#49 Let me bore you to sleep - Jason Newland (24th October 2018)

Hello, welcome to jasonnewland.com, let me move this around a little bit, that's better. My name is Jason Newland and this is let me bore you to sleep, and I hope you can see this, I'm trying to get the microphone closer to my mouth so that the volume's a bit louder. I'm not sure if it's working or not, but hey, it's worth a try isn't it, it's worth giving it a go.

I hope, hopefully the microphone's working, but whether it's, you know, I don't want to have it hanging from my, I suppose I could attach it to my beard, but that would just be weird, a weird beard. So this is, I don't know what number this is, the let me bore you to sleep is 49 or something, and I did, I started to do one yesterday on Facebook live, a live let me bore you to sleep, it turned out to be more of a chat with the people online. So this t-shirt's really creasy, creaky, creasy, so I'm going to discount that as being a let me bore you to sleep session, so this is a real, a real let me bore you to sleep one.

So before I start, I wanted to say thank you to those of you that have sent me messages on YouTube, I need to reply to some of them actually, and also on Facebook, and just to say thank you, I've had some really, really kind messages over the last few days, so it's heartwarming, you know, it's nice. I don't think I kind of need to be constantly told that I'm doing good, and I'm doing okay, and I'm doing, what I'm doing is worthwhile, but it is nice to hear it. And yeah, so the other things before I start, what is it? I've got an itchy left eye, I'm trying to itch it without touching it, itch it, scratch it, that's it.

I've no longer got a laptop, I've no longer got a podcast, these things will change in time, but as far as I'm aware, my stuff's still on Spotify, because when they take the podcast, Spotify actually downloads the sessions, and they keep them on there. As far as I'm aware, that still happens. So my website, jasonnewland.com, it's still got all my back catalogue on there as well, so you can download all the videos and all the mp3s free.

And the YouTube channel's got pretty much all of my videos from the past on there, and present ones as well, I was going to say, and future ones, but can't have future ones yet, but this will be on there when it's finished. The good thing about doing live sessions is they upload pretty much instantly, they're kind of uploading as you record, as you do them. Recording this on the iPhone means that I have to upload it afterwards, and it takes about an hour.

So it's quite a process. Most of my Let Me Boyd the Sleep sessions are on mp3, and as I said, they're available on my website. There's only a few actually, oh, I've got an itchy back now, only a few on video.

So if you want to listen to some of the earlier work of the JJ, of the Mr New Land, you can do. So as usual, I will say, only listen to this or watch this when you can safely close your eyes. And I think that fits quite well with the fact that this is a sleepy, sleepy weepy session, so it's supposed to be boring.

That's what I like about this is because no one can insult me by telling me that it's boring, because it's supposed to be. See that little, that smile of pride. I don't really have any pride, but on this one, it's like, yeah, kind of covered all angles.

Even when I'm talking about something that I'm interested in, you know what, it's still boring to other people, so it's good. So I suppose what I could talk about is hypnosis. I could talk about my little journey into hypnosis today.

So it's a story, and some of it might be true, some of it might be made up, I'm not sure. The thing is with memories, they're not always 100% correct. You know, even psychologists will tell you that we can't always be that reliant.

And I've noticed that, is tell you what, I've always been pretty good, but I can remember years, like I've got these little, you think of like a laptop, you know, you bookmark stuff. I kind of got in my brain bookmarked certain years for specific things that may have happened. And sometimes within those years, I've even got the month as well.

Probably not the day, I don't go that in depth because that would be a little bit obsessive, possibly. But generally for the month, I might remember what I was wearing, I might not, probably not. But there was a time when I just pretty much wore the same things all the time.

I kind of still do really, not the same things as then, because I can't fit into those clothes anymore. And I've always just done a wee on the carpet. And I'll tell you why that isn't a wonderful thing.

Because I've just cleaned the carpet, that part of the carpet, so it's a bit wet. And I put some paper down. So because, you know, I left it to dry and he did a poo on there.

So I had to clean that up. And then I put some paper down. And now he's avoided the paper all together and just gone on the carpet.

So basically he's decided to go to the toilet on the bit of carpet that's not been cleaned. So I suppose you could look at it different ways or it's nice of him not to go on the carpet that's clean. But then there's paper on top of that bit of the carpet.

