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I count myself lucky to have grown up knowing him. He and my Grandma (maternal grandparents) lived in Marton where I grew up, having emigrated from the UK to NZ in 1952 with my auntie and mother. They saved enough to buy a house there, and lived in it the rest of their lives. He got a job at a timber firm within walking distance. Never bought a car. Never needed to.

Grandad was a storyteller. He had an exceptional memory, aided by a love of history and of books. He had an adventurous spirit and loved exploring places. He loved the outdoors and nature, something he seemed to inherit from his own father. I inherited these things from him too perhaps, definitely a love of storytelling and exploration. (I inherited an Irish Passport from him too, this has been useful. )

He would tell me and my brothers and cousins stories about his travels and adventures, people he met, things he saw and experienced. He would share the sense of the awe he felt floating on the Dead Sea, seeing the ancient rock city of Petra, old Jerusalem, the Colossus of Rhodes, the pyramids of Giza, Monte Carlo, the Norwegian Fjords, the midnight sun in Iceland.

Many of these he saw after joining the British Royal Navy in 1932, on a 12-year contract. Times were tough in the early 30’s. He’d tried his luck emigrating to New York, but the financial crisis forced him home with just 10 shillings to his name. He stayed home to help his Dad on the farm but markets for their crops were bleak. The Navy offered security and an opportunity to see the world. He trained as a cook, and rose to Chief Petty Officer.

Of course, he saw other things in the Navy in the late 1930’s and early 40’s.

He told us the stories of events as he saw them, but not really his emotion of witnessing those events. I’m not blaming him, I mean, how could anyone truly process the enormity of what happened then. Or even after the war, the decision to bring his wife and daughters to the other side of the planet, knowing they’d probably never see their families again. He and Grandma did return after he retired in 1973. His Dad died just a year before, aged 96.

My Mum convinced Grandad to dictate some of his life stories so they could be recorded. I’m incredibly grateful they did that. Memories fade, but when it’s written down it outlives the teller. His retelling of those adventures is quite matter of fact, and I’m more drawn to the felt emotion and meaning of things. So, last year, I attempted to tell his story as poem. I’ve tried to imagine what it must have been like for him to feel the emotions that came with all these things he witnessed. Trying not to project my emotionality onto them, but trying to bring words to what he must have felt, from what I knew of him in the 17 years we shared together.

The Grandad I knew was grateful. Grateful for the life he was given, despite the jeopardy he faced. He could be strict – he was a Navy-man after all – but he was also fun and laughed lots. He laughed at my many little quirks. We played cards lots, and went on bike rides lots. I never remember a lot of emotion though, other than gratitude. All of those post war years easily might never have been.

One thing he would say with some emotion, that has always stuck with me: war is a blimmin’ waste. We must never go there again, to that utter futility. On the last page of his short memoir he listed the numbers of lives lost by nation during WWII. He saw many go down with their ships. Many he shared a ship with never came home. It is incomprehensible. Perhaps that always was the right emotion: disbelief.

This is Grandad’s story, told through the lens of my imagination, of what he saw might have felt and he experienced it all.

Happy birthday Grandad.

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Nostalgia is a bit of a buzzword at the moment. A couple of weeks back, the afternoon drive-show hosts on a popular NZ radio station were nostalgically remembering tunes from their childhoods. They asked people to call in with their nostalgic memories, so my daughter called in and recited the compete theme song to Little Einsteins. She’s only 14, so childhood wasn’t long ago, but it clearly holds fond memories for her. The DJ’s said she nailed it.

She has an incredible memory for lyrics and lines; she can recite most of Hamilton the Musical, and her current on-loop fascination is Epic, a musical, multi-album retelling of Homer’s Odyssey. This ancient story is buzzing at the moment too, the 3000-year-old tale of Odysseus, King of Ithaca, returning home from the Trojan War.

There’s something timeless about that theme of returning home, and the longing that accompanies it. So much of art, poetry, literature and music talks about the longing for and journey towards home.

Playlists

A few years ago I started collecting a playlist of songs about Home. It’s not an exhaustive list, just songs that have caught my attention and imagination over the years; an eclectic collection of artists bringing words and imagination to that universal longing for home – that place where everything is in its right place.

Home can mean different things. It can be our hometown, a portal in our memory back to our place of origin: like John Denver’s country roads, or Ed Sheeran’s old country lanes. They’re nostalgic, but there’s a pang in the remembering: “Take me back to when,” Sheeran longs; “I should have been home yesterday,” Denver regrets.

Home can also mean a present place – our home address. There’s an ache in the distance from that place. Kiwi artists feel the pain of distance while so far from our South Pacific homeland. Shihad’s Home Again is an anthemic banger,1 carrying both regret – “I’m sorry, I was miles away” – with a steely determination to return – “I’ll be home again.” Jack Johnson’s home is tranquil – his garden, birds in the attic, seeds on the ground, changing seasons – but ultimately it’s not just a place but connection: “Home is wherever we are where there’s love there too.”

All of this presumes that home is a happy place. Everclear’s Wonderful comes with a light, catchy tune, but describes the dark pain of a broken home. This child longs for “the things that I had before like a Star Wars poster on my bedroom door”, but refuses to accept the normalising or bypassing of his family strife: “Please don’t tell me everything is wonderful now.” We know in our bones it’s not meant to be like this.

Nostalgia

The word nostalgia carries a deeper meaning than just the recall of cosy memories. The Greek word nostos means ‘return home’. The ancient Greeks had an entire literary genre called the Nostoi – ‘the returns’, the most famous surviving example being The Odyssey. But álgos literally means ‘pain’ or ‘suffering’ (i.e. neuralgia = nerve pain, myalgia = muscle pain). Nostalgia in its truest form is a visceral ache of separation from home. Odysseus is driven by the pain of prolonged distance from his wife and son. His journey is tenuous and costly, confronted by obstacles and jeopardy, and at each step we wonder, “Will he make it?” Will this next challenge or monster be his end?

Spoiler alert: (although in fairness, a 3000-year-old one) Odysseus makes it home to Ithaca, overcoming overwhelming odds. But Ithaca isn’t the place he remembers. And worse, Odysseus isn’t the man Ithaca remembers. His struggles have changed and contorted him.

Without pretending to be an expert in ancient mythology, it strikes me that this story is more than just a journaling of a hero’s adventure. It’s an archetype of our own battle to survive the challenges life throws at us, and the ways our own sense of self can be misshapen or distorted in the fight to hold on to control, safety and belonging.2 Life has a way of frustrating and shattering our hopes and securities, and in crisis we wonder, “will we make it?”

Jeopardy

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s Our House is a beautiful song, a soundtrack for countless home decor ads with a warm fire, flowers in a vase, two cats in the yard, and “everything is easy cause of you.” Home is a state of ease, and a picture of tranquillity and love.

Our House is Track 7 on their 1970 album Déjà Vu, back when albums were crafted to tell a full story. But the full story demands Track 7 is held in tension with Track 8, 4 + 20; a short, sombre and tragic song of disconnect, fracture, addiction and despair. (Trigger warning: if you are sensitive to themes of suicide, please don’t listen to it).

We’re deeply wired for home, but life doesn’t promise happy endings. We must hold these truths in both hands.

In my last article ‘Lost’ I mused, “Perhaps we can never be truly lost.” Even when we’re displaced and without our bearings, there’s a deeper wisdom guiding us if we learn to quiet ourselves and listen.

We are never truly lost, and yet I wonder if we can ever truly be home either.

We can’t go back to our nostalgic memories, and we were never meant to stay there. Living and growing means being separated from our comforts, but in that painful space between remembered comfort and our current reality we grow and mature. That growth is never linear though. Odysseus’ journey wasn’t linear, but a repeating cycle of jeopardy, crisis and tenacious overcoming. It costs him. He faces monsters, but he also finds friends in surprising places. All of it shaped him.

Parts of Us

The people our journeys intertwine with shape us. Ed Sheeran recalls “these people raised me”, but not all fared well. Relationships fade or fracture. Tragedy strikes. We age and our bodies fail. As life carries on, through triumphs and tragedies, we’re faced with that inescapable reality that none of us make it out of this story alive. It all matters though, and the stories point us to something: a reality further down the road that we’re journey toward.

There’s also something deep within us, a reminder of who we really are. That innocent child, uniquely and wonderfully made, filled with awe and wonder, a version of us before the world forced us to conform, adapt, and armour up to survive. That child is still there, asking to be remembered, inviting us to hold the tension of our innate beauty, and the story of the journey that got us to where we are now. All of it belongs, even the painful bits, and holding all this together helps us to again feel at home in our own skin.

Maybe these songs reach me so deeply because they point to something genuine and real. Across the spectrum these artists encompass, there’s a universal hope and tenacity that draws me towards a sense of feeling more at home in myself, and finding a sense of tranquillity and ease even amidst the doubts and storms.

Home, then, is less a place and more a posture, a direction of travel towards that point on the horizon we know we’re called to and made for. It’s the determination to face the monsters we encounter, and the humility to accept we don’t always get it right. Our battle to survive costs us, but there’s a deeper invitation in our stories drawing us to love, acceptance, forgiveness, and the courage to try again. Sometimes that takes the teeth-gritted, fierce tenacity of Ellie Goulding’s Home. Other times it’s the quiet and deliberate perseverance of Sleeping at Last’s North.

The Wisdom of Misfits

If you listen all the way through my playlist, you’ll find an oddball entry at the end. The coda to my compilation of serious artists and storytellers is a Muppet. I grew up with the madcapped mayhem that was the Muppet Show. Just like my daughter can recite Epic or Little Einsteins by memory, I could sing word for word every song on our Muppet Show LP.

We also had the soundtrack of the original Muppet Movie; the origin story of Kermit and his friends’ trans-American road trip to stardom. They faced obstacles and villains on their journey. At the point of high crisis, stranded in the Nevada desert, with all hope lost, Gonzo poignantly croons I’m going to go back there someday, capturing their deep yearning and yet an even deeper hope:

“This looks familiar, vaguely familiar,
Almost unreal yet, it’s too soon to feel yet,
Close to my soul, and yet so far away,
I’m going to go back there someday.”

The Muppets were a zany bunch of weirdos, yet even they thought Gonzo was weird. No one even knew what kind of creature he was. But sometimes it’s the misfits that surprise us with the clarity and insight that capture a depth of emotion everyone else misses. To me, that’s the genius of making Gonzo’s song the movie’s axis. Kermit’s the story’s hero, and Rainbow Connection its Oscar-winning hit, but when hope is lost, it’s the misfit Gonzo who reminds Kermit who he really is.

Perhaps it’s the misfit parts of ourselves we’re convinced don’t belong that our stories in fact turn on. The parts we’re most embarrassed about, the parts we turn away from or resist, the parts of us we’d prefer others didn’t see – the hardest parts of our story – quietly and subtly point us to what really matters. Accepting that all of who we are belongs is part of coming home to ourselves as we were divinely created to be.

This is what I think Thomas Keating meant by “It is like coming home to a place I should never have left, to an awareness that was somehow always there, but which I did not recognise.” He doesn’t mean we “should never have left” as though we erred or transgressed – our original sin – but that life happened to us and misshaped us. God still sees the true, divinely imagined us. We’re lost, not broken, and God invites us home like the Prodigal Son.

I’m slowly learning that all of my journey matters, that all of me belongs, and I’m finding peace in being able to hold it all in both hands, knowing I am loved, and worthy of that love. Always learning to realise I’m already home.

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Realising we’re lost is an unsettling feeling. It’s not just not knowing where we are, but a deeper feeling of losing our bearings. An inner sense of confusion, anxiety, even dread. Some stages of our lives feel like that; when the security of our reference points vanishes and we don’t know where we are, or perhaps even who we are.

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Milk Shakes

Growing up, I spent lots of time on farms with my dad and my older brothers. Just north of my hometown runs into steep, rugged hill country. Rangitīkei sheep country. To be clear, I’m a townie, not a country kid, but I spent a lot of weekends on these farms, learning to ride motorbikes, navigate the hills and tracks, and find my way home.

Some of my earliest memories are of sitting in front of Dad on the petrol tank of his bike as we explored these farms. One time we were way out the back of one farm, a spot Dad hadn’t explored before. We stopped on a high ridge; we could see hills and valleys for miles and miles. Dad was looking around, scratching his head, and then said, “Huh, I think we’re lost!” There was no hint of despair in Dad’s voice, but I burst into tears. I was perhaps five, too young to know where we were. But Dad knew everything, and he says we’re lost!

That wasn’t what Dad meant by ‘lost’. What he meant was we hadn’t ended up quite where he expected. Wrong turn, wrong hill. He still knew which farm we were on, where the boundaries and landmarks and tracks were. He tried to explain this to me, but my little nervous system didn’t want an explanation; it wanted soothing. I didn’t like feeling lost.

Dad’s not an emotionally overt kind of guy, not big on cuddles or words of affirmation. Partly a product of his generation perhaps, but mostly his innately pragmatic personality. He fished through a hidden bag of bits and pieces under the seat: spare sparkplugs, wire, bits of twine and tape, and he pulled out a Milk Shake. This iconic kiwi lolly soothed my sensitive little nerves so Dad could point out the ridges and tracks that led back to the woolshed, back to where we started, where the car was parked.

I still love Milk Shakes; not just the taste, but that recalled emotion of feeling safe.

Being Lost

Our lives go through stages and seasons. There are times of certainty and flow, when we’re in a rhythm, connected with the people around us, a sense of competency in what we’re doing, and even if it’s busy there’s balance and equilibrium.

