The clock had just hit 8.10pm, our 4 and 2 year old children were in bed and my wife Colette was also in bed feeding our 7 week old. The washing up was done, the place was moderately tidy so I poured myself a cup of decaf tea, and turned on Netflix to find a…
I remember the moment when it dawned on me. I was sitting in a module called human performance in the final year of my psychology degree. The dawning moment was a realisation that some of the psychological knowledge being absorbing, was putting words on areas I had a deep lived experience of. Terms such as…
When I return from an adventure trip or expedition, I often find I want a period of “decompression” to enable me integrate back into my day to day life. After being away for over 2 months on the North West Passage, this period of decompression lasted a few weeks. Last year after climbing Mont Blanc,…
We were over 1,200 miles offshore and in trouble. The goal was to row our boat across the Atlantic Ocean to the Caribbean island of Antigua but we were being pushed south by mother nature and were utterly helpless to her power. At this rate, we feared we would not only miss Antigua but potentially…
A few years ago, a good friend of mine Mark McCartney started a really interesting project called “What is a good life?”. Over the course of 3 months, Mark interviewed over 100 people from all walks of life around this one question. I was one of the people Mark chatted with and I remember having…
It was a Friday afternoon and I was coming towards the end of not only a busy week but a busy day. I hadn’t planned out the day as well as I might have, and as a result had a smaller gap than I’d like for my exercise. As my zoom call was coming to…
The times we are living in have definitely brought a more considered air of reflection for me. My godmother Irene passed away two and a half years ago at the age of 84. I was thinking about her recently and the time I went to visit her in Chicago back in 1996. She brought me…
About 4 months ago, one of my best mates suffered a brain aneurysm. Not only did he survive, but he is on track to make an incredible recovery. The levels of resilience, courage and sheer grit he (and his wife) have shown are something that will inspire me for a long time to come. I…
Over the past 15 years, through life experience, education, professional training and working with people, I’ve realised that our mind is arguably one of our most important and precious resources. The human mind is vast and wide. The mind is not the same as the brain. Our brain is physical, our mind is not. When…
Taking care of ourselves, our families and looking out for others in our community is very much top of mind for all of us at the moment. The coronavirus is impacting people in different ways depending on individual circumstances. Some have been directly affected by the virus and have lost loved ones. Healthcare workers are…