I was very lucky to be so lovable

• Enneagram 3 → “I’m only lovable if I’m producing value, why would you love me intrinsically”, Richard Rohr talks about this in the first 3 mins here

I came from a high conflict household and probably had cPTSD so a band setting was hard (this is still too much of a victim framing IMO)

• But I wasn’t awkward in other places, with people I had knew for longer!
• Also there was IMO the awkwardness of like, I didn’t care about being in a band really. I didn’t care about the bass at all. I wasn’t engaged at all. It felt similar to like, going on walks with my mum → “I guess I’ll do this, I guess I have to”, vs like e.g. cubs/scouts which I genuinely really enjoyed

University was a very intense wake-up call to the trauma of growing up in a high conflict home with a broken family

Something about home group of friends

• Had friends as a kid, as a teenager, etc. Uni was just like, boom, meet these other adults, it’s kinda awkward, etc. Become an adult, etc

Asia → Tilly, etc

• Idk it was a fuckin big thing dude and still cPTSD etc, and I did get to be great friends with Tilly pre-stream entry. There were no good people in Manilla, it was hot as shit, it was a big gamble to go with Simmo

8. People don’t need to find me interesting to value me

• E.g. Attila, Dan, Michael, historic people like my long-term girlfriend, etc etc.
• I think I’m loved for being earnest, genuine, sincere, warm, etc, rather than because I’m interesting. Interesting is just one value, right? And, do I value people primarily for being interesting? I suspect not 👀
• But, I really overindexed on “holy shit, I’m not interesting, that’s my problem!” from teenage years onwards, which made me totally miss/undervalue my strengths

Hey ChatGPT, summarise this pile of feedback I’ve gathered

What reliably lands is your presence, care, craft, and steadiness—the way you make rooms safer, hearts softer, ideas clearer, and systems work. “Interesting” is a bonus; it isn’t the engine.

From the feedback you shared, here are the core themes people consistently value in you—none of which depend on being “interesting”:

• Grounded, calming leadership & authenticity. People feel safe, peaceful, and inspired in spaces you lead (e.g., sharing circles, meditation info, “in tune with oneself”). 
• Music that moves people. Your guitar/singing lands as tender, pure, and heart-opening—regularly singled out as a gift. 
• Attuned listening & incisive questions. You track people closely, ask clarifying questions that touch depth, and your day-to-day demeanor is steady and well-regulated.
• Vulnerability, honesty, and quiet confidence. Others name your openness (even tears) and “vulnerability posting,” alongside a composed, quietly confident vibe. 
• Writing that resonates. Multiple folks highlight your ability to capture the important thing in your experience; others describe your prose as “resonant/excellent/magical.”
• Systems/ops backbone & rapid learning. At work you’re prized for high-agency problem-solving, setting up reliable systems, and learning new domains fast.
• Community-building & relational care. You make people feel welcome, keep strong relationships, and your supportiveness shows up in concrete help. 
• Warm, masculine/protective presence. People explicitly name your warm energy and “manliness” as attractive and reassuring.

Rewriting the story → I noticed that me and my dad didn’t connect, but also remembered that I did connect with others

• When I was a teenager, I noticed how difficult it was to talk to my dad. I also noticed how I found it very easy to talk to other people, that I felt comfortable and sociable around other people, like my girlfriend, my cousin, my school friends like Woody and Dan. Not an enormous list, but still, there were clearly people who I could happily spend time with. I noticed how conversation was so stilted with my Dad, and realised it by definition couldn’t be a me-thing. It must be something between the two of us, some lack of connection, sad, but not universal, not damning.
• When I was 29, in the middle of August in 2025, I flew to Spain to visit my Dad in hospital, where he had just had open heart surgery, getting very close to death (sepsis and a bacterial infection of a heart valve, which would certainly have been fatal just a few decades ago). I thought it’d be the time to reconnect, as I hadn’t spoken to him all year. I stayed in the hospital for 12+ hours a day for 2.5 weeks, and found that he was incredibly difficult to connect with, that he could only talk about himself, that he had no curiosity about me at all. I realised that he was like this when I was a teenager too - he has definitely gotten weirder over the years, but this was always his core way of being → total lack of curiosity, total focus on himself, blind disregard for the emotions of others, etc. I realised that even if I cared about football and classic cars and beer and classic rock, this is all we’d ever connect on, that we’d never have a deep relationship, that I’d never feel seen by him, because he couldn’t see himself, he couldn’t meet himself emotionally, he was blocked off emotionally, disembodied, dissociated, freeze response, so how could he possibly be attuned to me? If you can’t be attuned to yourself then there’s no way in hell that you can be attuned to others. My dad never went to therapy, of course, he’s a boomer, it wasn’t a possibility for many years, and by the time it become a normalised thing he probably would have been at least 40, if not 50, decades of unprocessed shit, decades of using beer as the way to relax, etc.
• So, it’d be mad to conclude “I am boring” from this data. Not to mention all the people in my life who love me, who enjoy spending time with me! My friend group at school, Jess and Tahira and Dan and of course my long-term girlfriend Ellie. Friends at uni like Vaishu and Olivia. Friends from my years of travelling, ok there aren’t many, but Tilly is an absolute once-in-a-lifetime friend, a beacon of “ok clearly I’m not boring because we had so much fun together”! And then Toronto, Michael and Michelle, people who deeply cared for me. And mentors, Attila and Michael and Dan, Brent! Come on dude, how many people do you need to cherish you to make you realise that the story has been totally wrong this whole time. If you were boring, if your fundamental essence was boring, why would these people like you, they’d find you dull, they’d bounce right off you. Elisa, Alice, Simmo, Catherine, Jason, Carmen, Trish, Johnson, wake up dude, what are you doing dude. James, Dan, Simon, Irish James!! People cherish you dude!!