#388 Let me bore you to sleep - Jason Newland (3rd May 2020)

Hello and welcome to jasonnewland.com. My name is Jason Newland. This is Let Me Bore You To Sleep. Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes.

Do I say anything else normally? I can't remember. I can't even remember. It's weird.

I haven't made a recording for probably... The 30th was the last time. It's now Sunday the... Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Sunday the 3rd.

So I think the last recording I did was Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. So it's three or four days, which isn't a lot really, but I'm used to doing these pretty much every day. I've now forgotten what to do.

I've forgotten how to do them. What do I normally do? I normally talk about something. I don't know.

I don't know. Anyway, I hope you're all well and keeping safe and healthy. I'm trying to do my best to do that as well.

And taking Andre out every day, once a day. I usually find a nice sort of time when there's no one around. Not that there's... There shouldn't really be anyone around anyway, but there's a lot of dog walkers.

There's a lot of people that have dogs. If you've got a dog, you've got to take your dog out every day because they do need the exercise. They also need to go to the toilet.

But not everybody with a dog has a garden. And so yeah, luckily I live in the countryside, which is a great place to have dogs. I don't have a dog, but you know, if I did have a dog.

But Andre, technically I don't have to take him out, but he insists on going out. I mean, he's equal, but he's probably worse than any dog I've ever known. I've lived with one, two, three, four.

I've lived with four dogs. I've lived with, for years, I've lived with each of these dogs. And even when they need to go out desperately, go to the toilet, nothing, the commotions, nothing compared to what Andre's like.

He just doesn't stop. The only thing, he doesn't make the voice sound because he's, you know, he doesn't bark because he's not a dog. And he doesn't go moo either.

You know, he's lots of different things. A lot of animal sounds he doesn't make. But where am I going with this? I don't know.

Oh, my squeaky chair. I have to sit in this chair. Normally I sit in the other chair to make these recordings because this chair is so squeaky.

But due to the internet, the wireless being so slow now, I had to, in order for me to use my laptop and upload audios to my website, I had to plug via the ethernet lead directly from the internet portal, whatever you call it, directly into the laptop. Because there was literally no, no speed, no power, nothing. And even though the laptop's on, I'm doing nothing with the laptop.

I went on to Netflix on the telly. The pictures didn't even come up. The speed's so low when it's plugged into the laptop.

So there's a general, it just gives you an idea of how slow the wireless is on its own, which is what I was using for the laptop and what I use for my phone. I got onto the phone and just so slow. And I can only put that down to everybody in the country using the internet all at the same time.

And I can't really complain about that because what else are people supposed to do? I mean, if anything, really this time of the year, or even if it was summer, people spend less time indoors, don't they? So especially the weekends and stuff, but not, not now. So it's a bit frustrating because trying to, I don't know if I mentioned it, those that haven't listened to me before, this is going to mean nothing to you, but then it's not supposed to. It's just me blabbering on about stuff.

But those that have listened before, firstly, I want to say thank you to Rachel and to Boston Chickie for your kindness. Thank you to both of you. And so I was, yeah, I made a lot of changes to my website last weekend and I deleted lots of my podcasts.

Well, I deleted most of my actual podcasts, the whole thing, but only the, the ones that I didn't think anyone was really listening to. And the ones that were remaining, which was about five, I deleted most of the recordings, apart from the last 10, like the most latest ones. There was a reason behind it, but I'm bit of a blur.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. Anyway, and it's not the first time I've done it either. It is the first, yeah, it's not, it's not the first time.

So what I've did this week is I re-uploaded all of the recordings on a let me bore you to sleep, the deep sleep whisper, relaxation for stress and the sleep hypnosis weekly podcasts. So they're all re-uploaded and back to normal. It took a little while for iTunes to put everything back to how it was, but it is now.

It's all, everything's exactly how it was before on all the different podcasts, you know, Castbox, Spreaker, Spotify, Stitcher, you know, all those ones all back as before, but there are a lot less podcasts as in the courses that I had. So for example, the short relaxation hypnosis course, the short pain relief hypnosis course, hypnotic buffet, healing words, hypno chats, all those things that wasn't really getting much in a way of people listening to them. I had a few, I probably had a few hundred a week, if that.

So I got rid of them and I've made them available on my website to download as bulk downloads for free. So they're there on my website. So you can, the way I've got my website now is you've got at the top, you've got the top podcasts, which is bore you to sleep, deep sleep, whisper, relaxation, stress, and sleep weekly, that one.

So those four. Then below that, there's the latest recordings. But what I'm probably going to do this at the moment is like a playlist that you can stream.

I might get rid of that once I've updated everything. And I have a list of the latest recordings, you know, but I haven't updated, I've not got enough on there yet to do that. So below that, the playlist, which you can just play all of the recordings, pretty much 700 or something.

Below that is a list of top bulk downloads, which is the let me bore you to sleep, deep sleep, whisper, relaxation for stress. They were on there anyway before. And they're broken into downloads of 50 sessions in each one.

And they're free as well. So you can download them. I couldn't do any more than 50 because the files would be just too big.

Generally. And it's not completely true. I probably could put like maybe 60 or 63, 70.

But I figured I'd do it in 50s because it makes it a little bit easier. And it is manageable as far as uploading them from my side. And hopefully manageable for you if you're downloading them.

So it doesn't take up too much space. And then underneath that on the website, I've got bulk courses, bulk downloads. So I've got all my courses that are no longer, well there's a couple still on online and the smoking one and the different things.