But seasons never last. Things change. We might choose change; a new job, a new role, a different place to live, different circles to move in. Or perhaps change happens to us; the loss of a job, of health, of a relationship, or a painful bereavement. These life events shake our sense of stability and control. We don’t know how we got here, or why this happened. Things or people we placed our trust in are gone. Or worse, we discover those things or people to be untrustworthy. People might say we’ll be okay, but we don’t feel okay. We feel discombobulated, adrift, and painfully far from that sense of flow and equilibrium. We crave that sense of home, where everything is in its right place.

The Bach

A Bach (pronounced Batch) in New Zealand is a holiday home, usually near a beach or lake; a getaway place to relax and unwind. Our bach was nowhere near a beach or a lake. It wasn’t near anywhere. The nearest settlement was a one-pub-and-servo1 town over an hour’s drive away on winding, narrow, dusty gravel roads cut into steep, slippery sandstone hills. Navigating past an oncoming car needed skill. Navigating past an oncoming logging truck needed prayer.

This land and its waters – part of the vast catchment of the Whanganui River – had for centuries nurtured and sustained Whanganui Rver iwi (tribes). Willing signatories of Te Tiriti o Waitangi in 1840, they were subsequently alienated from this land by treaty breaches of the settler government, breaches still being reckoned with.2 Connection to land and water was deeply spiritual for Māori:

E rere kau mai te awa nui nei mai i te kāhui maunga ki Tangaroa.
Ko au te Awa, ko te Awa ko au.

The great River flows from the mountains to the sea.
I am the River and the River is me.3

The land was later divided up and given to returning soldiers from World War II to farm, a thank you for their service to King and country. But these blocks were so remote and rugged that most couldn’t actually stay or make any kind of living there. For the tough souls who did stay, it was an inhospitable, isolated existence. Their stories of survival are sobering.

The bach wasn’t ours; it was an old logging gang’s quarters. It was primitive: tin roof and cladding, no insulation, no electricity, but a cast-iron coal range that cooked meals, heated the room and even provided hot water for a shower. Luxury. It was quiet, and yet not: we’d be woken at dawn by the morning chorus of native birdlife, and kept awake at night by the screeching call of Kiwi. The same chorus and calls heard here for centuries. Spectacular.

Good Keen Men

Dad and I headed out there one long weekend. I was in my early teens, my big brothers were working and doing their own thing by then. Dad was keen to explore an area of dense virgin bush up behind the bach by foot. There were no tracks, but you could follow the terrain and rough tracks formed by wild deer and goats. Beyond the stream by the bach was a steep spur that led up to the main ridge that separated our valley from the next one over. Dad’s plan was to go up this spur, along the ridge and back down the next spur to our dusty road half a mile down from the bach. Too easy.

The day was overcast; not gloomy, but the thick white clouds diffused the sun’s light without giving away its location. Climbing the spur was a couple of miles of steep bush-bashing, following a couple of turns but eventually finding the ridge. An expansive view unfolded of yet more valleys and ridges, on almost forever, it seemed. These were the environs of quintessential kiwi bushmen I grew up learning of, rugged blokes, like Barry Crump, the legendary good keen man who could survive in bush like this for months.

We tracked along our ridge for 20 minutes, then took the next spur back down into the native bush. As we followed a rough goat track, I noticed an old Rimu tree with an unusual lichen pattern on its massive trunk. We kept on for another 20 minutes or so, then came by another big Rimu with an uncannily similar lichen pattern. We paused for a drink, and I noticed something else: footprints in the damp soil. Not hooves; boots. They looked fresh. Could we have company way out here? I crouched and looked closer, and felt a chill as it hit me… these were our boot prints.

I flashbacked to being a kid on Dad’s motorbike, hearing Dad say ‘we’re lost’ and bursting into tears. I didn’t burst into tears this time; I had by then learnt that real kiwi blokes “keep calm and don’t make a fuss”. Barry Crump wouldn’t cry in the bush. Harden up snowflake. But I still felt it; that visceral, hollow chill deep in my gut.

Have you ever had that sense of going in circles in life? Patterns and habits–behavioural loops–we know harm others and ourselves. Try as we might, inevitably we end up circling back there, carrying a sense of failure and shame, and that sinking feeling we’re stuck, far from home.

A Deeper Wisdom

Dad, ever the pragmatist, sat down, pulled a muesli bar out of his pack, broke it in half and gave me a piece. He didn’t say much; he was as surprised as I was to see our own boot prints, but he still felt calm. Don’t panic, take a deep breath, listen to the birds. Panic doesn’t serve you well in the bush.

Dad pointed out the steep terrain here was actually our friend. We knew which side of the ridge we were on. Rain this side runs down these flanks into different creeks and gullies, but they all feed the same stream; the one that flows along the road the bach was on, and on to the Whanganui River. We just needed to slide down into the gully, find a creek and follow it, and we’d hit the road somewhere. Our internal compasses may have failed us, but the water wouldn’t.

Perhaps we can never truly be lost, if we learn to trust the land beneath us, and the deeper wisdom it holds.

We tracked our way down into the gully, battling soggy ground and thicker undergrowth; wet feet and wet backsides as we slipped and slid, but a clear creek was forming and beckoning, meeting another creek, and another, forming the stream that, sure enough, guided us eventually to the dusty gravel road we’d hoped to find hours earlier. We were a long way further down the road than we intended, our calves and shoulders complaining loudly by the time we returned to our palatial bach and stoked up the coal range for much anticipated hot showers to sooth our aching bodies.

These days we have Topo GPS on our phones. Looking at that spot 30 years on, I can see where we went wrong. But even when batteries die and satellite signals drop, the old wisdom of the land still holds true.

Navigating our way

It takes courage to admit we’re lost. It’s unsettling, but it’s deeply human. You may feel lost but you’re not broken. Realising these patterns and loops – as discomforting as they feel – is actually our deep, nonconscious survival brain keeping us safe and inviting us towards healing.

I’ve found myself lost in life too many times. Sometimes it’s been a slow realisation. Other times it’s been like a brick to the back of the head.

I have a persistent – and at times brutal – inner critic;4 an internal, nagging voice that says I’m broken, I’m a failure, I don’t belong. My default response is to this voice is to relentlessly try to outrun and prove it wrong with compulsive busyness and distraction. But that never works; it reinforces the loop and locks me into an increasing state of high-functioning anxiety that leads to burnout – completing the circle back to failure and shame.

But what if that voice is actually not foe but friend – a warning signal alerting me that I’m heading the wrong way? Instead of outrunning the discomfort, what if I pay attention to the signal, trusting its invitation to pause and recalibrate – to soothe – and practice kindness to myself, and honest vulnerability with others that leads me not further into lostness but back towards love and healing?

If that resonates with you, welcome. Sit here with me for a bit. I don’t have expert answers or directions. But I do have a deep faith that there is something much deeper calling us; that we are never truly lost, and there is a wisdom in our deeper selves beckoning us home. I’ve seen it in the autumn leaves, felt it in the breeze on my cheeks as I sat on a swing by the ocean, and heard it in the calm voice of guides I’ve met along the way – people who know what it means to be lost and have discovered those seasons of dislocation are precisely where they’ve learnt to navigate unfamiliar terrain.

As we find words for these seasons, and honestly share our diverse stories of wrestling with what life throws at us, we begin to discover not just the wisdom of others, but the wisdom buried deep within us. It was always there, in the terrain of our own souls, waiting for us to let go of striving, to sit, breathe, and listen.

I’m not someone who’s got this figured out. But I’m slowly learning to trust that deeper, quieter voice that’s always been whispering, calling me to notice, create, love and trust that I’m okay. Pointing me towards healing, towards home.

Keep an eye out for my next article, exploring the longing for – and the journey towards – home.

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I have fond memories of swings from my childhood home in Marton. We had these massive oak trees in the backyard; Dad had tied a rope to one of the high branches with a motocross tyre on the other end and made a swing out of it. I loved that swing: the cool breeze past my ears, that rhythmic, calming pace. When I felt adventurous, I would swing higher, the sense of nervous exhilaration pushing the edges of my kid nerves. But mostly, for me, swings are calming memories.

Here’s me as a little fulla in my swing. It was actually car seat that hooked over the back seat of our HQ Holden. It perhaps wasn’t the safest car seat (it was the 70s, there weren’t even seatbelts in the back), but Dad turned it into a decent kids’ swing. I love this photo – clearly, I was happy, content.

Where I now live, we’ve got a large section with big trees. My daughters have grown up here. I made a swing for them from a high limb of our sprawling honey-locust tree: a proper wooden platform with custom-welded stainless-steel brackets and high-tensile rope. Industrial. My girls loved it, sometimes just by themselves, swinging gently and feeling the breeze through their hair, sometimes with me pushing them high enough to touch the leaves and branches. Exhilarating screams.

Calm amongst the chaos

Back in April 2022, I spent a weekend at the tranquil little Coromandel Peninsula settlement of Whiritoa. It was an opportunity for a little silence and solitude, which I’ve learnt I need every now and again.

It had been a weird couple of years. New Zealand came through the first half of COVID remarkably unscathed; by the end of 2020 we had stamped it out, and while the rest of the world was languishing, we were at the beach, at concerts, zero restrictions. We were so grateful we gladly elected our government back in with a landslide victory – a happy and compliant team of five million.

But 2021 shifted. Delta wouldn’t be stamped out so easily, and the strict measures that had helped in the beginning started to work against us. Anxiety, isolation, strain, and distrust, culminating in a month-long occupation at Parliament, with hundreds protesting how all this was playing out, before being dispersed by force in March 2022. It was a wild national swing from relief to anger.

I was reflecting on this just a month later in Whiritoa. It was strange, because those same years had been restorative for me personally. After several years in a high-strain construction management role in the rough-and-tumble of our building sector, it had taken me a couple of years to unwind. By 2022 I was discovering more natural and restorative rhythms that returned a sense of equilibrium. I knew this was a privilege, as many had found those years tough and stressful. I was holding these disparate realities in both hands – grateful for my easier season, yet aware of the societal strains around me.

Down the beach at Whiritoa, a small tidal stream flows into the Pacific Ocean, lined with pōhutukawa trees and rustic rope swings. I went and sat in one of those swings for an hour or so, just swinging gently, contemplating all this. Words came that formed a poem, trying to capture my nostalgic memories of childhood stability while acknowledging the turmoil that had been in me and was now around me. It’s not a matter of imagining all that away or just going to the beach for some navel-gazing time alone. For me it was about finding a way to stay grounded through what life throws, so I could engage in a healthier way.

A letter to my future self

I now look back on that time, and that poem, as if somehow my inner consciousness knew I would need it someday, because tougher times were still to come.

On a Saturday in November 2023, I was pushing a four-year-old on our big swing when something sharply tweaked in my right wrist – a sudden, painful jolt.

I came inside immediately and iced it, assuming I had strained or sprained something. On Monday it was still sore, so I went to the physiotherapist. I took a week off work, but it didn’t improve. By then it was December; a mate helped me tidy up my building jobs and I took extended time off through Christmas and New Year. It would be fine by then, right?

It wasn’t.

The pain increased and spread into my fingers, up my forearm, like a slow contagion. It didn’t make sense. This was just an innocuous sprain, right? Why was it getting worse?

Six months later, I was diagnosed with complex regional pain syndrome. Somehow my autonomic nervous system perceived this simple injury as a threat to my whole body, and a normal pain response became an embedded autonomic nervous system strategy wildly out of proportion to what had really occurred.

I haven’t worked since then. Still can’t. Those nourishing rhythms and practices that brought tranquillity and equilibrium four years ago don’t work anymore. My body is constantly tense, wired, on alert. Rest is hard. Sleep is unrefreshing. Relaxing is almost impossible, even though I have so much time.

It’s like I wrote that poem as a letter to my future self, reminding me that seasons swing in and out like a pendulum, that summers don’t last but neither do winters, and that through them all I’m provided for and still seen. I’m held even through this, even when it feels out of control. Everything I need is still here, and I am not alone.

That’s something I find very hard to hold on to. Yet somehow, it holds me.

Holding on and letting go

Holding on to hope becomes something we sometimes have to force ourselves to do, even when we struggle to believe that this is not the last word. There is something deeper and stronger that holds us, a rhythm beneath our lost routines and broken practices that still carries us even when we’re lost.

There’s something magnetic that pulls us back toward that inner state of equanimity we might call home, that place where everything is in its right place, where there is calm and healing even when all the evidence points against it. That is hard to trust when it seems so far away, when it seems as though we’ve lost our way and may never find our way back to that home, that state of equilibrium, that place where everything is in its right place.

For me, to hold on to that requires, on the one hand, a bloody-minded perseverance and, on the other, a gentle letting go – stopping my manic striving and simply resting in the trust that I am held in an all-encompassing love I will never understand and yet somehow know deep in my bones. Like a distant memory of belonging and being safe in a place I struggle to remember, yet know I will return to someday.

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The town I live in is known as the “town of trees”. We have an array of trees from all over the world, their leaves all adding to the palette of colours: the golden-yellows of the massive London planes, the deep reds of the North American liquidambers, the orangey-browns of the Japanese cherries and the bright yellows of Chinese ginkgo bilobas.

Oaks remind me of my childhood backyard in Marton. We had massive oak trees at the back of our yard near the railway line. I remember gathering old wool sacks full of dead leaves and acorns to dispose. I loved jumping into the bag and burrowing into the musty, crunchy leaves. I probably wasn’t much help in actually tidying our leafy mess.

I’m a nostalgic soul, and perhaps autumn is a kind of nostalgia; the shortening days and lowering temperatures a long farewell to another summer past.

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The Mundane School Run

Right on two years ago I was doing the school drop-off run. I’d dropped my older daughter at high school and was heading to the middle school for my younger daughter. There was once a railway line running through the middle of one of our main streets; the tracks are long gone but the trees remain, their falling leaves painting a resplendent picture.

