The Blindboy Podcast - Are you really John Wayne ?

Episode Date: March 1, 2023

A travel podcast about the importance of Assertiveness and listening to your inner voice Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Crows along the brosing boulevard, you sideways Brendans. Welcome to the Blind Boy Podcast. I'm only in the door from Portugal. I was over in Porto the past week, doing lots of exciting writing. I had a writer's room for a television project that I'm working on, that I can't speak about yet. Did that for a couple of days.

Got some wonderful stuff written that we're all really happy with. And I wrote't speak about yet. Did that for a couple of days. Got some wonderful stuff written that we're already happy with and I wrote an entire short story which I'm incredibly pleased. I wrote a full short story from start to finish in like five days and I was incredibly pleased with that process. That I didn't experience any any writer's block or any doubt doubt I just had a ferocious amount of fun with the page controlled waking dreaming that's all I want if I can feel like I'm daydreaming on the page but I have control over what's happening and when I'm writing I'm not thinking of anybody else's work I'm not trying to write like any other writers.

It's just what's coming out of me. And the influences from other writers are there, but they're assisting me in the background. They're kind of cheering me on from the sidelines. It's very difficult to do any type of creativity when you're consciously aware of another person's work. Another person's work has to inspire you. The feeling of joy that you got from their work,

the feeling of that has to be present in you. Put there as a feeling, not as thoughts. I read a wonderful interview once with the writer Kevin Barry, who I've had on this podcast before. But Kevin is one of my favourite writers. And it was Kevin Barry speaking about how he found his voice as a writer and when he was in his late 20s and he started writing

short stories or having a crack at a novel he wrote almost an entire first draft of a novel 77,000 words which he says to this day he can't even open up and look at. Because he wrote an entire novel basically copying Cormac McCarthy. And Cormac McCarthy, if you don't know, phenomenal writer. But a lot of his work is, I don't want to say Western, but it it's he kind of modernised cowboy fiction he made it gritty and Kevin Barry went so far as to to move to a place called

Butt, Montana a place in Montana called Butt and he moved from Limerick to Butt to try and pursue the feeling and smell of Cormac McCarthy and to put this into his writing. And all it got him was 77,000 words that he couldn't read.

But it was the pain of that experience, going through the slog of that failure, that made Kevin not write like Cormac McCarthy and instead start writing from his own experiences and trusting his own ear and writing from a sense of lived experience people he'd actually met people he'd actually heard and when he did that he had his first short story that was in the voice of Kevin Barry he'd heard his own voice and Kevin's voice is considered to be one of the best in the world today he's one of the

widely considered to be one of the greatest living writers he was long listed for a fucking Booker Prize and won a Goldsmith's Prize but when I'm writing the voice that I have to try and escape is Kevin Barry's voice because I love his work and when I'm feeling insecure

and I don't trust my own voice when I'm writing I write 2000 words and it don't trust my own voice when I'm writing, I write 2,000 words. And it's not 2,000 words of Blind Boy, it's 2,000 words of Kevin Barry. But I can't be Kevin Barry. Only Kevin Barry can be Kevin Barry. So when I read my words as Kevin Barry, it's a pile of shit. But I reconnected with my own voice over in Porto. And I wrote a full short story.

That was 100% in my voice. And my creative voice hasn't changed. And it never will change. And even though I'm in my 30s now. It's the same voice I had when I was fucking 16. Doing prank phone calls. Or writing silly songs about greyhounds when I was 20. The only thing that changes is the perspective that I write from.

And the thing is with my creative voice, and this is something I've realised, it's very distinctive. I can't hide it. It's very strong on the page. Now that can be a good thing or a bad thing. There's very little subtlety to it. Opening up one of my short stories is like, do you know when you get a bag of chips do you know when you buy a bag of chips from the chipper

and they wrap it up, they wrap your chips up in the brown paper and then you get into the car and open them and you're suddenly afflicted with a very powerful pang of vinegar, this very strong smell of vinegar

that attacks your nose and your eyes and you're like, oh fuck I don't know if I want this, is this too much vinegar? But then the vinegar dissipates around the car you eat the chips and you go, do you know what? This bag of chips isn't too bad

at first I wanted to put these chips in the bin, I thought they put too much vinegar on it. But now it makes sense. I can taste the potatoes. Oh, there's a bit of salt. The vinegar is evaporating. And now I understand these chips. That's what my short stories are a bit like.

And I have to accept that. Because I can't make those skin-on chips that you get in a smash burger place. I can't make those rosemary fries that they serve you in a tiny little shopping trolley. Alongside a pulled pork bap. And I can't make those really crunchy, crispy chips that have been fried twice. And they're so crunchy you don't even know if they qualify as chips anymore. Or those chips that you get in a Chinese takeaway that have been quick fried for 20 seconds. I can't do any of those chips.

I make a bag of chips that you get in a chipper and you open it and your eyes hurt from the vinegar but I can't access my creative voice if I don't understand my emotions and that has nothing to do with writing that has to do with how I live my life I need to understand if I feel angry or if I feel sad or if I feel afraid

I need to feel those emotions as they are and not let another emotion get in the way by means of a defense mechanism and this took me back to a writing trip I took last summer where I went over to Spain for a week to try and get a shitload of writing done like I take retreats for writing. This is something that most, a lot of writers will do. If you can get a week somewhere, anywhere to just go, I'm going to this one place

and I have one job in this one place and that's to write as much as I possibly can. That's what I like to do. So last summer I went to Spain and it wasn't a particularly successful writing trip. I did a lot of writing. I got thousands of words. But out of the 10,000 words I wrote,

I only kept about 500. Because the 9,500 words I wrote weren't in my voice. Because I didn't understand what I was feeling. My mental health was quite bad and there's one incident I think back to last summer. So I was sitting in this cafe all morning, sitting with my laptop, writing. Now I was writing outside this cafe because it was very, very hot. It was 30 something degrees. It was unbelievably hot. And I was writing outside. I was in the shade. Still felt like a hairdryer. And I was wearing shorts. Now the type of

shorts I was wearing. Now first off as an Irish person we only really get to wear shorts about three times a year. So I'm not really used to wearing shorts and sometimes when I do wear shorts I forget the last time I wore shorts. Now the shorts are important for this story. So I'm sitting in this cafe outside and it's quite packed there's a lot of people there and my table is about six meters from the door of the restaurant. And I was drinking coffee and sparkling water. Which meant I needed to go for a lot of pisses. So I'd been there all morning writing away on my laptop.