But so I've got, oh yeah, also next to the top downloads, I've got chronic pain. So all my chronic pain relief sessions, they're all in one download. All my relaxation sessions, hypnosis sessions, all in one big bulk download.

And there's over a hundred of those. And the sleep hypnosis recordings, all these are from the past. Everything's from the past, isn't it? And so the chronic pain, sleep hypnosis, relaxation hypnosis, and self-help hypnosis.

So I've got those four downloads as well. And they're all fairly big files. So that's in with the top bulk downloads.

Underneath that is the courses. And they've got little headers before, you know, bulk download courses or courses bulk download or something. I forget.

The laptop's too far. I can't actually see it from here. I can see the laptop.

I just can't see the screen. Yeah. So and in the courses, I've got chronic pain courses, relaxation, sleep courses, chatting, you know, smoking.

And I think that's it. That might be, yes, probably about it. So you click on one of those.

And so you click on the relaxation courses, and then a bunch of, it goes to a different page and a bunch of courses comes up. And you can download each one if you choose for free. And it's a bulk download, but they're not big files.

Most of them. Most of them are kind of not particularly big. The only big ones would be probably the chatting ones.

So if you've got the sleep hypnosis ones, click on that. You've got seven days sleep hypnosis, cure, fall asleep, counting sheep, in bed with Jason, you know, random things like that. And you've got the pain one.

You know, so it's different ones, different section. With the chatting, click on that one. And you've got the hypnotic buffet, a Jason live from his bedroom, whatever that was.

And you've got the hypno chats and healing words, or Jason's healing words. And another one I think is just called healing. One's called healing words, and one's called Jason Newland's healing, or something.

Now they're bigger files, because the, I think the hypnotic buffet is like 31 recordings. And some of them are quite long. And the hypno chats, I think that's quite a big file as well.

But not big, big, like one gigabyte or something. Or some over maybe two gigabytes. So it's quite not big, big, but you know, bigger than most of the other courses.

So that was boring, wasn't it? Wow, I definitely live up to my title as the most boring man in the world. I am in the process of reuploading all of the recordings for the top podcast section. So the Let Me Boy The Sleep one, at the time of this recording, there's 204 uploaded out of 380 odd.

So still a few left to do. And there's 50 deep sleep whisper uploaded out of over 200. So there's you know, got some more to do on that one.

50 of the relaxation for sleep out of 100 and I don't I've uploaded all of them, because there's 39. But there's a few that are actually got two versions, one with music, one without. So all the sleep hypnosis weekly ones are uploaded.

So they're available to download. I'm hoping, but it's hard to really be honest, not honest, but I'd like to have it all done by the end of tomorrow or by the end of today. It's so boring.

It's beyond boring. Because it is just a case of copy, create a new file, or create a new product. So copy the title, paste it in, put an image in, unclick three boxes, click another two boxes, make sure it goes into the correct collection, save, and then upload the file, which takes a few minutes to upload.

And then back again to do the next one. It's just hours and hours and hours and hours to do it. And I can't watch anything on the internet while I'm doing it either.

So I can't even watch a movie or watch something on Netflix. Because nothing works when I'm doing uploading. It doesn't really work even when it's just not when it's plugged into laptop, the lead, when I'm actually uploading something, nothing works.

And that's the way it always is anyway. Whenever I'm uploading something, all the energy from the internet seems to be used for that upload. Oh dear.

But then it makes sense. You think I'm uploading, I feel I've got over a hundred gigabytes, gigabytes. I've got a lot, a heck of a lot of, yeah, I've got a lot of stuff that I've been uploading lately.

So I've been doing this all week long, which is why I haven't made any recordings partly. Because I'm a little bit embarrassed really that I kind of made those changes and now I'm undoing the changes or re-redoing the changes wherever you want to word it to make things back how they were. Although the website is now better than it was because people can now download the courses as bulk.

Don't need to, I don't think anyone really needs to download an individual recording for those ones because they're only, although, I don't know, maybe I should have them as individual as well. Or perhaps I'll just put a playlist embedded. So for those that don't want to actually download it, or they want to listen to one first, you can just listen to whichever one you want.

I don't know, that means making another podcast. Also, I'm going to make it easier for those that want to use my website to download recordings by, you can do it like the way it has been where, you know, you put your details in and, you know, and that's a good way and it can be quite good because you can collect lots of ones together and, you know, do it that way and you get a link sent to your email address. I'm also going to have another link embedded, including a player like it was before, so you can play the recording, stream it for free, but underneath it'll be a download here with an arrow, big red arrow.

You click on that and it'll instantly download to your, I don't know, your computer, your laptop or your phone or your tablet or wherever it is. Just instantly download. So I'm going to be doing that, but that's the next step once I've updated everything.

And that's going to take a while. To do. So that should be completed by the end of this week, I hope.

Yeah. I've tested it out. I didn't know how to do it because it just is quite complicated to try and figure a way of just to press, make one click and it instantly downloads to your, you know, to your device.

I'm going to figure out how to do it. There are ways of doing it by getting a link from, you know, keep it, let's say storing it on OneDrive or Google Drive or something. There's different places.

I'm not sure about Google Drive if they offer this, but some of them that you pay for the service, they give you a link which you can put onto your website. And when it's clicked, you know, you put a banner or a little logo, a little picture, when it's clicked on that link, it just automatically downloads it without taking you to another page or anything like that. I figured a way to do it without going through that process.

