I first heard the dhol at a cultural showcase on the infield of our local racecourse. It was a summer mela of sorts, with food stalls and brightly dressed dancers, but all my attention zeroed in on that drum. The dhol’s bass notes thudded in the air like giant footfalls – I imagined an elephant walking in time to the music. Each deep boom rattled through the grass and grandstand, as palpable as distant thunder. Then came the sharp, syncopated cracks of the treble side, trumpeting over the bass, a playful counterpoint that reminded me of an elephant’s lively trunk call. In that moment, the dhol became in my mind “the elephant of musical instruments.” It was massive in sound, commanding and majestic, yet oddly endearing. I was a little awestruck, picturing a sound-monster elephant lumbering amid the crowd, each strike of the drum a heavy footstep or a jubilant trumpet.

I remember how the crowd responded. A circle of bhangra dancers had formed on the grass, feet kicking and arms whirling to the dhol’s pulse. Even spectators couldn’t help but tap their feet. I felt the vibrations in my own chest, the rhythm syncing with my heartbeat, stirring something primal and joyful. There was a paradoxical gentleness to the experience too – for all the dhol’s volume, it didn’t scare me; instead it drew me in. I found myself smiling at the sheer delight of it. It was as if that drumming was a friendly giant inviting us to dance. The memory of those elephantine beats echoing across an English racecourse sticks with me years later. In the moment, I knew little about the instrument itself, yet it spoke to me in a language older than words. Only later would I learn just how far those vibrations had travelled through history to reach me that day.

The dhol is a double-sided barrel drum originating from the Punjab region of India and Pakistan. It has ancient roots in South Asia, used in regional folk music for centuries. The word “dhol” itself comes from the Sanskrit ḍhola, meaning drum. Some speculate that percussion instruments resembling the dhol existed in the Indus Valley civilization over 4,000 years ago, hinting at a lineage as old as the earliest cities. While we can’t say for sure how the first dhol sounded, we do know it has been around a very long time. By the Mughal era, the dhol had made its mark – the 16th-century Mughal Emperor Akbar the Great even kept dhols in his royal orchestra, and the instrument was referenced in written records of that period. Historians believe it may have been introduced to South Asia by Persian or Central Asian influences – the Persian drum dohol is a likely ancestor. So the dhol as we know it today is a product of cultural exchange, evolving over generations into Punjab’s iconic rhythm keeper.

Physically, a dhol is as hefty as it sounds. The drum has a wooden barrel body with goat-skin or synthetic skins stretched tightly on both ends. Each side produces a distinct voice: the larger drumhead yields a deep, booming bass, and the smaller head produces a crisp, higher-pitched tone. Dhol players – called dholis – sling the drum over their shoulder with a strap and strike both ends with sticks. Traditionally one stick is thick and slightly bent (often called a dagga) for the bass side, and the other is thinner (tilli) for the treble side. The result is a dynamic two-toned beat that marries low thunder with high crackle. Listening back to the memory of that day, I now recognise why I heard elephant footsteps and trunk calls: the dhol was literally speaking in two voices. Its dual heads were performing a rhythmic duet – heavy and light, earth and sky. This unique construction has made the dhol beloved for its ability to drive music with both power and agility.

Over time, the dhol became deeply embedded in the culture of South Asia. It was traditionally played during harvest festivals, religious fairs, and weddings, often symbolising joy and communal spirit. In the Punjab region especially, the dhol grew into more than a drum – it became the heartbeat of an entire way of life. Punjab’s agrarian communities developed folk dances to the dhol’s rhythms. Foremost among these is Bhangra, a lively dance that originally celebrated the spring harvest (the festival of Baisakhi). As far back as the 1800s, farmers would finish their season’s work and erupt into dance, the dhol leading the celebration with its pulsating beat. Bhangra music and the dhol are inseparable; one early description simply noted that bhangra was performed to “the beat of the dhol”. Even today, across Punjab (in both India and Pakistan), Bhangra dancers—men and women, amateurs and professionals alike—move to traditional dhol rhythms that have been passed down like family recipes. The folk songs (boliyan) they sing are buoyed by the dhol’s pattern, and the dancers’ feet mirror the drum’s kicks and off-beats. During Baisakhi in particular, when the wheat is golden and ready, the sound of dhol fills villages as people literally dance in the fields, thankful for the bounty. The “elephant” drum announces that it’s time to rejoice and give thanks.