A storm had blown a massive amount of leaves off overnight, forming an eye-catching multi-coloured carpet on this beautiful morning that followed. I pointed it out to my younger girl, but she had other things on her mind that day. So had I. As I dropped her at school, a magnetic instinct deep within me drew me back to just pause and take in the scene.

I had been a builder for years, but at this point I had been unable to work for six months. I had sprained my right wrist the previous November, and the injury had not healed, instead morphing into a neurological nightmare known as complex regional pain syndrome, or CRPS. I had just been given this diagnosis, and was waiting on a second opinion. I was confused about what was going on; I was wrestling with daily pain, disrupted sleep, and confusion about where this left me and my business. Not just that, but so much of my identity had taken shape around what I could achieve with my hands.

This deep voice was inviting me to pause and push all that aside; to just go back and take in the scene, take in the colours, smells, and crisp morning air.

I obeyed the voice and drove back to a spot under a ginkgo tree with its bright yellow carpet encompassing it. This same deep voice that had drawn me back nudged me a little further, whispering, “you could do something fun with that.” Next to the ginkgo was a liquidambar with deep red leaves; the contrast was eye-catching. “Do something with the contrasting golden hues, do something creative.”

The creative child meets tall‑poppy culture

In my last article, I talked about this whimsical, creative child-version of me back at primary school, writing quirky stories and dreaming vivid narratives in my bedroom. It was like the same voice was now again calling me to do it again; do something quirky.

But there was another voice, another impulse trying to shut that down, saying, “Nah man, don’t be a try‑hard, just stay cool.”“Try‑hard” is a put‑down here in our tall-poppy culture; it’s someone who puts themselves out there, stands out, does something different, goes outside the norms… “Don’t do that, bro, just stay cool, just be normal.”

To be clear, these weren’t real, audible voices in my head. They were subtle impulses, imaginings, more like memories reappearing than voices. We all have them in some form. But these different impulses – for me to create, or to keep my head down and fit in – created a mental loop that carried on for about 15 minutes; an invisible internal struggle between my young creative self and this older self that had learnt to fit in by acting normal. Like, “What would other people think of me if they saw me doing something weird with leaves?”

Soundtracks of our lives

You’d be right in thinking there’s a lot going on in my head, but there’s more: there’s more often than not a soundtrack too! Music that has stuck with me as meaningful or resonant at some stage or place in my life. As I was debating the leaves, Spandau Ballet was singing:

You are… Gold
Always believe in your soul
You have the power to know
You’re indestructible, always believing
You are Gold

That song was released in 1983. I was 6 and had a little AM transistor radio I probably first heard it on, or maybe on RTR Countdown on the telly. But why were these lyrics from 40 years prior so indelibly etched into my psyche? What was meaningful about them? Why had they surfaced up now? The leaves were gold, but did I believe I was gold? Do I really believe in my soul; then, or now?

Crossing the threshold into action

I had to laugh at myself when realized what I was doing, arguing with myself was sillier than playing with leaves. So I grabbed a massive armful of deep red liquidambar leaves and started placing them in a pattern amongst the yellow gingko leaves. I took time to make sure the letters were even, clear and readable, but to be honest, it took less calories to do it than it did fretting.

People were driving past on their way to work or dropping their kids off at school; high‑school students were walking and scootering past; people were walking their dogs, or their kids to kindy. None of them paid any attention to this weirdo playing in the leaves. No one cared. That “don’t be a try‑hard” voice was just an internalised echo from my own school years.

Two people did stop and notice; a couple who looked like they’d slept rough that night, still carrying half a bottle of wine at 8.30am. They crossed over to see what I was doing. The guy said “Faaaar, that’s awesome bro… yeah… awesome.” His companion was more curt: “Yeah cool mate. Hey, can you give us a lift to Rotorua?” I really couldn’t (over an hour away), so she just walked away, but the guy just kept looking, almost mesmerised: “Yeah… that’s awesome aye…” And then too carried on too.

Perhaps me and him were the only ones not in a hurry to be somewhere that morning.

The ripple effect of sharing

I took some photos of my little creation, but then second-guessed whether to share them or not. Again, “don’t be a try-hard” rang in my head, but I ignored it and posted my photos on our local community grapevine page, before returning to the life worries and stresses I’d been keeping at bay.

That evening, I found nearly 500 people had liked my post, and over 40 comments: “Lovely encouraging words”, “This spoke to me”, “Absolutely beautiful”, “I believe it's a Ginkgo.” Not one criticism. Not one post saying “What a try-hard.”

I was especially moved by a direct message I received from a woman around my age, barely holding life together. So much was working against her, she was nearly done, but what I’d whimsically created in the leaves spoke deep in her soul, the reminder she needed that “You are valued, you are not alone, you are gold.” Honestly, if that was the only message I’d received, it would have been worth it.

But really, that was a by-product of me resolving my own internal struggle; of hearing and noticing my own impulses and instincts, and recognising them for what they were. Those voices were all valid in some way; noticing that, and laughing at it, released the loop that was keeping me stuck.

Believing all of us belongs

That little zany child wanting to do something quirky, that’s always been there, although for large parts of my life that side of me has been constrained. That older voice saying “Don’t be a try-hard”, that was looking out for me, because I had been mocked for being weird, quirky, different, un-cool. I had to find other ways to fit in, be accepted and affirmed. These were adaptations, but that part of me guarded me from emotional hurt and drove me to achieve and succeed. Becoming a respected builder was a sense of affirmation, and while there’s utilitarian value in construction, creativity is very much a part of it, especially bespoke builds and solutions required for heritage restorations. Renovating literally means re-making new, it is inherently creative.

But this was just leaves, right? Here today, blown away tomorrow, to decompose and feed the soil for another season; another lap around the sun. It was no big deal, no creative masterpiece. Creativity isn’t just high art or ballads or showpieces though.

Being creative is perhaps just mindfully adding something new to our space, something that points toward a better story, or expresses a different insight. It could be as simple as a caring check-in text to someone who just sprung to mind; it could be a friendly chat to the person at the supermarket check-out, deliberately using their name (that’s why they wear name-tags, right?) “Hi Daisy, how’s your day going?” isn’t hard to say, but it could create a positive memory of the day for Daisy. It might be Daisy’s only bright moment in an awful day.

Our hidden, golden selves

I could easily have given in to my internal critic and not done anything, but it wouldn’t have brightened the days of the people who saw it. Driving away would have meant that one woman who DM’d me wouldn’t have received that affirmation she desperately needed. Me giving into a whim meant her own deep, vulnerable self could find some beauty in her space, a simple affirmation that kept her going. The beauty from the trees and the leaves did that, as did the 40-yr-old lyrics from a British new-wave band. Putting the two together wasn’t hard, it was child’s play in fact.

I can see this gold in others, this value and unique beauty each person carries inside them. But I find it so much harder to see it in myself; I struggle to believe that this timid but insistent voice deep inside me could be trying to bring something of unique value that adds beauty to my little world.

I’ll finish with the words from my grapevine post two years ago…

A shout out to anyone doing it tough at the moment, feeling like storms are hitting and everything is falling down. It’s tough. Take a minute, make a little space for the sadness and pain. They’re real. They’re signposts, telling you it matters.

Sometimes there’s seasons when it all falls around us, but seasons do pass, eventually. Hold onto hope. Let your roots grow a little deeper, soaking in nutrients of kindness and grace, even in the little things, and newness does grow, slowly, imperceptibly, buds of hope and promise of better tomorrows.

It’s okay to mourn the loss of summer warmth. It’s okay to feel like spring is still far away. But there’s beauty in the in-between. There’s a reason for everything. Be kind to yourself. Look for the beauty in your in-between, small things, a smile, a kind word, a thank you, a hug. Just like there’s beauty in falling leaves, there’s beauty in you. You are gold.

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The first story I found was “Nappies the Wonder Pig”, an endearing tale of a little piglet born on an Australian farm, the third of three boys. Their mother died at birth and the farmer abandoned them to a big, wide and scary world. Nappies became separated from his siblings, alone and forced to find his own way. He carjacks and crashes a car, flees the scene, scrambles through a town, and stows away on a plane to Christchurch. There, he’s unexpectedly reunited with his brothers McFuzz and McGuballface. Together they begin their pilgrimage home, not knowing the way but knowing that together they would be safe, on their journey back to where everything was okay. Until in a dramatic twist near Blenheim, an initially friendly hitchhiker pulls a gun and shoots Nappies in the stomach, and he dies. The end.

This wild and comically tragic story was the freeform expression of the weird and wonderful things spinning around in my eight-year-old head, all the way back at James Cook Primary School in Marton. Finding this story was like finding a long-lost part of myself that had yet to consider that quirky, offbeat writers weren’t really the norm in an 80’s rural New Zealand town; a version of myself I had somehow misplaced along the way.

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Rose-tinted Memories

It’s funny the things that stick out in my memory of that time. My Standard 2 teacher, Mr Tate, would sit our class down on the mat – arms folded, knees crossed – and read us stories from Joy Cowley, Witi Ihimaera and Margaret Mahy; iconic Kiwi authors. I also remember him reading my stories to the class. I remember my classmates cracking up with laughter at this zaniness that came from my inner world. Though my stories were weird, my peers enjoyed them. Something from my imagination connected with them and earned me affirmation, without any great effort on my part – these stories just flowed.

That laughter cut two ways in my memory though. I remember my teachers and peers liking my weird and zany stories, but I didn’t feel like they really liked me. Not naturally sociable, I found friendships difficult, and crowded classrooms over‑stimulating: thirty‑odd kids jammed into a tight room, chaotic noise bouncing off high ceilings and hard walls and lino floors. When my senses overloaded, I was easily provoked by the mean, teasing things that kids just say at primary school: “Mark, plaque, did a fart, on the way to Kōwhai Park” were the taunts that resounded in my head. Mum counselled me to “just let it wash over you”, or “sticks and stones will break your bones but names can never hurt you.” It would have been easier if I could have just shaken it off, but I couldn’t; it hurt. I was sensitive and hyper-aware of what others thought and said about me.

My school reports would read: “Mark’s very good with English and Maths, and excels with his creative writing, but he needs to learn to be more tolerant of others.” I remember reading these reports with Mum and Dad, and while I’m sure they praised my successes, what stuck in my head was the quiet frowns that followed the “needs to be more tolerant of others” bit. I internalised the sense not just that I was doing something wrong, but that there was something wrong with me.

Isn’t it funny how one negative drowns out the many positives in our memory?

Early Environments

Like Nappies, I was the youngest of three boys. I looked up to my older brothers – Craig and Grant, eight and five years older than me – and saw them as confident, competent, and social. They were quite different to each other; Grant was extroverted and outgoing and always had mates around to run around with. Craig was more withdrawing, but still had close friends that he explored and laughed and did stuff with. They seemed to make friends naturally. Socialising never looked hard for them.

I felt safe around my brothers, and safe in the home environment Mum and Dad had built for us. Literally; Dad hand-cleared an overgrown section, once a railway station-master’s yard, and built the house we were raised in before he and Mum were married, 60 years ago. They still live there. It wasn’t just a house; it was a home and family that I felt secure in, a place where I had a space to imagine and dream.

With their hands full mediating my big brothers’ competing personalities, plus the rigours of day-to-day adulting, Mum and Dad were relieved I was largely compliant and could entertain myself. Highly introverted, I treated my bedroom as my own little world where I could be creative and expressive, and unseen as I sang, laughed, and acted out odd story arcs with my soft toys. It was hard to emerge from that secluded space and connect easily with others.

Though I never had words for it then, there was a vulnerable part of myself that I felt I couldn’t express in front of those around me. I could put that quirky creativity into stories that won praise and laughter from teachers and peers, but I didn’t sense they liked the quirky me behind them.

Bittersweet

The word ‘melancholy’ is misunderstood. It sounds like a mopey kind of depression, but it’s far deeper than that. Author Susan Cain coined the term ‘Bittersweet’ in her book “Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole.” It’s not a gloomy sadness, but an innate yearning; a longing for something deeper and more meaningful than the everyday mundane seems to offer. And not just something ‘out there’ but something internal; a nostalgic sense that once upon a time everything was good and ideal, and somehow that’s now fractured or lost and beyond recovery. The bittersweet one is driven by the desire to retrieve this perceived ideal, yearning for that place of belonging and equanimity. And not just a destination, but a journey back to that state of everything being in its right place. Only recently have I realised this bittersweet lens has coloured my world since childhood.

That was Nappies’ adventure, trying to get back to where everything was in its right place; where his family was around him and he felt connected and safe. I have no idea why I made Nappies’ odyssey end so abruptly. Maybe I was inspired by a Shakespearian tragicomedy, maybe the oddball ending of a Muppets skit. Maybe I was taking too long so Mr Tate made me hurry up and finish. I was just eight and it was just a kid’s story. I barely recognise my classroom cursive now, but I vividly remember the class’s laughter and Mr Tate’s praise.

Somewhere along the way, I lost that. There were odd glimpses and outlets for my humour, but largely it’s like I decided that this kind of freeform creativity wouldn’t cut it long-term. I was never consciously aware of this decision; it was a reflexive, non-conscious adaptation to perception. An 8-year-old might get away with zany, random stuff, but some internal instinct told me I needed to grow up and be sensible and useful. And I did find a way to be sensible and useful, to fit in; adapting to what I thought the crowd around me expected. But that melancholic, zany, creative kid has always still been there, somewhere in the shadows, the echo of his voice ringing in my soul somehow.

