Dear RentMen visitors, RealConnection chose to answer 16 interview questions that were last updated on 21 Aug 2020

Interview

  • What should others absolutely know about you?
    I am never quite as sure nor as uncertain as I may seem. And I would like to listen a lot more and talk a lot less now so please do get in touch and tell me about you and we will soon see if there's a real connection between us.
  • How do you go that ‘extra mile' in your life?
    The journey is as much if not more important in a way than the destination. I have an adventurous spirit and I love fresh challenges, new people and learning and adapting. I am constantly in awe and wonder at this life and unless and until that finishes I don't consider any of the miles as extra as such, unless they all are. I believe it behoves me to do the best I can, never knowing for sure quite what that is. I hope to share worthwhile times on the road ahead, and with respect to those kind enough to have read all of my rather long interview, (this being the very last question left for me to answer) I hope that you will contact me now, so we can get to know one another on that road which is now right ahead of us.
  • What are your greatest personal traits?
    My sense of fun and adventure, my commitment to integrity and honesty whilst respecting confidences, but most of all my kind heart.
  • What do you do for fun?
    I'm a pretty playful chap so when on reasonable form I'll find fun in most things, from the mundane seeming to the wild and exotic. It seems fun is a euphemism for sex oftentimes and I certainly find sex to be great fun and many other things besides. As for pastimes and interests, I've listed some of those under another question already.
  • What’s your lifestyle? What makes you who you are?
    Eclectic and eccentric. Increasingly environmentally / ecologically conscious and this is a work in progress. Philosophical, whimsical and even comedic. Utterly unconventional yet many who meet me imagine me mild mannered and highly conventional.
  • What is your ‘niche’?
    I am authentic and this isn't a job or an act or something I am ashamed of but a privilege. I have seen much, travelled extensively, been a diligent student and then businessman. Worked on a remote island teaching scuba diving, walked with criminals, the homeless, the mentally unwell, the dying, the suicidal and come face to face with my shadow side and my prejudice and hypocrisy. I appreciate sophisticated things but see them as vapid and hollow if they lack soul. I have run a large multinational profitable enterprise and my greatest moments were those where I prioritised people over profit and was proved right for doing so in the end. I can go from the suit and tie city professional to the wetsuit of a scuba diver to don leather dive into the depths of the world of fetish & kink. I am experienced but have the mindset of a beginner, keen to share. I am sensitive, sensual, sexual, sociable, societal and spiritual. The only limits to the quality of the experience are in our mutual trust and ability to connect and communicate honestly. Everything is with mutual respect and consent or not at all. Tell me about you, what you are looking for and ask me about anything that matters.
  • Tell us what you consider to be your greatest life experience.
    Losing so much of what I considered vitally important or believing I had and realising that none of it mattered in the way I had believed. In many ways also a dreadful experience but actually it gave me an appreciation of so many things I had been taking for granted and it put the magic and mystery back into my life.
  • What makes you stand out from the crowd?
    I generally love people but generally am not a fan of crowds and so I literally might be out and away from the crowd. When I do attend large gathering I will typically tend to talk to the people on the fringes first but somehow gradually work my way around much of the room in time. I can seem quite energised and entertaining but generally that sort of experience is actually quite tiring for me. In contrast I am much happier 1-1 or in groups where I feel a genuine personal connection and interest.
  • What would you like your followers to know about you that is unique and even a bit personal?
    That whatever quality they perceive as special in me it is because they have that quality in themselves which it resonates with and that all I can ever do at my best is to let go of my own beliefs and be with people as they truly are, no matter how they judge themselves and help them to see themselves with kindness. I hope that people don't follow me but rather that we appreciate walking alongside each other, belonging and believing in the healing miracle that this togetherness brings connecting us as it does to a greater whole that in moments such we these we might glimpse as sublime.
  • If you and I were on the beach having some wine and great food, what would you tell me about yourself.
    I can imagine myself smiling and saying before getting onto that, what is your food like; and perhaps being cheeky and asking whether I can try a bit please and would you like to have some of mine? and asking you about your day and just breathing, loving the moment, noticing perhaps how the light reflected from the ocean plays across your face. Magic.
  • What kind of diet and fitness regiment do you follow?
    Variety is important and I don't follow a regime so much as keep an eye on some indicators as I do care about my health and what I eat and how I treat my body but I don't believe there's a magic formula that is good for all seasons. I live an active lifestyle and keep myself on my toes and in that way stay reasonably fit and athletic. I've tried the focussed personal trainer gym habit and for whatever reason it doesn't suit me. As for diet, well, I tend to eat what I love and I do my best in thinking about what's a healthy, balanced diet and of good quality. I think food isn't just a mix of nutrients: it's a wonderful gift that if we prepare with love and gratitude delivers nourishment for the soul that has even more value than the scientific nutritional values for my physical body. I don't like to waste food at all and oftentimes that will determine what I eat. Finally, my body is very good at feeding back if I am not getting the balance right and I am doing my best to make time each day to stop and be mindful of what it is telling me.
  • What are your hobbies? What do you like to do in your spare time?
    Hiking (or more humbly here walking)
    Looking after animals: currently this includes some of my neighbours' dogs a couple of days a week and feeding the large collection of birds and other wildlife that come to my garden
    Scuba diving
    Electronics, lighting and odd bits of DIY and other projects of the sort
    Philosophy and psychology
    Sex (yes, I love it when it's
    Meeting new people and learning about other cultures and other ways of life and points of view
    Eating out (ok much less so these days but still a favourite)
    Swimming
    Visiting art galleries, the theatre and musicals,
    Gardening
    Cooking
    Supporting a couple of different charitable organisations and themes
    Being there for people who need me (both family and long term friends and also people I have recently met who for one reason or another I connect with including some people whom I coach)
    Writing
    Cycling
    Listening to audiobooks and podcasts and music and watching TED talks and the like
    And I'm missing some things I am sure but hopefully that gives you a sense of why I am never bored.
  • What do you enjoy most about yourself?
    Life with me is almost never boring and I continue to confound myself. I can at times be overly critical of myself and yet on the whole I have a playful and adventurous disposition, a great sense of humour and an instinct to see the best and the potential. Despite having a brain that passionately wants to understand and make sense of everything it has accepted that my kind heart knows best in the long run and indeed is reluctantly accepting that my intuition is probably also smarter than my intelligence. Well, not to worry. That bit that likes to make intelligent sense of everything is a pretty good storyteller. I have no end of stories.
  • How often do you travel? Do you prefer to travel or you are more of a homebody?
    Up until quite recently I was travelling extensively, for over two years travelling to several different countries each week on average. That almost killed me and I don't recommend it. Far more enjoyable and valuable were the times I spent some time living in other countries including two extended periods each of a few years in different parts of Asia. These days I am enjoying being home which for now is London. I love the fact that British people are in a minority in London because it's such a cosmopolitan place. While I take a bit of a rest from all that travelling, the next best thing to travelling abroad for me is the opportunity to live with and get to know such a diverse range of nationalities and cultures as are represented here in this challenging, crazy yet amazing city. I remain open minded to live abroad again at some point and to travel a bit more again; but I am also feel a more urgent responsibility towards the environment.
  • Name 5 things that you can’t live without.
    Love and compassion
    Faith and hope
    Joy and a sense of adventure
    A sense of humour
    My relationships
  • If you have to pick one thing that everyone else should absolutely know about you, what would it be?
    As with life generally, it's not what you don't know about me that's the problem. It's what you might think you know for sure about me that just ain't so that'll bite you in the bum. I cannot honestly think of anything that everyone should absolutely know about me because I can't think of anything about me of which I am absolutely sure.