The first week of 2026 has been interesting. Not just personally, but for the whole world.
I didn't make any resolutions. I quietly decided to make a few changes to my lifestyle that will steer my Type-2 diabetes towards remission, and help me to improve my health generally. A happy side effect of these changes is that I will lose weight and gain strength. All good. I have mentally prepared myself for the challenges that will arise, but these are easy to deal with. It really is a matter of reframing things in your mind.
]]>Written in 2015 during the first week of stepping away, when habit proved louder than intention.
The last eight days were something of a revelation.
On my birthday, I decided to step away from almost all personal social media for a year. I knew how that would sound. I had made similar declarations before, usually framed as resolutions that dissolved quietly and without consequence. This time felt different, largely because I was tired of hearing myself repeat them.
]]>Written in 2015.
Written at a moment when narrowing my life felt less like loss and more like relief.
Today is my forty-seventh birthday.
For months, I had been taking a long and sometimes uncomfortable look at my life. Becoming a stay-at-home parent had shifted my understanding of what mattered and what did not. It forced a reckoning with how I was spending my time, my energy, and my attention.
What came into focus was simple, even if acting on it was not.
]]>Written in 2015.
A new film had just been released, based on a book I had not read.
That was normal for me. I love films, and for years I had been content to let adaptations stand in for the books they were based on. Watching was easier. Faster. Convenient.
]]>Written in 2015.
It has been nearly a month since I last sat down to write.
The summer took over, in the best possible way. I spent as much time as I could with my son, making the most of what felt like the last summer before childhood began to change. Museums, hills, mines, the sea, and lengthy gaming sessions. It mattered.
]]>Written in 2015.
Opinionated people are those who announce their views repeatedly, without being asked.
An opinion, offered once, is usually harmless. When it becomes habitual, it turns into noise.
]]>Written in 2014.
‘Where do you want to meet?’ That seems to be the standard question when I arrange to see someone I have not seen for a while.
I do not mind choosing the place. What tends to follow, though, is that I end up organising the whole thing. Time, date, and even how the other person is getting there.
]]>Written in 2014.
I have spent much of my life caring too much about what other people think. About whether I am offending someone. About whether I am being judged. Over time, that habit became exhausting, and worse than that, it made me cautious in places where I should have been clearer.
This is the point where something shifted.
]]>Written in 2018.
It is a strange thing, that feeling of being snowed under.
What strikes me now is how much of that pressure is self-imposed. I am doing a lot. I have started writing again for a motorsport website. I do not get paid for it, but it puts my work in front of a large audience.
Alongside that, I take on bits of design work. I volunteer as a webmaster and club secretary for a motorcycle club. I also volunteer with my son’s football team. I am competent at all of it, but none of it pays.
That is the tension. If I take a full-time job, I lose the time I need to write. Writing is what I enjoy most. Writing for free feels like a way in, a way to improve, a way to open doors. What appeals to me most is that it can be done from anywhere.
I know I will have to work something out.
Looking back, this reads less like confusion and more like the early stages of choosing a direction.
Written in 2018.
We will soon be taking a long overdue holiday.
We are not leaving the country. Nothing extravagant. Just getting away from it all for a week.
My laptop died a few weeks back. I replaced it with a desktop and a dual monitor setup, which means it will not be coming on holiday with us. That feels like a good thing.
I have decided to leave everything behind except my smartphone. It will be on Do Not Disturb for the duration, whenever it gets switched on at all. I have also bought a book and intend to start it and finish it while we are away.
I truly intend to be off-grid for the first time in a long, long time.
Stepping away like this no longer feels like an experiment, just a necessary reset.
Written in 2018.
My son is in France on a school trip, his first time abroad without us.
He is having a great time. I am finding it harder than I expected.
Whenever I am away, I know that he misses me terribly. Now I am getting a taste of that feeling myself.
