Sometimes it’s important to play to your strengths. Sometimes it’s important to work on your weaknesses. For some reason the former always sounds much more appealing than the latter.After a nearly ten year break, I have returned to study. I am

MFSA115: A Thought Indoors

Feb 9th, 2024 3h 38m

Never trust a thought that occurs indoors, the saying goes.We are into the final third of summer here in Australia, and at the risk of tempting the sun gods, I daresay the weather has started to stabilise – as far as Melbourne weather ever doe

MFSA114: The Present Future Dynamic

Dec 28th, 2023 5h 4m

As the year comes to a close, it seems natural to reflect on the year that has passed, and where it has taken us. Are we where we intended to be? Where we wanted to be? Or are we somewhere else, somewhere better defined as the logical destinat

MFSA113: Live At The Candy Factory

Nov 3rd, 2023 4h 36m

I have recently returned from a few weeks in Canada. The trip included a weekend with some very good friends, during which I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to play an extended set on what is probably my favourite pair of speakers

MFSA112: Subclinical

Aug 31st, 2023 4h 29m

I’ve long been intrigued by the end user experience of modern medicine, and what can at times feel to the layperson like a focus on only fixing what is broken. If we are unwell past a certain arbitrary threshold, we receive medical interventio

MFSA111: Leaving The Right Things Undone

Jul 15th, 2023 5h 11m

Much has been said about the importance of time management. When time is tight and competing priorities overlap, it can be easy to succumb to a sense of guilt that things may be missed or not prioritised appropriately.I had a bit of an epipha

MFSA110: What If It All Works Out

Jun 24th, 2023 2h 35m

Negativity can be seductive. As we get older, our awareness seems to build about just how much can go wrong at any given moment – personally, professionally, geopolitically, economically, and physically. It’s easy to be fearful, and the more a

MFSA109: Frame Of Reference

Apr 30th, 2023 5h 17m

We all have our idiosyncrasies. Two of mine are closely related, in that I love a good quotation, and I am a sucker for a good cliché. In both cases, I like to think of them as bits of distilled wisdom that have stood the test of time. But as

MFSA108: Why Not Both

Feb 22nd, 2023 2h 18m

A commonly accepted definition of sustainability is the ability to meet the needs of the present without compromising the needs of the future. So how then to make a future worth waiting for, without shortchanging our ability to fully seize the

MFSA107: Some Colours Have No Names

Jan 22nd, 2023 4h 33m

The summer holiday period is drawing to a close here in Australia, and we have just come back from a few weeks travelling through New Zealand’s South Island. The landscape is extraordinary to the point of being mind expanding, and every day wa

MFSA106: That Little Bit Further

Nov 6th, 2022 4h 55m

There is something exciting about covering new ground. The transition from known to unknown brings with it a sense of renewal and energy, and it can be quite fun to explore that little bit further, and to cover a little bit of new ground at th

MFSA105: Tin Roof Rusted

Sep 18th, 2022 4h 22m

It has been an unusual weekend. It has been an unusual year.Springtime in Melbourne often brings a bit of rain. With another La Nina apparently on the horizon, we have seen quite a bit of rain already. So much so, in fact, that it has exposed

MFSA104: Days Go By

Jun 19th, 2022 3h 16m

Winter has arrived in Melbourne. To me that means short days, falling leaves, and the occasional smell of a wood stove across the city at night. It can be easy at this time of year to withdraw a little bit, to bunker down and count the days of

MFSA103: Your Call Is Important To Us

May 4th, 2022

Coordinating travel, as with coordinating a lot of things these days, involves a lot of time waiting on hold on the telephone. As such, I am becoming something of a hold music aficionado. On many recent calls the music has been punctuated with

MFSA102: The Spirit Of Radio

Feb 24th, 2022

As I grew up my two older sisters were a constant source of musical guidance and inspiration, taking me to concerts, bringing me records from overseas school trips and keeping me up to speed on the hottest bands across the genre that was then c

MFSA101: A Soft Landing

Dec 29th, 2021 3h 51m

Ah yes, life in a pandemic. I suppose every now and then life throws up a bit of turbulence, and so this is our time. But what is the difference between flying and falling, really? There are some parallels shared with the difference between dr

MFSA100: Gudaseya

Nov 20th, 2021 5h 55m

As I write this I am just over three hundred kilometres from home. May not sound like much, but after an extended pandemic and all of the restrictions that come with, even a little bit of travel is a really big deal.The past few weeks have be

MFSA099: Too Late To Leave

Sep 17th, 2021 3h 1m

Whether we are talking about social gatherings or impending natural disasters, there comes a point at which leaving is no longer an option. A point when, to paraphrase an old movie quote, there can be no turning back, and there is no choice but

MFSA098: Second Shot

Aug 9th, 2021 2h 23m

I love a good World War II documentary. While the world is today a very different place, there is still so much from that era that rings true, including the misplaced optimism in 1939 that suggested ‘the boys will be home by Christmas’. Similar

MFSA097: Dark And Long

Jun 21st, 2021 3h 11m

It is the start of the longest night of the year here in Melbourne as I write this.As you may infer from the titles of my podcast episodes over the years, I have a recurring interest in the pivot points, the transitions, the turning points, th

MFSA096: Push Hard But Go Easy On Yourself

May 22nd, 2021 2h 18m

I am not a fast runner, but I like to run. After so many cancelled events it was great to again run in an organised event last weekend. It was a road run along the Great Ocean Road on the southern coast of Australia. The weather was wet but no

MFSA095: Get The Balance Right

Apr 11th, 2021 3h 5m

While the whole world may be going through a global pandemic, the experience of every country and every individual has been different. As my good friend Dan has put it, we may all be riding out the same storm, but we are definitely not all in t

MFSA094: Have To Get To

Mar 30th, 2021 2h 1m

Fun means different things to different people. An activity that one person sees as an exciting adventure – say free solo rock climbing, slam poetry or building a ship in a bottle – another is just as likely to see as profoundly terrifying, un

MFSA093: A Place That May Not Exist

Feb 11th, 2021 2h 9m

While the events of the past twelve months have provided plenty of reasons to be pensive, persnickety and petulant, I am feeling optimistic and inspired at the moment. It has been a year of limitations, worries, uncertainty and introspection,

MFSA092: Out And Back

Dec 30th, 2020 3h 9m

I enjoy long distance running with good music as a physical and psychological release. In particular I like the out-and-back style run, heading out to a distant point and then turning around to head home. Running out, there is a sense of adven