak…
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Hunting for Gems
Are there any activities or hobbies you’ve outgrownor lost interest in over time? I used to spend hours in the city, moving from one second-hand record store to another, scanning the shelves for comedy albums. Not music this time—comedy. Victor Borge. Peter Sellers. Shelley Berman. Bob Newhart. They were old even then, and that was…
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The Hinge
Describe your most ideal day from beginning to end I’m a person with simple tastes. I don’t need much to have a good day. My ideal day is made of a handful of small scenes that, put together, feel like enough. I’m up at 4:30 or 5:00am. The house is quiet. I feed the animals…
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What Each Decade Taught Me
How do significant life events or the passage of timeinfluence your perspective on life? When I was 17, I thought focus was a virtue. Cut out distractions, study hard, give yourself to the things you valued. I did that. I achieved. But I also felt empty. In my twenties I worked at a major bank.…
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A Measured No
What’s the thing you’re most scared to do?What would it take to get you to do it? Every now and then someone says they went skydiving on the weekend like it’s a normal weekend activity. They’ll say it casually—like it’s on the same level as trying a new café. I’m always interested and usually ask…
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My Complaint
What do you complain about the most? I complain about people who are caught up in themselves — people consumed by their own wants, always receiving, always wanting to know what’s in it for them. It feels self-indulgent, and it makes life harder than it needs to be. If I’m honest, I think I complain…
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Remembered Well
Can you share a positive example of where you’ve felt loved? I’ve learned that being loved isn’t always a warm feeling. Sometimes it comes as a question. “Are you going to stay on?” When people ask that, they’re not only asking about a contract. They’re saying: we’ve grown used to you. We trust you. We’d…
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Closing Tabs
Where can you reduce clutter in your life? I sometimes think of about clutter as open tabs – the low-grade pressure running in the background, the feeling that life is always slightly unfinished. We’re in the declutter process at the moment. We’re currently living in a five-bedroom house, and in a couple of years we…
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House Rules for Online Communication
In what ways do you communicate online? Online communication, for me, isn’t a toolbox so much as a building: same address, different rooms, different dynamics, different outcomes. Email: This is the study. The good reading lamp. The filing cabinet. It is very adult. Everything said here can be printed, forwarded, rediscovered in 2029, and used…
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A Life Mission
What is your mission? I have dedicated my life to helping people grow. That has taken different forms in different seasons, but the thread has been remarkably consistent. I did it as a parish minister, walking alongside people as they grew in their knowledge and love of God. I did it as a husband, taking…
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This Season
Do you spend more time thinking about the future or the past? Why? I probably spend more time thinking about the future than the past — and it’s less about personality than values. I’m drawn to long horizons. I often ask: What needs to happen now to build the best possible future in fifty years’…
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My Biggest Challenge
What are your biggest challenges? New Year’s Day 2026 It’s tempting to name my challenges as problems to solve, but that isn’t quite true. They are frequently awkward, demanding, sometimes painful—and yet they keep asking something of me that feels important. So rather than list what frustrates me, I’ll try to name what I’m learning…
The Afterword 