The Reflection Room with Craig

Stories, reflections and conversations for deeper living.
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The Reflection Room is a space for exploring the experiences that shape who we are. Through narrated essays, personal reflections and thoughtful conversations, writer and coach Craig explores identity, relationships, change, courage, belonging, purpose, love, loss — and the strange, beautiful business of being human. Some episodes begin with Craig’s writing. Others begin with a conversation. All of them begin with curiosity. There are no perfect answers here. Just an invitation to slow down, look a little closer, and perhaps understand something new about ourselves. Welcome to The Reflection Room. curiouscraig.substack.com

Episodes

  1. Jun 13

    How Death Turned Me Into a Writer

    A former colleague said something to me recently that stopped me in my tracks. “I always knew you were a great storyteller, but I didn’t know you were such a good writer.” I laughed because neither did I. In fact, I don’t think I would have become a writer if I hadn’t spent a period of my life thinking I might die. For most of my life, I thought my gift was speaking. I could hold a room. I could make people laugh. I could take something complicated, painful, or beautiful and find language for it. Whether around office coffee machines, over dinner tables, or on long walks, I’ve always loved making meaning out of experience. Storytelling became my career. Communication became influence. Connection became work. I thought that was the gift. Then one day, I was lying in a hospital bed waiting for emergency surgery. A few hours earlier, I had been one of the healthiest versions of myself I’d ever known. Suddenly, I could barely walk, barely breathe, and couldn’t focus on anything except the sensation that something was profoundly wrong. I signed a consent form giving the surgeons permission to do whatever they needed to do. And for the first time in my life, I fully accepted something I had spent thirty-four years avoiding. I could die. I remember looking around the room. The walls. The lights. The doctors preparing for surgery. And a voice inside me said: Pay attention. This could be the last thing you ever see. Then, a question arrived. If this is the end, are you happy with what you’ve done with your life? The answer surprised me. Yes. I was proud of who I’d been. Proud of how I’d tried to make people feel. Proud that I’d tried to leave people a little lighter, a little more hopeful, and a little more understood than when I found them. To me, that’s always been the mark of a good life. But another answer arrived almost immediately afterwards. There’s still more in me than this. Not regret. Potential. I had the strange feeling that there was still something inside me that I hadn’t fully become. A few moments later, I was asleep. When I woke up, my body was unrecognisable. A huge wound down my abdomen. Tubes. Drips. Machines. Pain. The doctors explained that my intestine had folded in on itself and eaten almost seventy centimetres. By the time they opened me up, a large part of it was already dead. Another hour, perhaps less, and things could have been very different. I remember hearing this and feeling something shift inside me. Not because I had nearly died. But because death no longer felt theoretical. It was suddenly sitting beside me. Most of us spend our lives avoiding death. It’s too frightening, too unknown, too heavy. So we don’t ask the questions it asks. We stay busy. We distract ourselves. We keep moving. Because if we stop, we might hear something we don’t want to hear. But when death sits beside you, even briefly, it has a way of simplifying things. The noise falls away. And the questions become clearer. Am I living honestly? What actually matters? What is there in me that still wants to live? The next few days were some of the hardest of my life. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t drink. I couldn’t move properly. I couldn’t laugh without vomiting from pain and discomfort. Almost everything that had previously made me feel like myself had disappeared overnight. And then I realised something. I couldn’t tell stories anymore. I couldn’t speak properly. I didn’t have the energy. I didn’t have an audience. I couldn’t sit opposite someone and make sense of what I was experiencing through conversation. The thing I’d always naturally done had disappeared. So, I started writing. At first, it wasn’t intentional. I wrote because my mind was too busy. I wrote because I was scared. I wrote because I was lonely. I wrote because I needed somewhere for all of it to go. I filled pages with observations, questions, fragments, and lists of things I wanted to do if I recovered. I emptied my mind onto paper because it was one of the only things I could still do. And slowly, something happened. I realised that writing felt completely different from storytelling. As a storyteller, I’d always thought my gift was speaking. But writing taught me something I had never fully understood before. To tell stories, you need a voice. But to write them, you need ears. You need patience. You need curiosity. You need to be willing to sit with discomfort long enough to hear what it has to say. Because if all you want to do is speak, you can only ever tell people what you want to say. But if you’re willing to listen, you begin to understand what people need to hear. And I don’t think I became a writer because I thought I might die. I think I became a writer because thinking I might die forced me into silence. And silence taught me how to listen. First to my fear. Then to my loneliness. Then to my body. Then to the small, quiet voice inside me that kept whispering: There’s still more in me than this. Simultaneously, as a byproduct of my recovery, I was developing a relationship with my body unlike anything I’d ever known before. I couldn’t run. I couldn’t throw myself into distractions. I couldn’t outrun my thoughts. So I lay on a yoga mat. I breathed. I noticed sensations. I listened to pain. I listened to fear. I listened to my body trying to recover. Tiny things, really. But after trauma, tiny things feel enormous. Sometimes I would spend thirty minutes simply trying to notice what was happening inside me. Trying to understand this thing that had nearly died. And over time, I realised something beautiful. Writing and this new relationship with my body were actually the same practice. Both required me to slow down. Both required me to pay attention. Both required me to listen. For most of my life, I had looked outward. Towards conversations. Towards work. Towards other people. Towards movement, stimulation, and noise. Suddenly, my world became very small. A notebook. A yoga mat. My breath. The sensations inside my own body. And strangely enough, that smaller world made me feel more connected to myself than I had ever been. I think many of us spend our lives talking over ourselves. We talk over our exhaustion. Over our grief. Over our intuition. Over our bodies. Over our quiet curiosities. Over the parts of ourselves that are trying to become something new. And then one day, we wonder why we feel so disconnected. I’ve realised that almost everything meaningful in my life has arrived disguised as a loss. Loneliness gave me creativity. Heartbreak gave me self-understanding. Uncertainty gave me curiosity. And surgery took away my voice and gave me something I didn’t know I needed. Listening. Everything that takes something away from us is also trying to give us something. The difficult part is that we often spend so long grieving what we’ve lost that we miss what has quietly arrived in its place. Perhaps that’s why the question that surfaced in my mind before surgery still stays with me. If this is the end, are you happy with what you’ve done with your life? Because the answer wasn’t simply yes. It was: Yes… and there’s still more in me than this. Maybe that’s what listening really is. It’s becoming quiet enough to hear the parts of ourselves that are still trying to become. And maybe that’s what loss is trying to do, too. Not simply to take something from us, but to introduce us to something we couldn’t see before. Because death took my voice for a while. Silence gave me listening. Listening gave me writing. And writing gave me back myself. So I’ll leave you with the question this experience has left me circling: What losses in your life might also be trying to offer you something? I’m sure if you look, you’ll find it. Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  2. Jun 8