Writing words I wasn't happy with. And then I needed a piss. So I got up, took my laptop with me. And went into the toilet of the cafe to do a piss. So I needed a piss. So I got up, took my laptop with me, and went into the toilet of the cafe to do a piss. So I did a piss, but I'd forgotten that I was wearing shorts. And there were shorts that didn't have a zipper. They're the shorts, they're like swimming shorts, the ones you pull up. And I'd forgotten, because I hadn't worn shorts in months.

When you take a piss in shorts, you have to be careful of the elastic. When you pull it back up, because what it can do is the elastic can squeeze the base of your mickey and then squeeze out piss that you didn't know you had and then it goes on your shorts and it looks like you pissed yourself.

Now, I'd shaken off and everything. i did everything you're supposed to do but when you're wearing like a zipper what happens is that little teaspoon of piss remains in the urethra and then absorbs back into your bladder but when you're wearing shorts elastic shorts that little squeeze on your mickey as it goes back in can release that bit of piss which normally stays inside you so I'd forgotten about this technique so when I pulled the shorts

back up, there you go huge big piss stain on the front of my shorts, they were grey shorts so it was a very noticeable piss stain, So I'm there in the bathroom going, oh fuck okay this is too big. I'm going to have to do something about this.

So I looked around at my options. There was a hand dryer. The hand dryer was a little bit too high. Now I tried it. So I climbed up onto the sink a little bit and then directed my crotch towards the hand dryer. Now I tried it. So I climbed up onto the sink a little bit. And then directed my crotch towards the hand dryer.

Effectively looking like I'm riding the hand dryer. Now I would have had to do it for I'd say six minutes. I couldn't do it. Because the thing was is that the bathroom was one of these bathrooms where if someone was to come in and the door opens. Then everyone sitting at the restaurant is looking at me fucking the dryer, basically. So that wasn't an option. Now, second option. I've got my laptop with me. I wasn't about to leave my laptop outside on the table, so I took the laptop into the toilet with me.

What if I walk out of the toilet and I hold the laptop in front of my crotch so no one sees the piss then I thought that's actually the worst thing you could ever do because then the people in the restaurant will go that man brought the laptop into the toilet to look at pornography now he has a boner and he's hiding it with the laptop. And there's children in the restaurant. So I'm glad I thought of that one. So I had to just say to myself, look, there's about a 25 second walk from here, from the toilet, back to your seat outside. You're going to do that walk. You're going to do it.

Keep your head up. Who's going to be looking at your crotch? Who the fuck's going to look at your crotch? Just do it quickly. Walk out. Don't be too obvious. Get down to your seat. It's 35 degrees outside. The ambient heat is going to dry up that piss stain in under a minute. You can change into new ones later.

It'll be fine. No one will see it. So that's the decision I made. But here's the problem I was gone by Irish cultural rules in Ireland if you're in a restaurant and you walk out of the toilet with a piss stain and you have that walk about you, whereby you know you have a piss stain, but you're just trying to sit down. In Ireland, people will see it, and then they'll look away. People will see it, and they'll go, I'd hate to be that person, that's kind of embarrassing. I better not make it uncomfortable for him, I'm going to look away. And then when I walk past, then they go to their their friend did you see the piss stain on that fella

that's what we do in Ireland I wasn't in Ireland, I was in Spain with a different set of cultural rules and the restaurant that I was in, this cafe was kind of posh this was a posh person cafe in Spain

so I walk out of the toilet, head up eyes forward, laptop by the side. I make it through the restaurant part. Thank fuck no one has seen. I get to the door. I can see my table. It's 10 feet away and just as I'm about to sit down, there's a Spanish family. A granddad, a dad, a mother and an adult son. And they see the piss stain. What do they do? They pint. They pinted at my piss stain. They pinted and then got each other's attention.

And pinted and laughed at my piss stain. Laughed. Like really, really mean. Laughed at it. And then I'm'm thinking maybe it's that type of laughter where I can join in maybe it's that type of laughter where eventually they're going to kind of half apologize and go this is really funny I'm pissing on myself all the time as well I understand you're saying no it wasn that. Then they stopped laughing and they all went back to each other's conversation. They'd humiliated me. Public humiliation. I'd been publicly humiliated. Now, I've never experienced that in Ireland. In Irish culture, if a group of people at a bar were to point and laugh at a stranger with piss the other people around would chastise the people

doing the shaming and say ah cop on you're being ghouled so what it's a bit of piss like somewhere like a pub is a sacred space and you have to maintain the crack like the crack has to be maintained at all costs in an Irish space like what happens when someone drops a glass in a pub? What happens? Everybody cheers. Everybody cheers. Because you can't have a glass dropping, a bad thing, interfering with the crack. So when a glass drops, everyone goes, oh that's awkward.

Wahey! And now everything's okay. Nothing has destroyed the crack. I've been drunk in Spain enough times. In this city of Cordoba where I go to, I've been drunk in Spain enough times that I've stopped and witnessed when glasses break in Spanish pubs.

And what happens? Does everybody cheer? They don't. They don't. Everybody goes dead quiet because crack isn't present. When a glass is dropped in a Spanish pub it's an interruption. It's interrupted people's conversations. A bad thing has happened and people go quiet and they look around and I remember once

I was in another kind of half fancy place and it was a waiter who dropped the glass. And when the waiter dropped the glass in this bar, I saw a table of people kind of totting in judgment at this waiter. Nobody cheered. And to take it back to the piss stain. And why, if someone had a piss stain on their pants in an Irish bar, why people wouldn't publicly humiliate them. There's this joke that my dad told me,

and this is a real old man Irish joke, and it perfectly illustrates our attitude towards piss stains on pants in pubs. So John Wayne walks into a bar, a bar down in Cork, and he orders a drink. And all the lads into a bar, a bar down in Cork, and he orders a drink. And all the lads at the bar, they nudge each other and they go, Fucking hell, man, there's John Wayne. It's fucking John Wayne over there, man.

It's not John Wayne. What the fuck would John Wayne be doing in Cork? It's John Wayne. It's John Wayne. He's ordering a drink. So John Wayne drinks his drink. And then he goes into the toilet for a piss. And then he comes back out of the toilet.

And there's a little piss stain on the crotch of his denims. And then the lads at the bar go, Fuck it, man, there's John Wayne. John Wayne's after coming out of the toilet, but he has a piss stain. Shh, don't look, don't look. Don't embarrass him. It's John Wayne and he's got a piss stain on his pants. Say nothing. Say nothing.

So John Wayne gets another drink and another drink and then he goes back into the toilet and comes back out with an even bigger piss stain. And now the lads are going John Wayne's after coming out of the toilet and now he's got even more piss on his pants.

Say nothing, say nothing. The piss is on his pants, don't let him see you. John Wayne orders another drink and another drink goes to the toilet, comes back out. The entire front of him is covered in piss. He is covered in his own fucking piss. Three times in a row now.