Beyond the farmlands, the dhol also found its place in spiritual and martial traditions. In Sikh and Punjabi culture, it was used to rally warriors in historic battles and to accompany religious processions. Meanwhile, Sufi mystics adopted the dhol for devotional music – a practice that continues in some shrines. Every Thursday night at the tomb of the Sufi saint Shah Jamal in Lahore, Pakistan, devotees gather for a dhol-driven trance ceremony. Under open skies, drummers like the late Pappu Sain pound out sinuous rhythms that build and build until the crowd enters a state of ecstatic dance. The air fills with dust, rosewater, and music; the distinction between drummer and dancer blurs into one collective heartbeat. It’s said that Shah Jamal himself, back in the 16th century, used the dhol and ecstatic dancing to spread his message. Hearing about this, I can’t help but marvel, the same type of drum that gave me goosebumps at a racecourse in Newbury is used half a world away to induce spiritual ecstasy in a shrine. The contexts could not be more different, yet the fundamental experience – humans moved by rhythm – is oddly similar.

It’s a curious thing to review an object that is so much more than an object. The dhol is wood, metal, and skin – but it is also history and heart. It carries the weight of generations while still compelling us to leap into motion right now, in the present. I think about the layers of meaning packed into each beat: a farmer’s prayer for good harvest; a grandmother’s memory of dancing in her youth; a diaspora kid’s first time feeling proud of his heritage; my own surprise and delight hearing an “elephant” make music. The dhol’s sound manages to be deeply rooted and yet immediately infectious to anyone who hears it. In a world obsessed with the new, the latest, the digital, here is something ancient and analog that still cuts through the noise – literally, with a bang. That feels almost miraculous.

The dhol drum stands as a reminder that not all human inventions are destructive or alienating; some, in fact, bring us together. A drum made of tree wood and goat hide, fashioned by hand, has the power to fill a modern city street with joy. It’s technology, tradition, and art all in one, and its appeal hasn’t dimmed with time. From ancient Punjab to global diaspora hubs, the dhol has proven itself an instrument of both cultural specificity and universal human connection. Its booming bass and crackling treble speak a language of celebration that we all seem to understand instinctively.

My personal experience with the dhol has been one of wonder and gratitude. I’m grateful that I got to hear it that day and witness the happiness it sparked. Even as an onlooker, I felt included in the story it was telling – a story of community, festivity, and continuity. Few instruments have made me smile as widely or have given me such goosebumps. The dhol, the elephant of instruments, has walked into my heart with its big bold footsteps and left an imprint that still resonates. I’ll never forget those first thunderous beats on the racecourse; in fact, I suspect I’ll be chasing that feeling for years to come.

I give the dhol four and a half stars.

In the summer of 2013, I stood at the foot of the Great Wall of China, dwarfed by stone and humanity alike. What struck me first was not the Wall’s immense length but the crowd. It felt as if half of China had decided to visit that day. One might assume that a 13,170-mile fortification would have plenty of space for everyone, yet there I was, shoulder-to-shoulder with strangers in a sea of baseball caps and sun umbrellas. I had traveled thousands of miles only to find that experiencing this Wonder of the World meant inching up never-ending stairs in a slow human tide. The Wall loomed above, an ancient backdrop to the selfie-sticks and excited chatter, and I remember wondering if it was worth it – this clash of grand history with the noisy, jostling present.

Climbing those steep, uneven steps was a test of both patience and knees. Each time I conquered one flight, another rose ahead, snaking upward along the ridge. I gripped a metal handrail worn smooth by millions of hands and caught my breath under a stone watchtower. A famous Chinese saying, carved on a nearby slab of rock, declared: “Not reach Great Wall, not good man.” In other words, “He who doesn’t reach the Great Wall is no hero.” . At that moment, pressed by a crowd on an unforgiving incline, I confess I felt less than heroic. And yet I climbed on, propelled by some mix of determination and the subtle peer pressure of that quote. Step after step, I was chasing not only history but a sort of personal validation, as if a section of my own story might be built on this ancient masonry.

What a story the Great Wall holds. This fortification isn’t a single continuous wall at all, but a series of walls built over two millennia of Chinese history. The stones under my feet were assembled in layers of time: first rammed-earth ridges raised by warring kingdoms as early as the 7th century B.C., later connected and expanded by China’s first emperor in 220 B.C. , and much of what we see today rebuilt in brick by the Ming dynasty (1368–1644) . In fact, the popular sections around Beijing – like the one I was scaling – are about 400 to 600 years old , relatively young in the Wall’s epic timeline. I tried to imagine the scope of this engineering marvel: over 21,000 kilometers of walls, beacon towers, and trenches stretching across northern China, an armature of empire so vast that its total length still boggles the mind. It’s no surprise the Great Wall is often called the largest man-made structure in the world, a UNESCO World Heritage site, and a symbol of China itself. But standing there amid the crush of tourists, I found myself less awed by statistics and more by the texture of the place – the rough grain of the grey bricks, the way the Wall follows the contours of mountains like it’s a natural feature that somehow sprouted stone battlements.