So, you know, it just took me a while to kind of, a little light bulb moment came. And so, yeah, it works well. So I'm going to be doing that.

So what I think I'll do is once I've uploaded all the new stuff, or right up to the latest stuff, I'll then add maybe the last month stuff into the latest, you know, so for the latest page, and have a like a picture, a little latest box you can click on as well, on the on the page, under top podcasts, something like that. I said something like that quite a lot today, haven't I? Yes, I have. And then I'll start adding the players, the streaming, so you can stream the recording on the website, plus the download link that you can just click to instantly download.

I'll start doing it backwards, starting from the very latest recording, going back on each of the ones so that it's there, you know, for, I don't know, just it seems to make sense to do it that way. Or does it? I don't know. I don't, I don't, I don't know.

But it's going to be cool when it's done. And it will be better than what it was before. It's really weird, I always go back when I say a sentence like that, go back to the late 70s with a bionic man who will be stronger than he was before.

He will run faster than he did before. He will see better than he did before, with at least one eye. You know, his arm will be stronger.

I'm not going to tell him which one, but one of them will be stronger. But we won't tell him that. We're going to find out his own way.

We know it's his right hand, his right arm, and he's right handed. We're not going to tell him it's extra strong. Let him find out in his own time.

So yeah, it's, I'm fed up with the website though. I don't want to look at it anymore. I've been uploading and making new stuff like all day long, all day and all night.

It's just, oh, please no more. I had my Amazon deliveries come through on, what day was it? Basically the last three days I've had Amazon deliveries because I bought a bunch of stuff because I can't get deliveries from the supermarkets because I'm not on their list. I can't believe it.

I thought, you know, I stopped going to nightclubs a long time ago. You know, I've been told you can't come in because you're not on the list, but one of the strippers. Oh, sorry, Jason.

I didn't recognize you without your bask. So I, to be told you're not on the list, you can't get deliveries. But Amazon, no such problem.

I mean, I reckon whoever owns Amazon, they deserve a pay rise. I hope they're getting paid well. Oh dear.

I don't know why people like Bezos. You know, those people that have got a hundred billion dollars. Why don't they just start buying up countries? I mean, literally buying up the countries, buying up, just take over a few countries.

Not like militarily, but just say, look, I'm going to want to be in control now. I'll make sure that every single person in this country gets fed, has medical attention. We'll build the best hospitals, everything.

All I got to do is work in my factory. Well, we have the base here. Well, you know, he could just, he could be the most, he could literally could be the most powerful person on the planet.

He could own half the world. Wow. I think that's what I'd do.

I don't know. A hundred billion. I mean, he will be the first trillionaire, won't he, I guess.

I don't even know what a trillion is. I know that a million, I used to think a million million was a billion, but it's not, is it? It's a thousand million is a billion. I'm talking about when I was, I'm talking about last year.

I used to think a million million. Does that make sense? A hundred hundred is a thousand. No.

Ten, okay, sorry. Ten hundred. Ten hundreds is a thousand.

A hundred thousands. Ten ones is ten. Ten tens is a hundred.

Ten hundreds is a thousand. That's kind of, and then it starts to go weird because ten thousands is just ten thousands. And a hundred thousand and a thousand thousands is a million.

So I figured if a thousand thousand was a million, a million million would be a billion. To me, that would make sense, but of course it's not. So a thousand thousand thousand.

It's not that much really when you think about it. See a thousand pounds, which is a little bit more than what I've got, but realistically that's a minimum wage. That's a month take on minimum wage in this country.

So a thousand pounds. So just a thousand of them, and you're a millionaire. So we've got to do is a thousand months.

So how many, how many years would that take? So you've got a thousand. So you've got 12 months in a year, 12. 12 times, 12 into a thousand.

Let's do 10 into a thousand and get more of an idea and then we can, 10 into a thousand is, that's a hundred, isn't it? It's a 12. So you look at the, I'm just like guessing, but about 80, 85 years, maybe, and you've got a million. But a billion is only a thousand million.

If you say it nice and quickly, it's hardly anything. So I don't know what a billion is. Is a billion a thousand million? Is a trillion rather? Is a trillion a thousand billion? Or the trillion a million billion? Or is it a billion billion? I don't know.

I know it's all to do with the noughts, isn't it? Mind you, old Bezos, Jeff, I like to call him JJ. No, he likes to call me JJ, but I always say, oh, can I call you JJ? He said, no. He said, you realize you turn that around, it's BJ.

And we laughed. And just because he's the richest man in the world now, don't mean he will be in five years time. Because six years ago, he wasn't even in the top 10.

Wasn't even in the top 10. Because he didn't make any money until, he had money, but he didn't become hugely rich until his company went onto the stock market, or floated, or whatever they call it, went public. Because Amazon was actually running at a loss for 20 years or something.

With investment, billions and billions of dollars investment. And it turns out, I think he owns something like 13% of the company. Maybe it's 16%, but it's very, very small amount.

Because all these investors have just taken huge amounts of it. Yeah, even with that tiny amount, like 13%, let's say, for example, you know, if you see someone get 13% of a company, you think, oh, I want more than that. I want more than that.

But that's worth 100 billion. For example, I don't know. I'm not sure if it's exactly because his money's built up, isn't it, over the years.

But so someone came along and bought all those other shares. Because I think he's got still got the majority stake. He's the boss.

But if other people came along and bought 15%, got 15% together, they could kick him out. Kick him out of his own company. I only know this because I saw it in Dallas.

