Category: Blog

Too many posts, too many reels, too many podcasts, too many emails.

Too many webinars, too many workshops, too many freebies, too many promises, too many buy one get ones, too many discounts, too many fakes, too many songs, too much movement and overall just too much.

Am I the only one to have reached absolute burnout with this oversaturation of media? Too many targeted ads, mediocre content creators, mediocre sales pitches, mediocre products. We are so overexposed to mediocrity. The true gifts, true talents, great products, great ideas never have a chance to rise to the surface and yet we are investing our time, our energy, our money, our attention into things that are only half good. It used to be that the cream of the crop would rise to the top but now there is no cream, just a sad emulsion.

I follow hundreds of people on Instagram but I see one post for every 20 ads. It’s depressing and it’s also overwhelming. I was meant to post on Substack a couple of weeks ago but I didn’t actually have anything to say. Between Christmas and now nothing really happened. My life wasn’t full of thrills and I didn’t draw anything either. I’ve had a break, a long-earned break, but I just wanted to talk really to myself in this blog and ask myself: what can I unsubscribe from? What can I keep watching? If my time was infinite, I can stay following infinite people, infinite subscriptions and infinite YouTube channels, but it isn’t. So in order to streamline my neural activity and in order to protect my attention, I need to cut the chaff.

Where we put our attention, it’s precious, and I believe there are just three categories of things that we should be giving our attention to: our friends and family, our hopes and dreams, and our education and self-improvement. I think everything can fall into one of those categories.

When I first started using Instagram, when it first came out, I made genuine friends on there. But now I have to wade through a sea of adverts of things I really don’t care for or want, just to see one post by my friend that was posted a few days ago. Yes, I can switch to the favourites tab, but by the time I’ve opened Instagram my ability to discern what I was actually meant to do when I got there evaporates like steam.

If I haven’t liked your pictures in a while it’s because I genuinely haven’t seen them. I have, from time to time, intentionally gone into the profiles of the people I follow and liked the pictures and engaged with the things that I’ve found, but it definitely hasn’t been shown on my feed. I have around 1000 people I follow, so this is still quite a task.

But sometimes I really just wish for a smaller, closer-knit group of people. People I can reliably see over and over again. People that inspire me over and over again. But I also want to follow accounts that I can genuinely engage with and who genuinely engage back.

Genuine engagement is one of those things that makes everybody feel good. Of course I love the big accounts with the flashy pictures and the great work and the interesting, funny stories that go on. They’re great for a few seconds, but your comments just disappear into a sea of others. They don’t really matter. You can’t really engage with the creator, just like a celebrity.

What I really want from my social media is friends. I want a few friends that encourage each other, inspire each other and see each other’s work. But the algorithm of infinite ads seems to make this a near impossible experience. I took time out from Instagram for a couple of weeks and I didn’t miss it.

I didn’t worry about things I might have seen had I been on there and I was quite productive in those two weeks. I got a lot of housework done. I got a lot of cooking done. I got a lot of work done, but I got a lot of thinking done too. Thinking that never has room to grow when I constantly distract myself with a swipeable app.

So my plans for this blog, this Substack, it’s not to be perfect. It’s not just to show up every Wednesday and force myself to say something. I’m going to try and do things naturally. If something interesting is happening, if I’m thinking something that I want to share, I’ll share it. Because my friends will see it one way or another. My friends, are always going to be a part of this.

I’m shrinking down. I no longer desire to have loads of followers. I no longer need to engage with big accounts. Our time on this planet is finite, and I’m not going to worry over the things that are artificially made to feel important.

I’m excited to work this year on new projects, new illustrations. I’m excited to see what my friends are making. I’m excited to see them taking a break as well if they need it and not feeling the paranoia of being present. I’m enjoying digging out my old CDs and listening to the music that I like, not the music that comes up automatically recommended to me. 

