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The sound was hollow. The clunk of the pedals, the soft thud of felted piano keys. There was no melody, no music. Only the mechanical workings of the piano, hammering out its silent, messy beat. Mouse had always heard those sounds as background noise, something that lived within another noise. Alone, they were strange. Sad. Maddening. He tried to pull music from the rhythm, a song hidden beneath the padding and clunking. But there was nothing.

Some time passed. Mouse’s hand tightened around the heavy tumbler glass. His eyes squeezed shut, as if to concentrate enough to trap some thread of sound inside his mind. A sharp ache bloomed across his forehead. He had been clenching his jaw without noticing. He opened his eyes. The bar was dim, smoky. Cigar smoke seemed to hang low in the air. Still, the padding and clunking. Still, no notes. The sound was difficult to listen to, and impossible to block out.

It now made no sense. How could those same keys, those pedals, ever make music? Even with melody, how could this mechanical thing possibly work?

He scanned the room. Couples laughed, groups chattered, drinks clinked. No one else seemed…

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Life focussed on community, friendship, offline communications, a hug, the sea, the land, growing something. That’s real life. I know it sounds like flowers in your hair, hippy bullshit, but it’s not, the blue zones in Japan, Greece, Italy and Costa Rica are fucking proof. No one is braiding each other’s hair or living in communes and fighting over bread (mostly). They’re talking, baking, growing, fucking, smoking, drinking and laughing. No bullshit, just purpose and community. We are the ones who have it wrong, and it’s so, so recent when this change started, we’re so fucking sure we’re supposed to be locked to our phones, online communities and the TV or more recently and infinatly worse, reels and… well it’s shit, we all know it. We enjoy junk food but at least we know it’s fucking junk, we should be honest about the junk content we’re taking on board en masse as we are about food. Junk food in moderation, junk content in moderation.

The average screen time of someone in the UK is now over 7 hours. 7 HOURS. That’s time looking at a screen, and much more importantly, time not spent looking at family, friends, the fire, going for a walk. I’m sat writing now, and I use my phone, but I'm scared, I'm scared for what this means for society. We crave simplicity, if we want to live long happy lives, then the goal should be to try and live like the long and happy people who live today. A more simple life. I'm not talking about removing all technology or living like the Aamish (I have no idea if that has 2 a’s but it sounds like it does) I'm just saying we need more simplicity, I know its possible, because ive seen it, and so have most people over the age of 30-35. Only 50-60 years ago we still existed in communities, ate in groups, spoke to each other. I actually remember growing up in Middleton on Cowling where we would have galas and maypole dances, and I know that sounds like some Snufkin bullshit, but it’s just how we lived. That was only 30 years ago. This level of stress and anxiety is new, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise

That level of simplicity changes the way we relate to each other and how…

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If Scotland has its kilts and pipes and passionate Highland pride, what does an Englishman like me have? I'm very proud to be from Yorkshire, but I sometimes struggle to find great pride in being English.

We don’t get the romance of rebellion or the grand tale of being conquered and clawing our way back from the jaws of defeat. English history is one of dominance, and dominance doesn’t age well in the telling of tales, and so our history is messier and much more oppressive. We did build those royal monsters down on the quay, sure, but we used them to do things we can’t undo. We dominated half the world, and in place of pride, we in modern England feel kind of quiet, apologetic and often embarrassed.

As I sit here thinking about it, I am realising my pride in England is there, and it’s strong. It doesn’t scream the national anthem or have much respect for our royalty or wave a red and white flag. For me personally, pride is in the way the stone changes from Yorkshire stone to…

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So Ive just gone though some of the things I used to write and I came across an old WordPress that I used to use, it was mostly the angsty jottings of a man who was, at the time, finding who he was supposed to be, but on it I found something I love, something relevant to who I am now and my current writing.

I know it makes me sound like some sort of Snuffkin-style character, but every Thursday back in 2018, I used to do a round trip in the morning. I used to go to Ingleton, followed by driving to Malham Cove and walking up Gordale Scar for my lunch. I would sit and eat a ham, onion and boiled egg sandwich behind a waterfall and write poems in a rather damp council notebook. I never was good at long sprawling poetry, not for lack of trying, but I used to really enjoy writing Haiku.

This is one I wrote on the 13th of June 2018 called “Healing ground”, and I'm happy to say I'm very proud of it. - Check it out…

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There was a loud clunk as the latch of the front door opened, and a mouse walked out. This mouse looked old. He closed the door behind him and pottered down the garden, holding a mug of steaming hot tea in one hand and a notebook in the other. He found a place on an old bench that looked down the valley and set the notebook down on the bench next to him. He put the mug to his lips and sipped the hot tea. 

Mouse hovered in the air, and for a moment, he just watched, his eyes locked on the old mouse. Mouse longed with all his heart to taste the hot tea for himself, to see down his valley from that exact spot on the bench, but he couldn’t. 