Now at this stage the lads at the bar are really really curious. Because they're thinking, man John Wayne has to go into the toilet three times. He appears to be pissing his pants each time. Now to the point that like his full crotch

is covered in piss. Like we don't want to embarrass him but like what the fuck is going on here? So now John Wayne has another drink and he goes to the toilet for his fourth piss. And this is too much for the boys. And one of the lads at the bar says, I'm going in after him. I'm going in. I'm going in and I'm going to find out what this is about. All right.

And the other boys go, don't, don't, don't, don't go in there. No, I'm doing it. I need to get to the bottom of this. Why is John Wayne pissing on himself? I need to know. Why is he pissing on himself? Come back, come back, don't. So the lad at the bar follows him in, follows him in.

And there's John Wayne taking a piss at the orionel. He can see the back of John Wayne's head. So the lad goes, okay, I'm going to go up now beside John Wayne and I'm going to take a piss beside him in the other urinal. He takes his dick out and starts to piss. And then he turns his entire body around, dick in hand, piss flying out, and says, are you really John Wayne? And pisses all over John Wayne's dick. And that story came to me, that memory of that story came to me

while I was sitting down in that cafe in Spain, sitting down outside, absolutely fuming, because the table beside me had literally just publicly humiliated me. Public humiliation. There's someone who's pissed themselves, let's laugh out loud, point at it, get each other's attention and humiliate this man, and then go back to our dinners. It was a new feeling for me. It was a new experience. And I was asking myself, this wouldn't happen in Ireland. People wouldn't point and laugh like that in Ireland. And that story about John Wayne came to me as evidence for me to go, no, my dad told me that story. This is an oral culture story from old men in pubs.

And the story illustrated to me that in Irish culture, if someone does something like piss themselves, collectively you try not to publicly embarrass them. Now we're not perfect. We gossip about people, we talk behind each other's backs. But public humiliation tends to be collectively shunned it's not acceptable and later that day I asked my my Irish friend who lives in Spain I said these people pointed and laughed at me because I'd piss on the front

of my shorts did I just meet a table full of assholes or is this something that's kind of table full of assholes or is this something that's kind of normalized within Spanish culture and my buddy said well they were probably pricks you probably met a load of pricks but however if you look around this city it's very conservative things really stay the same for a long time they have very strict traditions and very strict festivals and everything runs the exact same every year on time perfectly. Every restaurant kind of serves the exact same dishes, all local Spanish dishes. They're delicious but you won't find many Chinese restaurants or Indian restaurants. There's one Indian restaurant but the only people who eat there are people who aren't from Spain. Have you noticed there's not a lot of McDonald's? There's

not a lot of Burger Kings? Have you noticed that everybody's kind of dressed the same way? Everyone's dressed quite nice. Have you seen anyone with tattoos? Have you seen anyone with piercings? This particular city of Cordoba is quite a conservative city and everybody who lives here is quite well off. They're not mad wealthy but they have generational wealth. No one has to worry about getting a house. They live in an apartment that their great grandparents owned and they have a little bit of property and a little bit of land. Everyone's quite comfortable and everything stays the exact same all the time and not a lot changes. And I think what he was trying to say to me in a nice way was, the way you maintain a conservative city that stays the exact same all the time

is by being a bit of a judgmental prick. If everything is this nice and everything is this perfect, then you tend to find that structures like this are maintained through intense snobbiness and that's what I'd experienced. I couldn't hear what they were saying but I'm guessing it was along the lines of look at that fucking idiot tourist in his shorts with piss all over his shorts. Look at that fucking idiot. What a fool. But what was so chilling about it for me was how normal it felt.

This was just like a normal thing for them. They just went back to their meals. They didn't care that they just laughed at someone and pointed. And they were wealthy people. They were clearly wealthy because I could tell by the way that they dressed. And it was like a Wednesday morning

and they were all like not working. So maybe they didn't need to work or they owned property and that's where their money came from. And my mind went off to darker places. I started thinking about the Spanish Civil War because the thing is with the Spanish Civil War that always sticks out to me

because all civil wars are horrendous. But with the Spanish Civil civil war the use of public humiliation was a real a huge part of the Spanish civil war in particular by Franco. Franco was a fascist who would have represented the wealthy capitalist class of Spain and during the Spanish civil war what Franco's soldiers used to do, they would round up civilians in a neighbourhood who were Republican, the opposing side in the Spanish Civil War.

These people were more kind of socialist and left-leaning. So Franco's forces used to go into villages and towns, get all the Republican civilians, in particular the women, shave their heads, make them drink castor oil, and then they'd parade civilians up and down the streets

in front of their neighbours, naked. And while the civilians were being paraded, they would shit themselves. They'd have diarrhea, uncontrollable diarrhea in the streets because the soldiers had just fed them castor oil. And then their neighbours would laugh at them. They'd point and laugh. And I couldn't shake that from my mind. If this is what the posh Spanish people used to do during the Spanish Civil War, is public humiliation and unashamed public humiliation part of

upper class Spanish culture or maybe not just Spanish upper class culture any upper class culture in a colonial nation but I've been around a lot of really posh English people like really proper posh English people

and even the real posh English people. Like really proper posh English people. And even the real posh English people they'll save their shitty comments for behind your back. But they're very concerned with politeness. I can't imagine them pointing and laughing. But having said that the only proper posh

English people that I've met have worked in the arts. In theatre. And they've been friends of mine so maybe I need to go down to Knightsbridge or Mayfair and do a piss on my shorts there and see how the past English react. Now I don't want to sound like I'm casting aspersions on the people of Spain because that would be fucking ridiculous, that's stupid, that would be xenophobic and to be honest this was my only, the only ever horrendous experience I've had with people in the city of Cardaba. And my fondest memories are with the people who wash the streets at night time.

See, the thing with Cardaba is it gets mad hot and it doesn't really rain that much. Because it doesn't rain, they wash the streets down every single night. Like in Ireland, we don't wash the streets because we just go it's gonna rain what's the point so everything's dirty but in this city in Spain every single night teams of people go out with hoses like workers for the city council they go out with hoses and they hose down all the streets. It's amazing.

And on nights when I'd be out having pints in a Spanish pub and I'd be walking back to my apartment, it'd be roasting hot so I'd take off my shoes. So I'd walk home barefoot with these dirty feet. But then the council workers who were washing the streets got to know me as like the barefoot drunk Irishman who'd walk home at two in the morning. So they'd see me and then they'd all pint their hoses at me, but in a really nice way. And it'd be fucking roasting. It'd be nearly 30 degrees at night time. So they're hosing me down and washing my feet and roaring and laughing.

