Ever felt your creativity stifled by the monotony of office spaces or mundane routines? How about looking to the great outdoors for some inspiration? We had the pleasure of hosting Garry Pratt, author of "The Creativity Factor," who believes that nature can be a powerful tool for unleashing our creative potential. Garry shared his personal journey and insights on the relationship between nature and creativity, how strolling outside can clear our minds, and how it's helped him run his business.
Think about it, how many times have you suddenly found the answer to a problem while on a quiet walk? This episode explores that very concept! We discuss how distraction and walking can spark ingenious ideas, share our personal experiences and favorite places that help us find clarity, and touch upon the metaphor of climbing a mountain. This episode is also peppered with fun and fascinating trivia about Garry’s expertise in Bronze Age sailing, his love for camping and cooking over a fire, and how these activities bring him joy and purpose in life.
As we wrap up, we invite you on a journey to rethink your work approach and consider the outdoors as your new productivity tool. Storytelling, another critical aspect of entrepreneurship, takes center stage as we discuss how walking in nature can set the stage for new narratives. We even share a quick exercise to help you create and share stories using found items – a tool for building trust within a team. So, buckle up for an insightful discussion that ends on a sweet note with a metaphorical carrot cake, a reminder to savor the simple joys of life.
Tune in next week for more stories of 'Distinction & Genius' from The Good Listening To Show 'Clearing'. If you would like to be my Guest too then you can find out HOW via the different 'series strands' at 'The Good Listening To Show' website.
Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE & REVIEW wherever you get your Podcasts :)
Thanks for listening!
Ever felt your creativity stifled by the monotony of office spaces or mundane routines? How about looking to the great outdoors for some inspiration? We had the pleasure of hosting Garry Pratt, author of "The Creativity Factor," who believes that nature can be a powerful tool for unleashing our creative potential. Garry shared his personal journey and insights on the relationship between nature and creativity, how strolling outside can clear our minds, and how it's helped him run his business.
Think about it, how many times have you suddenly found the answer to a problem while on a quiet walk? This episode explores that very concept! We discuss how distraction and walking can spark ingenious ideas, share our personal experiences and favorite places that help us find clarity, and touch upon the metaphor of climbing a mountain. This episode is also peppered with fun and fascinating trivia about Garry’s expertise in Bronze Age sailing, his love for camping and cooking over a fire, and how these activities bring him joy and purpose in life.
As we wrap up, we invite you on a journey to rethink your work approach and consider the outdoors as your new productivity tool. Storytelling, another critical aspect of entrepreneurship, takes center stage as we discuss how walking in nature can set the stage for new narratives. We even share a quick exercise to help you create and share stories using found items – a tool for building trust within a team. So, buckle up for an insightful discussion that ends on a sweet note with a metaphorical carrot cake, a reminder to savor the simple joys of life.
Tune in next week for more stories of 'Distinction & Genius' from The Good Listening To Show 'Clearing'. If you would like to be my Guest too then you can find out HOW via the different 'series strands' at 'The Good Listening To Show' website.
Don't forget to SUBSCRIBE & REVIEW wherever you get your Podcasts :)
Thanks for listening!
Welcome to another episode of the Good Listening To Show your life and times with me, chris Grimes, the storytelling show that features the clearing, where all good questions come to get asked and all good stories come to be told, and where all my guests have two things in common they're all creative individuals and all with an interesting story to tell. There are some lovely storytelling metaphors a clearing, a tree, a juicy storytelling exercise called 5-4-3-2-1, some alchemy, some gold, a cheeky bit of Shakespeare and a cake. So it's all to play for. So, yes, welcome to the Good Listening To Show your life and times with me, chris Grimes. Are you sitting comfortably here? Then we shall begin. And there we have it.
Chris Grimes:Welcome to a very special LinkedIn Live All bells and whistles recording of the Good Listening To Show stories of distinction and genius, a show in which I invite movers, makers, shakers, mavericks, influencers and also personal heroes into a clearing or serious happy place of their choosing to all share with us their stories of distinction and genius. And I'm absolutely thrilled and delighted to have Captain Clearing himself because of his great love of the outdoors. He's even got a t-shirt to match. Would you like to puff up your chest please, gary, outside? Yes, this is Gary Pratt, author of the Creativity at Factor, and it's all about harnessing the power of the great outdoors. Gary, you're extremely welcome to this, a special Good Books series strand recording Hello.
Garry Pratt:Thank you very much, Chris. My first LinkedIn Live, so hopefully no editing required.
Chris Grimes:Yeah, no editing required. I'll be gentle with you. I've done this before. This is all good. So House Morale, what's your story of the day?
Garry Pratt:first of all, my story of the day. You didn't prompt me for that.
Chris Grimes:It's spontaneous. That's the idea.
Garry Pratt:I'm reading a very good book, but this book is based on the fact it's one of those slightly time travelling where there's a portal. You can go back to the same point in time all the time and, whatever you do there, you can change history and then go back to that point and it all resets itself if you do it again. So I haven't really got into the book, but I thought it was a really interesting premise and I guess there's probably times in our life we'd all like to go back and reset our lives at, perhaps. So I don't know what that would be.
Garry Pratt:I haven't got to that what my reset date would be yes.
Chris Grimes:And indeed it sounds like a bit of a variation on the theme of Groundhog Day by the sound of it.
Garry Pratt:Yes, yeah, basically yeah, same premise, but this one historical. So yeah, changing things in history.