Shadows and Masks

As I transitioned into adolescence, I began to pack the zanier, wilder, freeform creativity into the recesses of my psyche, just like Nappies and my other stories were buried in a box under the window seat. I began to practise and outwork a more pragmatic and useful version of me. Writing gave way to woodwork, metalwork, physics, and sports; I became a tradie rather than a writer. I learnt to adapt to cultural norms of what I perceived a kiwi male should be like: friendly but tough, hard-working but relaxed, funny but not verbose. Like the cultural exemplars around me: tough rugby players, bushmen and tradesmen; strong-silent blokes that just got stuff done. I learnt to play a part that could keep me under the radar, but while I could project cheerful harmony, or calm, laid-back affability, it only ever worked to a point. Under stress, conflict or the pressures of adolescence, the mask would easily slip and that sensitive, vulnerable and easily overwhelmed kid would still be there, withdrawing in emotional pain or lashing out in explosive reactivity.

I was like a bottle of homemade ginger beer; handled carefully, it’s refreshing, tangy, even sweet, but bumped about and opened in a hurry you’ll likely get a volcanic mess.

I had no tools to understand why I was like this, though. And surely this proved I was still inherently defective, like everyone else had access to some magical social ease that was always beyond reach to me. So I doubled down with the mask of doing, acting, achieving, and hiding emotional expression and creativity.

You see, the best and worst parts of us are so often two misunderstood sides of the same coin. My embarrassing social clumsiness was the flip side of my unique creative gifts. With solitude and space for dreaming, and exploring narratives, storylines and patterns, I could find ways to express my unique and quirky perspectives in a way that brought joy and laughter and even insight to others. My sensitivity and expansive inner world could notice and bring language to things many others missed. But the confines of a classroom of competing pressures, noise, elbows and sensory overwhelm were not my happy place. Acoustic ceilings and walls, calm reading spaces and noise-cancelling headphones didn’t exist in Marton in 1985.

The Journey

And yet here I am, writing again about Nappies, and rediscovering that inner child who has always been there, still very much a part of me, and with life circumstances a full-circle opportunity and space to dream and write again; to tell my tales and try to give language to loss, longing, hope and integration; that all the parts of us belong, and the pilgrimage is worth making.

We all carry that child somewhere within us, and we all, for large portions of our lives, keep that child in the shadows, an instinctive protection of the more vulnerable parts of ourselves. How that catches up with us varies: perhaps it’s a slow, gnawing sense of emptiness or dissatisfaction, perhaps a traumatic life event that forces us to reckon with loss, grief, and the fragility of our lives.

We all face these bittersweet realities, but how we face them matters – whether we make space for, or keep hiding, the unique parts that make you you and me me; whether we keep wandering, isolated and scared, or turn our compass toward home, to that sense of everything in its right place, of truly belonging.

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I want to share with you a poem I wrote around four years ago, at a place quite special to me, called ‘The Clearing’. It’s aptly named, as it’s been a place where I’ve been able to pause and clear some of my worries and fussings away, even if only for a time.

I’ll add some thoughts below the poem, but before you read these I invite you to pause, breathe, and just read the poem slowly. Perhaps imagine you’re in a place from your own memory that reminds you of a place or time of tranquility. Remember the sounds and smells, and allow yourself to rest in that place in your memory. An invitation to ease.

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When I became self-employed six years ago, I made a conscious decision to block out a day a month in my calendar to get away and declutter my busy head. One of my favourite places was Maungatautari’s Sanctuary Mountain, a predator-fenced inland island sanctuary — a fully fenced mountain. It’s now home to many indigenous species of birds and reptiles, some that had been extinct on mainland New Zealand for decades. For a lover of solitude and Aotearoa’s outdoors like me, it is a sanctuary.

In the middle of one of the smaller sub-enclosures is a spot called The Clearing. It’s a great place for solitude, reflection, or just switching off and taking in all the smells, sounds, and cool, damp air under the tall forest canopy. It’s a feeding spot for Kākā, one of Aotearoa’s native parrot species. So even when I’m there alone, I’m never actually alone — whether they’re simply observing me from the treetops or coming down and sitting next to me.

Clearing can be a noun or a verb. I wrote this poem in The Clearing, but it’s also a metaphor for the practice of clearing: taking a deliberate pause to get out of my own head — my worries, fixations, and well-worn mental paths — and just notice the deeper things within me. Observing the way my mind spins around, what it keeps spinning back to, and putting all of that to one side for a moment to be mindful of simpler things: the feel of the cool air under the forest canopy, the sounds of the many different birds near and far, the smell of the damp, rotting leaves in the undergrowth.

You don’t have to go to The Clearing to do this, though. You can perhaps find a short moment in your day-to-day — sitting with your coffee and just smelling it, listening to what’s outside, near and far. Turning up slightly early to that appointment, switching off the car and just sitting, noticing your breath, perhaps slowing it a little. Easing.

Easing isn’t necessarily easy; it’s often the opposite. I now struggle to reach a point of ease or rest — a consequence of my injury and the pain disorder I now live with as a result. I drove back to The Clearing last week for the first time in a while, an attempt to sit and pause where I used to, where I wrote this poem four years ago. I found there was a school group there — over thirty excited kids with their teachers and parents. It’s funny; even when I am alone, it often feels like there’s a bunch of excited children running around in my distractible head. Or the pain in my arm like a screeching parrot. Like the gates back to that place and time of ease in my memory are locked; a season long gone.

But I’m learning that it’s not actually reaching that place of tranquillity that really matters; it’s being deliberate about taking the time and effort to turn up and practise that stillness again, even when it feels pointless, like I can no longer get there. It’s not about reaching some magical zen, mystical place. That’s why they call it a practice.

This is a season, and it’s unlike the previous one. And like all seasons, this one too will pass. There’s hope in that, I guess, but the invitation is to pause from looking ahead and yearning for a better day. We never know what’s ahead — what tomorrow may or may not bring — but this, right here and now, this moment, is real. Accepting this moment and all it brings, the good and the painful — this being alive — it is good. It is beautiful, in its own way.

There’s still this childlike self within us all that has the capacity to step back and observe the simplest things with wonder. The sounds and colours of birds in the trees. The feel of gloop or sand in our fingers or on our cheeks. We don’t so much get older; we just get busier — busier doing all the things we’re supposed to do in the societies we live in. Those things are important; they help us survive. But that childlike wonder, that free-form creativity that splashes vivid colours on the page and doesn’t care much about staying inside the lines or about what others think — we need that too. That’s what makes us unique.

I encourage you to practise the pause. Find whatever time you can manage, and just pause. Smell the smells, hear the sounds near and far. Notice your breath. Slow down, just a little. Try to ease your jaw, your shoulders, your brow, your glutes. Ease, just a little. Notice this moment, right here and now. It is good to be alive. It is good you are here.

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P.S: As a small easter egg, see if you can spot the Kākā in the picture behind my poem.

This week marks the end of another Kiwi summer, down here in our upside-down little corner of the world, as new seasons begin in the dominant Northern Hemisphere. And one of the largest, richest and most-watched sports is poised for a new season: Formula One. New Zealand has a proud and storied legacy in F1, especially the 60s and early 70s golden era with three Kiwi heroes who etched their names into motorsport’s halls of fame. Now a new Kiwi name is fighting to make his mark on the biggest motorsport stage: Liam Lawson.

Lawson’s name is popping up in our headlines again ahead of next weekend’s Melbourne Grand Prix, after his trial by fire in 2025. F1 isn’t just motor racing; it’s a multi-billion-dollar media ecosystem, turbo-charged by Netflix’s Drive to Survive with its hero/villain storylines and sensational headlines; motor-racing meets soap opera.

A Golden Age

Kiwi pride rests on our golden age exemplars: Denny Hulme, 8-time GP winner and 1967 World Champion; a big, rugged man with a quiet but gruff persona; known as ‘The Bear’ he was widely respected. Chris Amon was “charming and modest”, smooth on and off the track with a second-to-none ability to discern and tune a car, according to none other than Enzo Ferrari.

One Kiwi name stands tallest as synonymous with excellence: McLaren. The 2025 champion team is named after Bruce McLaren; our first F1 winner founding the team in the 60s, attracting the top designers and engineers with his charismatic, sunny personality and fierce determination to succeed.

The strong-silent type, and the affable, understated geniuses; three iconic Kiwi exemplars.

Kiwis are still on the podium. Look very closely at 2025 champion Lando Norris’ racesuit. Just beside that hallowed name McLaren. Right by the ‘N’, see it? Yep, a kiwi. The flightless bird, that is.

I know that sounds like grasping at straws, but we’re a bit salty McLaren are world champs and New Zealand doesn’t get credit. Both the winning drivers and teams get their national anthem played at the end of each race; Lando’s a Brit and gets God Save The King, but so does Team McLaren, somehow claimed by Mother England. Even worse, when Lando’s Aussie team-mate Oscar Piastri wins, we hear God Save The King and Advance Australia Fair. Now that just hurts our souls.

Liam Lawson’s our big hope to change all that. When asked by a journalist about McLaren’s anthem, he called it straight: “It’s completely bulls***... It’s a New Zealand team... Bruce McLaren is an absolute legend.”1 Dead right, Liam, but be careful how you say it; Kiwis are friendly and affable, and not brash or abrasive, remember? Definitely not big-heads. Likeable.

Except Liam did come off brash. And abrasive. And worst of all, not liked. On or off track.

Headlines and social media labelled Lawson as brash and arrogant. Other drivers called him aggressive and dangerous; he was filmed giving another driver the finger while passing him.2 When asked about his brash style Lawson replied, “I’m not here to make friends.”3 Oh dear Liam.

Comments and headlines build a preconception in our subconscious, and Netflix grips its viewers with reductive hero/villain binary narratives. Our non-conscious brain soaks this data in and builds a picture about who fits in and who might be rejected based on persona. This is true on an individual level, but also for a small country once lauded for punching above its weight, but now on the margins of the global stage, hoping our guy might make us famous again; not just for succeeding, but for embodying the ‘Kiwi way’. But is this fair on a 24-year-old trying to come to grips with the glare of the global spotlight, and a car that corners at over 300 km/h with 6 g’s of force on his adrenaline-fuelled senses? Do we have any idea what that’s like?

2025

Lawson was promoted to the top Red Bull ahead of the 2025 season, to partner legendary 4-time world champ Max Verstappen. Red Bull is a proper title-winning team, ruthless and determined. Our NZ betting agency was offering $20 odds for a Lawson race win; hopes were high but the wheels came off faster than anyone dreamed. After just two weekends – where he crashed in Melbourne and qualified last in China – Lawson was sensationally axed, replaced by former friend-turned-villain Yuki Tsunoda.4 Kiwi talkback and social media lit up with tall-poppy cutting barbs; he had it coming, was never that good, deserved it for his attitude.

To be fair, this wasn’t a universal sentiment; Lawson received a huge amount of sympathy for an unfairly short opportunity to adapt, from fans, experts, and fellow drivers. A scapegoat narrative formed, with Liam as victim and his Red Bull boss the pantomime villain.5 But this is still narrow binary thinking, ‘either/or’ categories that miss the nuance that allows space for more thoughtful, considered ‘both/and’ critical thinking. To get to this space requires pausing and questioning, considering what might lie behind the headlines, outward personas and our own preconceptions. Emotional intelligence.

Lawson survived a brutal 2025. Though he was cut from Red Bull, he still had a seat with their junior Racing Bulls team. He still got to race in F1. He deleted his social media accounts, kept his head down and worked hard. He showed poise, determination and self-awareness, earning his seat for another season and learning harsh lessons that place him in good stead. He has a future, he’s still fast, still has that self-belief that won’t back down to anyone. What may have been spun as arrogance was simply belief and drive. Don’t believe all the headlines.

Exemplar Comparisons

Comparing Lawson to our iconic exemplars of yesteryear is unfair. That was a completely different era with different expectations and without our modern clickbait headline newsfeeds. We don’t know the real Liam Lawson, but digging deeper we discover the rose-tinted memory of our exemplars wasn’t the whole of them either.

Hulme would surely have despised being filmed by Netflix, having a reputation for clashing with prying journalists trying to spin a story; they dubbed him The Bear, and not for his physique. But behind his gruff persona he was a sensitive man. He saw too many fellow drivers killed, none affecting him more than his friend and team-mate McLaren, killed while testing Hulme’s car in 1970.6 Denny was inconsolable, but that anguish drove him to push for safety changes, knowing the younger drivers couldn’t rock the boat. A values-driven truth-teller, he quit in protest after the 1975 season.

McLaren was likeable and charismatic, but fiercely driven and determined; those who didn’t match his tenacity didn’t last at McLaren.7 He was a visionary who died before his time, just 32. This also impacted Amon, who, like Hulme, quit after witnessing too many deaths and not enough safety changes. He too had a truth-telling streak.

Returning to NZ, Amon became a TV expert on an early 80s motoring show. After testing the latest Toyotas at his beloved Manfeild track, he shockingly roasted Toyota; their cars were unsafe and handled like dogs. Toyota executives were shocked by his on-air outburst. Had Amon paused to consider the potential consequences of offending a global manufacturing giant?

Toyota, rather than react angrily, responded by reaching out to Amon to chat. They didn’t expect it to go well, but were pleasantly surprised by Amon’s disarming humility and pragmatic solutions. By looking past headlines, an enduring relationship was born that changed the ways cars were made around the world.8

“Almost single-handedly [Amon] raised the safety and quality of Toyota suspensions – first here and then globally. And this in turn forced other car makers to raise the ride and handling safety of their own cars. One can only imagine the number of lives that have been saved by his work – it is probably in the thousands and, for me, that will be his enduring legacy.” (Toyota New Zealand CEO, Bob Field)

Amon dared to tell the truth: not impulsively or brashly, but from a place of honesty and values. He knew himself and the gift he brought to the world. The famous McLaren changed the way race cars were made, but Amon changed the way your car was made.