I’m enjoying writing with pen and paper. I’m enjoying playing PlayStation with actual discs. I’m enjoying the paint and the brush in my hand. I’m enjoying cooking. I’m enjoying peanut butter on its own with a spoon. I’m enjoying the droplets of rain that get caught in a spider’s web. I’m enjoying research through books. I’m enjoying the reflections in puddles. I’m enjoying the warmth of an electric blanket on an ice-cold evening and I’m enjoying the silence of those rare moments where I’m not gripped onto my phone.

And I want those moments of joy for you too. 

So whether you read this or not, whether you’re subscribed or not, it’s fine. If you enjoy it, come along for the ride. It might not be as you predicted, but sometimes the less predictable things are better.

AI has filtered into most aspects of our lives- seen or unseen.

Our days are filled with interactions with our phones, our machines are automated and our utilities are provided to us by a remote source of artificial intelligence. There are some in the world where the act of fetching water from the earth is still a reality, but for those of us in the modern world, our conveniences have given us what looks like freedom.

1. Handmade Wonder

I am not against “AI”. To enjoy the conveniences of our civilisation, I can’t be. But I’d like to explore for a moment what it means for a person to give up their critical and creative thinking to a machine that will do it in a fraction of a second. The real loss is not the art, it’s the human capacity to struggle, imagine, and shape ourselves.

I can only speak from the viewpoint of the artist, as that is my only well trained muscle. I’ve definitely spent more than my 10,000 hours to master drawing, and I can confidently render most things on paper or screen if I put my mind to it. But that skill took me my entire life to shape, it took me making thousands of terrible art works for a handful of good ones.

We can now sit in front of a screen with an idea (heck we don’t even need an idea- AI will do that for us) and cast a spell or so it seems to create that thing we imagined. It is definitely magic- but like all good magic it does involve some trickery.

2. The Danger of Surrender

In an age of infinitely generated everything, what value is there in creating something by our own hands? Let me take you on that path.

A human starts out as an unpolished gemstone, a diamond in the rough if you like. Through overcoming difficulties we cast off the rough and shape the more beautiful stone. Perhaps we discover a fracture or blemish in our stone along the way, but we trim and refine. We strengthen our inner beauty (because that’s where it lies all along- revealed through our perfection) and we work to become that better version of ourselves.

Our inner work is shaped and perfected, and so too is our outer work- especially if you happen to be someone with a craft, and indeed most of us are. Our jobs all require learning and refinement, all require us to solve problems.

But if we hand over the tasks of solving all problems to AI- then we miss out on the fundamental reason a human needs to feel purpose, to feel achievement, to feel whole.

I could generate a very nicely rendered image, but what lands is merely a fleeting moment of interest. Maybe I’m stepping into the world of the mystical here but there is something mysterious about things that humans have created. That sense of awe we get when we look up at the Sistine Chapel or the bewilderment when we look at the concept art of a film, or the experience of playing in an immersive computer game. That sense of awe is curiosity and intrigue into “how did that human do that?” “Can I do that?”

3. The Dystopian Possibility

AI certainly can help us with an infinite amount of tasks, but what happens when it takes ALL tasks away from us? Is the point of humanity the ability to progress? To problem solve? What happens to our psyche when all of our struggles are removed?

Struggles are not created equally. We definitely do not want to continue in mind numbing work, we do not want to struggle to survive or struggle for basic necessities, every human should be afforded the dignity of these basic things. But a struggle for achievement is different, it could be as simple as perfecting a dish we want to cook for our families or as grand as building a hotel from our own vision.

But it’s not in the completion of that struggle that we find meaning- it is along the way. And if we use AI to shortcut our struggle, or any other kind of shortcut for that matter then we miss the point.

So many great minds, once they solve their problem soon find another one to ponder and crack- because THIS IS THE HUMAN CONDITION.

This is why the curiosity gap works so well to keep us glued to social media, why we obsess over completing a jigsaw puzzle. Humans need to solve their own problems in tangible ways.

In a world where our problems are solved, we no longer can call ourselves human. We have to ask ourselves why the elite would want to remove the work from the human hand- they profit from not paying their workers, but if there are no workers, then no one will have the money to buy into this perpetual consumerism?