And then I'd be rolling around the ground while there's like six council workers spraying me with a hose and then by the time I walk home I'm fucking dry and they were cooling me down which I'm now realizing is like the exact same as those posh people shaming me for pissing myself the of Spain, piss on me with public water that's mad scarce in an orgy of generosity. Where am I going with this? When those people shamed me for the piss on my pants, for the piss on my shorts, I couldn't write. I couldn't write anymore for the rest of the holiday because I'd internalised the shame that they'd put upon me I hadn't done anything wrong

who hasn't pissed themselves who hasn't gone to the toilet and gotten a little bit of piss on their pants who hasn't done that that's a universal human experience we all go for pisses That's a universal human experience. We all go for pisses. That's completely universal experience. Who hasn't had to walk to a restaurant

with a little bit of piss on their crotch? All of us have done that because that's a universal human experience. Now what that is, that's called humility. That's humility. The ability to recognize I am a fallible human being. No better or worse than anybody else. And I might get a bit of piss on my pants every so often.

And that's okay. I can be humble about that. I won't be judging myself for a bit of piss on my shorts. And I won't be judging anybody else for a bit of piss on their shorts. Because that's humility now when those people laughed at me I should have been able to find those words in myself to forgive myself I should have been able to draw those words up from myself and say this is their problem these people aren't being very nice the only person who's done anything bad is actually them

for trying to hurt my feelings I haven't done anything bad by accidentally pissing myself I've done nothing wrong but I didn't have the dialogue with my own emotions I didn't have the self esteem

I was in a bad place with my own emotions. I didn't have the self-esteem. I was in a bad place with my mental health. So I didn't have the strength of the voice within me to be able to say to myself what I just said there. To have that self-compassion to go, you've done nothing wrong. This isn't a nice experience. But you can walk away from this table and you can go about the rest of your trip and you can feel fine tomorrow morning. I didn't have that.

I took the humiliation and the shame on board and I felt like a piece of shit. I felt like a fool. I felt like a fool. I felt like an idiot. I felt deserving of their chastisement because I couldn't hear my own voice inside me where self-love and compassion and self-forgiveness comes from. And from self-love and compassion and forgiveness comes humour. Like let's be honest, comes humour like let's be honest that's hilarious it's fucking really funny

that I got into that piss pants situation that's a really funny story but I couldn't go to humour, not back then what I should have done is taken that experience on board and incorporated that into my short story I should have written about that experience on board and incorporated that into my short story.

I should have written about that experience. I should have felt that humiliation and instead of internalising it and stabbing myself, saying, wonderful, let's get that humiliation, let's leave this restaurant where these cunts are, go somewhere else where people are sound.

Now you're going to write. You're going to write about pissing your pants and everything that you felt inside. And you're going to create a short story. That's my voice. That's my internal voice. I didn't have access to it. And I can't access that voice. When my mental health is shit.

What I didn't have access to in that moment is assertiveness and assertiveness is the flexible pursuit of having our preferences met our opinions voiced our emotions and beliefs honestly communicated in an appropriate way at the relevant time. Now that's the psychological definition of assertiveness. Basically what assertiveness is, when we understand our emotions and we have a good dialogue with our internal world, then we fully understand what our boundaries are. When you're assertive and capable of being assertive, then you know when someone has crossed the line with you. Those people crossed the line. They abused me. They humiliated me in public. They were wrong

and I was right. Accidentally getting pissed on my shorts isn't hurting anybody. But did I have assertiveness in that moment? No I didn't because I didn't understand what my boundaries were. So when they pointed and laughed at me and humiliated me I believed them. I believed that they were right. And I stayed there with my laptop, frozen, embarrassed, trying to write while they sat there eating their dinner for about a half an hour. And I didn't move because I was frozen in shock and anger. Now, what would I have done if I was assertive? I would have listened to my needs and my needs are that wasn't very nice better get the fuck away. I wouldn't have gone over to them and started a fight and said don't speak to me like that. I would have if they were my co-workers

or something and I couldn't get away but what I should have done was wow this is a hostile place this is hostile people I need to leave and get away from these people because the vibes are bad that would be the assertive thing to do I could have done that if I understood what my emotions were and if my mental health was in check it wasn't and what that did that fucked up my writing it stopped me being able to access my creative voice where my work comes from where my creativity comes from because I can't I can't hear that creativity if I don't understand what I'm feeling and understand what my boundaries are I should have been playful when I'm assertive

I get playful and curious if I was assertive in that situation their humiliation doesn't actually hurt me instead I step back from it and go fucking silly people Jesus isn't that very rude and I would playfully use that thing that happened

to me as a jump off to be creative and to write about those people and to write about those feelings and that experience because it didn't cross my emotional boundaries and the reason I'm speaking about that experience in Spain which was like seven or eight months ago or nine months ago, is because since my mental health has started improving, since I went back to therapy, since I started to achieve greater emotional literacy, I'm able to cry now when I feel sad. When I feel angry now, it's for a reason. I don't feel excessively angry. I don't have anxiety. I have a good solid emotional dialogue and my creativity has returned. So I made a promise to myself when I went to Porto last week to be assertive when a situation presents itself where I need to be assertive.

And that's what I want to speak about after the Ocarina Pause. Okay, it's time now for the Ocarina pause. I'm in my home studio. So I have an Ocarina. You're going to hear an advert for something. Oh. Rock City, you're the best fans in the league, bar none. Tickets are on sale now for Fan Appreciation Night on Saturday, April 13th

when the Toronto Rock hosts the Rochester Nighthawks at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton at 7.30pm. You can also lock in your playoff pack right now to guarantee the same seats for every postseason game and you'll only pay as we play. Come along for the ride and punch your ticket to Rock City at torontorock.com. On April 5th, you must be very careful, Margaret. It's a girl.

Witness the birth. Bad things will start to happen. Evil things of evil. It's all for you. No, no, don't. The first omen, I believe, girl, is to be the mother. Mother of what? Is the most terrifying. Six, six, six. It's the girl is to be the mother. Mother of what? Is the most terrifying.

Six, six, six. It's the mark of the devil. Hey! Movie of the year. It's not real. It's not real. It's not real. Who said that? The first omen.