Deeper Legacies

Another proud legacy that grew from Amon’s relationship with Toyota was the establishment of the New Zealand Toyota Racing Series, reinvigorating the Kiwi summer racing scene as a high-profile proving ground for young drivers during the Northern Hemisphere winter.9 Amon was the founding patron and ambassador; his name is on the trophy that has been held by 16-year-olds Lando Norris, Lance Stroll, Liam Lawson, and his new 2026 team-mate Arvid Lindblad. Another nod to the legendary straight-talking brilliance of a golden era, exemplars who backed themselves to achieve and excel.

Lawson’s well aware of this legacy, as he’s aware of the tall-poppy undercurrent of negativity that permeates our culture and encourages young Kiwis not to strive or stand out, not to be a ‘try-hard’. Just being on the F1 grid is something few achieve, and he’s hungry for more. A hunger easily spun as cockiness, and an expressiveness interpreted as brashness. Perhaps that comes with the temperament required at that level. What makes us baulk at these qualities in New Zealand, when other F1 drivers are just as direct, driven or expressive and still celebrated by their less guarded cultures?

Perhaps the photo below gives a glimpse of the character behind the persona. In the 2019 NZGP at Manfeild (now named Manfeild Circuit: Chris Amon), Lawson was pipped to the finish by fellow Kiwi Marcus Armstrong, only for Armstrong to receive a five-second penalty for a dangerous pass. Lawson was declared the winner, yet here he’s comforting a distraught Armstrong behind the scenes; leaving the rivalry on the track, showing empathy and camaraderie off it. Race hard and go home, like The Bear would say, and enjoy the friends you make along the way. I reckon McLaren, Hulme and Amon would be proud of that, and would be celebrating Liam Lawson’s achievements. Something New Zealanders should be proud of too.

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I want to suggest that most of what shapes how we think, feel, and “fit in” never reaches our conscious awareness – and that this matters deeply for how we live, especially here in a little place like Aotearoa.

When we think of what we know, we usually think of facts we can recall, equations we can solve, or ideas we can discuss. The stuff we can consciously remember, equate or articulate. And the more of this you can do, the smarter you are, right?

But is that all intelligence is? Is our overall ‘intelligence’ limited to just head-level, rational thinking? Or are we more than that?

Testing a country’s smarts

Back in 2003, New Zealand aired a national IQ test, Test the Nation.1 Simon Dallow and Lana Coc‑Kroft hosted the TV show while Kiwis sat at home doing the quiz. The morning after, we did what Kiwis do: those with high scores talked them down, those with low scores laughed them off. Don’t be a big-head, and don’t get sensitive about it.

Test the Nation was an IQ, head-smart intelligence test. But the very next day, we’re comparing, relating to each other, finding our pecking order. There’s something relational going on here that matters, even if we’re downplaying success, or laughing off failure. Still, even if only implicitly, our Western culture elevates head-smarts above other smarts. “I think, therefore I am”, right?

Emotional Intelligence

When researchers tried to link business or entrepreneurial success to IQ, they couldn’t make the link. Some people with high IQ stalled, while others with lower IQ succeeded. Facts, equations and ideas only seem to go so far. Head-smarts don’t always equal success.

In 1995, American psychologist Daniel Goleman published his best-seller Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ,2 arguing that skills like self-awareness, empathy and social-smarts – what he called Emotional Intelligence or EQ – predict success better than head-smarts and academic grades.3

Where I grew up, there was almost an allergic reaction to the word emotion. Emotions weren’t to be displayed or trusted, and the exemplars around me modelled either strong, silent-type stoicism, or easy-going, light-hearted phlegmatism. But EQ isn’t just about knowing emotions (happy, sad, fearful, angry), it’s knowing how we connect and relate to those around us. It’s a relational thing, and another way of knowing. It’s learning to read and connect with others – while also reading and understanding what’s happening inside of us. These give us not just data but meaning.

This knowing ourselves, and understanding others on a relational level, matters a lot.

Survival Instincts

Our urge to fit in is also a survival instinct. Our ancestors were at more risk isolated from their pack. There has always been safety in numbers, and a deep desire to fit in and not be alone. We don’t face tigers on the street in our culture, but we very much face the threat of isolation, rejection and the need to conform within our packs. And our survival brain reacts similarly to these threats today as it did with tigers.

This video from Dr Russ Harris explains this within an evolutionary framework.

For those less comfortable with evolution, I’d argue the ancient Hebrew origin narratives in the Bible tell a similar story. Cain perceived threat by comparison to his brother Abel and killed him. Cain was banished from his community. He was terrified by the threat of isolation.

Whether we trace our lineage back to Adam or Grug, we’ve always constantly scanned our environments and interactions for threats. It’s called neuroception.4 We do this non-consciously. We need safety and connection with those around us, and we need to feel safe and connected. It’s not just for warm fuzzies; it’s a hard-wired survival instinct. We feel a deep need to fit in, so we scan for vibes and feedback from those we interact with, and conform to the norms and expectations of our pack, our family, our culture. But for large parts of our lives we’re completely unaware we’re doing this.

Becoming Conscious of our Non-conscious

Estimates vary, but research has suggested the processing speed of our conscious brain – our rational, conscious, equation-solving brain – can be measured as somewhere between 16-30 bits per second. A bit is a simple yes-no answer to a binary yes-no question. 16-30 tiny binary decisions per second; that’s what we can be aware of – conscious of – at any moment.

But our bodily senses (sight, sound, smell, taste, touch) send around 11 million bits of data per second to our survival brain.5

Conscious, decision-making brain = 16-30 bits per second.

Non-conscious, deep instinctive, autonomic survival brain = 11,000,000 bits per second.

Think about that for a second. (The irony of that sentence isn’t lost on me.)

The vast majority of what we sense, we’re never aware of. But we are sensing it. Our brain is processing all that. It’s a catalogue of signals that feeds our neuroception threat-awareness system. We’re barely conscious of any of it, but it’s all going in, building a map and patterns for surviving this world.

When you walk through a familiar room, you’ll most likely automatically look at where you’re going, and probably won’t notice peripheral stuff like the ceiling. It was always within your field of vision, but it isn’t particularly interesting because it’s bland and white and you’ve seen it before. Your non-conscious brain filters it out. Unless there is something interesting is there, like a big spider. How you react to the spider will likely come down to how you feel about spiders, or your previous experiences of them. Experiences shape perception.6

Your non-conscious brain alerts your conscious brain to a threat. The ceiling was always within your field of vision, but a potential threat triggers not just the noticing, but a somatic, bodily reaction – heart-rate and adrenalin, fight/flight/freeze – especially if you really don’t like spiders. You may not even remember a bad experience with a spider; perhaps when you were tiny a parent or sibling reacted anxiously to one. You noticed that; your survival brain stored that data. Even if you no longer remember it, it built a signal and a pattern that still throws up a “threat” warning when a spider appears in the corner of your vision.

Even a picture of a spider might illicit that response

Cultural Survival

Growing up in the 80s as a boy in a small rural New Zealand town – with a tradie father and grandfather, with two older brothers, British ancestry in my veins, shaped by conservative Christian belief systems – I learnt and intuited what kind of men made it in this place. My 11-million-bit/sec survival brain was picking up these cues and vibes from before I can remember. The exemplar bloke was a strong-silent type, or an affable easy-going type. Not expressive or offensive. Limited emotion. Understated. No big-heads. I needed to be that to fit into this place, to conform in a non-expressive, tall-poppy cutting culture. My threat system learnt how to adapt and survive within these environments; how to fit into the pack, in a small, distant country at the bottom of the South Pacific, where rocking the boat is discouraged, and one doesn’t put their head up above the parapet.

That knowing is still there in the deep, instinctive, survival level of my brain. It’s a well-worn path, reinforced by memories of my emotional expression being unwelcomed, or seeing others in this culture get chopped down or mocked for being different or ‘too much’ – the creatives and truth-tellers, those who dare to speak up and call out this false conformity, or just try to do something different. Something excellent.

The Essential ‘You’

But beneath all the layers of masking, pretense, and conformity there sits something deeper still; a core wiring – an essence – that makes me uniquely me and you uniquely you. It’s where those unique and innate gifts of ours live, those things only I can bring to my world, and you to yours. They were there when you were knitted together, before you were born. But culture shapes us too, and after years of hard-wired conforming and adapting, it takes courage to show those vulnerable, essential parts of us again, and some well-formed neural networks to rewire.

That journey home to our essential self starts with simply recognising these forces exist and have always been at work in our cultures and environments. They are there, and we can’t escape them. But simply noticing; becoming conscious of all these competing forces, and becoming aware of how we react to them; using our conscious brain to notice what rises deep in our instincts, emotions and body sensations as we remember and observe all these shaping influences. Knowing what our masks look like, and what essential parts of us sit behind the masks. And asking better questions of all these instincts. “Is the spider really a threat? My body is saying ‘fight/flight/freeze’ in response to the threat, but is the threat real? Or can I pause, breathe slowly, and then deal with the spider differently?”

But this isn’t about spiders, but conformity to norms. Do we still have to submit to those narrow norms?

The Journey to Belonging

Beginning to ask myself these questions has started to help explain a lot of ‘whys’ for me. Why I hide emotion or expression or creativity, even though they are naturally a part of me, and were there before I decided to fit in. Why I lived at a hundred miles an hour, disconnected from my emotional and body intelligences, unaware of what really drives me. I still find it hard to listen to my somatic body cues. I find it far easier to ‘harden up, and just play on’; that became a well-worn path.

But I don’t have to keep living that way. I don’t have to keep pretending to be hard, stoic, cheerful or non-offensive. Change starts with awareness – of what impulses rise in me in challenging or threatening moments – environmentally and culturally, and what old rules I’m still unconsciously following; what cultural cues my neuroception is still scanning for. Belonging is a journey of slowly learning to realise all these things happened and still happen, but they don’t define me.

Belonging isn’t just a personal, introspective exercise either. When we learn to be at ease with ourselves we learn to accept others as they are too. Emotional Intelligence grows. That’s crucial for others around that have always felt like they don’t fit in, or don’t have something worth saying. Those whose gender has meant their voices are less heard or respected. Or whose ethnicities have placed them outside of decision making or culture shaping influence. Whose neurodiverse way of thinking and processing has been misunderstood and misconstrued. Or whose disabilities or limitations has left them feeling unseen and unvalued. We need their perspectives too, and they need to know it’s safe to be heard.

So when I ask “How do you know what you know”, I don’t just mean your IQ, or the facts in your head. I mean those millions of quiet signals your body has been collecting since before you can even remember; those connections and intuitive pieces of data that have shaped you and taught you how to survive in a threatening world. The work now is to begin to notice all that, and to ask better questions of it all, like “Who was I before the world got its hands on me? Who am I behind the mask?”

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I’m leaning further into the friendly cultural rivalry between New Zealand and Australia. It’s tongue-in-cheek, but my main point isn’t beating Australia in a national gloat-fest – that’s silly. This week I want to go deeper in exploring the two sides of the mask of personality: the things we accentuate and embrace, and the things we hide in the shadows and avoid, and even shun.

The Sweet Cake

In 1935, in Perth, Western Australia, a legend was born. Bert Sachse, head chef at Perth’s Esplanade Hotel, created “a crusty meringue-like sweet cake topped with whipped cream and passionfruit;”1 a delicately crisp outer crust with a light, marshmallow-like centre. As light as a ballerina. His creation was named after touring Russian prima ballerina Anna Pavlova. The famous Aussie ‘pav’ was born.​

Problem is, this wasn’t the first pavlova. In 1929, in New Zealand’s very rurally named ‘Dairy Farmer’s Annual’, the same recipe named ‘Pavlova’ appeared, proof “that the pavlova was ‘created’ or ‘invented’ and then stolen/falsely claimed by chefs/cooks across the Tasman.”2 Typical. Aussies have always liked stealing little brother’s toys.

A 2020 BBC article3 suggests this sweet cake has a much earlier history in Europe, an obvious attempt by emotionally-distant Mother England to knock her antipodean children’s heads together and take our toys away completely. But we won’t have it. We continue our little play-fight, knowing no one will ever really ‘prove’ where it came from. (It wasn’t Australia though, just sayin’.)​

The Oscar

The late 90s and early 2000s was a breakout time for Kiwi talent on the silver screen. From Jane Campion’s The Piano to Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, Kiwi filmmakers not only swept awards but put New Zealand’s jaw-dropping natural scenery on the world stage. From the majestic Southern Alps to 11-year-old Anna Paquin’s adorable best supporting actress speech, the world was discovering New Zealand through cinema.​

Out of all the awards claimed, only one Kiwi-born actor has ever won an Oscar for lead actor. Just one.4 It was no fluke either; he was nominated three years running. This guy was the premium product. A superstar. Maximus. The Gladiator. And we were basking in his reflected glow.​

Russell Ira Crowe was born in Wellington in 1964. When he was young, his family moved to Sydney but returned during his high school years. He began his performing career in Auckland as ‘Russ Le Roq’. Seeking brighter lights, he headed back to Australia, appearing in Neighbours and Romper Stomper, then on to Hollywood with 1997’s L.A. Confidential and his run of nominations in The Insider, A Beautiful Mind, and Gladiator.​

We were so proud. The world was raving about our Kiwi boy Russ. Kiwi success. Kiwi recognition.

Of course Australia were claiming him too. But he was born in New Zealand. He’s ours. Back off.

The Lobby

Life in the bright lights is intense and stressful. It can bring about darker moments, as the Finn brothers discovered a couple of decades earlier, sans 24/7 global news coverage and tabloid media. And us Kiwis get a bit uneasy when our flag-bearers deviate from our favoured personas of ‘strong-silent type’ or ‘easy-going, friendly and self-deprecating.’ Don’t be a big-shot, don’t rock the boat, don’t mouth off and whatever you do, don’t make us look bad. The Finns fit our ‘easy-going’ mould nicely. But Russ? Stories started to suggest he wasn’t so chill. Short-fused. Intense. Brash. Explosive.​

Just after receiving his BAFTA for A Beautiful Mind, he was seen in a heated argument with the awards producer off stage.5 That’s not chill, Russ, not cool.​

Later that year, police were called to a London restaurant after a fight broke out between Crowe and a Kiwi businessman.6 Public brawling is definitely not cool. What will Mother England think?