As I ascended, I thought about the people who had built and guarded these heights. It’s estimated that as many as 400,000 laborers perished building the Great Wall over the centuries , earning it the somber nickname “the longest cemetery on Earth.” Many were soldiers or conscripted peasants, toiling in brutal conditions – hauling stones up these very slopes through scalding summers and bitter winters . I could almost feel their presence in the oppressive August heat. My heart pounded from exertion and altitude, but I knew my struggle was trivial compared to theirs. Each time I paused on a step worn down by countless footfalls, I imagined the hands that placed that stone, the lives that were expended to raise this barrier. There is a Chinese legend about a woman named Meng Jiangnu who trekked to the Wall only to learn her husband had died during its construction; she wept with such grief that a section of the Wall collapsed. In that moment, amid sweating tourists, I understood how a wall can be both protection and tomb, triumph and tragedy.

For all its vastness, the Great Wall was never impenetrable. History records that determined invaders found their way through more than once. Genghis Khan and his Mongol horsemen famously breached the Wall in the 13th century, and later, in 1550, a Mongol army led by Altan Khan simply went around one section and overran the garrisons behind it . The Wall’s very existence is a paradox: it stands as an awe-inspiring feat of human cooperation and ingenuity, yet it was born of fear and conflict, and it often failed at the task for which it was built. I reflected on this as I climbed: the stones beneath me were a monument to human ambition – to build something that lasts – but also to our folly in believing that walls can solve deeper problems. Centuries ago, this wall divided “us” from “them.” Now, on this summer day, it united people from all over the world in a shared pilgrimage. The irony would not be lost on the emperors who commissioned it: a structure built to keep foreigners out now welcomes millions of foreign visitors every year.

Near one of the watchtowers, I squeezed through a narrow doorway onto the Wall’s highest accessible point in that section. The scene took my breath away. To the north, the Wall curved along green hills and disappeared into the distant haze; to the south, it plunged back down into a valley crowded with tiny figures beginning their own ascent. The Great Wall is often said to be the only man-made structure visible from space, a factoid I’d heard since childhood – but in truth, you cannot see it with the naked eye from the Moon. (From that distance, the Wall’s width would be like a human hair viewed from two miles away.) Standing there in 2014, I realized that it didn’t matter if astronauts could see the Wall; what mattered was that I could see it, touch it, and feel its history pressing up from the stones. From my perch, I watched the crowds below moving along the ramparts, a living river of multicolored shirts and umbrellas flowing over the dragon’s back of the mountains. In that moment, the Wall felt less like an artifact and more like a process – the ongoing story of human beings swarming, striving, and interpreting this place anew each day.

My 2013 visit to the Great Wall lasted only a few hours, but it has lived with me ever since. I often think about how I felt at the top: equal parts exhausted and exhilarated, insignificant yet somehow part of something enormous. The Anthropocene – our age of human dominance – is usually defined by how we reshape the planet, and here was the literal evidence of that, stretching to the horizon. But the Wall also reshaped me in a small way. It humbled me with its scale and age, but it also comforted me with the thought that even our most enduring achievements are, in the end, human and finite. The stones will not last forever; in fact, large segments of the Wall have eroded or crumbled away over time. What does endure is the impulse that built it – the drive to leave a mark, to protect our loved ones, to accomplish the impossible. Walking down from the Wall that day (which was much easier than going up), I felt a kinship with everyone around me – past and present – who had faced a hard climb and kept going. We were all, in our own ways, becoming “heroes” of Mao’s proverb by reaching the Wall, even if our only conquest was a selfie and sore legs.

The Great Wall of China is both: a place where you can feel utterly alone with your thoughts one moment and swept into the currents of humanity the next. I’ll say this: the Wall didn’t give me the pure joy of a perfect five-star experience, but it left me with something more complex and lasting – a reverence for human history and a humbled heart for human effort. I give the Great Wall of China three and half stars.

I remember the first time I truly saw the night sky. I was nine years old, in rural Pakistan lying on a Charpai beside my Dad, far from city lights. Above us, countless stars glittered in patterns I’d only seen drawn in books. Dad traced his finger in the air, connecting dots: there was the Big Dipper, and just off its ladle’s tip, the North Star. To the left stretched Cassiopeia, a skewed W of five stars. And then, right above the tree line, I spotted Orion—three stars in a neat row for his belt, a bright shoulder (that was Betelgeuse, Dad said) and a foot glowing blue-white (Rigel).

I was amazed that these distant suns, random in their scatter, could align into pictures. It felt like we had discovered a secret cosmic message written across the darkness.

Humans have been finding messages in the stars for a very long time. The very first constellations were likely defined in prehistory​. With no electricity and no screens, our ancestors looked up and saw stories: they connected star-dots into sky gods and heroes, weaving their beliefs and mythology into the night canvas.