Only in theaters April 5th. I can't work that one. I got my first ocarina actually in Cordoba, in Spain, in 2014. That's where the first ever ocarina came from. That one is lost, I believe. Apologies to any dogs that were listening. I know you don't like the high pitch of the ocarina came from. That one is lost I believe. Apologies to any dogs that were listening. I know you don't like the high pitch of the ocarina. Support for this podcast comes from you the listener via

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I'm not beholden to advertisers. No advertiser can tell me what to speak about, what tone to take. This is a fully independent podcast funded by the listeners and that ensures that each week I get to show up and speak about what I'm genuinely passionate about. I get to be congruent with what I want to express and be authentic. And the subject of independent media. Two weeks ago I did a podcast where I spoke about the disparity between independent media and established media

and I spoke all about how established media, radio, tv, newspapers likes to pretend that independent media such as podcasts doesn't exist and established media creates celebrity by only speaking about events if they occur in other forms of establishment media. So just a little update on that to prove the points that I was making. So first off, as a little test I said in that podcast, this week I'm going on the radio and I'm going to speak about imperialism. And I'm going to have a nuanced conversation. and I'm going to speak about imperialism and I'm going to have a nuanced conversation then they're going to take one sentence that I said

and frame it as a thesis statement put it as a headline and make me look like I'm in the IRA they did it, they did that I went on the radio and had a lovely chat about imperialism and monarchy and I said imperialism is terrorism because it is, that's what it is

imperialism and colonialism is terrorism because it is that's what it is imperialism and colonialism is terrorism it's taking over another country and killing all the civilians so it's it's terrorism so the newspaper took that sentence and put it alongside a photograph of me and made it look like i was in the ira and thing is i say that. I did say that imperialism was terrorism. I said it. But they chose that one sentence. They chose the most inflammatory sentence to get all the daddies annoyed on Facebook.

And the other thing that happened last week, which is fucking bizarre. So there was an article about me in the Irish Times written by Michael Harding, who was on the podcast last week. And Michael, fair play to him, he wrote a Harding who was on the podcast last week and Michael fair play to him he wrote a lovely article about appearing on the podcast and he wrote about my writing and it was very flattering and thank you Michael for that for that article but because

Michael published that article in the Irish Times I've had like four offers to be on radio and television in Ireland because of the article. Now I turned them down because I was in Portugal. But I'm talking about the biggest talk shows in the country. And they contact me and they go, hey blind boy, would you like to come on and speak about the article that was written about you in the paper? So that's an immediate no. the article that was written about you in the paper. So that's an immediate no.

Like I'm not coming on TV or radio to speak about a newspaper article that was written about me. Now the reason that's a no is because that's how you become really annoying. When people feel they can't escape you and you're all over the radio and the TV for fucking nothing that's when I don't want or need that attention. It's very negative attention from the type of people who will harass you online.

But it proved my point. Multiple offers to come on TV and radio, the biggest shows, just to talk about an article that was written about me in the paper. When the president of Ireland came on this podcast, how many opportunities to go on tv or radio do you think I got how many phone calls do you think I got none literally none they pretended

it didn't happen but an article gets written about me in the paper and now all of a sudden they want me on tv and radio to speak about an article and And if I'd have said yes, that would have meant in the past week, I'd have been on two talk shows and two radio shows. And then I'd get more calls going, Hey Blind Boy, will you come on onto our radio show to talk about the other radio show that you were on last week? And if I keep doing that each week, then I become famous. And that's how it works.

You keep appearing on the TV and radio to speak only about the previous TV and radio thing that you did. And then if you do it enough, one of the tabloids writes an opinion piece about you, about why you're on the TV and radio too much. And then you get a phone call and it's the TV and radio going. The tabloid just wrote about why you're on the TV and radio too much and then you get a phone call and it's the tv and radio going the tabloid just wrote about why you're on the tv and radio too much do you want to come on to the tv and radio to talk about why you disagree with this and it goes on and on and on and on and that's how you become an irish celebrity and it's all bullshit it's a self-feeding bullshit cycle that's created exclusively by established media to keep

itself alive and if the president of Ireland comes on your podcast which is actual news because it's the president of Ireland talking they pretend it doesn't happen they pretend it doesn't happen and also since that podcast I did two weeks ago I got contacted by people who worked in TV and radio and who had since left it and they said, you're right, 100%. It's an editorial choice. Blogs, podcasting, they're seen as competition. So established media doesn't want to acknowledge them. Now, I don't want to sound like a little ungrateful shit who's ungrateful because he's been offered to come on and speak on the radio.

What I'm doing is I'm just, I want to highlight that this is a thing because no one is talking about it and I have a unique position of having worked in both worlds and I think it's worth talking about because it's such a strange phenomenon and it's so recent.

It's recent because click sites are gone. There used to be click sites. Joe.ie, The Daily Edge, Her.ie. They're still going, but they're not in their heyday anymore. And these click sites used to work as intermediaries between established media and independent media. This was the middle ground that made everything work together. But now they're gone, and now established media

is at war with independent media and pretending it doesn't exist. So I'll be sticking with independent unless I have something to actually say or if I'm trying to promote something so if I'm promoting my next book then I'll go on TV and radio because it's like what's the crack I'm here for a reason I've just created something and I'd like to speak about it because the other thing too especially since the pandemic the level of online harassment that you get when you appear on established media it's gone up by about a hundred percent since before the pandemic like there's very troubled

people on facebook who legitimately believe that if you appear frequently on TV or radio that you're like part of a global secret society that's taken over the world. They think you're an interdimensional shape-shifting lizard and there used to only be a few of these people in Ireland but since the pandemic they all got fucking radicalized on Facebook over the past two years. So that attention isn't very nice. That attention is quite unpleasant and frightening. But when you stick with independent media, you're not on their radar. They don't give a fuck about you. Blind Boy, would you like to come on the radio and address your comments about online harassment?

Do you want to come on the radio and talk about how people think you're an interdimensional shape-shifting lizard? On the radio. We think people would like to hear these comments on the radio, Blind Boy. Would you like to come on? Alright, I'll come on for about five minutes. We got Blind Boy on the line. Blind Boy, what do you think of people who are anti-vaxxers? Well, I think that anybody

who doesn't believe in science and evidence is irrational. Alright, Blind Boy, thanks very much. We've got an advert coming up now for some tyres. And then front fucking page headline on Facebook. Blind Boy Ball Club. I think anti-vaxxers are irrational. And then I get death threats for six weeks.

Alright, so Belfast this Saturday is sold out. I've got wonderful guests. Can't wait to do it. I added a second Belfast this Saturday is sold out. I've got wonderful guests. Can't wait to do it. I added a second Belfast date because there was so much demand for the first one. It's in like November. So you can get tickets for that in November if you want.

I think I added more Vicar Streets. I don't know where they are. I don't have my gig sheet. They're ages away anyway so there'll be plenty of time and I think everything is oh yeah Drogheda on the 1st of April

I'm in Drogheda on the 1st of April where's that em where the fuck is Drogheda on the 1st of April I think there's only one place in Drogheda where it can be.

