Quiet Unfiltered Notes: From the Fire

There is a conversation I have replayed in my mind so many times that I can no longer tell where the memory ends and the mythology begins. I know roughly what was said. I know the room. I know the light. I know what I was wearing and the particular quality of silence that came afterward. But the precise words have long since blurred at the edges, worn smooth by the handling the way a stone becomes something almost beautiful after enough years in a river. I still replay it. Not because I am stuck. Not because I have failed to move forward. But because somewhere beneath all my conscious reasoning, some part of me has decided that this memory is not finished with me yet. That it still carries something I have not fully understood. That to stop replaying it would be to lose something I cannot afford to lose. I have asked myself why. And as I start my weekend, that question has been sitting with me all week. The one I cannot shake. Do we keep certain memories alive because somewhere deep wi...

It is late tonight i finished my last shift for the week. The house has finally grown quiet. The world is winding down. The notifications have stopped. The emails can wait until tomorrow. For the first time all day there is nothing demanding my attention. No conversations. No work. No responsibilities pulling at my thoughts. Just silence. It is strange how uncomfortable silence has become. Not because silence is dangerous in itself. But because of what it often reveals. During the day we have become experts at staying busy. There is always somewhere to be. Another shift to work. Another project to finish. Another message waiting to be answered. Another errand. Another responsibility. Another distraction. And when the day finally ends, many of us do something almost without thinking. We switch the television on. Sometimes we are not even watching it. It simply fills the room. Background noise. Background conversation. Background company. Some people fall asle...

its one in the morning and I havent long got home from my shift at Gold Coast University Hospital and as the world sleeps I find myself sitting quietly with a deep sense of gratitude. It has been one of those weeks where I have spent a lot of time thinking and reflecting on books. Not just writing them. Not just publishing them. Not just selling them. But thinking about where they go after they leave our hands. Next week I will be donating a box of my memoirs to The Footpath Library . And honestly, the thought has encouraged me this week more than I can properly put into words. There are moments throughout the publishing journey where you become consumed by practical things. Printing. Editing. Distribution. Marketing. ISBN numbers. Sales reports. Social media posts and content creating. Book listings. Reviews. All of those things have their place. They matter. But every now and then something happens that reminds you why you started writing in the first place. This feels like one of t...

As Saturday rolls around and my week comes to a close at the Gold Coast University Hospital , I find myself thinking about something I have not been able to shake all week. A letter. Not just any letter. A letter I wrote years ago to a younger version of myself. At the end of my memoir Kissed by Death, I wrote a letter addressed to the boy I once was. The boy who had no idea what was waiting for him. The boy who would eventually find himself fighting for his life. The boy who would carry wounds nobody else could see. The boy who would spend years asking questions that seemed to have no answers. The boy who often felt invisible. The boy who did not yet know that he would survive. For some reason, that letter has been sitting heavily on my heart lately. Maybe it is because life has changed so much recently. Maybe it is because I have been reflecting on where I have come from. Maybe it is because some chapters have unexpectedly closed while new ones are opening. Or maybe it is simply beca...

As another mid-week rolls in, I find myself thinking about music again. Tonight my thoughts have drifted somewhere specific. Tonight I find myself listening to U2 . For as long as I can remember, U2 has been part of the soundtrack of my life. Some bands come and go. Some artists dominate a particular season before quietly fading into the background. But there are a handful of artists who somehow remain. They stay. Not because every album becomes your favourite. Not because every song changes your life. But because their music somehow becomes woven into the fabric of your own story. They sit with you when you are experiencing your dark night of the soul. They celebrate with you on your most victorious days. For me, U2 is one of those bands. Tonight I found myself sitting quietly listening to All I Want Is You . I have heard the song hundreds of times. Probably more. Yet somehow it still reaches places inside me that few songs ever have. What struck me tonight was a simple reali...

Tonight, after finishing my shift at Gold Coast University Hospital , I came home tired. Not just physically tired. The kind of tired that settles somewhere deeper. The kind that arrives after a difficult week. The kind that comes when life changes direction unexpectedly and you find yourself trying to process things your heart has not yet caught up with. Bianca and I were lying in bed winding down for the night. She had Taylor Swift 's Songwriters Hall of Fame speech playing on her phone. I wasn't paying much attention at first. To be honest, I was trying not to think. Trying not to replay the events of the week. Trying not to revisit conversations I wish had gone differently. Trying not to analyse every detail of things I still don't fully understand. But then a sentence caught my attention. Then another. And before I realised it, I found myself completely drawn in. Not because it was an award speech. not because she was talking about fame But because she was talking abo...

This morning I am sitting quietly with my first coffee of the day. The house is still. The sky outside is only just beginning to wake up. In a little while I will put on my uniform, get ready for work, and head off for another shift at Gold Coast University Hospital . But before the day begins, I find myself sitting here reflecting. It has been a difficult week. One of the more difficult weeks I have experienced in quite some time. There have been disappointments. Questions. Conversations I never expected to have. Chapters that ended much sooner than I thought they would. Plans that suddenly changed. The kind of week that leaves you emotionally exhausted before you even realise how tired you are. To be honest, I have spent much of the last several days trying to process everything. Trying to make sense of things. Trying to understand what God is doing. Trying to understand why certain doors close while others open. Trying to reconcile disappointment and faith at the same time. And if I...