    Standing Too Close

    Forests we cannot see Sometimes the hardest things to see are the things we’re standing inside. The closer something is to us, the more difficult it becomes to recognise its shape. A fish doesn’t notice water. A person standing in the trees may not notice the forest. Many of us move through life assuming we’re seeing the whole picture, when in reality we’re only seeing the small patch of ground directly beneath our feet. Proximity distorts perspective. How many times have you searched endlessly for your keys, only to find them thirty minutes later in the exact place you first looked? Or better still, in your pocket. There’s something almost embarrassing about that kind of blindness. The thing was there the whole time. Right in front of you. Close enough to touch. Yet somehow invisible. The problem wasn’t that the keys were hidden. The problem was that you’d already decided where they weren’t. And once we’ve decided something is true, our minds become remarkably good at defending that truth. Even when reality is sitting in our pocket. I think life works like this more often than we’d like to admit. Not just with keys. With relationships. With habits. With identities. With beliefs. With ourselves. Recently, I had a conversation that stayed with me long after it ended. I was talking with a friend about her relationship with her mum, a relationship that’s become increasingly strained over the years. There are things that need to be talked about, patterns that need to be acknowledged. Hurts that need to be addressed. Yet every attempt seems to end in the same place. Defensiveness. Denial. Justification. The conversation never reaches the thing beneath the conversation. And so nothing changes. As we talked, I found myself repeating a phrase I heard often growing up: “She can’t see the forest for the trees.” It’s a strange expression when you think about it, but its logic is rooted in simplicity. Because if you’ve ever stood in a dense forest, you’ll know that the forest itself becomes almost impossible to see. All you can see are trees. The one directly in front of you. The one blocking your path. The one catching your attention. The forest disappears behind them. The Circle of Visibility Another angle to interpret this from is to imagine standing in the middle of a foggy field. You can see perhaps five or six metres in every direction, a small ring of clarity surrounding you. Everything inside that circle feels visible. Known. Certain. Yet beyond that ring lies an entire field hidden by fog. What’s fascinating is that fog doesn’t just obscure what’s ahead of us. It limits our visibility equally in every direction. Meteorologists actually define fog by the distance it allows us to see. Once visibility drops below a certain range, you’re effectively moving through a circle of sight that travels with you. No matter where you walk, that circle remains centred on you. What’s even stranger is that when we look at a fog bank from the outside, it appears like a solid wall. But once we step into it, the wall disappears. The fog seems to open up around us. Not because it has become clearer. Because we’ve become immersed in it. And that’s the illusion. You feel as though you’re seeing clearly because there is always a patch of clarity around your feet. You can see something. You can navigate. You can make sense of what’s immediately around you. But in reality, you’re standing inside a field of fog. The clarity was never the whole picture. It was simply the limit of your perspective. To me, that’s what awareness feels like. Not seeing everything. Just seeing the few metres directly in front of you and mistaking them for the entire landscape. It doesn’t matter how many people who love us tell us we’re standing in a forest. Sometimes we can only see trees. And for a while, those trees become our truth. The problem isn’t that the trees aren’t real. They are. The problem is deciding too early that the trees are the whole truth. Because a tree can be true. And the forest can be true, too. But when we confuse our immediate truth with the wider truth, we get lost. Not in the forest. In our certainty. Defending Certainty That’s why it’s often so frustrating when someone else can’t see something that feels obvious to us. We can see the pattern from where we’re standing. We can see how their behaviour is affecting their relationships. We can see how their habits are contributing to their struggles. We can see how their refusal to acknowledge something is preventing change. And because we can see it, we become convinced they should be able to see it too. But that’s rarely how it works. The closer something sits to our identity, the more difficult it becomes to examine. The mind develops an extraordinary ability to protect its existing reality. To explain. To justify. To defend. To preserve. There’s usually no villain involved. The mind is simply trying to keep the world stable. Certainty feels safer than uncertainty. And admitting we’ve been wrong about something can feel like stepping beyond the edge of our little circle of clarity and, and back into the fog. During our conversation, something interesting happened. My friend realised that the frustration she feels toward her mum is remarkably similar to the frustration others sometimes feel toward her. Different circumstances. Different blind spots. Same mechanism. And in that moment, I recognised it in myself too. The moments where I wish someone would simply stop arguing and look honestly at what’s in front of them. The moments where I want someone to acknowledge a truth that seems painfully obvious. The moments where I think: “How can you not see this?” Without realising there are places in my own life where others are probably asking the exact same question about me. That was the moment the conversation became more interesting. Because the issue wasn’t her mum anymore. The issue was something much bigger. The tendency we all have to mistake our immediate view for the whole landscape. We are rarely blinded by ignorance. More often, we are blinded by proximity. Awareness Is Enough People often talk about change as though it comes from effort. More discipline. More motivation. More willpower. Try harder. Push more. Be better. But most of the meaningful changes in my life haven’t happened that way. They happened because I saw something. Really saw it. When I understood what certain foods were doing to my body, I didn’t need discipline to avoid them. When I recognised patterns that were creating suffering in my relationships, I didn’t need motivation to question them. When I realised certain environments were draining my energy, leaving became easier than staying. The awareness itself did most of the work. Once something becomes visible, it’s difficult to pretend it isn’t there. The challenge isn’t usually changing. The challenge is seeing. Once we allow ourselves the vulnerability of recognising our errors, we naturally begin to align. Often, the victim within us only needed to feel safe enough to move on. Once we notice it and acknowledge it, there is no need to continue hiding behind it or licking our wounds. Something in us decides to adjust, and we often don’t realise it. The Lives We Adapt To We’re remarkably adaptive creatures. In fact, we’re so adaptive that we’ll often adjust ourselves around a problem rather than address the problem itself. We drink alcohol and ignore the anxiety it creates. We continue investing energy into friendships that leave us feeling depleted because ending them feels more uncomfortable than maintaining them. We remain in relationships where important conversations never happen because we’ve convinced ourselves that avoiding discomfort is keeping the peace. We stay in jobs that make us feel small, uninspired, or fraudulent because they provide certainty. We spend money on things we don’t really want because we’re hoping they’ll give us something we do; Belonging. Approval. Connection. Love. The thing is, most of these choices don’t feel significant in isolation. That’s what makes them so difficult to see. One friendship that leaves you drained probably won’t change your life. One relationship where you’re constantly swallowing your truth probably won’t break you. One job that makes you feel uninspired or inadequate can be tolerated for a while. One purchase made to impress people rather than express yourself won’t bankrupt you. One evening spent numbing yourself instead of listening to yourself won’t define you. The problem is that very few of us are carrying just one. We’re carrying dozens. Tiny compromises. Tiny acts of self-abandonment. Tiny adaptations. We tell ourselves each one is manageable. That it’s not affecting us that much. That we’ll deal with it later. That everyone feels this way. But what we often fail to notice is the accumulation. The friendship that leaves us depleted combines with the relationship we’re avoiding difficult conversations in. The relationship combines with the job that leaves us feeling disconnected from ourselves. The job combines with the habits we use to distract ourselves from noticing. The distractions combine with the pressure to maintain an image that was never really ours in the first place. Individually, each tree seems small. Collectively, they become the forest. And before long, we find ourselves exhausted, disconnected, and uncertain why. Not because of one catastrophic decision. But because we’ve spent years adapting to conditions that slowly extinguish us. The tragedy is that these adaptations eventually begin to feel normal. We stop noticing what they’re costing us. We stop recognising that we’re carrying them all. The strange thing is that many of these behaviours survive long after they’ve stopped serving us. We’ve built our lives around th