It’s a scary thought. If the work as we know it is removed from the human, what will a post-labour world look like? It’s definitely not going to be the free time utopia these AI bros are talking about. Not for us anyway.

My mind can’t even comprehend what a world like that could mean for us. There will always be a reason to enslave our fellow humans, perhaps disturbingly it will be for entertainment purposes, perhaps trapped in a theatre for the elite.

4. Hope

And yet there is hope. We have a gift that can’t be automated, our ability to shape ourselves, that is our human compulsion. To overcome struggles to learn, refine, create. Our creative impulses won’t die with the advent of AI. We don’t need to let go of our humanity, as long as we keep thinking for ourselves, challenging what’s created with AI, even collaborating with it. We can reach out for meaning, not ease.

The future doesn’t need to be a theatre of spectators; it can be a collective workshop, because for now, the tools are still in our grasp.

My ankle wobbled, unsure of taking its first step into the plane. I’d tricked it into thinking this would be an easy journey, sure we just pack our stuff hop on a few trains, buses, planes. How hard could it be?

It’s weakness grumbled at me, not exactly taking it easy, are you? With my life packed into a suitcase, me and my half broken companion set out to fly to Bangladesh. The ticket was cheap and the air was hot. Biryani awaited.

Like everything else in my life at that point, my perfect plan lasted precisely 5 minutes. With the connecting flight cancelled, the few people I’d share it with were told to wait here FOR DAYS until the next flight was restored.

Flying alone was a test in itself but coupled with an ankle that behaved like a wet noodle was a topping on the insanity ramen our world was slurping. NO ONE knew what the hell they were doing.

In that airport, I felt suspended. Neither here nor there, somewhere between the life I was leaving and the one I was yet to invent.

“The next plane to Bangladesh is… uncertain” a staff member told me, in the same tone one might use to break the news of an escaped lion. “You can try the flight to Mumbai, but you’ll have to run.” Run! With these spaghetti legs! But off I went, hobbling heroically through the airport like a wounded wildebeest and miraculously boarding that flight in a fever of joy and fatigue.

God knows that airport is massive. The weirdest thing happened in Qatar, I bumped into a friend from a past life. I hadn’t left the house or seen anyone in years, let alone bump into anyone I KNEW. It was clear from the frosty interaction we were no longer friends, and after swapping numbers she proceeded to ignore my texts. People had become quite strange since lock down and I certainly didn’t live up to her new standards of living with the Royal hoi polloi.

I sat in the plane on the way to Mumbai worried I had no ticket or a place to stay. But that was a problem for future me. I settled into a short flight and decided I’d work out Kolkata when I landed.

Ah… India!

The world’s busiest airport was extremely… empty.

There were just 10 people passing through immigration from that flight including myself. I remember the curve of the building, the long carpet lined, trudgerous walk. The air thick and musty like nothing else I’ve breathed.

I’d never been to this side of the world before, only dreamed about it. And the decision to go was to liberate my inner yearnings of a life more than what i had been doing for 15 years in an office. I was meant to draw, and the ache of never putting pencil to paper called for an exquisite shift.

Thanking the heavens for internet bookings, I arrived in Kolkata with a dead battery. But myself, more alive than ever, was ready to be an artist again.

I’ve been drawing for most of my life, apart from that bit where i was working my butt off in an office.

I distinctly remember saying aloud to my managers at the time, who were interested in my skills as an artist, that i had accepted my fate. I couldn’t perform my best at work and continue making great art.

Essentially i had given up, and ploughed myself into the corporate world, while being distinctly unfulfilled.

The pain an artist feels when they are removed from their craft either by choice or circumstance i would compare to losing a limb. I am of course only guessing, for i have not yet lost a limb, but i have on occasion been maimed and incapacitated for a time on my various body parts. But should i have lost a leg, i imagine the grief experienced would be quite comparable to that of losing one’s connection to their art.