He was then seen fighting with his personal bodyguard.7 Good grief, Russ. South Park climbed on board with the bad-boy image: Russell Crowe “fightin’ ‘round the world” – “Born in New Zealand in ’64, a hot-headed actor named Russell Crowe…” Kiwis are chill and friendly, not hotheads. (They made his accent sound Australian though. Maybe we could fob him off to the Aussies and get out of this…)

The final straw was in the lobby of a New York hotel in 2005. His temper exploded as he threw his phone, hitting desk clerk Nestor Estrada. He was arrested and charged with felony assault and possession of a weapon, and pleaded guilty to reduced misdemeanour assault. Estrada sued for emotional harm.8

Glowing pride turned into national shame.

Exemplar to Exile

While in Australia in 2009, NZ Prime Minister John Key was engaging in the usual trans-Tasman banter with the Aussie press. Regarding Phar Lap, Crowded House and the pavlova, he said, “Everybody knows that they’re ours and for Australians to claim ownership of them is quite inappropriate.” But he was happy to offer them Russell Crowe instead.9

In a Test cricket match between Australia and New Zealand at Wellington’s Basin Reserve; the proper 5-day sometimes-intriguing-even-thrilling-but-often-dull-as-watching-grass-grow version – the mixed Kiwi and Aussie radio commentary team started up the usual banter: Phar Lap, Crowded House, Kiwi-born Aussie champion cricketer Clarrie Grimmett.10 The Kiwi offered a deal: “How about we keep the pavlova and you can have Russell Crowe?”​

I’m not joking. We’d trade our only Oscar-winning lead actor, for a sweet cake.

All good banter, right?

Tall Poppy Syndrome

There’s a serious problem here. And the problem isn’t Russell Crowe. To me, the problem is a national cultural psyche that happily basks in someone’s glory when they’re riding high, but shoots them down and abandons them when they’re low. Is it a knee-jerk reactivity to perceived brand damage? An instinctive chopping down of someone who has risen too high for our comfort? An envy-driven national schadenfreude that delights in a big-shot getting taken down a notch or two?11

Russell Crowe is clearly a strong, driven, assertive and expressive personality. A Challenger. Self-assured enough to put himself out there, in the bright lights, to make a name for himself, and not take any crap. He found fast fame but with it the intense glare of living in a fishbowl. Those accepted Kiwi male exemplars of ‘strong-silent type’ or ‘chill, easy-going and friendly’ don’t fit Russell Crowe – or he refused to fit them. In a culture that doesn’t model or encourage healthy emotional expression (“Don’t be a sook”, “Don’t get angry”, “Pull yourself together”), what happens when you are naturally emotionally expressive? You can bottle it to fit in, but what happens when the pressures build up?​

To be completely clear, I’m not condoning public violence. That deserves to be called out, and was. But this wasn’t just about calling out specific instances of poor behaviour, because this shade on Russell Crowe still exists today. It’s become part of the story of Kiwi identity and cultural norms: “Be famous, we love our sons and daughters on the world stage, but stick to the norms. Be self-depreciating, don’t be a big-noter, don’t be too expressive or mouthy, and don’t make us look bad. Don’t be a Tall Poppy.”

Behind the Mask

“I’m extremely sensitive, and that’s probably where some of my negative stuff comes from,” Crowe admitted to Australia’s Sunday Night in 2014. “I’m a little bit intuitive, so I know from a handshake whether somebody means me good or ill. And sometimes I don’t want to, once I know where they’re coming from, I don’t want to play that game anymore.”​12

Crowe became known for being abrupt and sometimes prickly in interviews, as discovered by the guy who tried to critique his Robin Hood accent.13 It’s simplistic to say he’s just an impulsive dickhead, as much as that simple tag works great for tabloid headlines. He’s far more complex than that; sensitive to criticism and an intuitive sense of power dynamics. The very traits that make us individually unique can come across awkwardly, especially traits our culture is uncomfortable with, like emotional expression or sensitivity. When healthy outlets for these traits aren’t modelled around us, when they’re outside the ‘norms’, we hide them in the shadows of our psyche and pretend to be ‘normal’. But there is no ‘normal’; we are all vastly diverse in many ways, and that is inherently good. Our traits are God-given gifts; growing and maturing is learning how to embrace them. ‘Character flaws’ are often the flip side of our greatest strengths, just waiting to be embraced, not hidden in the shadows. Just like Crowe’s rare acting gift. The Marlon Brando of our time.

Crowe immediately apologised to the BAFTA producer, and his son who witnessed the incident. He wasn’t so much upset his speech was cut short, but rather that the poem he read – a poignant tribute to famed mathematician John Nash, who he played in the movie – was cut from the telecast for time. He didn’t see it as a slight on himself but on the heartfelt tribute to Nash.

Crowe’s bodyguard Mark ‘Spud’ Carroll was trying to alert him to speculation and gossip about him. “Spud was passing on other people’s ‘perceptions’ and I shot the messenger.” Spud himself said, “As for calling it a fight, believe me, we have done much more damage to each other playing touch footy.”​

And the phone in the lobby? A combination of “jet lag, loneliness and adrenalin” while trying to call his wife back in Australia triggered his frustration. The phone wouldn’t work and he hurled it against a wall. He was embarrassed and admitted his fault publicly. He gave the clerk $100,000. “The bottom line is I did something pretty stupid... this is possibly the most shameful situation I’ve ever gotten myself into in my life.” “It’s past me now... and I can play the role of ‘that’s water off a duck’s back,’ but I’m not that guy.”14

Accepting Ourselves

The younger Russell Crowe, outwardly feisty but inwardly sensitive and struggling with the pressures of fame, has mellowed with time and come to terms with himself. “You gotta cut yourself a bit of slack... if you’re a dick every now and then, you know. It’s bound to happen. You’re bound to get somethin’ wrong, you know.”15 This isn’t whitewashing poor public behaviour: he’s publicly owned these things, isn’t proud of them. Still regrets them.16 But he seems to have come to understand who he is, accepting and embracing the many facets of his personality, light and dark. All the parts of him finding equanimity.

Australia seems to have also grown to accept him as he’s mellowed with time, and perhaps with himself. His neighbours and surrounding communities deeply appreciate his generosity.17 He’s one of the National Trust of Australia’s National Living Treasures. Only two non–Australian-born faces have ever appeared on Australian postage stamps: Queen Elizabeth II and Russell Crowe.18

But this isn’t really about Russell Crowe. Has New Zealand come to accept different personalities, different expressions of our humanity and all that these diverse traits and gifts bring to our collective identity? Have we yet learnt to accept all the different parts of us, and what these diverse voices have to teach us? Can we all stand tall and be authentically ourselves? Can we collectively embrace all of us?

I’ll leave the last word to the man himself. Maximus. The Gladiator. Russ. Human.

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My last article — The Land of the Long White Cloud — introduced New Zealand the place, and its quirky, friendly, easy-going inhabitants. Or at least, that’s how we prefer to be seen.

This article is a story of what happens when our best and brightest are seen on the global stage — and of how we like to be seen… and not seen.

1981 was a big, big moment for us – on the big stage of music and televised show business. A quirky bunch of Kiwis had been causing a stir throughout the 70s, with their zany costumes, bizarre hair and makeup, and catchy but unconventional new-wave tunes. We weren’t entirely sure what to make of them at first; they were far removed from what our still largely conservative – and quite heavily regulated – music tastes were used to. Then we realised that overseas, people were really vibing with these boys… our boys. Split Enz.

That June, we were all a bit giddy with excitement. Split Enz1 were starring on Dick Clark’s epically famous American Bandstand. America was the epicentre of global pop culture. Sure, the Brits had phenomenal bands like Rolling Stones, Led Zepp and Pink Floyd, and the Aussies had AC/DC and Cold Chisel – but even for them, being seen and heard in America was the big deal. And American Bandstand was the epicentre, where things were hoppin’ and poppin’. And our boys were poppin’. No New Zealand flag or signature silver fern, of course, but… Split Enz. See what they did there? E–N.Z. In one clever move, they slipped our initials in there – and made it so the Aussies couldn’t thieve them, like they had with our other hit 70s band, Dragon.2

Dressed in their usual quirky attire, Split Enz played “One Step Ahead” from their latest album Waiata. And then… wait for it… they actually talked to America’s showbiz icon, Dick Clark. An American icon was talking to them – to us! This was the moment. Bated breath…

He talks to Tim Finn first, who introduces the band. We like Tim, he’s friendly, laidback, easy-going, self-depreciating – very Kiwi. Tim introduces Eddie Rayner on keys in his pink pants, Noel Crombie with his skippy beats, Nigel Griggs “our token Pom, all the way from England… we’ve allowed him to stay in the country.” We’re very welcoming like that.

(Dick) “And last but not least…?”

(Tim) “That’s Neil, my kid brother.”

And the crowd screams! Neil is very, very popular you see. Proper star. We love Neil.

Friendly Tim explains the meaning of Waiata: “It’s a Māori word. The Māori people are the indigenous people of New Zealand. They got there first, and they’ve graciously allowed us to live there… Waiata means singing, dancing, celebration – generally, really singing and dancing, which is something we like to do, and we like to spread it around.” We’re friendly like that – and our Māori culture makes us wonderfully unique. And correct Tim, Māori were here first.3

Dick turns to Neil, wanting to know more about our mysterious little corner of the South Pacific.

(Dick) “We know very, very little about your home country.”

Yep, that’s the problem, Dick – but here we are. Let us tell you, very proudly.

(Dick)“It’s a lovely, most beautiful country in the world. It’s very pastoral.”

Why thank you, Dick!

(Dick)“But there is a problem. When I was there, a lot of young people were leaving. Why is it?”

Now Dick, we’re low-key – and a little avoidant – so we’d prefer not to discuss our problems openly. We prefer the chill, easy-going persona. Tell him, please, Neil.

(Neil) “Well, it’s basically the worst place to be in the world if you’ve got any ambition, certainly as far as being a rock band.”

Gasp.

Imagine us, sitting around our telly in stunned silence. Someone drops a spoon back in the kitchen. Aunt Dolores clutches her pearls. This isn’t good. Our boys were supposed to make us look good. Worst place in the world for ambition?

(Neil) “It’s a wonderful place to have a nice, quiet time—relax, play sport, go outdoors, climb mountains, you know, fording rivers, all that sort of stuff.”

Tim and the others spontaneously burst into “Climb Ev’ry Mountain” from The Sound of Music, which lightens the mood. Tim taps into the rugged backcountry sheep-farmer exemplar, and we’re back on track.

(Dick) “Of all of these places – you’ve been to England, Japan, Australia, the United States… Would you go back to New Zealand now and make your home?”

Of course, Dick! Best-kept secret in the world down here, aren’t we, Neil?

(Neil) “Well… I think we all want to be buried there.”

WTF Neil?! You’re supposed to make us look good – but you’re making us look bad! This isn’t how we want to be seen. Who does this little punk think he is, calling us out like this? He thinks he’s better than us! A tall poppy that needs cutting down to size.

Of course, New Zealand wasn’t literally sitting around a TV watching this. No spoons were dropped, no pearls were clutched. It was months before TV broadcast tapes made it down here. Six months. Roughly. On a leaky boat. Bandstand never actually screened in New Zealand, so really, ‘I’m spinning yarn’ as we say here in NZ. Telling a tale.

But the fact is, we do indeed do this in New Zealand. We see our flag-bearers on the big global stage, with their stars was shining brightly, and we love to collectively bask in their glow. It validates us a bit as a small and perhaps still a little insecure nation. But we do gasp and clutch pearls when our stars lose their poise, or talk about the things we’d rather avoid talking about. The things we keep behind the mask. Like when we’re called out as an ambition sink-hole.

1981 was a snapshot of a time when we were still grappling with a sense of national identity that hadn’t fully formed. When our ambassadors are seen on the world stage, they need to represent us well, right? We want to be seen well. To fit in. Collectively. This places pressure on our young stars just trying to find their way, or expressing their individuality and finding their unique voice. Of course we were delighted Split Enz were doing well; most cultures are proud of their best and brightest achieving and succeeding, but there comes a point where celebrating turns into co-opting. We bask in their glow, but don’t realise it becomes less about them, and more about us. And that doesn’t appreciate who they really are, let alone understanding what’s really going on for them.

Split Enz wanted to make good music and play around the world. They were definitely being noticed – perhaps too much. On that tour, Tim was stalked by a mother and daughter in Canada. Neil, still only 23, was struggling with the glare of sudden stardom and had become more reclusive between shows. Rayner and their manager got into a skirmish. Tim, who used quirky stage banter to mask his stage fright, was in a precarious mental state and suffering panic attacks.4 What you see on stage – the outside of the mask – doesn’t always match what’s happening behind the scenes, in the shadows.

And in a way, that’s true for all of us. We learn to adapt ourselves so that we can be appreciated by others; so we can fit in and be safe, seen, and in control of our lives. But under the surface – behind the mask – we don’t feel safe, or in control, or that others will accept or flaws, defects and struggles.