Hold on a minute. TLT Theatre in Drogheda. Please come to that gig. Please come to my gig in Drogheda. Everything else is sold out alright but old Drogheda old Drogheda where Cranwell had a crack at it

come and see me in Drogheda will ya and if the promoter is listening I'm fucking promoting this man every fucking week every week for months I'm promoting Drogheda everything else is selling out

no problem with Canada fucking sold out Belfast, Dublin, Cork everything's sold out alright this is a Drogheda problem the fuck are you doing with 900 seats in Drahada problem. The fuck are you doing with 900 seats in Drahada?

Who the fuck do you think I am? Nathan fucking Carter? What? I wouldn't do that in Limerick. Like Drahada is like Limerick. Drahada is the Limerick of the East. 400 seats I can do. 500 seats

I can do. 900 seats in Drogheda? You're still recovering from what fucking Cranwell did. I don't even think there's 900 people in Drogheda. Please come to my gig in Drogheda in the TLT Theatre on the 1st of April. It's going to be great. They wanted me to do a radio ad. A radio ad for the gig in Drogheda. I'll do it here and you can use this audio and put it on the radio.

Hi guys. That's my blind buy impression. I'll do it here and you can use this audio and put it on the radio. Hi guys. That's my blind buy impression. Hi guys, it's me blind buy bow club. It's me blind buy bow club and I'm going to be in Drogheda on the 1st of April doing my new song called Horse Outside. That was a very tumescent

ocarina pause there. That's the longest one we've done so far. That was about 15 minutes I think this episode is a travel podcast I think that's what that was when I was recounting my experience in Spain with the piss pants but there was a reason I was talking about that

when I spoke about those mean people outside that bar who made fun of the piss on my shorts and how I didn't have assertiveness in that moment. And like I said assertiveness there didn't mean confronting those people. Assertiveness meant having an honest emotional dialogue with myself whereby I understood what my boundaries were. And the thing is with an experience like that, where I was...

What caused me pain wasn't what had happened. It was how I had reacted to what had happened. Right? Because if that experience happened to me this week and I had piss on my trousers and someone laughed at me that way I have enough emotional resilience and emotional regulation right now that if that happened it wouldn't upset me in any way. It wouldn't...

I wouldn't take that experience and then believe it and feel like a piece of shit because my emotional well-being is much better. But why it fucked up my writing that time I was in Spain was because, first off, there's the triggering event. These people laughed at me and were mean to me then there's my belief about that event my belief being they're right I'm a shameful person who's worthy of being ridiculed and laughed at and then what follows the next day is a sense of shame and it's a sense of shame around having the awareness that I allowed it to impact me that way

so that then follows a cycle like a day passes and then I say to myself Jesus those people yesterday were actually assholes why did you allow that to impact you in that way why did you allow their words to penetrate your being to the point that you felt like a piece of shit? Why are you so weak like that? And then I start to feel anger and then I become preoccupied with the fantasy of

what I would have done if I was in that situation again. Except that fantasy is one that's informed by an irrational anger so I imagine shouting at them or throwing a pint glass at one of their heads and then that's no good to me because now I'm in a swamp of toxic anger

about something which happened in the past and the toxic anger came in because I wasn't taking ownership of feelings of sadness instead of feeling legitimately sad for myself that my mental health was so poor that I allowed their words to impact me instead of allowing that sadness in which would be a little bit too vulnerable anger steps in first and then I start to think about if I was back there yesterday I'd have fucking hit your man into the face who did they think they are

who did they think they are that they can point and laugh at me who did they think they are that they are better than me and then I started to fixate on the fact that the son the adult son in that group who laughed at me his arse crack

was hanging out of the back of his pants and then I started feeling contempt for his arse crack going you're not better than me your arse crack

is hanging out so what if I did a piss in my pants and this absolutely fucking pointless thoughts

a pointless spiral of anger that took up like a day of my time. When you miss opportunities to be assertive in the moment and you allow your boundaries to be broken in any way, that then turns into anger tomorrow and that can be quite toxic and it can leave you feeling very very powerless so last week when I went to Porto in Portugal and I knew I'm going to Porto and I'm going there to write I need to go here to work and I need to be at the top of my game and I need to go here to work. And I need to be at the top of my game. And I need to have creative flow. And I need my mental health to be in check. Because I have to come away from Porto.

With decent work. This needs to happen. On the bus. To the airport. To Dublin airport. From Limerick. A situation presented itself on the bus. Where I needed to be assertive.

I needed to understand what my boundaries were and what my needs were. So the bus to the airport was absolutely packed. 100% every single seat is taken. A very stressful coach ride from Limerick to Dublin airport Airport which is two and a half hours long now this is not a pleasant bus ride alright, the seats are small enough as it is so the two and a half hour coach to Dublin Airport it's not comfortable

it's not comfortable but you put up with it so I sit down in my seat very cramped but I'm like fuck it, I'll deal with it. I've got my Kindle. I'm going to read Dubliners by James Joyce, which I hadn't had a proper look at in about 10 years. I sit down and then a lad sits down beside me, sitting beside me, young lad of about 20. The bus is filling up. And then in front of us, two American women sit down in the seat in front of us. Now as the bus takes off, the American woman in front of the young lad beside me,

she decides, I'm going to recline my seat the full way. Now there's an unwritten rule on buses. If you're on a coach and it's cramped and that coach is completely full, you don't recline your seat. Because the extra 15% of comfort that you get on this journey, for you to have that 15% of comfort, you're removing 15% of comfort

to the person behind you so you don't recline your seat unless you're going for the domino effect and everybody in the row is reclining their seat but you don't recline your fucking seat so the woman in front of the lad beside me she goes for the recline

and it was really fucking it really got exceptionally cramped for this young lad beside me but he was like 20 and I looked at him and now his phone was stuffed up to his face and this was going to be a two and a half hour journey and I looked at him and I clocked in my head he's deeply uncomfortable with this woman reclining her seat deeply uncomfortable with this but he's not going to say shit because he's 20

he's just going to leave it be so he did and then the American woman beside this woman I saw her looking at the one beside her reclining and I clocked in my head she's going to try and recline on me she's looked at the woman beside her

and said wow that looks like a good idea she looks so comfortable and the dude behind her didn't say shit so I'm going to go for a little recline too so I checked in with my So I checked in with my boundaries. I checked in with my emotions. I quickly asked myself this is going to be a two and a half hour journey. This is a very cramped bus. Nobody else on this bus has gone for the recline. Nobody because everyone on this bus understands that it's unacceptable.

The dude to the left of me can barely move his hands because of the reclining woman in front of him. So I checked in at my boundaries and said to myself, do you know what? It's fair for me to ask the woman in front of me not to recline.