Chris Grimes:So it's sort of quite Jules Verney as well about travelling in time, yes, yeah so it's not.
Garry Pratt:It's not, but the portal isn't now. The portal is a set time in the past.
Chris Grimes:Yes, by the way, your video seems to be snagging slightly, as it's snagging for you at this moment, it counts.
Speaker 3:It's not snagging for me.
Chris Grimes:So if your signal I don't know if your signal is snagging or not, because you're pixelating beautifully- it's normally okay.
Garry Pratt:I'm not sure I can do anything about it. Well coming across.
Chris Grimes:It's a podcast first and foremost, so that's really important. So I can hear you fine. And, by the way, we can definitely edit this stuff out while we argue about whether or not your streaming service is working correctly. But you're looking great.
Garry Pratt:So with the streaming service I've got, I'm afraid.
Chris Grimes:You're very welcome to it as well. So I have you to thank as well because you've rescheduled today and actually because of all of your philosophy. When you rescheduled you actually gave me half my day back and indeed I thank you because I went outdoors. I went outdoors on my bike. My bike is my freedom and I've learned that sort of idea of, if in doubt, walking out, the sort of nature philosophy I've learned partly from you, but also from our mutual friend Dave Stewart, and I'm delighted to say that he introduced me to you and I'm really enjoying our association ever since. So do you want to just quickly tell us the story behind the story of the book? First of all? So the creativity factor. I hope you've got a copy to hand to show the screen as well.
Garry Pratt:Love it. I'm sure you'll ask me where to get it later. I'm very easy, because there's only two Gary Pratt's on the internet. I'm one of. The others are cricketer. I wish I was the cricketer.
Chris Grimes:And you're both spelling it with a double R, double T, because that's what's so lovely about the Gary Pratt. It's all very clear.
Garry Pratt:It's a name I didn't particularly like as a child, but now it's very useful being, you know, alone on the internet.
Chris Grimes:And just before you get onto that, I love the fact you're inviting business leaders to ditch the board room. You'll see what you do there. Walk the talk and spot the creativity and harness the power of the great outdoors.
Garry Pratt:Yes, yes. Well, so the story behind the book is probably like lots of books, is personal. So you know I've had a very tinkery career. We're not talking about really about my career today, but you know, if I wanted to find thinking space when I was running a business, or you know, I just knew that I went outside and we can go into where that came from, from me, and I knew, you know, I think, like lots of people, lots of people I interviewed from the book, everyone inherently knows if they want to clear their head, walking is a pretty good thing to do in going outside. But a few things happened, one I talk about in the book.
Garry Pratt:I was another bit of my tinkery life in archaeology, which you might get to, but I was doing a master's in archaeology and I was starting to put myself out of my comfort zone by going and talking at conferences and I'm absolutely terrifying.
Garry Pratt:You know, from talking at big business conferences I don't mind that. And then suddenly, in front of peers, talking about your own research is a terrifying thing and Serendipitous, fortuitous. I was talking in Edinburgh and my plane, dan Dila, got off the plane and it was basically gridlock and normally I guess before a conference talk. I do whatever most people do, you know, you go to a cafe with your notes and your laptop and you're just trying to get it in here and I was sitting, sitting in a taxi and and I didn't have that opportunity, but also I wasn't going to get there in time, so I just got out and walked. So I just walked to the conference centre and you know, in the film it'll just be seamless. You know, I just walked through the door, picked up my land yard, walked onto stage and had to give my speech, and it was almost that yes.
Garry Pratt:And it was by far the best presentation I've ever given. So this sort of made my mind go. Why did you know? You know you get the sort of clearing ahead, but it was. Why did that happen? So that just took me down those. You know I'm a natural researcher, I think. So it took me down the research rabbit holes of starting to read about walking, thinking and who's done research there and creativity and how it makes your mind, and so that's one bit. So that was my intellectual interest. And then the other bit was I am a mountain leader, yes, and so I was already taking people on sort of just nice mountain walks and journeys and I'd taken a group off to Morocco. So we weren't doing work Really, we were just going for a nice walk.
Chris Grimes:But also, You'll do a very exciting one in Mallorca next year. I'm hearing, and I'm very much wanting to reciprocate and join you on that too, actually.
Garry Pratt:So one of these, I was out there with a, organized it for a friend's 50th and met a load of people I've never met before his friends, you know. And so I also had that reflection of, oh, you get really deep connections with people when you do this. You know new people not. You wouldn't have got that on a stag weekend in a bar in Swansea, would you? So that's then when it came together and I started one, research the book and two, think about how you would actually, you know, build some methodology around it for business and put this to use. But the simple answer, Chris, is lockdown happened. I pitched a book to a publisher and they said yes, so I have to write it. So, yes, lovely.
Chris Grimes:And what's meant for you won't pass you by even the traffic jam and the fact that you thought right, that's it, I'm getting out and walking. Yeah, just wonderful, carpe diem, sliding doors moments. Yes, and I'm researching you as well. I love the fact that one of your epiphanies in the research that you did was you realized that creativity is generated best through abstraction and distraction. Yes, and the idea of being outdoors as a sort of side activity actually feeds the main activity. Just to riff on this, you're in brilliant company, because I recently had the author of Shakespeare, the man who pays the rent, who co -authored the book with Dame Judy Dench, okay, and the actress. She too, cannot just sit there with a script. I learned she has to do what actors call a side activity. Is you do anything but that you displace an abstract, and that's how you, then your synapses, begin to process what needs to be processed.