I learned a lot about that whole thing. I don't know how much of it's true. And it happened with Apple man, didn't it? He got kicked out of his own company that he created.

He didn't have the... I don't know. I think once it goes to stocks, I don't even know if even if you've got the full shares, if the board decide to kick you out, they can, I think. I don't know.

I hope it never happens to me. I'll wait a minute. It can't because I don't know any money.

I forgot. I was living in a different parallel universe then for a second. A trillion.

I wonder who'll be the next person. The next big thing to... I don't know. I reckon it'll be something like AI, some artificial intelligence thing.

Whoever comes up with something that... well, they already are, aren't they? But I don't know. Something that's really going to improve the world or not. It seems to be that the money's in it.

It's something, if it makes things easier for people or it destroys things, that seems to be where the money is. So, someone could create some kind of chemical warfare where they could... how can they shut down the... not just, you know, hurt people, but also shut down economies all around the world, create some kind of virus or something. That'd be worth some money, wouldn't it? How would they test it, though? Do you need to test it before you could actually get any money out of it, prove it works? I don't know.

But yeah, there's something... because at the moment they've got the... in some places they've got carers with their robots and they've been using them in care homes, not all care homes, but some where... and they have... they're able to talk to their family via screen, probably a tablet or something. And you've got a... when you... you can't use the word tablet, though, with elderly people because they end up choking on it. It's like, no, it's not that kind of tablet.

Stop it, put it back. But I took some water. No, no, no.

It's... So, I wonder what else could... what else could there be money in? I did think about, you know, when this silliness is all over, I might start stocking up on toilet paper. I'm talking, like, buy... every week buy as much toilet paper as I can, stick it in the loft. I've got enough room in there for thousands of packs of toilet paper.

And, I don't know, sell it. If there was another shortage in the future, I'd be able to sort of sell it and get rich. Well, it doesn't really sit with me morally, to be fair.

I'd more than likely probably just give it away free. I wonder what it is. I'm trying to think, you know, my psychologist and various people, counselling, psychotherapy that I've had, like, as well as everybody else I've ever met.

So, I always ask, why don't I charge? Why don't I try and make money out of what I do, what I spend all my time doing? And I don't have an answer for it anymore. I used to have an answer. My answer was, it's free because it's a free service.

It was much easier when I was in my 30s to say that, because I had a job. You know, I was doing all right. But it's a bit weird now, like, oh, why is it free? I'm like, oh, for God, I'm not sure.

It's free because it's a free service, maybe? I think I've rebelled because people kept going on about, you should charge, you should try and make money out of this. And I didn't like it, didn't like their attitude. So, I just decided, no, no, no, no, no.

So, the more someone tells me to do something, the less of a chance I'm going to do it. And, you know, telling me that people don't appreciate something if they don't pay for it, that used to annoy me as well. I was like, no, you don't understand.

That's not the case. People appreciate what they appreciate, regardless of whether it costs money or not. If you watch a movie that you enjoy, you're going to enjoy it more if you've paid to rent it out or paid to stream it, compared to if someone's just lent you the DVD.

You're still going to enjoy the video. If you like the film, you're going to enjoy the film. I used to get bootleg, not bootleg, but cheap copied versions of albums when I was in my 20s.

And they were tape recorders, like tape, tape, you know, tapes, tape albums. It's like Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson, all that stuff. And again, they'd be three, four pound, five pound cheaper than in the shops.

So I just, yeah, I love that. I think something that'd be like a pound each or something. And I just buy a whole load of them.

I didn't enjoy them any less when I was at home listening to I Will Always Love You. You know, it was just as much enjoyment as it would have been had I got into a shop and spent money. Although I am reading a book, well, I'm listening to the audio of The Magic of Thinking Big, which is a book that I read many, many, many years ago.

Many, many, many, many, I'm talking probably, yeah, over 20 years ago. And it's kind of like a sales book, but it's not really just about sales. It's about thinking bigger than thinking small, you know.

I've already not, I've not explained it very well. It's called The Magic of Thinking Big, and it's about thinking big. Ah, okay.

I think I'll go and buy that now. You've sold it to me. It is good.

It's very motivational. So I do sort of wondering, because there's some things I do think about. You know, I'm okay as far as generally medical stuff.

You know, we've got the NHS here, and it doesn't cost anything. This squeaky chair. I'm fortunate to be in a country where the medication isn't really expensive to buy.

And so, you know, I'm lucky because I'm on one, two, three, four different medications. So that would cost quite a bit of money if I was, for example, if I was living in America, possibly Canada. I'm not sure if what the situation is, but some countries it would cost, or I just wouldn't be able to have the medication if I didn't have.

I think it's down to insurance as well though, isn't it? But I don't know enough about it. I just know a lot of people who I spoke to that live in America can't afford to get their medication because it's hundreds of dollars, which is, wow, it's hard to even imagine. But if something happened to Andre and I needed to take him to the vet, like in an emergency, I wouldn't be able to because they won't see.

I've got a vet locally, and they won't even let you in unless you pay a certain amount of money. See, my friend, he had a ferret as well, and he had these, I don't know, sort of lumps or whatever that he got from the garden, some kind of nits or mites or something, but they really, you know, really kind of seemed to be making him ill. Called up the vets, and they said, you come along, but it's going to cost you £180, and you have to pay it before we even see him, won't examine him or look at him or anything, unless you pay the £180 to start with, plus anything else, you know, medical treatment, medication, anything like that added on.