At that moment, the earth moved suddenly. It felt like a great hook had attached to the back of his jerkin and snapped him back as fast as he had flown down the valley. Before him, he helplessly watched the same hills and trees fly past him in the opposite direction, all of them rushing towards the old mouse as he flew through the air towards…

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“I asked her about everything, school, friends and life. I got to have input and her actual respect, I'm not talking as a father, but as someone she trusts and listens to. I got to teach her to love walking, how look after those we love, how to be focused and present and to enjoy the silly things. In turn she taught me to love nature, not in the way I already did, I love landscapes and hills, she taught me to love the little things. She would ask me about work, like really grill me on it, and life and friends and gossip. I can honestly say that when times were hard at work or in life, she honestly came up with ideas and points that made everything seem less bleak. In the same light, when we did something big or exciting or had a big win, she was always the first to congratulate me and to celebrate with me on the school run.

I'm proud of my kids, immeasurably so, and as I write tonight, also proud of myself. It would have been really fucking easy to be swept up in all this wild life and success, and to make excuses that I had to work more or didn’t have time. My company went from a little start up in my living room to a multimillion pound company with 10 employees in just 5 years, and in that time, I walked my kids to and from school most days. I did that, where most people wouldn’t. For that I am proud, and grateful for all of the support I got in doing so of my wife and bother…”

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“It feels a bit weird. It made me very aware that Ive literally never passed anything officially academic. I failed all my GCSE’s as a child and promptly quit school before I could get anywhere near A levels. I never went on to higher education and never revisited… well anything academic. Ever.

Its made part of me sad, sad that it’s taken me till 38 years old to remedy that. I'm defiantly guilty of thinking there is nothing I can’t learn from books and I’m sure I’m right to an extent. But this course has been a liberating experience when it comes to my relationship with academia. You don’t just have to learn form books. I have learn a huge amount form SJ, she’s brilliant, but to my knowledge she’s never written a book. That to me means that there is a vast expanse of knowledge, wisdom and information that is never committed to paper. I feel a bit like I discovered a new continent and now I get to go exploring. That’s really cool…”

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“She was wrong about the restaurant, cultures always trade and exchange food, the restaurant was sound, culinary brilliance. If I could find any defence for the poor lass it was that the decor was a little ‘Asia soup’. There’s something oddly comforting about it, really - an ancient Indian door propped up in the Lakes, guarding a restaurant that can’t decide which part of Asia it wants to be. Maybe it’s actually just being honest about the muddle we all are, trying to pin ourselves to places, cuisines, and roots. Or, much more feasibly, maybe not. I could have done without the loud ramblings of a probably well-meaning American teenager, but we had a wonderful meal and I'm very comfortable to tell you I had curry, Thai food, Chinese, sushi and a sticky toffee pudding. She would definitely classify our table culinary hate crime, but it was exceptionally tasty. I'm going to insult the Spanish now, too and say if anything, it was like 'Asian' tapas. Banging.

Caz and I have spent a lot of time discussing the trees out here, it took us ages to identify them and wonder how old they are. They’re just here because someone who loved them and made sure they’d stay. I do love Victorian and Edwardian gardens, it reminds me of Monk's Kirby or Newnham Paddox and where we used to visit sword punk under the blessing of the Earl…”

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“I’ll tell you something private. I’ve always said I’ll do one term on the town council. Just to make it official. Not just to sit in the beautiful Mouseman chairs in that poor rotting council chamber (which I’ve sat in a thousand times to write my journal). I’d do it to remind people that this place exists because people look after it. It doesn’t stay alive on its own and it certainly doesn’t do it with the “help” of certain local politicians and North Yorkshire council men and women, continuously siphoning off its money and land.

I remember the sad day we digitised the archives and they sent me, in a battered old white van, to dispose of hundreds of heavy, leather-bound handwritten books, ledgers, registers and more. I kept them in my van for three days past the deadline, honestly i thought someone must want them. I took them to the museum, to the library and to the new archive store - no one wanted them. Destroying them was…”

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“When I was 16, my dad took my brother and me to America; he was worried it would be our last holiday together and decided to go big. We went to the Grand Canyon and, as we have always been a walking family, the plan was to walk the Grand Canyon. Not out to skeleton point like the Americans do, but to hop the fence, walk past the “Danger of death” signs, and get all the way to the bottom. Over 20 miles, 8000 feet in elevation and 38 degrees heat and about 15 hours. We followed the South Kaibab Trail and it was - well I was 16, it was really fucking far. Beautiful, life affirming, a memory to last a lifetime, but really fucking far.

This particular memory was of a long path, the whole path was made with thick, heavy orange shale, which looked like flint knives. A man walked towards us…”

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“The number of times I have told people I own Raven Forge, you know, because its true, and have been met by “and Sam,” yes, of course, and Sam, I didn’t forget my fucking brother, I own Raven Forge, he owns Raven Forge. Both are true. The number of times I have said “I’m really stressed at the moment” and someone says “you should try being me” “try being a single parent”, “You don’t even know what stress is, kid” is wild. Nowhere in the statement “I’m really stressed” did I imply you were in fact not stressed. There are certain things I don’t understand about human interaction yet, and…”