Garry Pratt:Absolutely, and that was one of the seminal papers for me when I started researching was one called inspired by distraction, by an American academic called Benjamin Baird which is, you know, actively tries to measure that. You know, he literally measured people's creative reasoning based on slobbing around doing a complex mathematical task and doing a slightly distracting task, and the slightly distracting outscored the others by 60% or something. So, and yeah, luckily, walking because I love it is actually a slightly distracting task. Your brain is perambulating, moving your body, you're navigating, so you know, adjust the fact of walking at a sort of nice casual pace, and there's a whole bit in the book about the right tempo.
Chris Grimes:And I love the word perambulation because it's similarly exactly like that when I'm teaching comedy improvisation in a place in France. We walk outside to do a Jane Austen-esque perambulation as we get into the idea of bantering one word at a time each. So it is that walking towards that's so helpful.
Garry Pratt:It is, it's walking towards and it's and yeah, I often say when I take things out, you know we're not. We might go up some mountain peaks if you want to, but it's not peak bagging, it's not how quickly you can do it, that's not. It's not a sort of rah, rah, macho hike. Yes, we're just traveling through nature. But that, that traveling, just by a quirk of evolution, basically puts your mind into this same Judy Dench default, you know. Default, distracted state.
Chris Grimes:And our good friend Dave Stewart says, perambulating at the speed of leather, which I quite like, because that's quite a Scottish thing.
Chris Grimes:So we can both take that from Dave Stewart, thank you. So yes, it's my great joy to and privilege to curate you through, and we're going to talk about your book again implicitly, when we get into a particular inner sanctum within the clearing. But it's my privilege to bring you into the clearing where we're going to arrive with a tree. I'm going to shake your tree. There's going to be a juicy storytelling exercise called five, four, three, two, one. Then there's going to be some alchemy, some gold, a couple of random squirrels, a cheeky bit of Shakespeare, a golden baton and a cake.
Garry Pratt:Fantastic.
Chris Grimes:It's all to play for and we'll enjoy the squirrels, because they're very most often found outdoors, unless they're, of course, in the zoo. Lovely, so let's get you on the open road. Gary Pratt, seasoned entrepreneur, I think you'll find you are author, strategist and mountain leader. Where is what is a clearing for you? Where is your serious happy place? Where do you go to get clutter free, inspirational and able to think?
Garry Pratt:Yeah, I found this. Yeah, it's easy and, once in, as hard as it can be outdoors, isn't it, you know? And it's clearing the wood. So, you know, I have a corner of my garden which is, you know, rusty, old bench under some bushes, which is definitely one of my clearings. I like a mountain path with a view, not mountain top. I quite like the journey, you know, halfway up the mountain with a nice view. But in your clearing scenario, and because I've been there a lot, I'd have to go for a little wooded clearing in near a Moroccan river where, you know, my mule, my mule of tears, and cooked, have laid out my rugs and pillows to have some nice lunch and mint tea. You know it'd have to be that.
Chris Grimes:I love the sense evocation of all of that Mule of tears. Did you say, yes. And peppermint tea yes. And Morocco we're getting Moroccan sort of herb. Well, just the air in Morocco Fantastic. Also, I love the fact couldn't help hearing it's halfway up the mountain. Have you read? According to you know, gabriel Marquez Lorquez, who wrote 100 years of Solitude? Do you remember this story where, when he died of pancreatic cancer, he left the world a final statement.
Garry Pratt:Okay.
Chris Grimes:He said I'm going to tell you two things what I've noticed and what I've learned. And what he says was what I've noticed that everybody wants to live atop the mountain and what I've learned is that life is not the top of the mountain, it's the journey towards the summit.
Garry Pratt:Ah, I love that. Yes, I often use. I've been tempted with some groups to not let them go to the mountain top just to see how it affects people. Almost get that. I haven't quite done it, but I often use the, you know, because I'm doing work in mountains, you know, with businesses and teams as a sort of relation that you know so many business metaphors are how to get to the top of the mountain. And, and you know, my sort of take is well, if you haven't got what you need to get to the top of mountain now, you're stuffed. Yeah. Yeah, you haven't got your lunch in your backpack and your the right clothes. You're never going to get there. So you more want to think about what's waiting for you in the valley, the other side, you know, when you come back down.
Garry Pratt:Yes, so there's lots of, lots of cheesy metaphor in the mountains no, but they just keep on giving, don't they?
Chris Grimes:It's sort of this wonderful, sort of sumptuous topographical series of metaphors. Yes, lovely, so we're in Morocco. Then has it got a sort of pinpoint in the sort of one, two, three pinpoint in the map I'm trying to remember what the name of that app is where they give you the GPR, what three words? Yeah, so you don't have to give me the one three words coordinates. But whereabouts in Morocco are we?
Garry Pratt:Well, we always track out a place called Imlil, which is in the mountains, luckily, Imlil, you say Imlil. Yes, so it'll be a half day trek out of Imlil somewhere towards Mount Tupacal in a nice valley, but luckily Imlil or weirdly, probably was one. Although it's in the heart of the Atlas Mountains, about 40 miles away from the earthquake, the terrible earthquake was actually not particularly affected. For some reason, some geology is saved in Imlil from the horrors of the earthquake, which is nice to think of.
Chris Grimes:Well, as you're a geologist, you can do your own research, can't you, I'm imagining?
Garry Pratt:But yes, somewhere there, so in the Atlas Mountains.