  3. May 24

    Maybe Deficiency Isn’t So Black and White

    I’ve spent a lot of my life around people who experience the world differently. Autism.ADHD.Depression.OCD tendencies.Sensitivity.Isolation.Schizophrenia.Anxiety. The kinds of things the world usually places under labels like: disorderconditiondifficultyproblem And of course, many of these things do create difficulty. I’m not trying to romanticise suffering. But over the years, a core question developed: Just how incomplete is our modern lens? Because one thing I’ve consistently noticed, is that people who struggle in one area of life are often unusually perceptive in another. Someone may struggle socially, yet notice patterns nobody else does. Someone may struggle with emotional regulation, yet create extraordinary art. Someone may struggle to focus narrowly on one thing, yet naturally connect ideas across ten different areas. Someone may feel overwhelmed by the world, yet simultaneously feel more deeply connected to life itself. And the more I’ve reflected on this, the more I’ve realised many so-called deficiencies are not simply deficits. They’re also redirections. Because it’s almost like the lack of something naturally creates movement towards something else. One of the clearest examples in my own life was discovering in my teens that I’m colourblind. Not black-and-white colourblind like people imagine. Red-green deficient. Certain shades collapse together for me in ways they don’t for others. At first, it never seemed important. Just one of those random little facts about myself. But as I’ve grown older, I’ve started recognising that it may have shaped far more than my eyesight. Because while other people were naturally distinguishing surface details more clearly than me, I became deeply focused on what existed underneath the surface. Meaning.Feeling.Intention.Subtext.Energy.Resonance. I became obsessed with what people meant, not just what they said. And truthfully, I don’t know whether I would have paid such close attention to those deeper layers had I not experienced a deficiency somewhere else. That’s what fascinates me. The possibility that perception reorganises itself. That every absence sharpens attention differently. If you begin to look at life through that lens, you start seeing it everywhere. The child who struggles inside rigid systems but thinks completely independently. The person whose sensitivity makes ordinary life exhausting, yet allows them to create things that deeply move people. The individual whose mind refuses stillness, but who can simultaneously hold multiple ideas, perspectives, and possibilities at once. The artist.The outsider.The obsessive thinker.The over-feeler.The wanderer.The person who notices too much. We teach these people to immediately view themselves as broken because they struggle within existing structures. But structures are just environments. A fish struggles on land, too. That doesn’t make it poorly designed. And I think this is where our relationship with ourselves quietly changes. Because most people are taught to ask: “How do I get rid of this part of myself?” But a far more interesting question might be: “What’s this pointing me toward?” Not every trait exists purely as an obstacle. Some traits reshape perception. Some redirect attention. Some force depth. Some create sensitivity to things others move past too quickly to notice. That doesn’t erase suffering. It doesn’t mean every difficulty is secretly a superpower. But it does mean we should be more careful before reducing human complexity to simple categories of “good” and “bad.” Because sometimes the very thing that creates struggle in one environment creates unusual awareness in another. Perhaps the deeper shift is this: Not merely learning to tolerate the parts of ourselves the world labels as flaws. But becoming curious about them. Questioning them differently. Listening to them differently. Seeing them not only as limitations, but as information. Because sometimes, a difficulty is not just a barrier. Sometimes it’s an orientation. A quiet pull toward the things you were built to notice. Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  4. May 20