Humans across the world live under one sky and see the same stars — and yet, each culture views the night sky differently. Ancient Greeks gazed at Orion and saw a brash hunter. Navajo stargazers saw Átse Ats’oosí, the First Slender One, a protector armed with a bow​. In ancient China, Orion was known as Shen, the “Three Stars” – not a hunter at all, but a place for the Moon to rest. We humans are nothing if not creative: give us a random sprinkle of lights, and we’ll find familiar shapes.

Of course, the stars themselves don’t know they’re in a constellation. The patterns we see are a product of our perspective and imagination. The stars in any given grouping can be hundreds of light-years apart and not actually connected at all. If we were to travel to another star system, our familiar sky pictures would dissolve into unrecognisable scatter.

But from here on Earth, with our limited eyes and limitless imaginations, we can trace cosmic connect-the-dots and see anything from a great bear to a teapot up there. As a kid, I found this idea enchanting: the night sky was like a giant dot-to-dot puzzle, one that every culture filled in differently.

Historically, constellations also served practical purposes. Before calendars and GPS, people used the stars as seasonal clocks and compasses. The appearance of certain star patterns told farmers when to plant or harvest. Seafarers navigated by the stars—Polynesian sailors, for example, followed star paths across the Pacific Ocean long before maps. And in the early 19th century United States, enslaved people escaping north were guided by the Big Dipper — known then as the “Drinking Gourd” — to find Polaris, the North Star that led to freedom​. A folk song called “Follow the Drinkin’ Gourd” even encoded this celestial route, giving directions in metaphorical verses. The simple act of recognising a constellation became a lifeline, a beacon of hope on a dark journey.

Constellations don’t only live in science and history books; they live in our hearts as well. They often serve as emotional touchstones. To me, Orion always meant winter. I’d peer through frost on my window and feel a little less lonely when I saw Orion’s belt glittering above, as if keeping me company on long nights. When I moved away for work, I remember standing outside my apartment on a chilly evening and picking out Orion in the sky; I felt comforted that he was out there, the same arrangement of stars shining above my distant home. We project our loneliness and our longing onto those distant lights, and they reflect back stories that make us feel a little less alone.

In the modern night, the stars are getting harder to see. The truth is, most of us live under skies washed out by our own artificial lighting. By some estimates, one-third of humanity cannot even see the Milky Way at night anymore​. That gausy river of stars — our galaxy seen from within — has vanished behind a veil of haze for millions of people. In the United States and Europe, the vast majority of children now grow up never having seen our home galaxy arch across a truly dark sky​.

There’s a famous story about the night the stars came back in Los Angeles. In 1994, a powerful earthquake knocked out power across the entire city before dawn. Startled awake, residents wandered outside and looked up at an unfamiliar, dazzling sky. Many Angelenos were astonished, even frightened, by the sight overhead. Some called 911, thinking the huge silvery cloud above them was a strange omen – it turned out to be the Milky Way that they had never seen before.

Moments like that 1994 blackout reveal how much our relationship with the night sky has changed. For most of human history, a sky full of stars was a nightly norm; today, it’s a rarity. For many urbanites, the constellations have faded into a nostalgic idea, like a painting whose colors you can no longer quite see. I live in a city where Orion’s belt and perhaps the Big Dipper are the only star patterns I can easily find through the amber glow of streetlights.

Once in a while, I escape to a place with truly dark skies. There, I’ll lie in the open and stare upward for hours, drinking in the celestial spectacle: the stippled band of the Milky Way, the pinpoint shimmer of the Pleiades, the countless stars that city dwellers like me hardly ever get to see. The experience is both wonderful and heartbreaking. Wonderful, because the stars are still there, just as spectacular as what our ancestors saw. Heartbreaking, because I know when I return to the city, most of those stars will disappear behind the haze of human light, invisible again as if they’d never been.

When I stand under a starry sky, I feel two opposite things at once: insignificant and connected. On the one hand, the stars remind me that I’m a tiny speck in an unfathomably vast cosmos. On the other hand, knowing that countless others before me have gazed at these same pinpricks of light makes me feel linked to something enduring and shared. The stars I see tonight might shine a bit less brightly than they did for my great-grandparents, but they are the same points of light that guided travelers and inspired poets long ago. I find that continuity comforting.