Wow. It was out of hours, to be fair, so that's probably why it was that much, but it still would cost money. And I just thought, whoa, I mean, I do my best, I do my best to keep him safe and healthy and stuff, but speak of the little monkey, and he arrives.

You know what, mate? He's out doing a wee wee. Well, he's going to have a drink of water. No, he's not, he's going to lick himself.

Okay, fair enough. What a lovely view. Now he's having a drink of water.

It is strange, it's like having a bit of wildlife in my living room, and he's completely ignores me, completely ignores me at times, completely. Sometimes he's all over me, doesn't leave me alone. Other times he'll just get up, he's asleep, gets up, runs over to the paper, does a wee wee or something, and other times he has a drink of water and maybe has a bit of food.

Sometimes he does a little parole, you know, goes into each of the rooms just to check that everything's fine. Goes into the bedroom, goes to the front door, has a little sniff under the front door, goes into the bed to the bathroom, opens the door up wide, has a look in there, goes into the kitchen, and then he goes and lays down again and gets into his little bedding. So he ignores me completely sometimes, just, I'm like, hello, I'm over here, I dressed up for nothing.

I just, uh, put all this effort into the meal, romantic music, candles, just ignore me. So he's, I don't know what I'd do in that situation if he needed like emergency help. Nothing, I guess.

I suppose I just have to, no, I suppose I just have to, however bad it sounds, probably go to the vets and just force the vet to, to sew him up or to look after him. And then get in trouble afterwards. But yeah, it's not something I'd want to do.

But I'd do pretty much anything to look after him and keep him okay. You see that in the news. Vet held up at gunpoint.

The man didn't want any money, he just wanted his, he wanted his ferret worming. He wanted flea powder. Oh dear.

So he's, hopefully he's going to be fine. He's not been falling over, because he went through a little phase of falling over, which was a bit weird. I think he probably hurt his leg and it was just a little bit weak, or maybe it hurt a bit when he was walking, so he'd just flop over.

But now he seems fine. I take him for long walks and he's very strong. He pulls against that lead and you'd think he was a lot bigger the way he pulls against it.

It's almost like a little dog, just heavier than him. He's really got some weight against it. It's a strong little thing.

But I suppose he's more determined than a dog is. I'm not sure, I'm sure some dogs are really determined, but he, I've never met an animal that's just so one-tracked mind. You know, especially when it's front door, he wants to get out of the flat, through the front door, or if I close the door in a living room and I'm trying to make a really quiet recording in the bedroom.

It's not going to happen if he wakes up, because it's scratch and scratch and scratching, and he doesn't stop. He's happy to do that for an hour or two hours. Sometimes he does it for a little while and he goes back to sleep, but if he's awake, he'll keep doing it.

He'll rip the carpet up, he'll keep scratching and scratching. You can hear him going, sniffing underneath the door, trying to get his nose under there. And then scratching.

And even inside my shed in the bedroom, you can still hear it. Even with all that outside coating on the shed that I put around there, I just still hear him scratching. The vibration comes through.

I think it's the whole flat, you can hear it. It's really like, I hope you appreciate my sound effects, my sound effects. Um, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum.

So I'm going to upload this and I will upload it and share it with Facebook and Twitter. And YouTube, I actually had someone on YouTube leave a message saying, or a comment saying, it's really good to see you're still around after all these years. So this must be someone that's been, that used to perhaps follow me a long time ago.

So that's cool. I sometimes feel that I'm making it up when I say I've been doing this since I was 36. Now I'm 49, nearly 50.

I've been doing this 14 years. In fact, I was 35 when I first started, so 35 when I first started making recordings. It sounds almost like a lie, but it's not.

It's actually true. It's actually true. Actually, actually, that's very true.

Indeed. Wow. Amazing, isn't it? You know, in some ways it kind of came about because my girlfriend dumped me.

It's true. Well, she didn't dump me, but we kind of split. And this, we started dating in, I think it was October night, October 2005, and we split up.

It must have been the first week of January, maybe the second week of January, something like that. And then that was on the Monday, and later in the week, possibly Thursday, Friday, Wednesday, even, I don't know. So I was in my bedroom on the laptop, and I thought, what shall I do? I was drinking some lager, and I just, I had an idea, and the idea was to relaunch the Free Pain Relief Service locally, because I've been trying to do it since 2004.

Zero interest, like a little bit, but very minimal. I ended up doing hypnosis sessions with friends and people I'd worked with, which isn't really the same as what I was looking for. And none of those people had chronic pain relief issues, chronic pain issues.

But I did some relaxation sessions and stuff. That was more for practice. But then 2006, I taught it to myself.

I taught it sort of in January, second week. I tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to do the Free Pain Relief Service.

I'm going to launch it. I'm going to launch it proper, proper, proper, proper, proper. I was going to drink a Coca-Cola.

And I decided there and then, I wasn't just going to launch that. I was going to launch myself. So I got my big cannon out.

I wasn't going to launch myself. I didn't use a cannon. I had a catapult.

No, I didn't. And I thought, yeah, this is going to be it. I'm going to launch myself as a hypnotist.

I've been studying it for absolutely years and years since 98, January. So how many years was that? 98, 99, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006. Eight years, I've been studying hypnosis and counseling and psychotherapy and stuff just from books and courses.

I've been on courses and audiotapes, videotapes, DVDs, you name it. I collected loads of stuff. I had a big library.

And I used to make recordings for myself. I'd do audio recording and listen to it and stuff like that. Especially when I was going through a really anxious time.