Split Enz split in 1984. Neil formed his own band, The Mullanes, who in 1986 became Crowded House – who shot to superstardom beyond anything Split Enz ever achieved. Neil’s a bona fide singer/song-writing genius, so we forgave him for his little outburst, as long as we could keep calling Crowded House our own. I’m not sure if Neil agreed to that; Australia certainly didn’t. “Don’t Dream It’s Over” ranks No. 7 on APRA’s list of Top 30 Australian Songs of All Time.5 (Back off Oz!) On Triple M’s “Ozzest 100,” it’s No. 65.6 Seriously? 65^th? That’s just rude.7

For me, I actually had to be out of New Zealand to realise what a big deal Neil Finn is. Music fans in the U.S. or U.K. don’t care so much where he’s from – only how good he is. They appreciate his unique talent. Ed O’Brien of Radiohead called Finn “the most prolific writer of great songs.”8 Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam effusively of him and often collaborates in albums or onstage.9 He’s joined Coldplay onstage here.10 And Dua Lipa11. He’s like a favourite great-uncle to touring acts here.

Do us Kiwis really appreciate how our best and brightest stars like Neil Finn are seen by others? Is there still a basking-in-the-reflected-glow aspect that helps us feel a little more seen in the big wide world – and perhaps a fragile sensitivity to how we’re seen?

We’ve grown and matured a lot as a country since 1981. Thanks to artists who followed in Split Enz and Crowded House’s footsteps, more of our talent is heard abroad. Our local radio networks play far more homegrown music, and funding agencies like NZ On Air support local creatives.12 We’re no longer the “ambition sink” Finn lamented on American Bandstand.

The main point of this essay isn’t about our music industry, though – it’s about our cultural norms and values that dictate how Kiwis should – and shouldn’t – show up in the world. Neil Finn rocked the boat; he called us out and made us look bad. We forgave him – but we haven’t always been so forgiving. We love seeing our Kiwis express themselves, as long as they stay largely within our perceived and implicit cultural norms. Strong silent types are okay, as are the harmless quirky self-depreciating funny ones. You can even be a little bit irreverent or pointed, as long as we can still laugh along.

Neil was direct and blunt on Bandstand. Maybe he was just being irreverent. Maybe it just came out awkwardly. We now know that he was exhausted and struggling under the pressure of the sudden glare of fame, this introverted 23-year-old creative from a mystical little country of just 3 million that doesn’t appear on maps. Neil Finn is clearly a driven achiever – steady and usually unflappable, but assertive and forthright when needed.13 That drive made him who he is, and that emotional honesty and authenticity underpins the enormous gift of his creativity. He is a Kiwi legend.

Neil Finn wouldn’t be the last Kiwi talent to express himself under the glare of the global spotlight in a way that made us feel a bit awkward. I have some more recent examples to look at over coming weeks, where our stars popped their head above the parapet or rocked our boat, and were chopped down by their own…

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This is the first essay in a planned series exploring collective identities, culture, and personality — and how we express or hide certain aspects of ourselves to fit in. I’ll write from my own perspective, specifically as one of the many cultures now living in these isles. I am Pākehā (a New Zealander of Anglo-European descent). Although I use the broader term Kiwi — how we’re generally known around the world — I don’t pretend to speak for an entire country or to categorise an entire population based on my worldview. I write and share from my observations growing up in my little corner of the world, how it shaped me, and how I learnt to fit in.

If you’re a fellow Kiwi, you may find something that rings true — or that you disagree with. Feel free to disagree; different perspectives are valued. If you’re from overseas, you may notice patterns that help make sense of what you know about us. And if you’re Australian, please take this as tongue‑in‑cheek humour — I’m a big fan of you guys. Honest.

The Pacific Ocean is really big. There are a couple of points in the Pacific Ocean where, if you bored down directly through the centre of the earth and out the other side (its antipode), you would come out still in the Pacific Ocean. It’s vast. You can fit all the continents on Earth in it. It’s really, really big. There are lots of tiny islands and atolls spread around, explored and inhabited by early seafaring peoples. Polynesians developed remarkable ocean vessels to explore the Pacific, using their knowledge of the stars, currents and wildlife.12 They found Hawai’i to the north, Rapa Nui (Easter Island) to the south east. They landed in South America. They possibly landed in North America too, centuries before Europeans.3 But what lay to the south of this vast ocean? And who would find out?

It’s said that Kupe decided to find out.4 He was convinced there was some significant land to the south. On the journey, Kupe’s wife Kuramārōtini first saw a distant cloud, “He ao!” As they drew nearer it appeared brighter, whiter. “He ao tea!” Closer still they realised it was long, surely meaning a large land. “He ao-tea-roa!” The land of the long white cloud. They had found The Great Southern Land!

Europeans found it too a bit later. They liked naming stuff after back home.

“What should we call this Land Downunder?”
“New England?”
“Nah, that’s taken. Didn’t end well for Mother England either.”
“New Wales?”
“Pretty sure there’s already a New South Wales somewhere, I forget where.”
“New Scotland?”
“Nope, there’s already a Nova Scotia, and a New Caledonia.”
“What about those distant Scottish islands, Hebrides?”
“New Hebrides is taken.”
“Seriously? Well, what about that obscure tiny Dutch island virtually no one’s heard of, Zeeland? Surely that’s not taken?”
“Let me check… It’s available! Let’s take it! We have found New Zealand!”

To be fair, a Dutchman was the first European to ‘discover’ this land. It was a slightly awkward encounter. It seems we’ve always done awkward quite well down here. It’s become part of our self-effacing comedic schtick. Comedians like Billy T James made a living out of this.

Except this first awkward encounter wasn’t very funny.

In December 1642 Abel Tasman and his crew aboard the Heemskirk sailed into a beautiful cove at the north end of the southern major island. The locals perhaps weren’t sure about this weird, large, sailed sea vessel and its strangely white-skinned crew. Stay wary. Tasman and his crew likewise weren’t sure of the natives of this land, very wary. Friend or foe? The locals blew their pūtūtara conch-shells, used for announcing, warning or welcoming. The Dutch assumed “definitely foe!” and responded with their own battle horns. And a cannon. Things escalated a bit. One of the small Dutch landing boats was rammed by a canoe, four Dutch crew killed, one Māori. The rest of the landing party escaped back to the Heemskirk and high-tailed back off to sea. Tasman never set foot on the land that would later bear a Dutch name. Tasman named that bay Moordenaers Baij, ‘Murderers Bay’.5

Of course, it was the English who ‘proper discovered’ this land. Captain James Cook and his crew on the Endeavour (with a little help from Polynesians who had already discovered this land)6 sailed into our easternmost part of our northern island in October 1769. A 12-year-old Nicholas Young first spotted a peninsula, now named Young Nicks Head, near today’s city of Gisborne. They sailed into a broad bay to meet those who had been here for centuries. The locals again tried to communicate as per their custom, Cook responded with guns. This time locals’ blood was tragically spilt. In the end Cook wasn’t that impressed and left to find a different spot. He named that place Poverty Bay. He named many other places too; many places still bear his name.7

Still finding New Zealand…

New Zealand is still being discovered in many ways. Despite Cook’s 18th century discoveries, many 20th century world maps still leave us off completely. Britain must be the centre of world maps, which places us at the bottom right corner. Maybe they ran out of space. Or ran out of ink, after drawing the continental-sized mound of red dirt to our west. But that’s cool, we don’t want to make a fuss.

Kiwis (as we’re known, after our quirky native flightless bird) don’t make a fuss. We’re pretty chill, friendly, easy-going, with a funny (dry, sardonic, and admittedly a bit awkward) sense of humour. We all get along, no big-heads here. Very flat, egalitarian. You’re welcome to come visit (if you can find us).

Rhys Darby, our king of quirky, kiwi comedy, was recently on a foreign chat show (not sure where, possibly that South Wales place?). On a reel titled “Are New Zealanders the Nicest People on Earth?” Darby is asked “What is it about that New Zealand sensibility you think that has just worked so well around the world?”

“I think it’s sort of a naïve optimism. We’re novelty, but we’re a breath of fresh air… for the Americans to hear these voices, and a lot of them didn’t even know where New Zealand was (still don’t!)… but it’s joyful, you know, we don’t punch down. I mean, as New Zealanders we barely punch!” (Rhys Darby)

That’s our Rhys. And it’s Kiwis in general right? Easy going, quirky, self-deprecating, witty. Or at least, that’s the stereotypical, cultural norm.

So when we’re left off a world map, we just laugh it off, right? No big deal. It’s okay that the Smithsonian or Ikea don’t include us on their big walls. No stress. When the boardgame Pandemic came out in 2008 they only got as far as that New Wales place too, no New Zealand, but that’s cool. Actually, when the real pandemic came out that worked out pretty good for us. Our little team of 5 million stamped Covid out and went back to what we were doing, aided by our 1200-mile-wide moat.8 Of course we were concerned about what the rest of the world was enduring, but we were quite happy not being seen. I mean, we’re okay with not being seen, right? Nicest people on earth and all.

Masking…

Personality comes from the Latin word ‘mask’. Persona is a thing we put on; it’s how we present ourselves to the world. How we fit in. Of course this primarily relates to individuals’ personalities, but there’s also such a thing as ‘collective personality’. Obviously not everyone in a culture has the same, or even a similar, personality, but we are shaped by collective forces and collective norms from the society around us. This varies from place to place. Social do’s and don’t’s shape and perhaps confine our expression. While we want to avoid stereotyping, broad patterns do emerge that do say something about our place in a culture.

A mask has two sides: the side facing out, that others see; and the side facing in, that only we see, or that some close to us see when the mask slips. The shadow side of personality. The parts we hide.

You’ll perhaps have noticed my subtle digs at our nearest neighbours Australia. For any Australian readers who haven’t yet given up on this post in disgust, Hi! For the record, I love Australia. It’s a beautiful country. Very big. And I love Australians generally. In the rest of the world, they’re more like us than anyone else. We have a strong shared history. We help each other out when needed. Aussies have a similar sense of humour, and we get a kick out of ribbing each other. And more than anyone they see beneath our easy-going, friendly, self-deprecating mask.

You see, we don’t actually like being left off world maps. It makes us a bit grumpy to be honest. We don’t express it outwardly of course, heaven forbid. We’re quite avoidant like that. Attachment issues from distant Mother England perhaps. Instead we quietly compile lists of offending maps and share it amongst ourselves with a passive disdain.9 We really really do want to be seen by the big wide world, but just not seen as cranky or bitter. We hide that. We want others to see us as friendly and chill, like Rhys Darby. Or strong-silent types who get the job done and don’t rock the boat. Boat-rockers might get cast adrift.

Australia sees behind the mask a bit more though. It’s a bit like a sibling rivalry for us with them, except they’re way bigger than us. And more seen than us. People know where Australia is. It’s massive. And red. Space Station astronauts know when they’re above Australia without looking out their window. Their cabins glow red.10 Aussies carry a bit more confidence than us too. We hate to admit it, but they’re also better than us at most sports, although we gloat when we beat them. Or twist the metrics a little bit to make it sound like we’re beating them. Per Capita Olympic Medals table anyone?11

Aussies love stealing our favourite things too. We keep lists of these things too. From desserts to sportsmen to our favourite bands, they nick our things just like big siblings do.

Like Phar Lap, the great racehorse who, in November 1930 at the famous Melbourne Cup, despite being dead last around the final corner, stormed through the field to a famous win. So famous there’s a bronze statue of him outside Melbourne’s Flemington Racecourse. Aussies love champions. We point out he was born in Timaru in the South Island of New Zealand, so he’s our champion. Aussies claim he was purchased by an Aussie trainer as a rough diamond, then developed and trained to be a world beater in Australia. We say if horses could speak, he’d say he’s Kiwi. They say we’re dreaming, and New Zealand had no racing industry, and horses don’t talk. We point out that it figures that they thieve stuff, because they were a convict colony, and then we’re rolling around fighting on the back lawn. Play fighting of course. We do love each other. But Phar Lap’s Kiwi. We have his bones.12 (They still have his hide, which is weird frankly, but there you go).

Tall Poppy Syndrome…

I’m going somewhere with this by the way. With personality, individual and collective, there’s always two sides to the mask. Us Kiwis like to project friendly, easy-going self-deprecating, but I think we also enforce that on each other here. Internally. We don’t like big-heads or class structures. We like our people to stay cool and calm and not rock the boat. You can succeed and excel, but not too much. Don’t think you’re better than the rest of us. Don’t be a tall poppy. We call that Tall Poppy Syndrome.

Australia has a version of tall poppy syndrome too. They’d prefer their best and brightest stay humble and easy-going, but they love their winners too. They love a good Aussie champ, and they don’t mind a little bit of Aussie snarl, that true-blue Aussie battler. That’s why they’re so damn good, they’re ruthlessly competitive. And perhaps because they grew up in a land crawling with things that’ll eat you.

We like winners too, but our winners have to stay cool, calm and collected. Strong, silent types. Don’t pop your head above the parapet, with strong opinions or brashness. You’ll make us look bad. No snarl please. Either be friendly and easy-going, or a strong, silent type. You can be funny, but don’t laugh at your own jokes. Don’t be brash, and definitely don’t rock the boat. You’ll get cut down to size. We’d prefer you stayed average than be a tall poppy. Ol’ Rhys reckons us Kiwis don’t punch down. Don’t even punch. But we do cut down. Or press down perhaps, more subtly. A darker undercurrent.

You may disagree with me. That’s cool. I have a few examples I’ll share moving forward to show my point. Examples of our best and brightest who fit that easy-going or strong-silent mould. I’ll call them ‘Exemplars’. Without realising it, generations of Kiwi kids looked up to these exemplars as the types to aspire to.

I’ll also give a few examples of Kiwis who’ve broken that mould over the years too. I’ll call them ‘alter-heroes’. As far as I’m aware, that’s my phrase. They’re not anti-heroes, that classic character type that is flawed or even bad but still ends up doing good. My alter-heroes aren’t so much flawed as just different from that classic ‘type’. I think these alter-heroes not only teach us we can be different, but that these differences are truly valuable to our culture. We need them, and need to recognise and value them. They add something diverse and redemptive to our story. We are all different, and that should be celebrated, not conditioned out of us.