Interestingly, even the stars that make up our constellations are not truly eternal—they just exist on timescales far beyond our own. Every so often, though, we get a reminder that even stars change. In late 2019, astronomers noticed that Betelgeuse, Orion’s reddish shoulder star, began to dim dramatically. Over a few months, Betelgeuse faded to roughly one-third of its usual brightness, dropping from one of the ten brightest stars in the sky to somewhere outside the top twenty. For a moment, it seemed Orion might actually lose a shoulder. The media buzzed with speculation about a possible supernova. Was Betelgeuse about to explode?. Researchers later concluded it was likely a stellar burp: the giant star had coughed out a veil of dust that temporarily obscured its light. Still, the “Great Dimming” of Betelgeuse was a striking reminder: even the most iconic stars can surprise us. The familiar cosmic portraits we grew up with will change, given enough time. Tens of thousands of years from now, as stars drift and new ones are born, the night sky will paint entirely different pictures. Future generations may connect completely new dots in the sky.

In the end, constellations are less about burning balls of gas in space and more about us — our stories, our hopes, our connections. They show how human beings can take the immense, indifferent night and fill it with meaning. We’ve been doing it for millennia, and even now, in an age of neon and LEDs, we haven’t stopped. Whenever we do get a glimpse of a dark sky full of stars, we’re still ready to be storytellers — to seek patterns and faces and heroes overhead.

If I consider constellations purely as a tool, I might give them four stars for utility — after all, they’ve guided us and inspired us, but they’re no GPS. If I consider them as art, I’d lean closer to five, since they form perhaps the oldest art gallery on Earth, one we all get free tickets to (weather permitting). Personally, what tips the scale for me is the wonder they sparked in my nine-year-old self and still spark today whenever I find myself under a truly starry sky – that feeling of awe and connection is, to me, priceless.

I give constellations 4½ stars out of 5.

There is a kind of gravity to childhood places. They do not tug at your body the way literal gravity does, but instead they pull at your memory, at your understanding of who you are and who you once hoped to be. In my hometown, nestled in the folds of the rural English countryside, that gravity is centered on a hill. And on that hill, there is a castle.

Donnington Castle is no grand fortress. It's a ruin, a skeletal echo of what once was. But for those of us who grew up under its shadow, it is a monument more enduring than any cathedral. When I first heard Ed Sheeran's "Castle on the Hill," I was startled not by how much it sounded like my story, but by how easily his memories could pass for mine. It is strange how personal a song can feel when it wasn't written for you. Stranger still that a ruined pile of stone can become a compass rose for a life scattered across cities and years.

Music has always had this time-machine quality. Neuroscientists say that the songs we listen to as teenagers embed themselves into our brains more deeply than any others. Maybe that's because adolescence is the age when everything is happening for the first time, and music becomes the narrator of those firsts. The first kiss, the first heartbreak, the first time you drive too fast down a country road with your friends in the back seat. When I hear that opening guitar riff, I don’t just remember. I relive.

I think often about how places don’t change nearly as much as people do. When I go back to visit, Donnington Castle is still there. The fields are still the same shade of green. The wind still carries the scent of wet soil and distant smoke. But I am not the same. And that dissonance—the one between the unchanging landscape and the changed self—is one of the quiet heartbreaks of adulthood. The castle remembers me, or rather, it remembers the version of me that used to sprint up the hill, lungs burning, half-daring gravity to catch me.

Growing up, I wanted to leave. Everyone did. Our town felt too small to contain our ambitions. We thought cities would make us real. And in some ways, they did. But there’s something hollow in the constant motion of adult life, something that longs for the slow, stretching silence of a sky that never quite ends. Every time I return home, I feel that longing settle into me like mist. I drive the same roads, pass the same hedgerows, and I begin to understand that the act of leaving was always paired with a quieter, less glamorous promise: the act of coming back.

We speak of nostalgia like it’s soft and golden, but often it’s sharp and blue. It pricks at the corners of your comfort, reminding you that you cannot go backward, only forward with a heavy heart. But there’s comfort too, in repetition. The castle on the hill does not change, and in that sameness I find something like forgiveness. It doesn’t ask where I’ve been or what I’ve become. It simply waits.

Ed sings about running through back fields and getting into trouble and dreaming of going somewhere else. We all did. But the deeper truth of the song, the one that lingers long after the melody fades, is that home is not just where you began—it’s where the layers of yourself still echo, even when you’ve grown too large to fit neatly inside them.

When I return to Donnington Castle now, I no longer climb its crumbling stones. I sit in the grass, and I listen. I listen to the wind threading through the arched windows, to the faint echo of my own laughter from years ago. I think about how time folds over itself, how the past doesn’t disappear but becomes part of the architecture of the present.

And I think about the hill, and the castle on it, and how they anchor me still.

To me, this song is near perfect. It loses half a star because no song, no matter how earnest, can fully capture the infinite, aching complexity of returning home. But it gets close. And maybe that’s all we can ask of art: not to be perfect, but to be true enough to help us remember who we are.

I give the song "Castle on the Hill" four and a half stars.

