Running keeps me alive. Staying alive to care for my wife and children.
I'm sharing this while sitting on a park bench overlooking the lake immediately after finishing, before my stretching, as i need to get it out, raw and unfiltered.
I felt naked at a client site last week.
Not as naked as when I went to The Rocky Horror Picture Show as Frank-N-Furter. Trust me, you don't want to see the photo, it would scar you for life. If you do then you are very naughty.
Sometimes I think my mind lives in the gutter, anyway ...
My wife Charlotte is going to find out now.
When she was sleeping after a night shift I would entertain my son by holding him upside down and walking him across the ceiling singing:
Spider-Pig, Spider-Pig, Does whatever a Spider-Pig does. Can he swing from a web? No, he can't, he's a pig. Look out, he is a Spider-Pig!
We both thought it was hilarious.
It shouldn't be this hard to get my own f*cking data.
When I started looking I found that my data was scattered everywhere.
This is my sequence of actions that helped me escape burnout, from deep despair to hopefulness.
At the start of this I did not know I was burnt out or what the word really meant. In reflection I have been through many cycles of burnout, with the last (and hopefully final) one being the worst.
I have never built an MCP server or published an npm package, and definitely not one with multi-agent coordination. Until 2 days ago.
In December 2023 I was burnt out. I did not have a name for it then. Just symptoms: exhausted, unable to think straight, nearly 100kg, in what I can only describe as a pit of despair.
By June 2024 I had lost 20kg, reversed Type 2 Diabetes, and understood for the first time why I kept burning out. The catalyst was not a book, a coach, or a productivity system. It was writing a song.
Some days I feel like the Incredible Hulk.
Not the smashing things part, though that would be satisfying. The Bruce Banner part, walking through the world feeling different and carrying something most people don't understand.
It's not easy bein' green. Except I am not looking for a cure. I am looking for my tribe.
I am rubbish at keeping a journal.
There, I said it. After years of buying notebooks, downloading apps, and telling myself "this time will be different", I finally admitted it. I am simply not built that way.
I never meant to give up alcohol completely but 6 years ago on Christmas Eve 2019 became the last time I drank any.
This is my story and if it helps just one person then it is worth sharing with you.