I also think this teaches us about human personality more widely. This isn’t just about Kiwis; that’s perhaps just a case study on how humans turn up in the world in diverse ways. Every person is unique and different, with different experiences and stories and cultural forces shaping them. But we’re also somewhat predictable. Patterns and currents emerge that can help us see what’s going on, and by observing these we can learn and grow. We can ask better questions. There’s an invitation here, for individuals and cultures.

At the end of the day though, I’m only writing from my perspective. All of what I write about growing up is how I’ve perceived it, from my location. My little corner. I try to observe, listen and learn from other perspectives, but I still unwittingly filter them through the lens I grew up with. We all do. As a child of the late 70’s, with my memories of growing up in a small, rural Kiwi town in the 80’s and 90’s, I can see how this collective, cultural psyche shaped me. How I unconsciously strived to be like those strong-silent types, or easy-going cruisey ones. I’ve come to see how I’m not like that though, I’m far more sensitive, expressive and heart-driven than that. I’m now relearning that these differences are gifts, and we gain so much from each other’s authentic expressions. That starts with me expressing what I’ve seen and noticed, and what I imagine growing could look like for all of us.

When I opened my laptop on Monday morning, I immediately realised this wasn’t the week for that. It’s been a heavy and tragic week in our corner of the globe, and a heavy week for our big brother across the ditch. We Kiwis and Aussies like to rib each other — a kind of sibling play-fighting — but when they hurt, we hurt too.

The name Bondi has always been synonymous with golden sands, surf, and sun-drenched happy crowds enjoying incredible natural beauty. Bondi will now sadly carry a different memory, especially for those who were there last Sunday evening. Arohanui from us across the Tasman Sea to the Bondi community, the local Jewish communities, to Sydneysiders, and to all of Australia.

I’ve tried to stay away from the news this week, because I know I’ll find it hard to see what has unfolded. It’s tragic and heart-wrenching. It’s hard to make sense of how and why something like this could happen. We’ve heard of some heroes — the brave souls who ran towards the danger. They’ve been honoured and celebrated, but they should never have had to do what they did. We know deep in our bones this isn’t right.

Deep in our bones. In our gut. This shouldn’t happen. We don’t need words for that. We just know.

Ultimately, words have failed me this week. Perhaps that’s the point. Sometimes no words are sufficient — and sitting in silence, simply feeling what we feel, noticing what is there, and what our deep gut-wisdom is trying to say, is enough. Sometimes clever words get in the way of that. Sometimes Divine wisdom is found not in the many words, but in the silence. Not in all the doing, but in the deliberate pauses in between — in stillness.

It’s not easy this time of year; we’ve made Christmas so busy. But we’re remembering a child born in the margins — in a rural backwater, in poverty, among dirty and smelly farm animals — and only low-caste shepherds noticed. In the quiet, the Divine broke into human history.

Whatever your beliefs are, I’d encourage you to find time to just pause, and sit. For as long as you’re able.
Notice what you can see — random things you mightn’t have otherwise noticed.
What can you hear — things near and far?
What can you smell? Notice.
Notice the feel of the ground beneath you, your seat holding you, the fabric of your clothes on your skin, the breeze on your cheek.

These things are miracles. They are gifts to receive. May they, even for a moment, cancel out some of the noise of our world and bring you peace. Arohanui.

That was back in the morning of my life. In the early morning, as the sun is climbing, everything seems a little more vivid, a little more bright and hopeful. All the possibilities of a new day. Promise.

The harsh realities of life then start to crash in. What was perhaps tolerated when you were a small kid – the childlike exuberance that allows you to just express whatever comes out, whether laughter or tears or fright or the sheer delight at just swinging in the swing again and again and again – now seems to be not quite as child-like and innocent anymore. Those crazy crayon drawings that bore no real likeness to the person you were drawing, but still made it onto the fridge, now turn into expectations of how well you do at reading or maths or writing. Or sports. Our intuitive little brains perceive – maybe wrongly, or perhaps quite insightfully – what will help us fit in and succeed in this big, unpredictable, and sometimes brutal world. Free-form childlike expression turns into adaptations and safety measures. You don’t want to stick out in this world. Especially not in small-town New Zealand.

Thresholds

Fast-forward to present-day me. I find myself now standing on some kind of threshold, in a number of ways: some of my choosing, some really not.

In many ways, life has been pretty kind to me. My childhood was safe and secure, with loving parents and two good big brothers. I had no major childhood traumas, and I’ve never really been without. Now, I have two amazing daughters, and a loving and supportive wife of 22 years. I’ve succeeded in a number of things that I’ve turned my hand to. I’ve been able to fit in to this place okay. That’s a privilege, and I know it.

Here’s the thing though, and this is true for all of us I think: fitting in doesn’t necessarily equal belonging. Fitting in is playing the game, keeping your head down, adapting to the world and culture around you and not rocking the boat. That is important in society… to a point. Belonging is truly feeling at home in your own skin, with all our particular quirks and diverse wirings and the stories our varied experiences tell. Belonging means that all of it matters. That all of us matters. And realising this can wake us up from a mid-life slumber, of just getting by, of making ends meet, or playing the game expected of us. And certainly of hiding any quirks or differences that might make us stick out. Of not meeting cultural norms. As Brené Brown put it, “fitting in is the greatest barrier to belonging.”

Fitting in, I’ve discovered during the past decade of research, is assessing situations and groups of people, then twisting yourself into a human pretzel in order to get them to let you hang out with them. Belonging is something else entirely—it’s showing up and letting yourself be seen and known as you really are—love of gourd painting, intense fear of public speaking and all.

“Many of us suffer from this split between who we are and who we present to the world in order to be accepted. (Take it from me: I’m an expert fitter-inner!) But we’re not letting ourselves be known, and this kind of incongruent living is soul-sucking.” (Brené Brown)

Looking back, retracing the steps of my life so to speak, I can see where those subtle shifts in my and my natural expression took place. It was never conscious, but I perceived that this innate expression of me wouldn’t be fully seen or appreciated in semi-rural, 1980s New Zealand. The stereotypical Kiwi bloke was a gruff, stoic, silent type that didn’t ponder or fuss, but just got stuff done. No flourish or emotional expression.

There’s some deep-level, non-conscious survival instinct wired into us that, at a certain point in our life journey, we suddenly feel naked, exposed. The uninhibited, child-like version of us suddenly feels vulnerable – not safe, not seen and not in control. We instinctively crave security, validation and a sense of mastery or competence, but at some point we begin to intuitively fear that our childlike expression of ourselves makes us more vulnerable to rejection. So we adapt. We put on masks. The Latin word for ‘mask’ is ‘persona’. We wear these masks as a different presentation of ourselves so we can stay safe, be accepted, and be masters of our own environment and destiny. And these masks largely work. For a time at least.

One of the OG’s of modern psychology, Carl Jung, put it like this:

“Thoroughly unprepared, we take the step into the afternoon of life. Worse still, we take this step with the false presupposition that our truths and our ideals will serve us as hitherto. But we cannot live the afternoon of life according to the program of life’s morning, for what was great in the morning will be little at evening and what in the morning was true, at evening will have become a lie.” (Carl Gustav Jung)

I’m not exactly sure how to quantify morning, afternoon, and evening of life. I think that probably varies from person to person, and these realisations come at different times for different people, brought on by different life events. There’s no exact dates. But these shifts happen. Sometimes we know clearly at the time, sometimes we only realise in hindsight. You could describe these shifts as liminal moments. ‘Limen’ is Latin for threshold. Like the threshold of a doorway; neither inside nor outside. In-between spaces. Transitions. These moments might be brought on by events or simple realisations. They might be grounded in physical necessity, or a kind of spiritual epiphany. It varies. But we all have them.

American Franciscan priest and writer Richard Rohr put it into even simpler categories: the first half of life and the second half of life.

“There is much evidence on several levels that there are at least two major tasks to human life. The first task is to build a strong “container” or identity; the second is to find the contents that the container was meant to hold. The first task we take for granted as the very purpose of life, which does not mean we do it well. The second task, I am told, is more encountered than sought; few arrive at it with much preplanning, purpose, or passion…

“… it takes us much longer to discover “the task within the task,” as I like to call it: what we are really doing when we are doing what we are doing.” (Richard Rohr)

The Second Act…

I’m currently 48 years young. My great-grandfather (my mother’s father’s father), a subsistence farmer near Ballymena, Northern Ireland, lived to 96. So I’m claiming my halfway point based on him. Humour me here.

My grandmother (my mother’s mother), in her latter years, suffered osteoporosis and joint-issues stemming from poor early nutrition in industrial England. I remember her as soft, caring, doting and empathetic. She was also made of English steel, tempered by the two World Wars she lived through, including the frightening blitzkrieg on her hometown Portsmouth. All of this while Grandad was away in the British Navy, never knowing if he would return. After the war, they emigrated to the other side of the planet, to this strange, far-flung, mystical place called New Zealand. Grandma and Grandad and their two daughters, born either side of the war, left in 1952 knowing they’d probably never see parents and siblings ever again. Isolation from supports. Traumas behind, and fear of unknowns ahead. It worked out, but she stoically carried all that through to 94 years of age. I also carry that in my bones. Literally. I’ll talk about epigenetics and genealogies and the carrying of our ancestor’s stories one day. It’s a thing though.

My Nana (my father’s mother) seemed to me as a child a slightly more distant soul. I loved her, for sure, and she loved me and I knew it. She loved all of her children and grandchildren. Life was hard for her though. She raised 3 children on her own after her husband left her in the very early 1950’s. Before Prime Minister Michael Savage introduced New Zealand’s defining welfare state protections, including the domestic-purposes benefit (or DPB) that provided for solo parents. Life was tough before then, and still tough even with that safety net. She never talked about all that, how it affected her. She was incredible really. Resilient. Despite those traumas, and a fragile body and legal blindness in her latter years, she lived to 89.

Glass and Steel

So I claim longevity genes. And tenacity genes. Though it probably sounds like bragging, it’s not. Really.

Here’s the thing: though there’s steel in my genes, my body’s been like glass these last 20 or so years. I’ve had four major health conditions that have battered me and kept me from work for 18 months or more. I’ll write about these another day, but Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Type II Bipolar Depression, a ruptured lumbar disc, two surgeries and two years of chronic back pain marked my 2000’s and early 2010’s. I overcame these. Glass and steel. Also with a lot of love and care from those around me. In many ways lucky, despite being bloody unlucky.

I’ve reached another threshold, though. In a weird way I knew a sea change was coming, but not like this. I’d had the chronic health trifecta already, but apparently it doesn’t work like that. I’ve just passed two years unable to work again. A fairly simple soft-tissue injury has turned into a neurological monster known as Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS). It’s complex. I’m complex.

I’ve run the numbers on the odds of CFS, Type-II Bipolar, lumbar surgeries x 2 followed by non-resolving chronic pain, and then CRPS, all occurring in one lifetime. I’m about 1 in 85 billion special. A unique little snowflake. Part of me likes being a unique little unicorn. Actually, we all are unique, varied, diverse and interesting. Medical history is perhaps the one place where you really don’t want to be interesting or complex.

Intention

Writing. I’ll endeavour to tell these stories over the coming months. That’s my intention for now. To write all of this down.

The idea of writing has been nagging at me since before this injury, but now I have the time. Ironically I can’t hold a pen, or type for long, but dictation is great. And I’ve never been short of words or thoughts or random ponderings. I have a curious mind. I don’t accept things as they appear. There’s always a ‘why’ behind the thing, and I like wrestling with that. Not necessarily finding answers, but asking better questions. Looking at a different angle.

I’ve always had this deeply embedded instinct to take in all the things around me, to introspectively ruminate and ponder on all of them and try to make sense and meaning of them. I’ve always done that; it was there before that ‘morning-of-life pivot’; before I shaped the mask with which I would fit in.

I’ve always looked from a different angle. That annoys some people. That’s okay. I truly believe we’re better off hearing all the different perspectives, the different viewpoints, from all the different experiences and stories. That diversity add breadth and beauty to life.

I know I’m not that diverse. I’m male, white, middle-aged, middle-class, educated, skilled, straight – privileged in so many ways. But my health journey has taught me things. My faith journey and realisations have taught me things. The people I’ve met and stories I’ve heard have taught me things. And I know I’m very different from that old-school kiwi male exemplar. I intuited it wasn’t safe to be a writer or poet when I was a kid back in small town. Maybe it’s safe now. Or maybe, write anyway.

If you wish to follow along…

… let me tell you those stories. Honestly, there’s lots of things in my noisy brain that need an outlet. I’ll try to be regular, but pain and head-space won’t always allow. Aroha mai.

Some weeks I’ll add poetry I’ve written. I might tell a little of the story or situation the poem grew out of.

Some weeks I’ll unpack my reflections on personality, or emotional intelligence, or the fascinating way we’re wired as humans. For better or worse.

Some weeks I’ll share my thoughts on faith, or life, or purpose. The ‘why's that have informed and altered and confronted me along the way.

Some weeks I’ll share my reflections of the ‘Kiwi male exemplar’ as I’ve perceived them to be. I’ve thought about these heroes and anti-heroes and how we can all grow as a culture when we embrace difference and authenticity.

Some weeks I’ll tell a quirky story about me and what shaped me, or someone I’ve met along the way who made me think twice about something, and left a mark of sorts.

This is my intention, and it’s as much to bring voice to that small child hiding within me. He’s been hiding away, not really sure if it was safe to write like he did before the mask came on. I think it’s safe now. I hope so. Hope is everything.

And, leave a comment. Tell what made you ponder, what resonated, what didn’t, what you’d like to hear me write more about as we go. I’d love to hear from you too!

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