Note from Hasan

I stopped writing because I didn’t know if I was a writer. As much as I forced myself to stay away from my desk there were times when I slipped up and ended up going on a writing spree. The very act of writing served as an escape when I needed one. But I never thought I would ever put anything out there again, until this morning.

This morning I hit 10 drafts on my substack, 10 fully complete musings. My brain said to me “10 is a ugly number, it uses too much space on my precious screen real estate”. So here we are, it’s been a while but hope you enjoy reading my depressing thoughts on “end of times”.

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I spend a lot of time thinking about a lot of stuff and recently have been hyper fixated on the “end of times”. Asking myself what will become of us in the long long run, like in 10 billion years and, I’ll be honest, it's a bit discouraging.

But first, a broad observation about human history. We know very little about the distant past. We don't know when people started to have names or what their names were. We don't know when humans developed language. Our species has been around for about 300,000 years and for almost all of that time, very little information has been passed down to us. 

When I think of human history, I often think of it as the story of humans getting better and better at preserving and passing down information. For all I know, there could have been great plays made 30,000 years ago, but I can't read them or see them performed, whereas I can see great plays from 2,000 years ago.

I can't see a photograph of London from 1200, but I can see one from 1900. Now, we have tons of technologies for preserving and passing along information. Not just photographs and writing, but also video and music recording and digital archiving.

It's tempting to me to see the human story as the story of accumulating more and more knowledge and information about each other and our universe. It's a line of progress that begins before cooking fires and ends with us understanding what's keeping the stars apart and how old the universe is. It begins with nobody's name or story being recorded and ends with everyone’s name and story being recorded.

Here is an idea which rides the rollercoaster of information accrual in an only upward direction. But it's odd because that's not the case. We know that humans, like all Earth species, have a temporal range, an amount of time they get to be a species. There was lots and lots of time before humans. And there will be time, in fact, lots and lots of time, after humans. Nothing we’ve ever observed in our universe is permanent.

We know that the sun is getting brighter, and in about a billion years, it will become so bright that all the oceans on Earth will boil. A little while after that, the sun will become so bright and large and as a red giant it will consume Mercury and Venus and probably, although not definitely, Earth. So that's where we're headed. We're headed to probably being part of a red giant. 

Not so long ago, some researchers were looking at a distant red giant, and they noticed inside a red giant some elements they wouldn't normally expect and they concluded that probably the star had once been a normal star and had grown and consumed some of the planets in its solar system. That's why they were seeing those elements that usually wouldn't be made from a star. And so what they were seeing in that giant were the remnants of those rocky planets.

In the distant future, Earth's love stories and technology and birdsong and everything else will be a bit of pollution inside a red giant. It'll be the small collection of elements that the star itself wouldn't produce.

I've been thinking a lot about how we cannot leave a permanent legacy, and how the urge to do something eternal for this world is quite simply the wrong urge. We don't need to remember everything or record everything.

We remember what we can and record what we want, not for eternity or posterity, but for the people we share this planet with and the people who will come after us in whatever remains of our future. It can't be about forever. It has to be about now and what we can see coming. We can't know much about ancient humans, but one thing I would guess about them is that, like us, they couldn't hope in forever.

They had to hope in themselves and in future generations. We are the embodiment of their hope, just as future generations will be the embodiment of our hope. And maybe that's why we're here.

To ease present tense suffering, to solve problems not just for each other, but also for the people who will inherit this earth. And most of all, to live in brief wonder on this, our brief planet. 

1. One thing at a time - multitasking

In a world obsessed with efficiency and productivity there is a profound wisdom in embracing a single-minded focus. I find that life’s most intricate stories unravel when we resist the temptation to multitask, have that singular focus and just do a good job.

2. Have a sacred space - a place to create and work

In the midst of life’s swirling chaos you must have a place where you can find solace. These places invite us to shed the weight of the world and discover our own truths. Within these spaces you can grant yourself permission to be your authentic self. They are the sanctuaries which cradle our dreams, where ideas are born and where our soles are both nurtured and challenged.

3. Be thorough - before, during and after

In any given moment it can feel as if there’s about 1000 things to remember, little things that most people don’t realise. Thoroughness applies to steps preceding and following tasks as well as the task itself. If over time you can apply this attention to the journey the 1000 small tasks will become smaller and smaller

4. Always be on time

Punctuality is an elusive yet seemingly simple act which holds an unassuming amount of significance. It helps us connect our responsibilities and interactions like the precision of a watch's gears. It whispers a profound truth: that our moments matter, and that showing up at the appointed hour is a testament to our respect for our shared existence.

5. “I Understand”

This rule is about feedback. Communication between an Apache pilot and its gunner is a matter of life and death. They must be sure that the other has received the message which has been sent. In aviation communication.

Roger = I have received all of the last transmission.