He comes home this evening. The last time I saw him was in the early hours of Wednesday morning, and it already feels like weeks ago. I cannot wait to see him and to hear about his adventures.
Over the coming months, I will be travelling to race tracks to cover various championships. I will go, do my work, and come straight back home again.
Home is where the heart is. My family means everything to me, especially when love makes absence feel this loud.
Written in 2018.
Lately, I am being pulled in fewer directions than I have been in the past.
I still do not have a day job, and I am continually trying to work out a way of getting paid for doing the things that bring me joy.
I love to write. I like to create imagery, watch films, and travel. Most of all, I enjoy spending time with my family and a few close friends.
My priority has to be living a fulfilled life. My wife and son keep my compass true, helping me stay on course towards something that really matters.
It has also become clear that I need to pay close attention to my health again.
Some priorities announce themselves quietly, but they are no less decisive for it.
Written in 2020.
I used to think generosity was a fixed trait.
Something you either had or did not. A baseline you could rely on, in yourself and in others.
]]>Written in 2017.
That if something mattered, it needed to be fixed, managed, or improved. That leaving things alone was a form of neglect.
Over time, that belief became exhausting.
]]>Written in 2017.
There comes a point when you stop explaining yourself.
Not because you have run out of words, but because you no longer feel the need to justify your choices to everyone else.
]]>Written in 2016.
Not just relationships or work, but routines, plans, even moods. When everything feels provisional, it becomes difficult to settle into anything fully.
You hesitate. You wait. You keep one foot slightly raised, just in case.
]]>Written in 2015.
There is a quiet reassurance in things that have stayed.
Old coats that still fit the same way. Mugs that feel right in your hand. Books you have moved from house to house without ever really questioning why.
]]>Written in 2015.
There is a strange discomfort that comes with quiet.
Not the restful kind, but the sort that arrives when you stop being visible. When there are fewer responses, fewer signals that you are being seen or acknowledged.
It is easy to mistake that silence for failure.
]]>So, here we are. The very last day of 2025, the final hours before we step into 2026 and whatever comes next.
]]>This is not a feed.
It is a place to put things down.
Some of what you will find here was written years ago. Some of it is more recent. What matters is not when it was written, but that it still feels worth standing by.
Nothing here is optimised.
Nothing is chasing attention.
These pieces exist because writing helps me think clearly, notice what matters, and leave a trail I can recognise later. If something resonates, that is welcome. If it does not, that is fine too.
This is a quiet place by design.
You are not expected to keep up.
Read slowly. Or do not read at all. The choice is yours.
Written in 2015.
There is always a moment, just after buying a new camera, when everything feels possible.
]]>Written in 2015.
It is easy to confuse response with value.
Likes, shares, comments and reactions offer instant feedback. They feel like confirmation. Over time, they can also quietly distort what you choose to say and how you choose to say it.
]]>Written in 2015. If anything, this has become more relevant.
There was a time when being reachable was a convenience.
Somewhere along the way, it became an expectation.
]]>Written in 2015. Still, the most straightforward answer I have.
I do not write because anyone is waiting for it.
]]>Written in 2014. This is a story, not a position statement.
Some days start entirely ordinary and end somewhere you did not see coming.
This was one of those days.
]]>Written in 2014. I still think about this every time I decide whether to carry a camera.
There is a strange pressure that comes with events like Goodwood.
]]>Written in 2014, during a period of real financial strain. I am in a very different place now, but I am leaving this essentially as it was.
Money has a way of getting into your head.
]]>Written in 2014.
People keep asking what this is meant to be.
It is not a movement.
It is not a brand.
It is not something you sign up for.
It is a way of choosing how to live, quietly and on purpose.
]]>Written in 2014.
There is something strange about visiting old friends.
]]>Written in 2014. Still true.
You keep saying you will change things later.
When things calm down.
When work eases off.
When the next problem is dealt with.
That moment does not arrive.
So this is me, calling time on a few things.
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