    The Brain Named Itself

    Here’s a thought that completely changed the way I see the ego. The brain is the only thing we know of in existence that named itself. Think about that. The brain created language.Categories.Identity.Systems.Explanations. And then quietly decided: “I’m the thing in charge.” Maybe that’s what the ego really is. Not arrogance.Not selfishness.Not confidence. But the part of us that believes thought should rule our entire life. Perhaps that’s why so many people feel trapped inside their own minds. We’ve been taught to live brain-first. “Be realistic.”“Think rationally.”“Don’t be emotional.” Logic became the leader. Feeling became something to suppress, justify, or distrust. But what if logic was never supposed to lead? What if it was supposed to support? Because the truth is: your brain is a tool. An extraordinary one. But still, a tool. And tools become dangerous when they start believing they are the master instead of the servant. The brain is designed to calculate. To compare possibilities.To scan for danger.To simulate outcomes.To identify gaps between where you are and where you want to be. That’s useful. But when the brain becomes the driver of your life, those gaps start feeling permanent. You begin lingering on everything missing. Everything you lack. Every possible reason something might fail. And because the brain is constantly searching for evidence, it keeps feeding those limitations back to you. “I can’t.”“It’s unrealistic.”“It’s too risky.”“People like me don’t do that.” The brain becomes both the prosecutor and the judge. And maybe the ego thrives there. Not because the brain is evil. But because survival is its priority. Not aliveness.Not meaning.Not fulfillment. Just survival. Which is precisely why intuition matters so much. Intuition doesn’t speak in endless arguments. It speaks in feeling. A quiet pull.A sense of expansion.A knowing.A resonance. You feel drawn toward something before you can fully explain it. A different life.More honesty.Better friendships.More freedom.More depth.More health. And this is the moment where most people override themselves. Because the brain immediately interrupts: “How?”“What if you fail?”“What if it doesn’t work?”“What’s the guarantee?” But maybe we’ve been using the brain incorrectly the entire time. Maybe the brain was never meant to decide what’s possible for you. Maybe its role is simply to help you move toward what your deeper self already knows it wants. That changes everything. Because now feeling leads first. The intuition says: “This matters to me.” “This feels right.” “I want more of this.” And then the brain gets a task. Not permission to shut the dream down. A task. “Help me figure out how.” That creates a completely different relationship. Instead of asking the brain whether you deserve something… you tell it what you’re moving toward. Then you let it help you close the gaps. Not by observing obsessing over them. Not by staring into them until they become your identity. But by identifying them clearly and asking: What can I already start doing? You want deeper conversations? Learn how to create safer spaces. Learn how to communicate in ways people can receive. Become more honest, yourself. You want more freedom? Learn new skills.Take small risks.Build gradually. You want better relationships? Become the kind of person capable of sustaining them. The gap is not proof you can’t do something. The gap is information. That’s all. And this is why intuition is such an important guidance system. Because thoughts and feelings are not the same thing. Thoughts are simulations. Calculations. The brain trying to run billions of possible outcomes at once. That’s why overthinking freezes people. Too many scenarios.Too many risks.Too many imagined futures. Feeling is different. Feeling cuts through noise. Your intuition rarely lies to you. People usually just stop listening because the brain is louder. But the brain is not your identity. It’s your supercomputer. Your real self is the thing observing it. The thing feeling through life. The thing sensing meaning. The thing drawn toward truth before it can fully explain why. So maybe lessening the ego is not about destroying yourself. Maybe it’s simply about taking the brain out of the driver’s seat. Let intuition decide direction. Let feeling provide the fuel. Then let the brain do what it does best: find you a path there. You don’t need the brain to decide what’s meaningful. Just to help you build a life around what you already know is. Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  5. May 3

    Breaking Apart

    I started working early. Not out of some big ambition. More a quiet need to feel useful. To feel like I was doing something. Earning something. Moving forward in some kind of direction, even if I didn’t know what that direction was. Early Mornings I had paper rounds. Early mornings. Rain. Cold. Going out before school while most people were still in bed. It wasn’t glamorous. But it gave me something. A bit of independence. A bit of money that was mine. I used that to buy the most expensive football boots I could, all in the name of looking cool. A Different Rhythm Then I worked in a garden centre when I was about 14 or 15. That was different. Slower pace. Older people. Conversations that weren’t rushed. People who knew things about plants. About seasons. About how things grow and take time. Cups of tea. Biscuits. I didn’t realise it then, but even that environment was teaching me something. Patience. Presence. A different rhythm to life. At the time though, I wasn’t thinking about any of that. I was just working. Doing something. Trying to build something that looked like a path. Because everyone around me seemed to be moving toward something. Apprenticeships. Studies in far-off places. Even if it was unclear, there was at least a sense that they were going somewhere. I didn’t feel that. I just felt like I was trying things and hoping something would stick. Morrisons Eventually, I wound up in Morrisons. A horrendously yellow supermarket chain in the UK. Hanging bananas in the grocery section. That’s where I felt at my lowest. And things shifted. Because that was the first time I really felt what it was like to be in something I didn’t want. Not just neutral. Not just unsure. Actively didn’t want. The environment was rigid. There were rules for everything. No phone. Clock-in. Clock-out. You couldn’t stand still. If you paused for even a moment, someone would appear and tell you there must be something you could be doing. It wasn’t about doing a good job. It was about constant movement. Constant output. Being seen to be working at all times. There was no space in it. No space to think. To connect. To be human in any real way. What I Didn’t Want And then there was my boss. He had a way of making you feel small without needing to raise his voice. In how he spoke. How he looked at you. How he used his authority and made it feel personal, even when it probably wasn’t. At the time, I hated him. Properly hated him. Because he represented everything that felt wrong in that environment. Control. Pressure. Lack of respect. But looking back, he played a role I didn’t understand at the time. He showed me, very clearly, what I didn’t want. And that clarity matters more than people realise. Because before that, everything had been a bit vague. I didn’t know what I was aiming for, but I also hadn’t experienced something strong enough to push me away from it. This did. The Apron I remember one day in particular. My mum came in to do her groceries. I was standing there in this green apron I had to wear every day. Doing something that felt utterly empty. In a place where I didn’t feel like myself at all. And I remember saying to her, hanging bananas to look busy as we spoke: “I’m not doing this anymore.I don’t want to wear a f*****g apron to work.” It wasn’t about the apron. It was everything it represented. Being stuck. Being told what to do. Not feeling like I had any control over my own direction. That moment didn’t give me a clear answer. But it gave me a clear reaction. A place to start. And from there, I began to look deeper. Not with clarity. But with intention. I started asking myself, even if loosely: What else is there? What could I do that doesn’t feel like this? I didn’t have a vision. I didn’t have a plan. But I had something new. I knew I didn’t want that. And that was the first real shift. Part of The Moments That Made Me Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  6. Apr 22