Chris Grimes:So, if I may and there you are with your Peppermint tea, we've allowed you that as well I'm going to arrive with a tree now to shake your tree to see which storytelling apples fall out. I've got a comedy apple croffle here somewhere. Russell, russell, russell. Here it is. It's only so I can say how'd you like these apples? So this is now your answer to a construct called 54321. We've had five minutes at Gary Pratt author to have thought about four things that have shaped you, three things that inspire you, two things that never fail to grab your attention that'll be where the squirrels come in and then a quirky, unusual fact about you. So you don't have to shake it all in a one-er, I'll curate you through it gently. So, first of all, four things that have shaped you, gary Pratt.
Garry Pratt:Okay, so everyone's shaped by their childhood, but let's pick one bit of it. The only holidays I ever had were camping in England, so that's probably pretty much shaped me, you know, and my parents were the type of campers that didn't take chairs and wouldn't go to a busy beachside campsite. It would be a field in mid Wales. So yeah, those classic days exploring random parts of the country and making dens and hitting things with sticks, you know, that's definitely shaped me. It definitely hasn't put me off camping, but yeah, just spending my childhood exploring the outdoors and fiddling around in it, I think is probably a major thing. That's shaped me.
Chris Grimes:Major sort of an eternal Boy Scout, metaphorically?
Garry Pratt:Yes, exactly the other different, oh. So I tried to pick a set of different things. I studied archaeology. Archaeology has definitely shaped me in lots of ways. I actually talk about it in the book. I think I've written the first business book with a almost half a chapter on archaeology. So you know that's something, and I think how archaeology shaped me is that well. I love it anyway and it would come on to some other bits about that later maybe. But in the book I talk about it being the only five dimensional subject and that's about digging. You dig in three dimensions, literally up down, left right. You're digging through time and the fourth dimension and the only tool you've got to pull that all together is telling stories as your imagination, because there's no right or wrong in archaeology. So that's definitely being. I say in the book that my archaeology history has prepared me well for the world of entrepreneurship and the border in which I'm not sure many people have thought about saying before.
Chris Grimes:Yeah, no a unique slant on that I love that More personally, if you want to go on.
Garry Pratt:So I met my wife at school, at school at Sweethearts, so you know my wife's been there the whole time. Siobhan and we set businesses up together and we're still married, so Siobhan helped shape to me, spent most of my life with Siobhan, and how long has that been since you met at school, and how long have you been together now then? So we met when we were 17, and I'm now 54.
Chris Grimes:So let the listeners on LinkedIn do the math.
Garry Pratt:So that's absolutely shaped me. We've had adventures and businesses together and kids together and everything else of life, so that's got to shape you well you did say we've had adventures, not we've had dentures.
Chris Grimes:Then didn't you?
Garry Pratt:Not dentures yet. This has definitely shaped me, but it's going to bring the tone down. So I saved someone's life. I had to perform CPR for 40 minutes in the country lane when I was 19 and that person was my father. So that shaped me and the trauma would also be maybe about worldview and life view. Post that moment, do you want to?
Chris Grimes:say a bit more about that, about what happened that day.
Garry Pratt:Yeah, we were just driving along and my mum was driving my dad had a heart attack. It's hard to know exactly what steps the classic wobbly falling over in the car is of such. So, yeah, we provide me and my brother did CPR and heart massage. And we were in the middle of country lanes in Somerset so my mum ran across to the a house, or I think it was actually a garage across the road. We called an ambulance but it took 40 minutes to come so we just kept going. It broke my father's sternum and I didn't that was my brother doing that bit or ribs, and yeah, it shaped lots of things. I guess Bonnet shaped me.
Garry Pratt:The simple thing I say to people is I've had first aid training now and all of that. But I guess it was that time when you watched sort of American really rubbish American sort of cop movies or things and you know you know there'd be CPR for three seconds and then they'd go like this and go. You know it's too late, they're dead. You know long journey from them to having a heart transplant and actually surviving.
Chris Grimes:And is he still with us?
Garry Pratt:He's not, unfortunately, but he had another 19 years. So yeah, but it definitely and it definitely affected my outlook on life, which immediately, to be honest, was, was a sort of you know, a normal teenage descent into you know a little too much drugish and alcohol abuse, you know to hide it away, but in the longer term, yeah, sort of an awakening through, through crisis.
Chris Grimes:by the sound of it, yes absolutely.
Garry Pratt:So there's a set of things which have shaped me, or some things I think.
Chris Grimes:Yes, no. Lovely answer. Now three things that inspire you.
Garry Pratt:Yes, again, some were sort of obvious. I try, I try to think what nature and the outdoors, but it seems a bit everyone likes a bit of natural or natural, or don't they?
Chris Grimes:But I think that the bit about that that really inspires me is stories of exploration.
Garry Pratt:As explorers. You know whatever, any kind of mind, if those are people climbing mountains or going to the north pole, or you know archaeological explorers in the past of the 19th century cutting through jungles. You know definitely that sense of finding new places. And there's a great book by a woman called Belinda Kirk who runs a thing called Explorers Connect. It's a you know, you know, say on a plastic tub across the Atlantic or something. Okay, I'm in, I'm in. But Belinda's book is brilliant because she, she, she talks about amazing adventures that she's had. But she comes to this point that you know adventure is a state of mind. You know an exploration is a state of mind that the minute you sort of put your backpack on or get on the train or a plane you're in that state of exploration if you're going somewhere new, so definitely exploration.