That's a fair thing for me to ask the woman in front of me not to recline. That's a fair thing for me to ask. Her extra comfort comes at the expense of my discomfort. So it's reasonable for me to request the same physical boundaries that every other person on this bus has. So she reached for the little recline and the second it went backwards and then I said really politely and nicely please don't recline your seat that'll make it really difficult for me on this journey so that was an assertive request I requested that my boundaries be respected now the woman in front of me she she got mad embarrassed. She got real embarrassed and went, oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. And didn't decline her seat. Now the

one beside her, she turned and watched, waiting for the dude beside me to request the same of her. Now he didn't, because like I said, he was about 20 and he was visibly uncomfortable he was probably afraid of conflict which is what I would have been when I was fucking 20. So she kept her seat declined which really wasn't

a nice thing to do like he was really fucking cramped this was piss taken it really wasn't a nice thing to do but I stayed out of it because that's none of my fucking business it's his responsibility to tell the person in front of him please don't decline your seat this is a living hell he didn't do it none of my business so the woman in front of me she didn't get to decline now I felt fucking great I felt really good because I had assertively declared a boundary I'd done it in a way that

wasn't confrontational or aggressive I'd simply asked for something based on my needs and the person in front had listened and respected my needs but then as the journey went on I could see that the woman in front of me she kept looking at the one beside her reclined relaxed the one beside her had a snooze and the one in front of me I could tell was fucking fuming really angry and annoyed that she didn't get to recline and that I had said no please don't recline now the thing is too her anger was probably a little bit of embarrassment because like I said if you looked around this bus not one person had reclined their seat because this is unacceptable behavior on a full fucking bus so to attempt that is to be cheeky to attempt to recline on a full bus is to try and push another person's boundaries and hope that they don't have the assertiveness to say no

now you might be thinking what if the woman in front of me had a physical need to recline? Well she didn't express that. If she'd have expressed that to me and it's like I actually do need to recline I've got this then I would have complied. That's changed the situation completely but she didn't. The information that I had was she was someone who wanted a little bit of extra comfort and I said no that extra comfort comes at my discomfort so we're all gonna have to equally do our fucking best on this horrible journey but we all share the same amount of discomfort if we keep our fucking seats upright. So the woman in front she was fuming she was looking at the woman beside her having a snooze she was probably feeling embarrassed that she chanced her arm and I said no now I could tell she was getting angry

because number one literally anything I did behind her move my feet took a bottle of water out of my bag to open it, she turned around and stared at me with a real aggressive face, trying to find the reason, if this fella does anything wrong, I'm gonna go at him, I'm gonna let him know that I am, my journey is fucking destroyed now because you wouldn't let me recline what I had to do in that moment then was be aware of my emotional boundaries because the thing is what she was doing there she was being passive aggressive effectively being aggressive towards me but doing it in a passive way so throwing daggers at me with her eyes because I opened a bottle of water that's passive aggression and I had to be mindful of my own boundaries that I didn't take any of that

energy on board because I'd done nothing wrong there's nothing wrong with saying no you can't recline your seat the bus is full I need my space and boundaries and they should be equal to yours so when I said that to myself I'm like no I'm actually right here my position is one of fairness it's a democratic this is a democratic position that I'm taking and it's one of equality so her attempts to communicate anger towards me I don't have to take any of that on board as a feeling of guilt because that's what happens when a person is being passive-aggressive towards you for whatever reason if you're not careful you can take that energy on board as a feeling of guilt a feeling of this woman seems really angry and upset with me maybe Maybe I did do something wrong.

Maybe I should allow her to recline her seat and for my journey to be extra uncomfortable. Maybe I should do that and I'm a bad person for saying no. But like, no, that's not the case. I understood what my boundaries were and I enforced them and I did it in a nice way. And I was real happy with myself too for even having the awareness around that.

For having the awareness in the present moment that another person's passive-aggressive, non-verbal signals, that I was able to witness those and step back from them and not take them on board emotionally as the experience of guilt. So she kept at this for the entire journey of about two hours. Now I'd said in my head, if this bus should stop for whatever reason and a seat opens up, I'm going to move over there and then she can recline. Because the best way to deal with any situation assertively is to try and find a compromise for both people. The thing is,

this bus wasn't going to stop because it was direct to Dublin Airport. Now, when I knew she was getting really fucking furious is this is a real cramped bus now. So do you know when you're behind someone on the bus and you look at the reflection of the window and you can kind of see that person's phone screen? Well, she was on her phone but she wasn't able to stay on any app so she'd open a video watch it for five seconds close it then

move to a new app then close that and move to another app now I wasn't snooping I couldn't read what was on her phone I could just see a vague silhouette reflection of activity on her phone. So I wasn't like invading her privacy. It was there as a reflection on the window. But I could tell by the way that she was flicking through all the different apps. That she wasn't staying in the present moment. Something was really bothering her and this was most likely anger. She was so angry

and so annoyed with me for having saying, no, you can't recline, even though the person beside you is having a lovely sleep reclined with that poor fucker beside me who can't move. She was so angry with me

that she couldn't even focus on whatever she was doing on her phone. So at that point I said to myself, when I get off this bus she might have a go at me I don't know but she might have a go at me so then I get off the bus after two and a half hours of a very uncomfortable journey but a lot more comfortable than it would have been if I had let this woman encroach on my boundaries. Now I'd been breathing, I'd been doing my meditative breathing to make sure that I'm checking in with my emotions, that I know what I'm feeling, that I'm calm, I'm emotionally regulated. So when we get off the bus and we're all going over to the bit where you take your

fucking luggage off, your one comes right up behind me and says hope you had a comfortable journey and in the split second I had a look at her because I'd only seen the back of her and she was an American woman in her 50s I'd say and she had tattoos on her arms now this meant one of two things she's either quite woke and progressive and left-leaning, or she's into crystals and healing and spirituality, which you'd think is a good thing, and generally it is. But unfortunately, since the pandemic, that might also mean that she fell into the anti-vax hole

and is now a raging anti-semite but I went with the I'm guessing this person is woke and left-leaning so when she said I hope you had a comfortable journey that's a passive-aggressive remark because what she meant was you fucking prick you didn't let me recline my seat so that's an invitation for me to respond with aggression or passive aggression or a snarky remark I wasn't going to do that

because like I said I was being assertive it's okay for me to want the person in front of me to not recline that's an okay thing for me to want that's my boundaries so there's no reason for me to get angry in that situation because I'm entitled to my boundaries so what I did instead I said to her which one of these suitcases is yours and she goes

that one there the purple one so I pulled out her big purple suitcase. To help her to be nice. And then I asked her. I said are you American? She goes I am. And then real honestly and nicely after helping her I said. I picked up throughout the entire journey. That you were really angry. I could tell that you were really angry.