    Your Mind is Beautiful

    I’m learning something that I wish I had understood sooner: My mind is beautiful. It notices.It wanders.It absorbs. It keeps reaching for meaning, connection, perspective, depth. For a long time, I saw that as too much. Too many thoughts.Too many layers.Too much feeling. Too much time spent circling lifeinstead of stepping into it. Now, I’m seeing it differently. What if it’s a privilege to notice so much?What if it’s a gift to feel this much texture in life? What if the thing I’ve been trying to manageis actually something I’m here to learn how to trust? Inspiration has never really been the hard part for me. The harder part has been deciding where to step in. When to stop observing and engage.When to say, this is enough.I’m going to begin here. To bring something outwardinstead of only holding it inward. To trust what I noticeenough to make something with it. For a long time, I didn’t fully recognise my creativity as creativity. I imagined that as something rarer.More artistic.More obvious. Something that belonged to people who were visibly gifted. But when I look back, I can see it was always there. Years ago in Sri Lanka, a girl I met at a hostel told me over dinner, “I think you’re quite creative.” She said she could see itin my tattoos,in the way I spoke,in the way I looked at things. I remember being surprised. I think she was right. I just didn’t know how to receive it. Because creativity, for me, often shows up as play. In how I move through life.In how I imagine things.In how I make a moment feel a little more alive. I’m constantly connecting, reframing, noticing patterns. I’m rarely waiting for inspiration. More often, I’m trying to work with everythingthat’s already here. And writing helps me do that,better than almost anything else. Writing is where things start to settle. Where the noise begins to organise itself.Where emotion finds shape.Where scattered thoughts land somewhere real. It’s where I regulateand createat the same time. A mind like thiscould observe forever That part feels natural. What feels harderis choosing where to enter. It could keep expanding,keep adding nuance,keep finding another layer. And often, that’s where I get stuck. Not in emptiness. In depth. Where do I step in?Where do I stop circling, and begin expressing? I’ve felt this strongly while writing my book. There were times years ago when I thought it was ready. But when I read parts of it now,I can feel how much I’ve changed. More perspective.More compassion.More patience.More context. So the temptation is to keep writing. To keep waiting. To keep refining.To hold off until it feels final. But if I wait for a final version of myself to speak,I might never speak at all. There’ll always be another layer. Another way of seeing. So maybe the point isn’t perfect expression. Maybe the pointis to enter honestlyfrom where you are. To stop over-curating the moment of entry. To trust that something realis enough. Because the things that move me most in othersare never perfection. It’s when someone stops waitingand begins anyway. When something unfinishedstill finds its way into the world. When honesty matters more than certainty. Because we all know that feeling: Not yet.A bit more time.A bit more clarity.A bit more confidence, and then I’ll begin. But sometimes beginningis the thing that builds confidence. Sometimes sharingis the thing that builds trust. Sometimes the creative actis simply the decision to stop hiding. And a mind like this can feel hard to carry. A burden, and often a heavy one. It can make it harder to know where to begin.It can keep you observing for so longthat you forget to engage. Still, there’s something rare in that. And the workis learning how to use it. Learning how to say: this is enough for nowthis is where I step inthis is where I trust myself. Because that’s the other side of all of this: expression. Taking what you seeand offering it to the world. Through words.Through art.Through conversation.Through presence. Through whatever moves you. And it matters more than we realise. It helps others see.Helps them feel.It helps people notice somethingthey might have missed on their own. Sometimes what you’re learning to carry,becomes what you’re here to offer. And I’m still learning. Learning how to trust myself.How to stop circling and start engaging. Because, It’s worth itto become who you truly are. It’s worth the misunderstanding.It’s worth the discomfort of being seen.It’s worth being thought of as a little weird. Because there are spaces in this worldwhere the way you areisn’t only appreciated, but required. So if you recognise yourself in this— if you’ve ever feltlike there was almost too much happening inside you,too much noticing,too much feeling,too much life being taken in at once— I hope you come to seethat this way of beingmay not be something to fight so hard against. It may be something to understand.Something to work with.Something to honour. Something beautiful, too.. If something in this made you pause or reflect, you might find it helpful to explore it further.I offer 1:1 sessions for people who want to think more clearly, express themselves with more confidence, or work through something they’re navigating.You can explore that here: https://www.fiverr.com/s/WEy8QpB Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  7. Mar 28

    What Would You Ask if You were Braver?

    I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the possibility that each of us carries a central question. Not always consciously.Not always in words.But somewhere inside of us, there is a question we are living in response to. A real quest. Not the surface-level questions we ask every day—what should I do, where should I go, what decision should I make—but the deeper one underneath all of that. The one that shapes what we notice, that pulls us forward, that keeps returning in different forms across different seasons of our life. And I think that question changes as we change. Some questions soften because we’ve lived enough to understand them.Some remain unanswered, but become easier to carry.And some only reveal themselves after years of asking the wrong ones first. It’s why I keep coming back to an old voice note of mine. Back in Mexico, October 2023, just months before an event that shifted me towards more truthful questions of my own. I was on the rooftop in Casa Punta carrying out volunteer duties, sweeping in the late afternoon sun, listening to a podcast interview with Gary Nolan. When, I was struck by not the subject itself, not even the mystery or the scale of what he was talking about. It was something much simpler and much more profound: this idea that the biggest breakthroughs don’t always come from chasing answers, but from finding the right question. It landed in me immediately, because I recognised it. There are some insights in life that feel traceable. You can see where they came from. A conversation that changed your perspective on an event. A book that gave you language for a feeling. A perfectly placed comment said at the right time to open a new door in your mind. There’s a paper trail. But then there are other moments. Moments where something arrives almost whole. Full. Complete. A knowing that seems to appear from nowhere, as though something in you has understood it all along. That day on the rooftop, I felt compelled that what mattered wasn’t collecting better answers, it was learning how to ask better questions. Because once the true question appears, the answer is often already there, quietly waiting inside of it. I started seeing it everywhere. We ask, should I leave this relationship?Should I take this job?Should I move?Should I tell them how I feel? But those are often not the real questions. They’re the first draft. The socially acceptable version. The mind’s attempt to hold something much deeper in a form that feels manageable. The real question is usually more confronting. Not, should I break up with this person?But: does my life still feel more alive with them in it? Not, should I stay in this job?But: who am I becoming by staying? Not, should I say how I feel?But: what is it costing me not to? And the strange thing is, once you reach those deeper questions, something settles. Even if the answer is painful, it becomes clearer. Because the deeper question contains an honesty that the first draft avoids. Looking back, I think that old voice note captured the beginning of something for me. At the time, I thought I was reflecting on ideas—on consciousness, intelligence, discovery, the mystery of insight. But really, I was beginning to understand my own life differently. I was beginning to see that what changes us is not always a new answer. Sometimes it is the courage to let a truer question surface. And now, with a bit more life behind me, I think it goes further than that. I think each of us is shaped by a question that lives underneath our whole experience. A question we spend years circling. A question that explains why certain conversations stay with us, why certain people feel important, why certain themes repeat in our lives, no matter how many times the setting changes. Maybe we’re really asking, am I lovable if I stop performing?Another, what does freedom actually mean for me?Another, how do I belong without betraying myself?And another, what is worth giving my life to? We may never phrase it that neatly. We may spend years disguising it as ambition, conflict, curiosity, heartbreak, restlessness. But still, the question remains there, underneath, shaping the road. And perhaps maturity is not about finally having all of the answers. Perhaps it is about refining the question. Letting it evolve.Letting experience sharpen it.Letting heartbreak, joy, failure, wonder, and time strip away what was never really essential. Because the questions do change. Or maybe more truthfully: they deepen. Some get answered.Some dissolve.Some become less urgent.And some, only after years, reveal themselves as the question we were really asking all along. So when I look back at that rooftop moment now, I see it differently. I don’t just hear a younger version of myself being inspired by a brilliant mind talking about discovery. I do hear that, and I really miss him sometimes. But really, I hear the beginning of my own shift. The moment I started realising that life is not just about finding answers that make us feel certain. It is about becoming honest enough to ask what we are really asking. And maybe that is the quest. Not to solve life once and for all…but to come into closer relationship with the questions inside of us. Because once we learn how to ask deeper questions—and begin to get closer to the one that’s truly ours— we often realise something quietly powerful: the answer was already there. Waiting…for us to be brave enough to accept it. If something in this made you pause or reflect, you might find it helpful to explore it further.I offer 1:1 sessions for people who want to think more clearly, express themselves with more confidence, or work through something they’re navigating.You can explore that here: https://www.fiverr.com/s/WEy8QpB Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  8. Mar 24