Chris Grimes:Did that inform your harnessing the power of the great outdoors in what you write about? So I love how you've chosen the language like board boardroom, but harness obviously is something for the outdoors in mountaineering, so harnessing the power. I wondered if it's that sort of.
Garry Pratt:I think you're thinking too deep about the way I go.
Speaker 3:The way I write.
Garry Pratt:I'm taking it now. Yes, all by design.
Chris Grimes:All by happy accident, all good, as indeed life is a happy accident. Absolutely so sorry.
Garry Pratt:That's one yeah.
Chris Grimes:Are you still connected? Name the person again that.
Garry Pratt:Belinda Kirk.
Chris Grimes:Is she still out there doing what you do?
Garry Pratt:Yeah, so her book was called the Adventure Revolution. So a fantastic book, great to have on your show. Maybe it fits with the book, doesn't it? I'm just always inspired by. I've been lucky enough to have jobs where I meet lots of people. I worked at the University of Bath in Entrepreneurship and some meeting hundreds of founders and you know, and when I say I like people who think differently and are creative, I just love. I'm always inspired by people who've just thought of mad things and starting to do them, so it's not necessary. People who've had it's not the success, end of it, it's that first bit of oh my God, how did you come up with that? So I'm always inspired by those conversations and, luckily, work. I don't know. I get to meet quite a few people in those. Quite often I say I don't understand what you're doing, it's in AI. But I'm not sure I don't understand what you're doing. It's in AI, but you can understand why or what they want to do with it or something.
Chris Grimes:So rather than thinking good luck with that, you actually get inquisitive and curious about it.
Garry Pratt:Always. Yeah, I love that sort of digging into those people's ideas, and I guess the last one is my wife was an English teacher, and not that that's the answer. But it's a crass answer, isn't it? It's just reading and anything. I don't know about it, but I've always got a nonfiction, fiction, magazines, and there's. I interviewed someone for a book who founded a big data platform in the States. I don't really matter what their business is, but their formative years were working at well, academic years were at Cambridge on the Francis Crick and they tell a story about how they went into Crick of DNA and blah, blah, blah Went into his office and found him sitting in his chair just surrounded by magazines and not all science magazines, you know home magazines. You know the Sunday is everything. And I was going to ask him. He said oh, what are you looking for? And he said I don't know, yeah.
Chris Grimes:Just sort of yes, a debauchery of curiosity.
Garry Pratt:Yes, exactly. So yeah, hopefully I'm channeling a bit of that, but yeah reading is always an inspiration.
Chris Grimes:In your background. By the way, I love the fact you've got a space hopper and he's iconic mode of travel.
Speaker 3:What's the story of?
Chris Grimes:your space hopper.
Garry Pratt:It's been in our life so long I don't really know. I don't think there is much to story apart from it's just the fixture. It goes with the lava lamp above, which I haven't put on.
Chris Grimes:Very 70s icon a lava lamp Not bad.
Garry Pratt:Yes, I'd like to think I could live a minimal life, but I'm a bit of a hoarder.
Chris Grimes:Yes, don't let the space hopper go. We like it, that's all good. So now we're on to the squirrels. What two things? What squirrels borrow from the film Up? That's when the dog goes. Oh squirrels, what never fails to distract you, your monsters of distraction, Gary.
Garry Pratt:Okay, ruins number one yeah, there's an archaeologist in me. If there's a pile of rocks in the field, they say you know, three stones make a wall. I'm not talking about a temple. You know I fiddle. If someone's plowed a field, I have to walk down along the plow looking down for pottery shards.
Chris Grimes:So are you a sort of lay detectorist then?
Garry Pratt:I don't have a metal detector, but I'm nearly using my eyes. Or obviously, yes, if there's something more substantial, I have to go and investigate it. I can't walk by a bit of a ruin. So yeah, that's one.
Chris Grimes:I love the idea that when you see a plowed, field you've got to walk along the furrows.
Garry Pratt:That's great. I love the idea that you're going to walk along the furrows of a man-made item.
Chris Grimes:Yeah, the classic field walking, old-fashioned technique of archaeology and I love the fact that you said do you say three bricks don't make a temple, or maybe they could?
Garry Pratt:No, it's an archaeological phrase. Three stones make a wall. Okay, so they're talking about dress stones. So if you find a nicely dressed stone, one means nothing, two doesn't mean a lot and all together probably means something.
Chris Grimes:Yeah, using the rule of three to find a clue to history.
Garry Pratt:And, funnily enough, I have a whole methodology in my book called Three Stones Make a Wall. We use rocks in nature to make our own walls.
Chris Grimes:Your book is suffused with wonderful suggestions of exercises and just wonderful curiosity to keep people curious. Thank you by the way this might Well. I've got a guest for you. Okay, this could be the moment because of the exercise, that they're in your bottom. I'm just going to share the screen and show you something. Hopefully you'll all start to look at this on screen, but I just want to play you this extract Are?
Garry Pratt:you looking at Dave.
Chris Grimes:Stewart yeah, yeah, just hear this, people, I've got a special guest for Gary.
Speaker 3:Hi, Gary, it's Steve Stewart here, Just popping in to say hello and much respect. You wrote the book that I would have written if I could have been bothered about it. So I'm very grateful that you've captured the sort of work that you and I do for our clients, and one of the things that I really enjoyed about your book, which I've already shared with you, is that you are not doing nature to people. You use the word outdoors Because certainly from our perspective it's all about the business outcomes for our clients. There are other fantastic providers that deal with nature as the main sort of participant, but for us it's really using the outdoors as a creative sample to help people sort of shift the thinking, which is really, I think, what I've got from your book. So thank you very much indeed for capturing that and much strength to you, sir.
