About Me

My name is Matt, I am a professional musician and teacher for the last 30 years. I currently live in India but was brought up mostly in the UK and partly in France. 

I have been very lucky to lead a wonderful life in both music and education, and have had the chance to meet and play with some of the best musicians in both of the countries I've lived in. I am also passionate about games, especially abstract board games such as Mill, Chess, Checkers and Backgammon.

Sadly one of the defining factors of my career up till now has been the mystery of sleep. As a travelling musician, along with the highs that this profession brings, not being able to get adequate rest, has been a prevailing factor for a long time.

Fortunately, this has not always been the case, and I have had long periods without such troubles. However, around a year ago, after a substantial break, insomnia returned and had a big effect on my life at the time. Having been diagnosed with COVID and long COVID, my health took a tumble and it had been an uphill task to get myself back to feeling good about myself.  

As I mentioned in the first post, the turning point was not how I overcame these difficulties, but how I decided to look at them. Once I saw this as a chance to learn something new and to enjoy the process of becoming a more healthy person, I started to see things differently. 

This blog is my journey of discovery there. Hopefully it can be a catalyst for others also to see that health and emotional difficulties brought about by lack of sleep can be a very positive thing despite the pain that it can bring. This blog aims to be a place of refuge and comfort for those who like me have been looking to do something a bit different. 










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Welcome

It is fairly likely if you are reading this that, you have or are having trouble with sleep. Sleep, is one of those mysterious things like hunger and breathing. Until you go without, you hardly know that it could be a problem. But, if you are unfortunate to be someone that is experiencing insomnia, you will know that it can rank up there as one of he most unpleasant things you can experience in life. So who am I to be writing on this subject. Why read what I have to say over the numerous blogs, websites, YouTube channels and books out there? After all, I'm not a medical professional. How can I be of help? Without going into too much detail of how and why - that may come later - the turning point for me was not, how can I get rid of insomnia? It was, what processes in my life can I change in order to help myself be a healthier happier person, and therefore as a result of that deal with these experiences more effectively? Not sleeping is no fun. Not at all, especially when you have t...
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Habits Habits Habits

One of the biggest shifts for me personally as someone who has struggled with sleep, and the emotional and physical discomfort that has accompanied it has been the idea of habit vs goal. (Alot of what I may write here may be seen to be taken from James Clear's book Atomic Habits, so if you haven't read it I would advise you to do so.)    In previous attempts to improve my health and sleep better, often I was putting the emphasis on sleeping as a goal. If I slept well, then it was a success, and if I didn't it was a failure. What this did was to make my emotional pendulum swing wildly from one extreme to another. On the one hand when I felt good, I felt really good and the world was a happy place. However when I didn't sleep and I felt bad, things felt as if they were as bad as they could get. I was simply miserable. Shifting my focus to a more practical, habit orientated approach allowed me to ride the waves much better. When I didn't sleep, it was no longer the end...
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