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“I first read Another Now a couple of years back, and I remember it cracked something open in me. It wasn’t utopian fluff, It wasn’t that one tedious friend we have talking loudly about shared wealth, It wasn’t some over-polished TED Talk optimism. It was a serious, deeply human look at what the world could be if we were brave enough to imagine beyond the stale inevitability of greed and capitalism and smart enough not to tear each other apart in the process. Worker-owned companies. Shared digital wealth. A society where the government actually belong to the people. A future that didn’t feel like a boot pressing down on the backs of our necks, but a…”

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“This has been an underlying foundation of my personality since I was really depressed back in 2013. I worked in a menial job in Craven and hated it, and everyone there to the point where I think all the hate just transferred over and I started to hate myself. Luckily this was another job with a lot of free time, with a lot of support from Caz and a massive kick up the arse I started watching lectures and reading books more than I ever had before. I learned a lot, but most importantly, it taught me that the meaning of life is simply to live. People seem to…”

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“The group is kinda exactly as I would expect it would be, I'm the only guy there, everyone talks about past lives, tarot readings, shamans and giving Reiki to their dog. I thought this would make my eyes roll or leave me desperately trying to figure out how it all connects, but I just don't care, I find it endearing - they’re all just so genuinely wonderful. No one is trying to be better than anyone else; the vibe is very authentic and curious. It’s just a gathering of people who, for their reasons, stumbled into…”

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“In the first place, we have Vienna. I thought it could be "Always a Woman" if it was anything, Vienna is again, a great song, but doesn't hold a candle to Piano man.... or “Always a Woman”, or even fucking Up town Girl.

How can people be so wrong about things that only appear to me to have binary answers? It's also on my playlist of waltz bangers. Piano Man tops out over Audrey Hepburn / Henry Manchini singing “Moon River” and Seal with “Kiss from a Rose” - The 3 best waltz-time songs.

All three of which easily come above Vienna…”

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“This was internal alchemy.

All of this effort was aimed at one thing: the awakening of a dornmant power said to lie coiled at the base of the spine.

Not metaphorically. Literally.

They called it the Serpent Power - kundalinī. Coiled like a snake, three and a half times, asleep in the root chakra. Every technique was designed to heat, pressure, and coax this force awake (Echo: Force. To Force. Forcefully) - and then drive it upward, through the central axis of the body), burning through blockages, destroying the ego, and revealing the soul’s true form.

The process wasn’t gentle. There was no symphony of angelic voices when it happened. Some reported intense shaking, visions, even loosing grip on relaity. Not everyone made it through intact, or even alive. But those who did described states of consciousness beyond form, beyond duality, beyond language itself. It reads like drugs and trips, it reads like gods and awakening.

They became, in their words, “liberated while living.” “जीवन्मुक्त” Free from death (3). Free from illusion.

Some adepts were said to halt the aging process. Others developed abilities that”

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“It doesn’t lighten the load, but it helps you carry it steadily, with both hands instead of dragging it behind you. Your accountability allows you to own this glorious fucking mess you’ve made. To look at it, steaming and red hot and just say “that’s mine”

You stop doing that stupid thing that humans to where we narrate our mistakes, desperately trying to soften their impact, or make them feel more normal. You stop waiting for someone to come and tell you it’s okay—because it is, or it fucking isn’t, and either way, its still you who has to deal with it.

That’s the bit no one tells you. Accountability isn’t loud like blame, or heavy like shame. It’s not even particularly emotional. In fact it's…”

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“Failure is my biggest asset. I fail more than anyone I have ever met, and when I do, im the first person to point at it and call it a fucking failure. I have no idea how it sounds, but it's true.  

When it comes to business, failure is my best friend, not my worst enemy. The more I try the more I both fail and succeed. Failure is not the end product of failed success, it's its byproduct, its waste product that success excretes on its journey towards an unabandoned victory. 

Sure something are an outright failure, but that’s not to say it wasn’t a stepping stone, a learning opportunity, on your road to wining. 

I will continue to fail till I’m no longer able to do so, but I'll…”

Responsibility isn’t something you can wash off, run off, or take drugs to numb. It’s waiting for you when you're stood dripping after a shower, it's folded over panting next to you when you stop running, and it has only increased in size when the drugs wear off. Drugs don't just mean recreational drugs; it means any vices that are a distraction from your responsibilities. For me, it was, unfortunately, gambling. At the time, it felt like a great distraction, when my addiction came to an end, when I stopped, hopefully forever, everything was worse, and whose job was it to sort out - that's right, mine. That was my responsibility, it always was, and I…

Yoga, when done this way, has a price-tag: drop-in classes averaging £10-15, depending on what town you drop-in to, memberships pushing £80-150 a month if you get on with a teacher, and retreats climbing into the thousands (it’s currently a hard pass for me).This raises the question: Has access to peace and healing become something you have to afford?

Connected thought: In my recent experience, the same is true for therapy. Mental health support, which should arguably be a basic human right, can cost you vast quantities. In a world where free services, like those on the NHS, are overburdened and underfunded, with waitlists that can stretch into years these costs are not so much a choice, but a paywall. For people having a horrific time mentally “come back later” can be, without exaggeration, a death sentence. So, It would seem both physical and mental well-being are increasingly reserved for those who…