Chris Grimes:Thank you, dave Stewart Brilliant. Thank you, dave. Yes, and the other happy coincidence I had this cunning plan and this idea, which I've never done before, and Dave wasn't available. But when you rearranged everything, it was available and so everything fell into place. Things are meant to be a bit like the day your car was stuck in traffic and you got out and then had a epiphany of this is my life, which is fantastic. Yes, so I think we've got another squirrel to come now.
Garry Pratt:This one's easy and quite timely. Weirdly it's a Karamak bar. I can't walk past the Karamak bar and now they're discontinuing it. I was reminded that's very recent, isn't it? I was last weekend. I met up with a childhood friend who was still friends, but I've known him since childhood and he delivered me two Karamak bars as a gift has arrived to say it's the last ones you're going to have, and maybe not just Karamak. I've got a sweet tooth and I ate a lot as a boy in a country village, so old-fashioned 70s sweets. If there's a Karamak bar on the counter to your point of, we'll always get my attention and my money.
Chris Grimes:Are you on a mission quest to sort of hunt down the last remaining Karamaks of the land?
Garry Pratt:You must still be an opportunity to get a sort of cash and carry box. It's mustn't there and get in. I suspect a Karamak bar will last many years.
Chris Grimes:Yes, it'll get a campaign to bring it back, because we're the floping heckers it gone because people like you and me are missing it. Another 70s iconic thing. I love that.
Chris Grimes:Same sort of ballparkers, fries, turkish delight and stuff like that. I've got another live song because I'm feeling like I'm beginning to look like Dracula here. That's probably more Dracula. It's even more scary now, but it's sort of me lighting out. Now we're on to one quirky unusual fact about you. The one is a quirky unusual fact about you, gary. We couldn't possibly know about you until you tell us.
Garry Pratt:Okay, well, again, I didn't struggle with this. It was which one thing to go. I've probably got a few quirky things. The one I went with is because I'm sort of related. So I am probably one of the world experts on the sailing networks and technology of the Bronze Age sub-energy. So I am waiting for that call from Radio 4 when they need the one expert to talk about sailing in the Sea of Crete and the winds and the tides. And I'm your man. Now, I'm not a sailor, I don't really like boats, but through my archaeological work I did write a dissertation on this very fact and modeled all the sailing routes that the Bronze Age ships would have taken across the sub-energy and basically know an expansion into the aegean.
Chris Grimes:So there you go, and I'm just trying to work out the scenario where we must get Gary Pratt in to talk about that, because I'd like to create a new.
Garry Pratt:I'm thinking you know a little bit of a migrant crisis. Maybe they're on little old sailing boats. Where are they going to end up if they leave from? They leave from Heraklion, and where are they going to end up? I can probably pull out my models and tell them.
Chris Grimes:I like that With models can travel with models. I like that. That's a great, that's the best curious fact and that's a great niche to specialise in. I like a bit of niche, inch-wide and mildy. What's the topic again, what sort of name the topic? Call you in if you want to know about Bronze.
Garry Pratt:Well, let's say Bronze Age, let's say Mnowen sailing technology and routes.
Chris Grimes:Boom when it comes to phono frame. When I'm next on, who Wants to Be a Millionaire? That's going to be the winner. Wonderful, so we've shaken your tree, hurrah. Now we stay in the clearing. Move away from the tree. Next we talk about alchemy and gold. So when you're at purpose and in flow, gary, what are you absolutely happiest doing in what you're here to reveal to the world?
Garry Pratt:Well, I think it has to be walking and talking. You know, it's what I do and where I've ended up and through all this journey, that's my happy place. Where I'm in flow is just, you know, walking that mountain path up to upper hillside with someone interesting to talk to or interesting people. That's my absolute happy flow.
Speaker 3:I do get you know.
Garry Pratt:I've never written a book before so I would say I was a bit in flow state in researching and writing a book. I'm very much in flow making a camp, you know, making camp, building a fire, cooking something on the fire is a good flow state. But I think you know, for the purpose of this, the sort of related definitely. Yeah, where I can lose hours is, you know, walking with you up a hillside. Bless you.
Chris Grimes:You've made me think of the expression improvise Bivalwek. Now, thank you very much. There's only one way to say improvise Bivalwek Great. So now this is the moment when we can put your book on a metaphorical plinth in the clearing. So tell us anything else you'd like about the book, and then my invitation to you is to read an extract from the book of your choice, if you like. Yes.
Garry Pratt:So what's my call? So we talked a bit about this, of where the book came from, its incubation, and you know, I think I'm not alone in finding this place where you know, I think some magic happens and, yeah, there's loads of. You know, normally when I go to the book, when I talk to these, people quite get into the science and they want to know all the proof from the science, which is very businessy, isn't it? Does this work? What am I gonna have? And there's plenty of it in there. You know there's a whole strand of neuroscience. We talked on a bit about why your brain gets into this state and the outdoors A fantastic Irish academic called Shay no Maha who's got a book called In Praise of Walking, which is all around the what happens in here. But I think my real call and the reason I wrote the book is because you know, most of my working career has been in that boardroom, in that, you know, trying to make the magic happen in a brainstorming session in the Watford Hilton. And so I think what my real call for the book and the hopefully the outdoors is one bit. That's my answer. Yeah, and I really hope people can appreciate that's a place to do work. You know this isn't bunking off. You know it's deep work you can do out there, and so that's bit of it, that accepting work doesn't have to take place in your desk.