    The Quiet Mirror we Find in Others

    About a year ago, I found myself in a bit of a lull. I’d just left my friends and flown solo from Patagonia to the familiar Costa Rica, hoping the sun and the rhythm of the surf would settle something wriggly inside me. For a while, it did — mornings felt easy, days had a kind of flow to them — until it didn’t. The feeling slipped. The questions came back, as they often do when we run from them. Quiet, but persistent. Where am I going? What am I building towards? What actually matters here? Nothing dramatic — just a low, steady hum of uncertainty. This afternoon, the surf had gone flat, and the novelty of being back in the sun had softened. The air was thick, unmoving. The kind of heat that slows everything down — even your thoughts. I walked to a small cafe and ordered an iced matcha. I didn’t have a plan. I just knew I needed to sit somewhere that wasn’t inside my own head for a while. So I opened my notebook. Not to journal, not to solve anything — just to write something. I had an exercise in my mind shaped by different writers and thinkers who return to this idea that when we feel a sense of lack — lonely, uncertain, wanting something more — it can help to shift the aperture, and look for the love that’s already there, out of focus. I think of writers like Natasha Lunn in Conversations on Love, Bell Hooks in All About Love, and Cheryl Strayed in Tiny Beautiful Things — all, in their own way, pointing back to what’s already here. The idea stayed with me, and the first question came simply: Who are the people that matter most to me? I wrote quickly, trying not to overthink it. No trying to be fair or complete — just the names that came easily, the ones that felt obvious. If I had to think too hard, I left it. I trusted that instinct. Then, I gave myself a second question: What do I actually love about them? Three words each. Not what they do. Not what they’ve achieved. Just the qualities that feel most them. It was easy. Of course it was. Talking about what we love usually is — we just don’t often give ourselves the space to notice it properly. Patient. Curious. Expressive. Energetic. Selfless. Charismatic. Warm. Authentic. Thoughtful. Playful. Brave. Disciplined. Kind. Reflective. Passionate. Funny. Genuine. Wise. I paused and read it back. There was something quietly grounding about it. Something simple, but steady. So I stayed in the mindset a little longer. Patterns started to appear. Not forced patterns — just obvious correlations once I looked. Certain qualities kept repeating: Authenticity. Kindness. A sense of adventure. And then, naturally, a third question followed: What does this say about me? Not as a conclusion — just as curiosity. Because the things we notice, the things we admire, the things we’re drawn to… they’re rarely random. They point somewhere. It made me realise that the qualities I love most in other people are also the ones that feel most important to me. Not in an abstract way — but in a lived, felt sense. The way someone shows up honestly. The way someone treats others with care. The way someone says yes to life, even in small ways. And then something shifted. It didn’t feel like a list of what I love anymore. It felt like a reflection — of who I am at my best, or maybe more honestly, who I’m learning to become. There’s something quiet but powerful in that. The idea that what we admire in others is often a kind of recognition. Not always of what we already are fully — but of something familiar. Something we understand. Something we value deeply. Something we want to live more fully ourselves. As I sat there, time passing without me noticing, the list stopped feeling like an outward excercise, and began to feel like an internal mirror. I closed my notebook and sat for a while longer. The ice in the matcha had melted. The cafe had gone quiet. Nothing in my situation had changed. I still didn’t have clear answers. I still didn’t know exactly where I was going. But something had softened. It felt like I had been searching for direction, when really I just needed to remember what already matters to me. Not in theory — but in practice. In people. In qualities. In the way life feels when it’s aligned. There’s something about the slower moments — the lower, heavier ones — that creates space for this kind of noticing. Not because they’re comfortable, quite the opposite. It’s because they force you to pause. To sit still long enough to actually see what’s already there. And sometimes, that’s enough. If something in this made you pause or reflect, you might find it helpful to explore it further.I offer 1:1 sessions for people who want to think more clearly, express themselves with more confidence, or work through something they’re navigating.You can explore that here: https://www.fiverr.com/s/WEy8QpB Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  9. Mar 17

    Is Ego Just the Surface Us?