So I used to make recordings to help myself to relax. And did ones for when I was selling as well. So I helped myself to sell and be focused and confident and that stuff.

Anyway, I was up quite late and I was working the next day. So it might have been a Friday because I might not have been working the next day. So it might have been a Friday night that I did this.

I have a recollection that it was a late night. It was like a quiet, not like all nighter because I didn't used to do those back then. Because I had like a daytime job that started at eight in the morning, nine, nine to six.

I think it was my shift, my job. Yeah. Nine to six.

It was eight to five, nine to six, I think. So I was up all night and I designed these postcards online. And the front of it was in color.

And they were postcards, quite not big postcards, but a nice size. You could get them through a letterbox. They're like letterbox-sized postcards, bright color advertising the Free Pain Relief.

And I built a website and it's called freepainrelief.co.uk. Don't have it anymore, but that was the website then. I got a telephone specifically for that. So I got a different telephone number just for that service.

And so I kept the design. I did the other bits and eventually I ordered. On the back of this postcard in black and white was a stop smoking course, which was going to raise money for charity.

The biggest stop smoking hypnosis session in history or something like that. That was kind of a thing. And I was going to hire out a theater.

That didn't go to plan because they wanted thousands of pounds from me up front. I thought, wow, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. So I had to cancel that.

But that was already on the postcards, but that was in black and white. But this, the pain relief was in color. That was the front.

And I ordered, I think it was a hundred thousand. It was a lot. A lot.

I mean, I didn't actually end up delivering all of them, but I delivered a lot of them. But there was a lot. There was a huge amount.

When it was delivered, it took up a whole bedroom. Stacks of these boxes of these things. And I started putting them in post office windows and stuff like that.

And people started, I started getting phone calls for the pain relief. Like, wow. So that started, just launched really quickly.

People were coming to my website. I was like, wow. So I did all this.

I built the website online. I did it fairly quickly. It's quite basic.

I built it myself as well back then. It's a fairly basic website. And did I build it myself? No, I didn't.

I did build it, but I used a website builder, Moonfruit. Yeah. Anyway, so I did that and then I had to wait for them to be delivered.

So it took about 10 days to be delivered because of a big, big order. I was so excited. Oh, so excited when they got there.

Until I realized I'd have to carry them upstairs myself. Not quite as excited then. And then I started, you know, post them during my lunchtime.

After work as well, I post them through letterboxes at the surrounding houses. And a lot of my spare time, my time I'd spent putting them through people's doors, you know. And I was getting quite a bit of good response.

So that stream continued. That went well. The stop smoking thing went nowhere because I didn't have thousands of pounds to pay for this theater.

They said even if it, even if no one turned up, I'd still need to pay for the theater. I was like, oh, okay. I did get a few people interested in that thing, but anyway, I had a website for that as well.

Stop smoking course.com or something. So I had two new websites built specifically for this leaflet postcard thing. And then after a couple of months, so like January, February, March, February, March, I'd been sort of seeing people for chronic pain and some other stuff as well, to be fair.

And because my friend, for some reason, my friend started to send people to me for driving lesser nerves. And I started seeing a bunch of people just suddenly out of nowhere, I was being recommended by my friends. And that happened before I even saw one person for pain.

That was almost forced upon me because even though I sent out the leaflets and I was posting them, I kind of was scared that anyone would actually call me. I was, I was scared. I was petrified.

The idea of someone expected me to help them and me, that responsibility and what if I couldn't, you know, because all my knowledge was, most of my knowledge was just, I guess, intellectual. I can't really use that word towards myself, but you know, it's more theory than practical. So even though I had done practical courses and trained, I hadn't, outside of training situations, I've not really done much work with people one-to-one.

Although I had many years of talking on the phone to people and communicating that way verbally. Anyway, I, everything kind of just came to life. So different streams, there was the pain relief people, there was the other people that wanted to see me for different things.

Some of those that would be referred to by friends, referred to me. And then, at the same time, in April 2006, I sent off... I'm not sure if it was letters or emails, or I just called lots of different charities in the town to see if they would like me to do something. Most of them said, yes, please stop calling.

But one place was a charity for alcohol. And oh, my stomach's gone weird. Alcohol misuse and gambling, addiction and stuff like that.

And for some reason, they were interested in me going along. So I did, went along, had an interview. It was voluntary.

Not the interview, I mean the whole thing. And I learned there and then one thing. If you've got a service to offer, you need, well, I guess I can't really talk for other people, but I think it's good if you can actually prove your service, demonstrate your service, demonstrate what you can do there and then with that person.

And you can't really do that in a sort of sales interview. If you're going to want to work in a call centre and they say, well, you can't necessarily show your sales or your communication skills in an interview because it's a different scenario. But this thing that I wanted to do, I wanted so badly, well, goodly, but I wanted it very strongly to be able to do this voluntary work and to be a hypnotist or hypnotherapist, whatever you want to call it.

But you know, hypnotist is fine with me. And I wanted to be professional in a professional environment, which that was definitely. It's very serious, very important environment for the people that were using the service as well as those working there.

So what I did is, and I learned this and I did this with another place as well, I said was the best way really is for me just to do it with you now, instead of talking about what I can do, let me show you what I can do. And that's what we did. The lady and a couple, I think another person, a manager and maybe a couple of other people came and sat down with me and I did a relaxation session with them.