Garry Pratt:But I think where I'm getting to, the more I've talked to people about the book and the more I do work with people outside in the book is twofold. One is, you know I think again, we know this, it's trying to be a bit of the journey that our work practices and workplaces are just a bit broken. They're not well designed for us as humans. That doesn't mean, you know, I'm never calling someone to never sit at their computer. Look at me, I'm sat in my office at my computer and I have to do work, I have to do Zooms, but you know that's saying we've got to be sitting here eight, nine hours a day and that's productivity, I think, is my main call. But you know we're humans and we don't operate well here. This is a tool of doing something, not the tool of thinking. Yeah, and that's the differential. But thinking is work and you've got to find ways to develop, get those ideas and develop them.
Garry Pratt:Brainstorming again, the whole section. It's not my work, brainstorming just does not work. It's been known for 20 years and people still do it and it's actually counterintuitive. So you've got to find new ways to, you know, be individually creative. But more importantly for workplace, I think, is that collective creativity. And, as you've experienced, you know, outdoors is a place where different connections happen and people have different conversations. So you know there's a collision of worlds here, I think, is, you know you have to be, you know you want to be creative and have ideas and put them through the thrashing mill to see what's good for you, your business, you want to decelerate and reset away from this digital shit and you want your colleagues and staff to, you know, be more connected and collective.
Garry Pratt:And we've got a place to do it. It's just out that window, yeah. So my book really is just, hopefully, you know, a sort of ticket to allow people to explore that, and I mean people, I mean businesses. So, oh, we were allowed to do this, which is quite often I get thanked for people, you know, allowing them to put their phones in the box at the beginning of the day and spend a day away. And I say, you know you can do that whenever you like, you know.
Chris Grimes:And that really is a lesson to us all, because I'm as addicted to my phone as most other people are actually, and I look forward to putting my phone in a box. Actually, I know it'll be good for me.
Garry Pratt:And don't get me wrong, you know I love just going, I go on walking, holidays and things which are nothing to do with work.
Speaker 3:So I'm not trying to say you know it's not.
Garry Pratt:there's still the loveliness of your bike ride and you might get some benefit from it, but you can actually make it work for you, and that's the bit of methodology, hopefully, that I've put around it.
Chris Grimes:And just reincorporating the fact that creativity, as you define it, is generated best through abstraction and distraction. I just wanted to reincorporate that because I thought that's worth saying.
Garry Pratt:Yeah, and I think you know it's come up more and more, as I've worked with teams and companies as well is that this? I think that is a myth of work-life balance. You know our structures are built around this sort of hard lines of leaving the office and we all know it doesn't actually happen because it's all life, yeah. So it should be the other way around.
Chris Grimes:You know, we should be designing work and workplaces that fit with us as humans and life, and I know that's a big call, but I think it resonates with the idea that people were lamenting after the pandemic, that they realized that their commute was their thinking time because suddenly work and home collided and they no longer had the what sounds I mean agonizing commute, sometimes of several hours, but they were using that as their you know travel towards. Ironically, Absolutely.
Garry Pratt:So, yeah, that sort of isn't maybe where I started with the book, but having used, written it, done lots of this, spoken to people and seeing people use it either with me, I've had some teams now or companies that have gone out and done it on their own, which I love, and there's a fantastic one. I actually made a lovely video, which is somewhere in my LinkedIn channel, of them using all my techniques I didn't know them, I wasn't facilitating them, which is lovely. So, yeah, and I shouldn't use the word bunking off, but I, you know, I do use it in some of my speeches that you know, bunking off might just be the deepest work you ever do, you know, but it's that. It's the sort of freedom of allowing yourself to leave your desk and you're still working. You might not be typing.
Chris Grimes:Yes, yes, absolutely so. Did you want to read an extract from it?
Garry Pratt:Oh yes, sorry. Well, I can. What have we talked about? I picked a sort of introduction. We've done the introduction bit. We've done Edinburgh and taxis. What would you like? Would you like something which sums up what I think? Or would you like a story about someone else using outdoor walking?
Chris Grimes:Or one of your favorite exercises within it. That you are, I know there are loads to choose from, but maybe that's just my idea. You do whatever you'd most like to do.
Garry Pratt:Oh look, now you've confused me, no Right, which is a good one.
Garry Pratt:I'm going to use natural storytelling, so it's a pretty simple one, in short, and that's why one of the reasons but also because it's actually one of the ones from feedback that people like the most. So here we go. So much of an entrepreneur's time is spent telling stories, but it's also one of the reasons that I think you're going to be able to do is because the entrepreneur's time is spent telling stories to investors, to new hires, to customers, to partners, to wives, husbands, parents, partners, friends and random people. They meet in trains or planes. The Elephage pitch is a story. The Pitch Deck is a story. The New Product pitch is a story. The Meeting with the Bank Manager is a story. The Sales presentation is a story.
Garry Pratt:Innovation has a narrative and is a story, and entrepreneurs can write these, tell them or get help doing this, but they always benefit in exploring new ways to tell them. Staring for more hours at PowerPoint slides is rarely creative, as we've seen throughout this book, so it's no surprise that walking in nature has been an inspiration to so many writers to find their stories. A quick fireway through outside thinking to explore ways of telling stories is through the use of found items. Step one for a portion of your work look for, find and pick up items you find interesting or ask your participants to Stick a leaf, some moss, a plant, a flower, a lost item. Don't overthink it, just gaze while you walk and pick up whatever takes your fancy.