It's hard to get angry at him though, because he's so cute. Even when he's being naughty, and he is naughty sometimes. You might think, oh, he's nice, he's just doing his... I think some people think, because he's a ferret, he's a polecat slash ferret, that he's like a gerbil, or like a little mouse, like something you keep in a cage and doesn't, you know, nice to look at, but don't do anything, you know, maybe.

But he's not. He's really, he interacts with me, communicates with me. And he's, you know, he's very clever.

And he knows what he wants to do. And he's very stubborn. And, you know, when I take him out for a walk, I know when he wants me to carry him, he'll go like that on my legs, both his paws on my leg, because he wants me to carry him.

Pick him up. Or he'll just... Sometimes, like today, I took him out. So my friend knocked on my door and said, do you want to go for a walk? And I said, I'm not a dog.

And he said, I know you're not. So that kind of, it was pretty attempted humor on my part, didn't really fit, didn't work. Do you want to go for a walk? Oh, I don't want to go for a walk.

But I did. I did. I went.

I took Andre. And we were crossing the road. I noticed that the lead was heavy.

And basically, I was dragging him. He went on strike. He just goes on strike, like refuses to move.

So he couldn't even be bothered to walk enough to get in front of me to put his paws on my leg for me to carry him. He just went like that and just put his whole body flat on the floor. He refused to move.

So I carried him for about 10 minutes. I don't mind carrying him because he's, if he was a, you know, if he was a crocodile, then it'd be, it'd be more difficult because they're heavy, I imagine. They look heavy, unless they're just full of air.

Mind you, they wouldn't be full of air, would they? Imagine an inflatable crocodile. I mean, the slightest move out, you know, those teeth, they just go pop. So yeah, wouldn't be any good.

So he's only little. He's only, I don't know how much. I've never weighed him.

You know, I don't have scales myself. And the only scales I have really that I go on is at the doctor's surgery. Every now and then, whenever I go to the doctor's surgery, I'll kind of think, oh, can I, can I just weigh myself? Can we just see what kind of weight? I kind of, I'm always, at the moment, last time I got weighed, I was just under 15 stone.

I know that I've put on weight since then. So I'm probably, I'm probably around 15 and a half, maybe, I don't know, over 15 anyway. But it's always good to sort of check, have a little check, you know, to see kind of what the weight is.

Sometimes I'll be 14 and a half stone. Before I moved to this town, I was averaging 13 and a half, pretty much all the time. And even then I was overweight, pretty much.

And then I realized that, you know, it's like now that, oh, I don't wish I was that way. I don't like have big, I don't lay in bed thinking about it. Oh, there's no lamentation going on.

I wish I was 13 and a half stone. But I, I did lose some weight though, last year for a bit. Got a little bit slimmer.

So I've got the kind of body that's, I don't like that, that term. It's a very political term that was used once and then suddenly, it's about four or five years ago, and then suddenly every politician was using it. But I use it in this sentence.

My body's not fit for purpose, perhaps. But it is quite flexible in a sense of, if I do exercise, I can usually sort of slim down a bit. When I was doing boxing back in 2009, I slimmed down, but I didn't necessarily lose weight, but I slimmed down.

So my stomach was slimmer, but I was more muscular. And I was doing weights, I had a punch bag in the garden and I miss my punch bag. I've had a few of them over the years.

First punch bag I got was when I was 13, I think. I had two punch bags at the bottom of the garden. So my dad had this, like it was a studio building that he had.

And he had it as an office, but he let me have part of it as a gym. So he put two bags. So I had this army bag, like a kit bag that I had in the army.

So I had that full of rags and stuff like that. So it was a light bag. And then I bought a punch bag, a bigger one that we had full of sand.

And they were both hanging up. I think I might have, there might be one hook or there might be two hooks. I think there might just been one hook and I alternated.

So I took one off and took the other one, put the other one on. But it was like a swivel hook. So it wasn't restricted and it could turn around and everything.

So I used to have a lot of fun with that. I used to love a punch bag. The best fun ever.

It's amazing. So there was a reason for me mentioning that punch bag. I might have got off topic a little bit.

It's unlike me. So yeah, the punch bag, I remember one day the punch bag said to me, I suppose you could do some hypnosis, could you? I said, what's that? He said, oh. And the punch bag handed me a book, Introduction to Hypnosis.