And so, I continued in my monochrome life for a number of years, where i stopped visiting galleries, stopped reading books, stopped engaging quite entirely in any sort of colourful life. And my life’s it seemed, was turning the same pale stained shade of grey that covered the disappointments on the walls of that office.

That was until, i fell.

I vaguely remember holding a maoam sweet in my hand and being surrounded by my colleagues on the stairwell, we were continuing a meeting we’d come in for just after the entire world’s lock down and on my first day back i managed to fall down the stairs. Quite likely I’d forgotten how to use them since being cooped up in my flat for almost two years, too afraid to go outside.

My sick feeling and inability to contribute to the meeting on the stairs soon made me realise that i had in fact broken my ankle. I slithered down the stairs to the bemusement of my colleagues, who i think thought i was overreacting, into a taxi and to the hospital.

It was in my recooperation at home, minus the office work, that my mind began to shift. The Summer Exhibition for the Royal Academy was about to close for applications and I decided that now, incapacitated as i was, was a great time to start a four foot painting, to be completed in a week. I worked harder than i ever had in that week, propped up on the floor, leg braced and plastered, but the discomfort was nothing compared to the joy I was getting from painting again.

And i promised myself that if i got accepted into the exhibition, i would stay in London and make one last attempt at being an artist. And if i failed, i’d pack my bags and take off to see the world as soon as i could walk again.

To be continued…

I arrived in Jaipur with a heart full of anticipation, stepping onto its dusty roads with the weight of twenty years of longing pressing on my chest. For two decades, I had imagined this moment—walking through the Pink City and immersing myself in the world that had captured my imagination long before I ever set foot in it.

A Chance Encounter with the City Palace

That morning, I had no particular plan. Jaipur, with its chaos of honking rickshaws, wandering cows, and the scent of street food wafting through the air, welcomed me like an old friend. I let my feet guide me, wandering aimlessly through narrow lanes lined with red-hued buildings. Then, as if fate had conspired to surprise me, I found myself standing in front of the City Palace.

For a moment, I simply stood there, unable to process what i was looking at. This was the place I had dreamt of and imagined through books and photographs. Now, it was no longer a picture on a screen or in a book. It was real—its towering gates, the intricately painted walls, the grand archways—all standing before me in warm, golden sunlight.

Stendhal Syndrome in the Pink City

As I stepped inside, I felt something strange—an overwhelming rush of emotions, a dizziness that made me pause. My breath caught in my throat as my eyes darted over the stunning courtyards, the delicate paintings, the white patterns on the pinkish walls. Then, I felt my eyes well up.

I had read about Stendhal Syndrome before—a phenomenon where people become so overwhelmed by beauty that they experience dizziness, tears, or even a sense of euphoria. I never thought I would experience it myself. But standing there, surrounded by the centuries-old artistry of the palace, I couldn’t stop myself from crying.

Maybe it was the sheer beauty of it all, or maybe it was the realization that I had waited twenty years for this moment. The years of longing, of imagining what it would be like, of wondering if I would ever see this place in person—it all came rushing in at once. I was standing where so many artists, royals, and dreamers had stood before me, and now I was part of that history, even if just for a fleeting moment.

Finding Myself in the Details

I wandered through the palace slowly, touching the cool marble railings, studying the vibrant murals, and absorbing the artistry in every carved panel. The blend of Rajasthani and Mughal architecture, the softness of the faded pink walls, the weight of history in the air—it all spoke to me in a way I couldn’t fully put into words.

I thought about how this moment had been waiting for me, just as I had been waiting for it. I had always been drawn to Indian art, to its intricacy, its devotion to detail, its love for storytelling through patterns and colors. And here, in the halls of the City Palace, it felt like my love for it had come full circle.

A Beginning, Not an End

Leaving the palace, I felt lighter, as if something had shifted within me. The twenty years of waiting were over, but in their place, a new feeling had emerged—the desire to understand this city beyond its grandeur. Jaipur had given me what I had longed for, and now, it was inviting me to stay, to learn, to create.