And they gave me a Monday evening, because I was still working, Monday evening from I think 7.30 till 9. And I do a course, it was a six week course, where I would be using some of the techniques, some of my stuff that I knew about, to help that group to deal with stopping drinking, to deal with, you know, relaxing, and confidence, self esteem boosting, that kind of stuff. And that's what I did. And it was really, I think it's quite successful.

Continue to do it for, I think we did three courses, six week courses, or maybe two. And then it turned into, I said, I think the things I liked was the relaxation bit, because we always ended with the relaxation, just sitting there. And the idea was, let's do some relaxation sessions.

I said, Well, cool, we'll do that. I said, Yeah, I know we will. I said, No, yeah, no.

I told you we're doing that. Okay. And what was it? It was, I think it was August.

So I was there doing it in the evenings. August, I started working part time in the job I had. So I started going and doing more relaxation group sessions during the day at this place.

And then they started asking, Can you do some recordings for us? And make some CDs, I started doing that. At this point, I'd already started making videos online, not audios, but videos for on Myspace. So then I thought, Well, I've got these audios I'm recording, I might as well stick them on my website.

And then I found a podcast. And that's how it all kind of went from there. And then 2007, I'm not sure what month it was, I think it might be beginning of the year, I found I was actually kind of headhunted by a drug charity, drug rehab.

They came into the Buddhist shop, asking about me. Because I was kind of connected to the center. They knew me through someone else that went there or something.

And they heard about me because they were in the same field of work when they alcohol charity. They were the two main places, Norcass and Iceni. Alcohol was at Norcass, Iceni was the drug rehab.

So I went into the evolution shop and my friend in there, he said, Oh, a bloke from Iceni came in asking about you. And he said, Can you give him a call? So I gave me a piece of paper and I called him up and he said, Do you want to come in? So I went in and that was even bigger because there was, I think, five people talking to me at the same time, asking what I did and how I did it and stuff. I said, Well, instead of just chatting, why don't we just do it? And there were some counselors, the managers.

I said, Let's just do a relaxation group. So I'll do a relaxation session with you now. And that's what I did.

So there was, I said there was like the main people in the building, but this wasn't with any clients, just with the staff. I did that and they were happy and I ended up doing two or three sessions a week there and a couple at the other place. So that was up till November.

And then I moved away here to go to college to do my university course, which is a shame because I wanted to continue there because I had a good thing going, you know, it was really good. My plan, here was my plan, all right. Seriously, I was living in the Buddhist community and I was going to stay there.

It was a little bit shaky because they didn't have enough people living there. And then one of the people living there was, he just turned really, really strange and just made it impossible for me to stay there. But he didn't start that until I'd already started university.

So I was traveling to the next town to go to, which is where I am now, to go to university in September 2007. I had a girlfriend who I'd really only been with for about two months, maybe. And we were at the I love you stage in a relationship or she was at the I love you stage.

And I'm not sure if I said it back, I might have done, I might have grunted and or changed the subject. So, you know, we were getting on really well. She was very funny.

And I had, I was kind of cutting down on the pain relief stuff just because of time. I didn't really have the time to do it anymore because of all the, because I was going to be, you know, at university and I was doing five sessions, group sessions at the Iceni in Norcast, those places. I wanted to continue doing that.

I wanted to, the idea was to become a counsellor. That's why I went to counselling, one of the reasons, because I wanted to be a counsellor at both of those places. I wanted to split my time between both and stay there forever.

That was kind of in my mind. I know it sounds a bit, maybe a bit naive, but I loved both of those places. I loved the staff and the clients.

Brilliant. It was, yeah, the only places that I, one of the only, yeah, I was happy at those places. I felt like I was part of something and I was the only one doing what I did as well.

Anyway, I moved, so I had to stop doing that. It was just not viable. I couldn't, I couldn't be traveling.

And to do that when I was at university, I couldn't afford that anyway, to get there because I wasn't getting paid. So that all went. I had a part-time job in Sainsbury's that was about to start.

And I think that was in November and that was going to be for Christmas, but I would have, I think they'd have kept me on. It was a short-term contract, but I think they'd have kept me on just because I'm pretty, I don't know, just pretty good at working and I sort of do what I'm told, I think. They'd have been lucky to have me.

So I was going to be on the grocery department just filling up and making sure the fruit and veg was sorted out. And the bloke that interviewed me said he liked me and he was really enthusiastic about cucumbers and I think presentation. And I can understand that because I would be as well.

You know, to make something look nice, to just make sense, you know, so when it comes to food, yeah. But I mean, vegetables are kind of food, aren't they, technically? So everything was kind of planned. Everything really came together nicely.

And then I had to move out of the place I was in because of what was going on there, which meant I couldn't start the job at Sainsbury's. I couldn't continue volunteering. And in fact, I think I was still doing the pain relief and I had to cancel that as well.

Just tell people, I had a couple of people that were regular, I said, no, I can't do it anymore, sorry. And then my girlfriend didn't want to be with me anymore because I moved away. And it was really weird because I went through all that.

I was living in a house with three people that were really nice, one that wasn't so nice, and then one moved out. And then, yeah, and then it just kind of went a bit weird. And suddenly, I've got this girlfriend, everything's like new, got this new girlfriend, and it's going really well, starting a university course, all this stuff, really, you know, and then suddenly, bang.

And a couple of weeks later, I'm sitting in this tiny little room, which is where I stayed for the duration of my course. It's the only thing I could afford. I couldn't afford to live in the town that I was living.

Couldn't find anywhere to live that I could afford to pay for or put a deposit down on or anything. I was just stuck. Luckily, I didn't have to put a deposit on this room because it was student accommodation.