And that's how it all started. No, it's not. So the hypnosis, I feel really I got into, I was very into Buddhism as a younger man, younger man, like the age of 22.

I'd say, really got into reading Zen books, classic Zen books, which led me to Buddhism meditation. So I had a nice little collection. I was also into poetry as well, particularly the beat generation poets, which then led me to reading books by Kerouac on the road, Ginsburg, who else? There's various different writers.

And that then led me, because I used to go into the bookshops, used to be pretty much, it's kind of like a hobby, reading books, collecting books, going to the bookstore, checking out books. Because what I would do, I'd read a book and then I'd look at the glossary or the bibliography or whatever you want to call it at the end. And maybe during the book, it's mentioned another book.

For example, I got into Charles Bukowski, and he was, some of the books that he, authors that he liked, I started buying their books as well. So it was, what was it? Into the Night. I forget the author of that, but it was a French author.

And so I've read various books, Kant, The Castle, The Idiot. Yeah, it's quite a few different books I quite like. I like the weirder sort of books, the books with dialogue, but not just the interesting conversation, maybe an unusual conversation.

I quite like that. So I haven't read any of that stuff for years. Perhaps I could do with doing that again.

And yeah, filling myself up a little bit more with some of that stuff. I do have recently, well, probably a couple of years back, I bought a bunch of Charles Bukowski books. So I've not read, I've already read them though, that's the thing.

I've read pretty much all of his books, including the poetry ones as well. So I have a big collection of his books. So that's the thing is I've read Post Office probably three or four times.

I don't necessarily want to read it again. I think that's why I I'm not comparing myself to Charles Bukowski here, but I quite like the idea of doing lots of different things. So I've not just done one recording for relaxation, one recording for chronic pain, one recording for sleep.

I've done lots and lots of different recordings for the same issues. And I quite like the having something a bit different, yet the same, but different, you know. Although I do see the value in having the same session and listening to the same session for maybe a month, but maybe not forever, you know.

I used to, back in December 1999, I stopped smoking and I listened to this, I bought this tape, which was a visualization, relaxation session. And there was some soft music and it was something Mary Field or the lady, she's an American lady, and she's had a beautiful voice and soft and gentle. And the whole tape was her just guiding me through a forest.

And I listened to it twice a day, in the morning and in the evening. And I absolutely loved it. And it helped me to learn to relax a bit more.

And it was really useful. It had nothing to do with smoking. It wasn't a stop smoking session, it was just a relaxing session.

And I did self-hypnosis for the smoking. And although I really loved listening to it, 20 years later, 19 years later, I don't think I'd still want to be listening to it every morning and every evening. And I'd want to listen to something different eventually.

So that's part of the reason why I do these. I'm not comparing myself to her. I'm just saying that's why I like to do more choice, offer more choice, more variety, but at the same time, still be offering the same kind of thing.

You know, the same, but then it's not all the same thing though, is it? Because these Let Me Bore You To Sleep sessions are just boring. That's it. It's me talking for 40 minutes or 50 minutes or 52 minutes or 53 minutes or 54 minutes, sometimes 56 minutes.

I've done some for 57, 58, 59, over an hour. I've done some for over an hour, hour and four minutes sometimes. And I don't think I've ever gone over an hour and 10, but I might have done.

And so, yeah, I'm not sure. And this, if, yeah, I might have done, but I used to really enjoy reading those books. And I think the, once I moved on from the big generation, because that was more like 40s, 50s, 60s era, and Charles Bukowski was more, well, he was still that era, but he was still more, I think he probably got more famous, more well-known more in like the 80s, 70s and 80s.

And so I've listened to some of his live stuff as well. So he used to, I used to own some tapes and some CDs and stuff of him doing, like reading his poetry in front of, I think he used to go to universities around America and do poetry readings and get paid for doing it. And I think what he used to do is just sit at a table at the front and just get drunk whilst reading his poems.

And he also made recordings as well, where he'd, I think he would have just read the poems at home or some home recordings. So I had those too. And I think there's something different if you, from reading the poem on the paper, to really listening to him or to the person that wrote the poem, reading it, especially if they were to explain what the poem's about, or how the poem came about, or what the purpose was, or maybe what influenced it, or where they were at the time of writing that particular poem.