In life we use ‘I understand’. This will always ensure that the sender and receiver are on the same page. Occasionally you may find a directive confusing. In which case just say ‘I don’t understand’.

Proper feedback enables effective execution.

6. Get confirmation - sent does not mean received

Always get a receipt and where appropriate confirm receipt with the recipient. your receipt is a record, proof and tracking device for anything sent or purchased. Without a receipt your actions cant be proved. Without a receipt you don’t exist.

This axiom holds true for any communication, never say what you can email and never email email what you can say. The more concrete the method of communication the more authority it holds.

7. Keep lists

Keep a prioritised list at all times. Carry this list at all times.

Keep track of detail relating to any project you are involved with.

Your list is your future and your past. You will justify your actions via a carefully updated list.

8. Always be knolling

A, B, K

A = Always

B = Be

K = Knolling

Always be Knolling. ALWAYS be Knolling. (Google it)

9. Take responsibility for mistakes

Responsibility is an essential trait of any individual in your life. Taking responsibility for your mistakes is a sign of good faith. Mistakes happen and it is important to claim them as your own.

10. Persistence - always press on

Life is a series of moments strung together by the elusive thread of time, and today, as you embark on the journey into the age of twenty-six, Its likely that you find yourself standing at the precipice of the unknown. The horizon stretches out before you, both daunting and enticing, like an unexplored universe waiting to be discovered. It is here, in this liminal space between youth and adulthood, where the dissonance of expectation and reality collide, that you begin to grasp the perplexing beauty of uncertainty.

When we were younger, the world seemed defined by absolutes, delineated by the rigid lines of black and white. But as the years unfolded, shades of grey began to seep into the periphery of my vision, blurring the boundaries and reminding me of the complexity inherent in the human experience. And now, on the cusp of twenty-six, you realise that life is not a paint-by-numbers masterpiece, but an abstract canvas waiting to be interpreted.

There is a peculiar charm to this age, an age that straddles the familiar and the unknown. It is an age of both self-assurance and trepidation, where confidence and doubt dance in an intricate tango. The world whispers its expectations, urging us to have it all figured out, to possess a concrete plan, a road map to success. Yet, as I confront the reality of my own existence, I come to understand that life rarely adheres to our carefully crafted blueprints.

Turning twenty-six is not simply a milestone in years, but a portal into uncharted territories of self-discovery and growth. It is a time when the weight of the past begins to ease, and the possibilities of the future stretch out like sun-drenched meadows. It is a time to embrace the uncertainty and relish in the freedom it affords.

In this juncture of life, the expectations of society loom overhead, casting their long shadows of judgment. The world asks, "What have you accomplished? Where are you going?" Yet, amidst the cacophony of these external voices, I find solace in the whispers of my own heart. For at twenty-six, you will come to understand that the true measure of success lies not in ticking off society's checkboxes, but in aligning one's actions with one's own values and passions.

As you gaze into the mirror, what do you see? Do you stand there scrutinising the contours of your face? Do you see a reflection marred by the scars of mistakes and the radiant glow of resilience? The mistakes you’ve made, the failures you’ve endured, they have become the building blocks of your character. They have carved the path that has led you to this very moment, where you stand, flawed but fiercely determined.

At twenty-six, you are learning to embrace the art of surrender, to release your brown-knuckled grip on control and allow the winds of uncertainty to carry you to unforeseen destinations. It is in the surrender that I find freedom, in the release of expectations that I discover the serendipitous magic of life. It is here that I realise the power of vulnerability, of opening oneself up to the world and all its glorious uncertainties.

So, as you embark on this twenty-sixth year of existence, embrace the unsettled beauty of uncertainty. Step forward, not with all the answers, but with an unwavering curiosity to explore the depths of your own potential. Reject the notion of having it all figured out and instead revel in the exhilarating dance of self-discovery.

To live a life unscripted, a life painted in hues yet unseen. 26 is an invitation to revel in the journey, to see what up until now remains unseen

I was sat on my balcony on a pleasant saturday morning watching countless parents chase their kids, sailing boats surf the waves and feeling the burning heat of the sun on my skin. It was at this moment I turned and looked at this ball of fire to only instinctively blink. This reaction and its intricacies made me think.

In the vast expanse of existence, there are moments of delicate vulnerability that stir the soul and ignite the imagination. These ephemeral instances, invite us to explore the fragile nuances that define our existence. Today, I want to delve into the exquisite fragility of eyelids, those guardians of our sight, as they face the wrath of the sun.

Eyelids are like ethereal curtains that shield us from the luminous fury of our celestial companion. Though seemingly insignificant, they are the unsung heroes of our vision, warriors on the front lines of our sensory experiences. Every blink, a symphony of protection, ensuring the delicate orbs of our perception remain unharmed.