    Recently, I found myself inspired listening to a podcast with Henry Shukman. So inspired, that I lasted around 22 minutes until eventually the guest — who I learned is a Zen teacher, author, and a wonderful speaker on the spiritual threads that run through everyday life — jolted me enough to stop watching and start writing. During the conversation, he described something that stayed with me. He spoke about what he calls a surface self and a soul self. And when I heard that, it landed… somewhere. Where exactly, I’m not sure, but something about it felt true — at least in my own experience. It seems to me that there really are two layers moving within us. · · · My surface self is closely tied to what is often called ‘the ego’. It’s the part of us that experts claim clings to the physical experience of life — the part that measures, compares, protects, and worries about how things appear. Ego, they say, doesn’t fully trust the things it can’t easily hold onto: deeper feelings, intuition, or the quieter sense of meaning that usually sits beneath what we do. Before going further, though, I think it’s helpful to pause for a moment on that word — ego. For me, it’s one of those terms that gets used often in spiritual conversations, so often that it begins to lose its meaning. That language can turn people away from the idea entirely, causing disengagement. Exactly what the ego wants. A few years ago, if someone had spoken to me about the ego, I’m not sure I would have listened. Nor would I have truly understood what they meant. It can sound abstract. A little woo-woo. Like something people say without knowing what they truly mean, or what it actually looks like in everyday life. It can often feel as though you’re supposed to already know what it means — and so we go through our lives rarely asking the deeper questions. I remember feeling almost embarrassed to ask someone: What do you actually mean by ego? · · · So when I speak about the ego here, I’m not referring to some mystical force or some enemy living inside us. I’m also not referring to something I’m fluent in the mastery of. What I’m referring to is something much simpler. For me, the ego is the part of me that reacts quickly and defensively. And, without awareness, it showed up frequently in my life. When I found myself doing something a certain way and was suggested another way — even a better way — my ego was the first responder, usually arriving in a uniform of resistance. Even if part of me senses the suggestion might actually be useful, the reaction often arrived before the reflection. The ego is quick. Protective. Almost automatic. Sometimes the ego doesn’t allow the space to properly consider the idea. The response just appears first. · · · But as my own ego has softened a little — as its grip has loosened — something interesting has started to happen in my life. I’ve begun to notice the reaction. There’s a little more space between the suggestion and my response. A moment where I can actually consider the idea rather than immediately pushing it away. And sometimes the “threat” isn’t really about the task at all. Sometimes it’s about the possibility that the story we’ve been telling ourselves might have another version. That can feel surprisingly unsettling. If someone suggests we might see something differently — a memory, a decision, a belief we’ve carried for years — it can feel like they’re pulling at a thread in the identity we’ve sewn. Even if the alternative perspective might ultimately help us. · · · What I’ve learned from thinkers like Eckhart Tolle, Bell Hooks, Brené Brown, Robert Greene, and Rick Rubin is that this protective mechanism likely developed during a time when survival really was the priority. Humans once lived in environments where physical danger was common. Being cautious, defensive, and alert would have been essential. But many of us now live in relatively safe environments. We sleep inside homes. We have heating and electricity. Food is accessible. Comfort is easier to maintain than it once was. And yet that same protective mechanism is still quietly running in the background. So instead of defending us from immediate danger, it sometimes ends up defending things like how we cut a cucumber, how we think a tent should be constructed, or the assumption that we already understand something perfectly and need no further input. If the sense of peace comes from the belief that you’re forever a student, then the ego feeds off of the opposite. “I know it all, already.” the ego, 2026 In that sense, the ego might simply be the part of us that prefers familiarity over change. If things feel safe right now, the ego wants to keep them that way. It tries to hold us in the place we already know. Which means it can slow our movement, restrict our decisions, or close us off to ideas that might actually help us grow. That doesn’t make the ego bad. In many situations, we need that cautious voice. Big decisions benefit from careful thought. Sometimes hesitation is wisdom. Sometimes danger is very real. But when fear becomes the main reason behind a reaction — especially the fear of change — it reveals where the ego is doing most of the driving. · · · What I’ve noticed across cultures and identities is how direct pressure often strengthens the ego. When someone tells us what we should do, resistance can appear almost instantly. But inspiration works differently. When someone simply lives in a way that resonates with us — when they show us another way of being rather than instructing us — something else happens. Inspiration slips past the ego in a quiet way. It doesn’t command. It invites. And in my own life, most — if not all — of the changes that have truly lasted came through that kind of inspiration. Sometimes only later, after growing a little, I can look back and recognise the moments where my ego had been holding something tightly, and see more clearly how it had been limiting me. Not maliciously. Just protectively. · · · When I think back to the idea of the surface self and the spirit self, it begins to make a little more sense. Because the surface self often wants stability, recognition, certainty. While the deeper parts of us seem to be asking something else entirely. I remember feeling this while I was back in ‘normal life’, working in Europe. I had a good job, an unintentional career unfolding in front of me, and was fortunate enough to be in a position where, on paper at least, I had everything I wanted. I ate in my favourite restaurants, bought the clothes I liked, vacationed on trips and weekends away, filling my days with small luxuries. On the surface, it looked like a very full, successful life. And yet somewhere underneath, there was a quiet sense of discontent that slowly grew louder. At first it wasn’t dramatic unhappiness — just a lingering feeling that something essential was missing. It took me a while to recognise what that feeling might be pointing toward. I have the inkling many of us encounter something similar at a point in our lives. For some, it will appear after they’ve achieved many of the things they once dreamed about. Getting everything you thought you wanted seems to reveals that those things alone don’t quite reach the deeper parts of you. For others, the feeling might show up earlier — as a subtle restlessness, a quiet question that refuses to disappear. A discomfort at what the world asks you to be. And when that question begins to surface, it can feel surprisingly disorienting. Is this really it? Careers, relationships, long-held plans — suddenly they don’t feel quite as solid as they once did. It’s not unusual to feel lost in this moment. I know, I have. But for me, that period of questioning slowly became the beginning of a deeper curiosity — something beautiful. Not about rejecting the surface world entirely, but about learning to listen a little more closely to that other part of ourselves — the part that might be called the spirit self. · · · And the more I think about it, the more I find myself returning to a quiet question. When we talk about the ego, are we really just talking about the surface self? The part of us that holds onto certainty. That protects the story we’ve been telling about who we are. That resists anything that might change it. If that’s true, then perhaps the deeper work isn’t about defeating the ego. Perhaps it’s simply about remembering that the surface self isn’t the only one who gets to write the script. There is another author within us — one who writes more slowly, more softly, and often, more truthfully. If something in this made you pause or reflect, you might find it helpful to explore it further.I offer 1:1 sessions for people who want to think more clearly, express themselves with more confidence, or work through something they’re navigating.You can explore that here: https://www.fiverr.com/s/WEy8QpB Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  10. Mar 8

    What Do You Notice that Nobody Else Does?