But then reading it without that information can also have a different effect, because then I would probably read the poem and attach it to myself, or connect it to my life, which could be therapeutic or useful or not dependent. So I suppose it's nice to have both versions. Sometimes if I read a poem by somebody and I know their voice, I do read it in their voice, I hear it in their voice.

And it's hard not to, especially with someone like Charles Bukowski, because he had a very distinctive voice. And I suppose in the same way, if you were to read, you know, if you had a transcript of this session, this recording, and if you've been listening to me for a while, you know, I know some people have been listening to me, you know, since 2006, online, and if you read it, you might end up reading it and sort of hearing my voice as you read it. I do that as well.

If I was going to read something by Kenneth Williams, for example, or John Major, who used to be Prime Minister here, I do recognize voices. I'm sure maybe everyone does, I don't know, but I'm not comparing myself to those that do or to Kenneth Williams. But I just sometimes I hear a voice and I recognize it.

It might be maybe a voice on maybe a film, an animated film. And I don't know who's in the film, I don't know the voices. And I, oh, I know that voice.

So I've got an ear for voices. I know when I used to work in sales, in insurance, and people didn't believe me. And not that I worked in sales, because I sat next to them, of course they believed me.

But I used to say to people, you know what, sometimes I'll get a phone call from somebody and I recognize them. I recognize their voice. And I haven't spoken to them for maybe a month or two months.

And I said, no, no, no, no, they didn't believe it. But actually, it's true. Sometimes I would remember the person.

So someone would call up and I said, oh, and I'd remind them of something that we spoke about. So maybe I said, oh, you collect hats, don't you? You collect hats. And sometimes they'd say, oh, how do you remember? I said, yeah.

Oh, you used to, you lost all your money in Vegas, didn't you? Yeah, it's probably not something to remind someone of. But, you know, it's, I don't know why, it's about voices. It triggers.

So like, when I was a counselor, I didn't need to remember their voice because they were sitting in front of me. But I didn't need to check people's notes, like from previous sessions, because as soon as they sat down and started talking, everything that it's previously said came back to me. It's like it was, it was all kind of sealed away.

And then it was available for me. And I was, I remembered without having to look at what was previously said. Even though we kept notes, and generally what, not everything that was said, but just a general outline of the session.

And I quite like that. I don't know how useful it is. Another thing I've noticed is, I notice when people are lying to me, because when someone tells me a lie, not so much if it's the first time they've lied, and I don't know.

But when someone says something that is different to what they've previously said to me, even if it was a year ago, it triggers the memory. And I remember, it's just like the, it's a bit like, you know, like the game operation. It's like that, like the buzzer goes off.

And it's like, oh, it's a little fib there. But it's not always lies. Sometimes, I know sometimes it's just the memory, you know, or exaggeration.

I try not to exaggerate. If I do exaggerate, or I do like to make things up, I generally tell people that I've made it up. So that it's not a lie.

So sometimes I'll exaggerate and I think, oh, wait a minute. And I say, I'm sorry, I didn't really climb Mount Everest. I made it up.

And I just, and I just, you know, I have to correct it. So I don't want to, I don't want to sort of be known as a liar, really. I'm not, it's not really my thing.

I don't, it's quite nice to not always tell the truth. Because there are times when that's not always the greatest idea. Especially if someone's asking you to judge them on their appearance.

And, you know, I try to avoid those situations. Because I don't like to lie. But at the same time, I don't want to say anything that upsets people.

So I remember my sister. It was at my brother's wedding. And my sister was wearing a dress or something.

And I was unfortunately wearing a suit. So I could never really, never see the point of that. But so she's my sister.

I remember actually, because I went through this room, and it's like it's got a table and chairs, but I don't think they really use it that much. Maybe they do, just not when I'm there. But then I'm not there that often.

So how would I know? They have sometimes used it when I'm there. So I have eaten at that table. Yeah, not for a while, though.

It usually just seems to be envelopes, like letters, and somewhere they just put their letters. But anyway, I walked through there into the kitchen. And my sister was there with a dress on.

And she says, how do I look? And I said, I don't care. And I just like, well, because I don't, I just like, how do you look? I find it hard to do the fake. Oh, you look lovely.

You look beautiful. You look there's never been a more beautiful dress in the whole world. Because I didn't feel that.