Well, it wasn't. It was a lady that would rent a room out to students, if that makes sense. So, yeah, but she was really, really lucky for me to find somewhere.

But as I'm suddenly sitting there, I'm like, wait a minute, what happened? What's everything happened? Everything's just gone. So, yeah, that was weird, very strange. Suddenly, I'm doing this counselling degree and not knowing what I'm going to do.

Because the whole plan was I was going to do my counselling hours, you know, my practice hours as part of the course, 100 hours or whatever. I was going to do that at the two charities. I'd already agreed it.

You know, I discussed it with both the charities and, you know, that's why I was going into counselling because, yeah, it's partly because of them. Very strange. Because a lot of people who started the counselling course, they had somewhere to go.

They'd kind of done what I did. They'd maybe been working or volunteering somewhere and they already had a place that they could get their hours and volunteer at. But that's what I thought when I first started and it didn't work out.

Although in the end, it's weird enough, I ended up doing it in-house. So at the college, we had the public would come in for free counselling sessions and I would see them. And I ended up doing more hours than anyone else on my course, counselling hours.

It's amazing, just very strange. Because the first year, we were supposed to start doing counselling, but one person turned up for me. So I couldn't start until the second year.

And other people already had maybe 15, 20 hours. And then come the second year, I just took off. And I just ended up with, I'd say about 128 hours or something like that.

Wow. Wow, man. Wow.

I wonder how many hours I've done all together, hours of therapy with people. 500, 1000, I don't know. I wonder.

No, it wouldn't be a thousand, would it? Quite a few over the time I did it. Wow. Wow.

Wow, wow, wow, wow. I could be the manager. I could be still be working in Sainsbury's.

I could be the manager of the banana section by now. Missed opportunities. But here I am.

Here I is. It seems strange really, all that stuff. I'm sitting here.

It's quiet. It's 17 minutes past four in the morning. I'm 90 minutes into a recording.

It doesn't feel like I've been talking for more than about 20 minutes. I've said practically nothing. And yeah, this is where we are now.

This is where we are. And to think I was 35 when I started this light journey or I was 27 when I started the journey because it was January 2000, January 98. So I was 27.

Technically, I started the journey when I was a kid probably really. Every journey starts when you're born, doesn't it? Really. But now I'm nearly 93.

How can you be 93? You were born in 1970. It's now 2020. That's it.

Yes. Yes. Wow.

Wow. Hmm. So when I was applying to go to university, filling in the UCAS form, with which I got help, I actually went to the college and asked for help because I didn't know how to do it.

And I just needed help. And they did help me fill the whole thing out, including the application for finance. Because now it's all done online.

But back then it was, it wasn't. And it was all done on like a chalkboard, you know, chalk and didn't have the internet or even paper back then. It was such a long time ago.

Didn't have paper, wrote on chalk, going to the toilet was painful, that chalk going off scratch. The, so what was I, 36 when I applied. So it would have been sort of early summer, probably June, June time I applied for the course.

Maybe July, but probably that June, July, June, July time. Yeah, probably June. It was quite, it was a late summer.

I didn't leave it really late. So probably, probably June. I think I left my job at the end of May because they, they basically said to me, either you go, you go back full time or you leave.

So I chose to leave because I must've applied before then. Why would I choose to be unemployed? I must've already applied to go to university. Yeah, I must've done.

It's such a long time ago. I can't imagine older, just giving the job up without having a somewhere to go. Yeah.

I must've known that I'd been accepted on the course. Maybe I didn't, maybe I just put some faith in it. So yeah, 36.

So it's nearly that time now, isn't that April? Are we still in April or is it May now? It's May, isn't it? Around the same time. This was 2006, no 2007, sorry, 2007, 17. So it's 13 years ago when I was applying to go to university.

Blimey, 13 years. Is that right? No, that's not right, is it? Yeah, it is. It seems longer in some ways, it does seem longer.

Seems like a lifetime away. Well, it is with someone that's 13. Yeah, I don't mean it like that.

Just seems a long time ago. Perhaps it's because since then I've moved one, two, three, four times. One, two, three, four.

Yeah, four times I've moved since that time. So that's quite a few moves, I guess. And so that's a story of something.

I'm not quite sure what my point was, if there was ever a point to why I was talking about that. But yeah, as far as we go now, it's 197 minutes. I think the reason I'm talking for so long is because I don't want to go back to the laptop and uploading stuff because it's so boring.

I can't face it. I don't want to do it anymore. It needs to be done.

It does. It really does. I mean, I've got nearly 200 Let Me Boy This Sleep ones to upload.

I've got 150 Deep Sleep Whisper. I've got about 70 Relaxation vs Stress. So there's, yeah, that's quite a lot, isn't it? I'm trying to break it down to 50s.

So do 50, have a break, do 50, have a break. But 50 can take me hours and hours. So I can't always just do 50 in a row.

I could do a little bit with the Deep Sleep ones because they're a lot quicker, because they're shorter files, smaller files, and they upload quicker. So maybe I should go back to them and get them all done. Because it's going to take two, four, yeah, a third of the time for each upload.

So to do 50 is going to take a third of the time. So this means I could do 150 in the time it takes to do 50 of the others. I think.

Is that right? Sounds right. Yeah, I think so. Right, I'm going to go.

Thank you for listening. Remember, remember, if you're still listening to me, please, please be kind to yourself. Because you deserve to be happy.

Lots of love. Bye.