As the sun rises, casting its rays across the horizon, we witness the harmonious dance between light and shadow. It is in this moment that we become acutely aware of the fragility of our being. With a mere sliver of tissue, they dare to challenge the mighty sun, standing as a barrier between our vision and the blinding radiance that engulfs the world. How is it that such tender veils can defy the very essence of brilliance?

But it is precisely within their frailty that their beauty resides. Like a fragile piece of parchment, they flutter open, awakening our senses to the vast wonders of the world. And with each gentle descent, they shield us from the sun's wrath, providing solace and respite from its overwhelming brilliance. In this dance of vulnerability and protection, we find a delicate balance that mirrors the complexities of our own lives.

As we delve deeper into the realm of our imagination, we encounter characters, who, like our fragile eyelids, navigate the tempestuous seas of existence. They, too, grapple with their own vulnerabilities, facing the harsh realities of life with unyielding determination. Their stories reflect the intertwining of fragility and strength, reminding us that even in the face of adversity, we possess the power to endure.

In the fragility of our eyelids, we find a metaphor for our own existence. We, too, are delicate yet resilient, capable of weathering the trials and tribulations that beset us. We navigate the world with wide-eyed wonder, protected by the fragile strength that lies within us. Our vulnerabilities, like our eyelids, do not diminish us but rather enhance our capacity for compassion, empathy, and resilience.

Let us contemplate the tender nature of our eyelids and their remarkable resilience. As they shut against the sun's fierce blaze, we discover a testament to the human spirit, a reminder of our capacity to shield ourselves from the overwhelming forces that threaten to consume us. In their vulnerability, eyelids become beacons of hope, illustrating that even the most delicate of structures possess a remarkable ability to withstand the storms of life.

Lets honour that, the tender veils that grace our eyes. Let us cherish their ability to shield us from the wrath of the sun, offering us the gift of vision and the capacity to witness the world in all its splendor. For within the fragility of it all lies a profound truth: that even the most delicate of things possess a strength that can defy the mightiest of forces.

In the annals of human achievement, there are certain skills that, for better or worse, bestow upon the bearer a sense of superiority and an air of sophistication. One such skill, often heralded as a rite of passage into the realm of true automobile aficionados, is the art of driving a manual car. A captivating journey that not only offers a means of transportation but also an opportunity for introspection and connection with the world around us.

The allure of the manual transmission lies not only in its mechanical complexity but also in the dance it demands from the driver. It is a symphony of coordination, an intricate ballet between foot and hand, a delicate equilibrium between power and finesse. Every motion, every adjustment, is an opportunity to engage with the car on a visceral level, to become one with the mechanical beast that obeys your command.

At its core, its an exercise in mindfulness—a practice that demands our full attention and presence in the present moment. The act of shifting gears requires a delicate balance of focus and intuition. As our hands engage with the gearshift, we are reminded of the power of choice and the influence we have over the trajectory of our lives. Each gear represents a distinct stage, a moment in time where we have the agency to make a conscious decision—to accelerate, to decelerate, or to hold steady.

In this fast-paced world, where automation and convenience reign, the manual car provides a respite—a chance to reclaim our autonomy and reconnect with the essence of human control. The physicality of engaging the clutch, the deliberate movement of our limbs, serves as a reminder that we are not mere passengers on this journey. We are active participants, co-creators of our own narratives, shaping our destiny with each shift of the gear.

Driving a manual heightens our awareness of the interconnectedness of our actions. Each gear change is a ripple, a cause-and-effect relationship between our movements and the response of the machine. It is a microcosm of life itself, reminding us that every decision we make, however small, carries consequences. We become attuned to the delicate nuances of cause and effect, learning to anticipate, adapt, and navigate the intricacies of the road.

Beyond the mechanics of gear shifting, there is a deeper philosophy at play. The journey of driving a manual mirrors the ups and downs, the moments of exhilaration and challenge that mark our lives. We experience the joy of mastering a skill, the satisfaction of seamlessly gliding through the gears. But we also encounter the frustrations—the stalled starts, the grinding gears, the moments when the path seems uncertain. Yet, it is precisely in these moments of struggle that we find growth and resilience. We learn to embrace the discomfort, to persist in the face of adversity, and to emerge stronger on the other side.

As I navigate the world in my manual car, I am reminded of the connection between man and machine, of our ability to tame and manipulate the raw power at our fingertips. It is a reminder that the act of driving, at its core, is an art form, a chance to explore the boundaries of control and freedom. And, in this dance of gears and clutch a celebration of the art of engagement—a testament to the richness of human experience. It reminds us that life is not a passive journey, but rather an active participation in the symphony of existence. As we maneuver through traffic, winding roads, and windows down.