And I didn't, and it'd be fake to say it. So it's like, yeah, just look like you're wearing a dress. And she looked fine.

This just, I struggle with that. I should have just, it wasn't me being horrible. I just, I just didn't, I didn't care how she looked.

She's, she's my sister, you know, I care about her anyway, I don't, it wouldn't bother me if she was wearing a seagull on her head. You know, this is just, doesn't make any difference to me. And I've been out even when I was at, yeah, I've been out with friends.

And most of my friends are women, or have been over the years. And I get on generally much more with women than with men. And I think it's because I'm probably, maybe I'm just very feminine.

I don't know. Maybe I look feminine. And so in the past, I've had a lot of female friends.

And sometimes we'd go out for a meal, or go out to the pub with them, and I'd be the only man. And I remember on a few occasions, they're like paying so many compliments to each other. Oh, you look so beautiful.

You look so beautiful. And like, doesn't she look beautiful, Jason? And I'd say, I don't care. What do I care if she looks beautiful or not? Doesn't make any difference to me how you look.

You're my friend. I'm not, I don't judge you on how you look. It doesn't affect me at all.

I've got no interest in that. In the same way, I wouldn't say anything horrible either. I wouldn't, you know, I wouldn't sort of say, well, actually, you look fine, but your eyebrows could have done a little bit more work.

I'm not going to say stuff like that, because I'm not an expert on eyebrows. And it's, you know, I don't want to have anyone to be upset. But on the same side, I don't do the over-enthusiastic falseness of, wow, you look like a princess.

That's amazing. If I start doing that, I know that if eventually it'd get boring for the person, if I was like that all the time with them. Oh, you look amazing.

I can't believe it. You're dressed up and they're beautiful. You look so great.

It's like, Jason, shut up. We're at a funeral. You know, I know that it could be over the top sometimes.

And, you know, oh, your makeup's wonderful. It's like, you could be a professional makeup designer. You could be a professional makeup artist.

Jason, I'm trying to do the poo. I'm on the toilet. Leave me alone.

This is kind of just one of those, I'm not bothered how other people look. It doesn't really affect me. It doesn't interest me.

And if you're walking down the street, whatever you're wearing, it doesn't matter. I don't see, it seems to be this big thing about how people look. And the only person I'm interested in how they look is someone that I want to be intimate with.

Or, you know, I'd be the only person that I would be interested in how they look. Anyone else, it doesn't matter, really. And that's how I seem to be.

And I'll give you a, oh, this is a little story. And I was about, I don't know the month, but it was 1991. And this person I was working with, he was actually the other side of the room, big, big room.

And he was working on one of the machines, I was working on another machine. And he kept shouting insults to me. And he was quite a lot older than me.

He was probably in his 40s, probably heading towards 50. And I was like 21. And he kept hurling things about my appearance.

And it wasn't flattering. It was quite very unnecessary. And something that I imagine he wouldn't have done had we not been in a safe work environment.

So he kept doing it. And I couldn't quite work out why. So this is the clean version.

I said to him, do you want to make love to me? And he said, well, I'll give you the clean version of what he said. Basically, no. I said, in that case, why do you care what I look like? And he did look quite puzzled.

I think I made it a fair point. It really doesn't matter. And even then, it might not matter.

But that's the only reason it could ever matter, really, how someone looks, is if you're going to be kissing them. Other than that, I say kissing, but other than that, perhaps holding hands, stroking their fingers, I don't know, whatever young people do these days. Got flies in the air today.

Flies are everywhere. That's why I clean the carpet. What part of it? Like a patch test, really.

Clean part of the carpet. If the flies don't go, then I'll clean more of it. But if the flies leave, then I'll just leave the rest of the carpet.

I'm going to do a bit of carpet every day. Sometimes doing a little bit every day actually leads to something being completed. Sometimes it doesn't.

So I kind of moved towards self-help books in 90, it wasn't really 97, because I was into them a little bit, probably 95. So from 92 to 95, I had quite a nice collection of books, poetry, philosophy, some psychology stuff, Buddhism, Zen, Taoism, you know, so it's quite, for me, it's all kind of the same kind of stuff. Emotional thinking about stuff, maybe being able to step back and maybe analyse, maybe a bit of analysis, a bit of observing myself.