Maybe I had experienced Stendhal Syndrome that day. Or maybe, beauty—when it speaks so deeply to the soul—has the power to transform us.

As I stepped out into the warm Jaipur afternoon, I knew this was just the beginning.

As I wandered through the crumbling meditation caves and traced my fingers over the faded colors on the walls of the residential buildings, the hum of mantras still vibrated in the earth beneath me. The Beatles Ashram, long abandoned, felt less like a ruin and more like a place in waiting—holding onto echoes of the past, whispering them through peeling paint and overgrown vines.

Only in India can you climb to the top of a six-story building, stand at the edge of a rooftop without a guardrail, and peer over at the vast expanse of the Ganga, spread out as far as the eye can see. No barriers, no warning signs, just the weight of space and air and possibility. Safety is less of a concern in these places—not out of carelessness, but because life here is not so tightly controlled. There’s a raw excitement in the risk, a thrill in the idea that the building beneath your feet might not last another decade, another year, another breath.

The walls, covered in graffiti and devotion, tell their own story. Some messages are from wandering seekers who left behind words in Hindi, English, and half-finished thoughts in marker pens. Others are just timeworn imprints of another era—paintings half-swallowed by moss, prayers that have settled into the cracks like dust.

The ashram even in its crumbliness is majestic, I wondered what it must have been like in its heyday, supported by all those famous people with deep pockets. The walls are pasted with images of its lovers, The Beatles, Mia & Prudence Farrow, Donovan, Mike Love…it must have been a beautiful sanctuary. The ashram itself, now a ruin reclaimed by the forest, still carries the echoes of that brief but legendary moment in music and spiritual history.

There’s a strange sense of peace here. Not the curated, meditative calm that polished retreats promise, but something wilder, more honest. A place where stillness doesn’t ask you to sit cross-legged with your eyes closed, but instead urges you to climb, to touch, to listen—to be present in a way that feels both exhilarating and completely natural.

I stood on that rooftop for a long time, the wind moving through the empty halls behind me, the sound of the river below steady and endless. For a place that many would call abandoned, it felt more alive than anywhere I’ve been in a long time.

I had imagined a tranquil afternoon by the Ganga, painting the riverbanks and bridges as the sunlight danced on the water. Instead, I found myself face-to-face with one of the most assertive art critics I’ve ever met—a little boy, no more than seven, with impeccable English and even more impeccable confidence.

He didn’t ask if he could paint; he demanded it. “You’re missing trees,” he declared, peering over my shoulder at my half-finished painting. “And why is the sky so empty?” Before I could respond, he plopped down beside me, grabbed a brush, and announced, “I’ll show you.”

I handed him his own page, hoping to redirect his creative energy. But the boy had other ideas. He dipped the brush into green paint and began covering everything—his page, his hands, my paint set, and eventually me. Green streaks appeared on my clothes, smudged across my arms, and, somehow, onto the edges of my painting.

As he worked, he explained, with great authority, how my painting needed more “life.” “Look at the trees over there,” he said, pointing to the forested hills in the distance. “Without them, it’s just water. That’s boring!” His passion was undeniable, even if his method was a bit chaotic.

By the end of the session, he had painted the world entirely green, including himself, and left me with a smudged but oddly endearing painting that I couldn’t bring myself to fix.

Later that evening, still speckled with green and carrying my paint-stained supplies, I went to the Ram Jhula Aarti. The river, now glowing in the golden light of dusk, felt like it had forgiven the day’s interruptions. The chants of the aarti carried through the air, weaving everything into a calm rhythm.

Standing there, watching the flames of the lamps ripple in the water, I thought about that little boy’s critique. Maybe he was right—maybe my painting had been missing something. Not just trees, but the life and unpredictability that Rishikesh brings to everything.

That smudged, green-streaked painting will never win awards, but it holds a memory I wouldn’t trade for anything. And isn’t that the point of art? To capture a moment, however messy, that makes you smile when you look back on it.

Some sketches of the local area.