Freelance Writer
Photo by Henrique Craveiro on Unsplash “There are decades where nothing happens and there are weeks where decades happen.” – Vladimir Ilyich Lenin They say that frogs in a pot of water being brought to the boil won’t notice the temperatures rising beyond a critical point until it’s too late. This logic is often applied to political situations…
Photo by Conor Luddy on Unsplash The Forty Foot, January 12th 2020 The weather has been pretty amazing so far in 2020. A stormy Saturday brought rain of the kind I hadn’t seen in a few months, but today was calm as we eagerly anticipate Storm Brendan roaring in on Monday morning. And what a calm it was.
Being willing to look foolish is a key part of being happy. Me, in Ha Giang, Vietnam, April 2018. I realised in the writing of this post that all of the lessons I’ve reflected on here refer to results that have come not just from WRITING articles, but POSTING them in the public domain as…
An overview of some of the practical aspects of joining a silent meditation retreat run at one of the Dhamma Centres around the world
Image: Keegan Houser on Unsplash I spent weeks and even months after doing a silent meditation retreat trying to put the experience and anything I learned from it into words. The results were a load of half-finished drafts of Buzz Feed-style “Top 5 Things a Meditation Retreat Teaches You” articles, never published as I never…
“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Blaise Pascal “All right, brain. You don’t like me and I don’t like you, but let’s just do this and I can get back to killing you with beer.” Homer Simpson “It’s a DEAL!” Homer Simpson’s brain I’d just arrived…
I’ve learned a lot from writing. I write about travel and self-improvement. I’m currently doing a Masters degree in Psychology and Wellbeing. There’s a lot of reading and writing involved in that too. It often involves gathering information, fact-checking and a lot of research. But the learning isn’t about the research you do, or the…
Photo by Clique Images on Unsplash “When I’m trying to lift 400lbs, I’m mentally training for life. Through self-discipline and repetition of things I don’t want to do, I’m training for life.” – David Goggins Training for life David Goggins talks extensively about the dark depths of despair he’s been in throughout his life, and how he’s overcome…
I did a 10-day Vipassana meditation retreat in Japan earlier this year. There were so many things I could say about it and the benefits intensive meditation can give you, as can establishing a long-term practice. But after numerous failed attempts to put these things into sufficient words, I gave up. That’s when I noticed the one thing that has stuck with me – I’ve learned how to take action
Welcome to Gav Is Gone – I’ve been writing here for a while now so here’s a bit of a hello, and introduction and shpiel about what I’m doing here.