Something that I couldn't really do when I was around other people, but I can do when I'm on my own. Very much, even when I was younger, I used to be a bit full on sometimes. And I couldn't seem to control what I said.

And I was always pulling myself up and telling myself off. But I seemed to keep going back, reverting back to that behaviour. And you know, when I was on my own though, when I was at home, I was able to be reflective and a lot calmer.

And in a way, I preferred that side of me sometimes. So I had this book collection and I lost it. I've lost my book collections quite a few times over the years.

Not just through... because I've moved around so much. I've ended up living in tiny little rooms. Sometimes I've left books in the rooms when I've left.

You know, I've moved out and I've left stuff there. Sometimes I've asked someone to look after something and then I've lost the stuff or lost contact with that person. Other times I have an itchy armpit.

That's lovely, isn't it? Or sometimes I... I remember in 1995, I was putting my... all my belongings into black bags, including my books. And I had... I always seemed to buy quite expensive books because they were... I say expensive, but you know, I'm thinking back in 90... in the 90s, 93, 94. I was spending sometimes 30, 20, 20, 30 pounds for a book because they were quite rare.

Some of the quite rare books... rare as in unpopular, I suppose. There wasn't many available. And Foils used to be a book in London bookstore.

I think it's still there. It's a bit more up to date now, but at the time it was... there was books that had been on the shelves for probably 30, 40 years. So, you know, and there's... the price was in pencil on the inside sleeve.

So I used to collect them. Not the inside sleeves, but the books I used to collect. And they, you know, I was never interested in hypnosis at that time.

And in 97, I got interested in what I needed, actually. Self-help. I needed help, basically.

So self-help was really the... one of the main options. And it's probably possibly one of the options in some ways, because we have to want to help ourselves as well as asking for help. Also, you know, I guess that's a cliche, and it's also a hard thing to do as well sometimes, is asking for help can be really difficult.

I find it less difficult now than I used to. That's why it took so long for me to get my own home. Because I never asked for help before.

I never... never sort of felt that I was... you know, it just never happened. But now, I don't mind asking so much, compared to how I used to be. That was a chair, by the way.

It wasn't a squeaky fart. It was a chair. The chair.

The only chair that I've got. I'm thinking of getting a different chair. I'm thinking of lots of things.

Doesn't mean it's going to happen. I decided what I really need is a Macintosh laptop. So is it a MacBook or something? I need to get... but they're too expensive, so I can't afford to buy one.

But I need something that... and the only... the reason that everything I've got isn't for my pleasure, that's the thing. It's for... so I can make better videos, better audios, better editing. But it's also the safety of Apple's products are safe.

You know, internet-wise, I can't... I'm not going to get hacked, because I was recently had a hacking issue with my laptop, and my email address, and all that stuff. And the software, if you get a Mac, and everything's on there, the video editing, and... so I'd quite like to get something like that, so I can make nicer videos, and... yeah, just... I'd like to be able to do this forever. Not just these, Let Me Bore You To Sleep, because I do... I do also want to do the hypnosis stuff, because I've got a passion for that.

It's a passion that is there. It waits sometimes. Wait, is that a real word? It reduces at times, but it keeps coming back.

It's still there. And it's the only thing that's stuck with me, as far as an interest, my whole life, you know, my whole life for the last 20 years, anyway. And it was January 1998 that I bought my first two hypnosis books.

And they were both introduction to hypnosis. And they were both really, really good books. They still are really, really good books.

One was green, and one was blue. And at that time, I already had quite... that I've been collecting since 2007, 2006. Like self-help books, brain mapping, books on creativity.

I was very interested in that, and very much... Yeah, I was interested in reading some of the classics, you know, like The Seagull, was it Jeremy something Seagull, and The Alchemist, and reading Anthony Robinson's, Anthony Robbins' books, Awaken the Child Within, and those huge books, big old books. They weren't big as in they were thick, very many pages. That's what I mean.

I'm not comparing myself to Anthony Robbins, but they were big books. And I started listening to his tapes. And he was talking about NLP.

So, I started, you know, started getting interested in hypnosis in January 98. And all it is, is I've been looking at these books. I've got a tendency sometimes, especially if I go to a regular place, I look at something and maybe it might take me a year before I buy it.