    Thanks for reading! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Sometimes I feel like I notice everything. I notice people laughing somewhere down the street. I notice the small hesitation when someone reaches for another person’s hand, and the subtle tension when that gesture isn’t quite welcomed. I notice the awkwardness that follows. The small emotional currents passing between people that most of us pretend not to see. I notice the sand between my toes when I walk along the beach — the grains that slip under my nails or catch in my hair. Those tiny physical sensations that pull you deeper into the moment. Sometimes it feels like the world gives me so much information, so many details. So many emotional signals. So many small experiences to drink in all at once. And at times it’s almost too much. There are moments when I feel like if I let it all in completely, I could lose myself in the chaos of it. The sheer volume of what exists in every moment can be dizzying. But this tendency to notice things has been with me for as long as I can remember. As a child, the world fascinated me. I was endlessly curious about how people behaved, how things worked, why certain moments felt significant even when no one else seemed to react to them. Maybe curiosity sharpened my senses in ways I didn’t understand at the time. For me, music became one of those gateways. Sometimes I even hear music where most people would only hear noise. Recently, lying in a quiet room with the sound of fans moving air through the space, I began to notice something strange. The wind itself carried tones. Small shifts in pitch as the air moved around objects, bouncing off walls, vibrating against spaces. When I really listened, it sounded like fragments of melody emerging from the room itself. I found myself wondering if anyone else would hear it the way I did. Perhaps this is what they talk about when they talk of ‘allowing’ creartivity to flow through us. Occasionally, I discover that someone else does feel this way. Those moments are rare, but when they happen, there’s a strange kind of recognition. Two people reacting to the same tiny shift in a sound, the same unexpected note in a song, the same subtle change in atmosphere. A shared moment of feeling without needing to explain it. Music often reveals this most clearly. Not through technical discussion or analysis, but through the physical reaction it creates. The way a particular note lands exactly where you hoped it would. The way it sends a sensation through your body before your mind has time to interpret it. Sometimes you glance at someone else in that moment and realize they feel it too. And suddenly you’re not alone inside this experience. The older I get, the more I realize that everyone notices different things. Each of us carries our own combination of sensitivities — our own recipe for what draws our attention. Some people notice style. Others notice status. Some notice language, accents, achievements, or appearances. For me, almost everything comes back to feeling. I notice emotional undercurrents. The unspoken parts of conversations. The subtle shifts in atmosphere between people. And as I travel, meeting people from different places and cultures, I’ve started to realize that this noticing is also a path toward something deeper. What I’m really trying to understand is people. Not the polished version they present on the surface, but the quieter truth underneath. The thoughts they rarely say out loud. The worries that keep them awake at night. The parts of themselves they’re unsure how to share. Most of us carry these things alone. Even with close friends, we rarely reveal everything. There are always pieces we hold back — sometimes because we’re afraid they won’t be understood, sometimes because we don’t fully understand them ourselves. So the two forces that seem to guide my life are simple: The desire to understand others. And the desire to be understood. Travel has slowly revealed something important about this. The more people you meet, the more cultures you encounter, the more conversations you have — the clearer it becomes that beneath all the differences, most of us are searching for the same thing. We want to feel that we belong somewhere. We want to feel that someone sees us clearly. We want to feel that we are not alone in what we feel. Yet the structures of modern life often push us in the opposite direction. They encourage comparison, separation, competition. They make us feel as if we are isolated individuals navigating the world alone. But when you slow down — when you really pay attention — something different appears. You begin to notice beauty everywhere. In music drifting through a rooftop gathering. In strangers sharing stories late at night. In quiet conversations that reveal something unexpectedly honest. Travel doesn’t just show you new places. It shows you how similar people are when the layers of performance fall away. And the more I reflect on these moments, the more I feel drawn toward one simple purpose: helping people feel seen. Not by offering answers, but by creating the space for real conversations — the kind where people feel safe enough to explore their thoughts honestly. Sometimes all it takes is one person asking a genuine question. One person sharing something vulnerable first. That small act often gives others permission to do the same. Because beneath everything — the ambitions, the anxieties, the distractions of daily life — there are clues guiding us toward who we really are. Those clues appear in the things that move us. The moments that make us feel alive. The activities that pull us back again and again without us fully understanding why. Music can be one of those clues. So can conversation, creativity, movement, curiosity, or the simple act of being present with another person. If you want to understand yourself better, one of the simplest things you can do is start paying attention to those moments. Notice what genuinely lights something up inside of you. Notice when you feel most connected — to people, to places, to yourself. Write those moments down if you can, and over time, patterns begin to appear. The experiences that matter most tend to repeat themselves in different forms. And within those patterns lies something important. They reveal what you care about. They reveal how you connect to the world. They reveal the things that help you feel less alone. When you begin to see those patterns clearly, something will shift. Life will begin to feel less like a maze and more like a path slowly revealing itself. You notice more beauty in ordinary moments. More gratitude for the small experiences that once passed you by, unnoticed. And perhaps most importantly, you’ll begin to realize something that travel has taught me again and again: The things you notice — the things that move you deeply — are rarely yours alone. Somewhere nearby, someone else notices them too. And in those shared moments of recognition, even between strangers, we remember something simple and powerful: We were never as alone as we thought. If something in this made you pause or reflect, you might find it helpful to explore it further.I offer 1:1 sessions for people who want to think more clearly, express themselves with more confidence, or work through something they’re navigating.You can explore that here: https://www.fiverr.com/s/WEy8QpB Get full access to CuriousCraig at curiouscraig.substack.com/subscribe

  • 10 Episodes

About

The Reflection Room is a space for exploring the experiences that shape who we are. Through narrated essays, personal reflections and thoughtful conversations, writer and coach Craig explores identity, relationships, change, courage, belonging, purpose, love, loss — and the strange, beautiful business of being human. Some episodes begin with Craig’s writing. Others begin with a conversation. All of them begin with curiosity. There are no perfect answers here. Just an invitation to slow down, look a little closer, and perhaps understand something new about ourselves. Welcome to The Reflection Room. curiouscraig.substack.com

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  • Creator
    Stories, reflections and conversations for deeper living.
  • Episodes
    10
  • Rating
    Clean
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    © CuriousCraig
  • Show Website
    The Reflection Room with Craig