And then she kind of sighs a bit as if her anger kind of left her because I'd named it she stopped being angry and she goes I was I was really angry I was annoyed because you didn't let me recline and the lady beside me she reclined for the whole journey now it turns out they were both American but they didn't know each other. Now I'd copped that they were American because I heard them both speaking to each other when they were sitting beside each other. Now the first thing I said to this woman was look I'm really sorry about that okay but I'd have had an incredibly unpleasant journey if you reclined and you'd have had a much more pleasant journey but at least we both had

the same equal shit journey and she laughed a bit at that and there was no more tension and at this point we'd walked a bit because we're both going into Dublin airport now this is where I took the big risk because remember earlier I said I looked at her fucking tattoos and I decided in my head this woman looks like she's kind of woke she's kind of with it this woman looks like she kind of cares about social justice so I came right out and I said it nice and friendly did you notice that the only two people who wanted to recline on that bus were you and the lady beside you and that you were both Americans and she goes yeah and I said to her

kind of joking but serious I said that's imperialism that's US imperialism and frontierism I said that anger that you felt that's a very specifically American collective sense of entitlement to other people's space

and other people's boundaries and she looks at me like I'm fucking mental but there's a curiosity in her eyes and she says something like tell me more or something like that at this point we're walking towards the doors of Dublin airport and there's no tension anymore

and I said America is an imperialist nation America takes over parts of the world America is founded upon frontierism this idea of manifest destiny everything in America is was there to be taken an entitlement for it to be taken and then she's like I've never thought of it that way you think that me getting pissed off about taking your seat is like something to do with me being American I said some of it maybe I mean you're American you grew up in an American culture this is this is what American culture is about American exceptionalism we are the best we entitled to space, why would some of that not leak into your personal behaviour and the things that might irritate you? She wasn't offended by

any of this, she was really interested in it and then I started talking about 9-11. I was like, yeah, fucking, I mean when 9-11 happened, everybody in the rest of the world was like, that's a terrible thing that happened to you America we're so sorry about that but you kind of had it coming as well in fairness you've done a lot of bad imperialist shit all around the world

you know this is an awful thing that happened but we can't say that we're fucking surprised that there was a terrorist attack and the general vibe from Europe was we're fucking surprised that there was a terrorist attack and the general vibe from Europe was we're so sorry about this this is awful

but you might have to take this one on the chain America because like look at what happened to fucking England, France got a crack at it, Italy had plenty of fucking terrorism this is what happens to countries that are imperialist. But America's

response was so disproportionate. Fucking invading Iraq. Changing the name of French fries to Freedom Fries. Because France didn't support the fucking illegal invasion of Iraq. And she started agreeing with me and giving out about

George Bush and telling me that she was involved in anti-war protests back in America around 2001 and how she didn't support the war in Iraq and by the time we got to the the sliding doors of Dublin airport which is when I knew I had to fucking stop talking about 9-11 because now you're in the door of an airport but as soon as we got up to the sliding doors we we were just laughing and having crack, and hadn't even thought about that shit on the bus. And she was genuinely intrigued at the concept of how American imperialism could find its way into

her being a little bit angry that she couldn't have my space on the bus. And then she asked me, well, why don't Irish people do that? And then I said, well, because we were colonised. We don't take people's spaces. We try to defend our own. And then I said goodbye to her,

and we had a little hug. We had a small little hug. And I said goodbye, and she went off to America. Now, I was completely talking out of my arse, all that stuff about 9-11 and frontierism and how that made her

entitled to my space. I just made it up for the crack. She was just happy that she met someone that was nice and friendly and that the anger that she felt

I don't even know if she agreed with me about all that 9-11 shit I think she was just happy that someone was human to her instead of me being fucking passive-aggressive and for me then I felt fucking amazing, I felt incredible because that there is the power of assertiveness, that there is the power of assertiveness. Assertiveness isn't conflict. It's not aggression. It's about calmly letting another person know what your boundaries and needs are and asking for them and trying to do it all in quite a kind, compassionate, playful way. And I was only

able to do that because at all points I was really mindful about what my emotions were what I was feeling and also believing my fucking internal voice when my voice said to me inside it's actually okay to not want someone recline their seat on you that's actually perfectly fine. And it's not rude to ask for this. And even if that person is a little bit pissed off. That's their energy. And you don't have to take that on board.

And all of that. Diffused conflict. And allowed me to have. A lovely little moment. With a stranger. For the four or five minutes that it was. And that is what set me up. To then fly to fucking Porto.

And to spend the week feeling great. And writing really well. Because when you do assertiveness correctly. And you're aware of your emotions and your boundaries. And you're aware of your emotions. And your boundaries. And you're aware of other people's emotions. And other people's boundaries. And you can maintain a respect for both your boundaries and theirs. And you do that effectively.

Your fucking self-esteem grows. Your self-esteem grows. And you feel like a decent good person. And just a final point on this at that moment when she was about to recline her seat and I thought about it beforehand what am I going to do when this happens because I have a feeling it's going to happen I made a strong decision there I must be assertive right now what would have happened if I didn't if she reclined her seat

and I did nothing and my journey is now really uncomfortable I'd have been fucking furious I'd have been angry with her but I'd have been twice as angry with myself

for not meeting my needs and I'd have been angry with her, but I'd have been twice as angry with myself for not meeting my needs. And I'd call myself pathetic, and I'd call myself weak, and I'd call myself a coward. And I'd be passive-aggressive towards her, and I wouldn't have read that wonderful fucking short story, The Dead, by James Joyce, which I read on that bus, and I loved. I wouldn't have fucking read that, because I'd have been fuming. I'd have been fuming with myself for allowing that fucking American woman, that yank, fucking yanks. Who does she think she is?

Who does she think she is to recline her seat on me? That would have been my thought process. The Irish man in me would have turned her into the Brits, reclining her seat trying to steal my potatoes out of the ground. And then I'd have gotten on the plane to Portugal all pissed off. Living in my head. I'd have spent the next day saying to myself. I should have said this to her.

I should have done that. I should have done this. Getting no fucking writing done. And lowering my self esteem by giving in to toxic anger I suppose this podcast was about travel and also mindfulness because what I did there on that bus

was mindfulness slow breathing really checking in and listening to my emotions and being aware of the emotions of people around me so that I can make here and now decisions that are the right decisions. And what comes out in the end? A little lovely moment of human connection

with another person where conflict was resolved and fun and laughter and playfulness was had even though I was talking out of my arse. Alright, I'm going to leave you go. I'll be back next week with a hot take. God bless. Ch choke a swan headbutt a worm

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