It might take me a few months, might take me a few weeks. It might be the same day, you know, sometimes I look at something and go away and then come back, and not be sure if it's something that I want. And then the first computer I ever had, I bought in about 98, 99, and probably 98.

I didn't touch it for a year. I bought it. And I thought, what am I going to do with this? I didn't have any internet.

The internet wasn't really... much was happening internet-wise at that time. So, I didn't do anything. And then come about 99, 2000, the internet really sort of started to get popular.

And then I started learning how to build websites. And web pages, and then learn how to build websites using the code HTML, or HTM and then HTML. But that was in 2000.

So, I started using the computer when I had a reason to. Because, you know, it's a tool to be used. I'm not comparing myself to the computers, but I'm just saying it's a tool to be used.

For me, that's how I felt about it. And, you know, back then, even when the internet did start, it took ages just for one picture to appear on the screen. It was all so slow.

And it was miraculous, but it was a slow miracle. You know, even the most amazing magic trick, you know, like David Copperfield. So, you know, if he made... didn't he make the Golden Gate Bridge disappear or something? It was amazing.

But if it had taken, like, three hours to happen, it would have been less amazing. You know, it's something... I'm not comparing myself to David Copperfield or the bridge, but it's something about... the internet was slow. It was really slow.

And I think it was quite weird because I'd see the picture on the screen, like a little picture. So, I knew what the picture was going to be. So, maybe it was a picture of Donald Duck as an example, because those were the... Generally, I imagine a lot of the pictures that people would download back then would have been Disney pictures.

I'm sure that was probably the most popular kind of pictures that people would download and want to look at on the internet. So, but I'd be, like, in anticipation of the picture, even though I knew it was going to be Donald Duck. And then when Donald Duck appeared on the screen with his little hat, little rucksack, you know, holding whatever he was holding.

And I'm not comparing myself to Donald Duck. I'm just saying his take could just be so slow to come up. And I'd be surprised because I'd forgotten what it was, what picture was coming up.

It's... Yeah, it's amazing. But anyway, I got into hypnosis. I bought these books and didn't read them straight away.

I'll be honest with you, I didn't read them straight away. But I was intrigued. I was intrigued, but not intrigued enough to commit to reading them.

Because, you know, I always thought, oh, hypnosis, it's the stuff you see on television, Paul McKenna on stage, telling people what to do and, you know, all that stuff. And I'm not comparing myself to Paul McKenna. I'm just saying that I used to... I wasn't really sure about it.

But I think some people still have that idea about maybe hypnosis being like stage hypnosis. And I remember my friend gave me a leaflet. And he said, and it was a leaflet for NLP training, so Neural Linguistic Programming.

And I thought, oh, but then I saw the price of it. And I thought, well, maybe, you know, Christmas is coming up. Do a few extra shifts.

Maybe I can get the money together. I thought, hmm. So what I did is I booked it.

It was a practitioner. No, no, that's not how it happened. No, this was for an NLP course.

And I didn't go on this one. But then I started going online to find out about NLP, bought some books. That's it.

So this was 1998. And then I went on a course. It was at the University, London University, City University, that's it.

City University in East London. And I went there and did an evening course, the introduction to NLP. I went along.

I really liked it. I think it was on a Tuesday evening. Or it might have been on Thursday evening.

Or it might be both. Because there was three terms. So maybe one of the terms is on a Tuesday evening.

And the other term was on a Thursday evening. Or the other term, the first one might be on a Thursday, the second on a Tuesday. I'm not comparing myself to a Tuesday evening.

I'm just saying that it's, it was a real, it was an interesting thing because I went there with some knowledge. And I also learned stuff as well. Because with NLP, hypnosis is part of it.

It's a collection of different ideas that came together to form that particular thing called NLP. So hypnosis, family therapy, and linguistics kind of came together to form a maybe gestalt therapy as well, to be fair, and a few other bits to form this NLP. And after doing the City University course, a long, long time ago, 10, 20 years ago, I started, I did the practitioner in NLP in 1999.

Then I went on to do the master practitioner in NLP. And then I did the hypnosis course. So hypnosis training, and I continued to buy books, collect books.

I travel all over the place, all over London to specialist bookshops to buy, because quite often, hypnosis books would just be on the shelf and be left there, and they wouldn't be touched. Because some of them were very academic, not really, not for your average Harry Potter reader. You know, they're not, they're not, not very fantasy.

