Mind the Gap

The sentence arrives about a second and a half after the remark, and it is always delivered lightly: I'm only joking. Notice where it sits. It doesn't withdraw what was said — it leaves the remark exactly where it is...

Last week, Michael Comyn made the case for silence. This week, the exception — because there's a second kind of silence, the sentence that was formed, weighed, and then never said. Aviation has a name for the conditions...

The voice that tells Ireland to mind the gap spent thirty years being trained never to let silence happen. In radio, they call it dead air — eight seconds of quiet and alarms sound in rooms you'll never see. Then...

Twenty-six years ago, a voice was recorded in a studio in Manchester. Two takes. The first was used. The second was a safety copy. Nobody thought it would matter. That voice now tells millions of people to mind the gap...

Sometimes the most intelligent thing in the room is the thing left unsaid. We had a friend called Bob. When someone was being foolish — not malicious, just foolish — Bob wouldn't argue, correct, or sigh. He would go...

There’s a railway station in Ireland that exists for one purpose only, not to arrive, not to stay, but to move on. In this episode of Mind the Gap , Michael Comyn explores a moment that many of us recognise but rarely...

We’ve all met them. The person who can hold the floor without drawing breath. The one who doesn’t quite notice when someone else is trying to speak. The conversation that somehow becomes… one-sided. In this episode of...

You walk into a café. The coffee is perfect. The service is efficient. And not once does anyone look at you. This episode starts with that small absence — and follows it somewhere unexpected. Through the emotional...

Before offering advice, ask a quieter question “You know what you should do.” Five familiar words, usually offered with kindness, sometimes with genuine care. Yet when we hear them, something small inside us can quietly...

In this episode of Mind the Gap , Michael Comyn explores a quiet but uncomfortable question. Is it acceptable to feel content while the world around us seems unsettled? With images of war, political unrest, and global...

Mind the Age Gap | Retirement Age, Identity and the Psychology of Ageing What does retirement age really mean in modern life? In this episode of Mind the Gap , Michael Comyn explores the idea of the “age gap” — the gap...

This week, during a leadership course, a participant shared a line from her father that stopped the room: “Whatever the mistake, it’s the lie afterwards that hurts more.” In this episode of Mind the Gap , Michael...

Here’s the thing. Most of us spend our lives editing ourselves in real time. Softening opinions. Swallowing reactions. Running everything through an internal risk assessment before it ever reaches our mouth. And then...

How do people really heal? Not through dramatic breakthroughs, but through small, ordinary moments. In this episode, Michael Comyn reflects on personal recovery from a recent experience of gossip and intrusion, and...

In this episode of Mind the Gap , Michael Comyn returns to Stoic philosophy to address how Stoicism is being simplified and misused in some online spaces, particularly where grievance, emotional shutdown, and contempt...