It's not that kind of pleasurable reading that you'd get with Harry Potter. Or, yeah, it's very, I like, I prefer academic-y reads, not because I'm an academic, it's just, I like things to just be plain, and to the point, and like reading-wise. A bit like me, I'm not comparing myself to me, but I like to, you know, I just get straight to the point, as you've probably noticed, listening to me.

You know, I don't, I like to beat around the bush. I just like to, you know, get, so that's why the kind of books I like to read, things where I can learn something from, something where I could just improve my knowledge about a specific thing. That specific thing being hypnosis.

So I've bought lots of books, lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of books, read lots and lots and lots and lots of books. I did quite a few different trainings, actually, over the time. And I never, I never felt the confidence to do hypnosis with somebody, you know.

I did see a few people, I did do hypnosis with people, a fan, you know, a few people, not a lot. And it wasn't really till 2004 when I really had that itch that I was wanting to just get out there and see what I could do. So the knowledge, I had some experience, but it was more knowledge-based, more academic, in a sense.

I'd also watched lots of videos, DVDs, therapists, you know, people doing hypnosis and NLP and, you know, listen to audios, listen to lectures, you know, lots of stuff like that. So 2004, I launched my free pain relief service where I was living, and I got no interest at all, but I did do some hypnosis with a few people that I knew for relaxation, mainly. And then in 95, I went on another hypnosis course.

But this, after that, I felt more confident within myself to just get out there and do it. So I relaunched my free hypnosis pain relief in 2006, and for some reason it took off. And I was getting people, I was seeing people every week, and it was going really well, going really well.

I started working, doing hypnosis at two charities. One was an alcohol charity, one was a rehab for drugs and alcohol, and I used to do group sessions, lead relaxation sessions for both of these different charities, as well as, you know, one of them I used to do hypnosis with the people, doing different things like helping them with confidence, with relaxation, with the, you know, with the addictions and whatever. So I used to do different things there as well.

And then in 2006, I started putting my mp3s onto the internet, and I started making videos. And here I am, 12 years later, making another video. So that's kind of the end, really, I think, of this particular session.

I'm going to watch some television, I think. I don't really know what's on. It's Wednesday night.

So this has been Let Me Fall Into Sleep, number whatever. I hope that the volume has been okay, because this microphone is, so that's about 14 inches away from my mouth. So there's another fly there.

It's not too far away from my mouth, hopefully. It's been listenable-ish. I'm going to try and get some, a thing off Amazon, which the microphone plugs in, and I should be able to, it should work okay.

But if this works, I might not need to. Anyway, but I'm never going to be shouting, you know, I never, it's always going to be softly spoken, because that's how I talk. Unless we were in a field, and you were on the other side of the field, then I'd have to talk louder.

But I don't like talking loudly. I like talking softly, you know. It's just what feels comfortable to me.

It's a bit chilly now as well. I have to turn the heating on. So I'm going to go thank you again to everyone, especially to those of you that left me a message yesterday, or you know, that I replied to, and to the last few days.

It's been really, really lovely. Thank you. I do appreciate that, because I think I need to know that what I'm doing is useful.

You know, it might sound silly, but I don't, I'm not doing this because I'm bored. There are other things I could be doing. You know, I could be playing with Lego, or building sandcastles.

I don't know, something, I'm not comparing myself to a sandcastle. I'm saying I could be doing other things. I'm doing this with the intention of doing something useful to help other people, to help you.

And I know that some people maybe would watch this and listen to this and think, what the heck? You're just talking about yourself. And it's just, why? Why? Why? You may even be holding a flower pot, saying why? The thing is, there's a reason to it. And those, it's just about boredom.

It's about just drifting away and having that safety to just let go. And sometimes it can be a comforting thing. It can be, you know, there are people that don't get to speak to anybody, don't get to hear anybody's voice.

And as I said earlier, because I do regular sessions, it's the same voice, but I'm saying different things each time. So it's not just the same thing all the time. Although it is partly.

So I'm going to go now. Thank you very much for watching and for listening. Please leave a beautiful comment.

And please like and subscribe if you wanted to subscribe. And I shall probably make another session very, very soon. Bye-bye.

Lots of love.