Garry Pratt:Step two at a good stopping point, ideally somewhere open with some space to gather, get into some type of teams. Step three ask each team to discuss, prepare and deliver a story using the objects. Give them 10 minutes to prepare before presenting to the rest of the team. The story can be about anything, but works really well if it's about their team telling us about recent achievements, for example, a strategy, a customer journey, or a recent problem or setback. It's a fantastic exercise to capture on video and go back to it a later time.
Garry Pratt:Now, this is the one I get almost most feedback on the one where you get the funniest videos, especially teams that know each other well, or yeah, people, it's a license for people to be a bit silly, which is always good.
Chris Grimes:And what's really implicit there is the deepening of trust that is just, by default, one of the outputs or throughputs of that lovely exercise.
Garry Pratt:And it's. You know they're looking at. You know some of them get you know, oh, and you got this leaf, and they always find something interesting to talk about here and it's just sort of today's point as well. But you know it's like I'm using Nate, it's not about you're not necessarily trying to. You know unpick what that leaf is doing as a metaphorical thing. Sometimes it uses just a prop. Yeah, yes, I'm sure in your work you know you can, for a good people, any three props and tell them to come up with something and that's part of my job, right?
Chris Grimes:So wonderful. We're now at the point where I'm going to award you with a cake, gary Pratt. So first of all, do you like cake? I'm quite particular, chris. Okay. So what are we having as a? Unfortunately, it's not a real cake, it's a metaphorical one. I know what do you want and I'll try and deliver you the proper one later.
Garry Pratt:Well, I've got two answers. So the only cake I really like is Carrot Cake. But my caveat and because we're talking about the book and the outdoors is the best cake is the one that's squashed in a bit of cling film in the bottom of your rucksack and comes out at three afternoon on a rainy day where someone happens to have a flask. So then I don't care what cake I have.
Chris Grimes:That's a lovely, lovely answer. So I'll give you the squash down the carrot cake, so we can even squish a carrot cake into some cling film for you. Perfect, okay. So now this is the final storytelling suffused metaphor what's the best piece of advice you've ever been given?
Garry Pratt:So I've got an anti-bit of advice which helped form me going right. It's sort of going right back to my shaped me thing, which was I went to a pretty standard country comprehensive. For example, banking wasn't a thing until I went to university. It was not that I ever wanted to be a banker, that was just working in the local bank. I remember I think this is when I was toying with doing archeology I'm sort of academic-y, so I did well at subjects and I should have been doing something serious. I remember a Korea's guidance basically telling me be realistic, people can't do whatever they like, you know. And there was this anti-ball of a baby going well, I can. I'm not saying I've done whatever I like through my life, it was realities, but it did stick with me and I think that plays into that story of my father and CPR that don't leave things till later. So those two together are quite powerful for me. Just get on and do things and to some degree you can do what you like. There's park morals and legality.
Chris Grimes:There's something really profound about that adage your criticism of me as a reflection of you, your career's officer, was probably transmitting from his own self-limiting beliefs in that.
Garry Pratt:Yeah, and I think partly he was. If he'd said it a different way he may have been he sort of thought I was.
Chris Grimes:It was well intended.
Garry Pratt:Not making the most of my opportunities academically, you know.
Chris Grimes:Yes, you had a different plan, a cunning plan. Pete, what's a favourite inspirational quote that's always given you sucker and pulled you towards your future?
Garry Pratt:Well, I thought again. I found this easy. Actually I'm not really big into I've got no quotes on my walls and I've not tried to allow any business. I had to have quotes on their walls really. But there's lots of quotes in the book to do with walking, which I find is right.
Garry Pratt:One I thought would be best for you and has been important to me is from Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer, where I can't even remember the context, but it's a little bit where they go to each other. Bob goes it doesn't really matter, and it just descends into this bit going doesn't matter, doesn't matter. I'm not very good at it, you know you'll be active. I think it's a good reflection I've taken to that most things in life don't really matter. Business doesn't really matter, money doesn't really matter. There's not much in life that falls under the this really matters banner. It's helped me go into important business meetings in where you should be, I don't know in awe, scared, or you're asking for money, or a little bit of me goes, doesn't matter, doesn't matter if they don't like me Wonderful.
Chris Grimes:I love that. And now, what notes, help or advice might you offer to a younger version of Gary Pratt?
Garry Pratt:Oh, I don't think you prepared me for that one either. Can I say I don't want to meet and give any advice to my younger self.
Chris Grimes:That's a great answer. Yes, yes, there's a story behind the story there. So, in other words, we're at peace with where we are. We don't want to look back.
Garry Pratt:Yeah, I just think I wouldn't want to be the 17 year old with me turning up.
Chris Grimes:Yes, you want to find your own path to this place. Yes, it's my walk, I'll go where I like. Very good, there's a lovely freedom in that. Ok, so we're ramping up to Shakespeare in a moment to talk about legacy, but just before we get there, this is the past. The golden baton moment, please. What might you like to pass the golden baton along to keep the golden thread of the storytelling going in your network? That would most enjoy benefit, or just like being given a damn good listening to in this way?
Garry Pratt:Well, I don't know this person that well but I have met them relatively recently this year and had some things on there. She's a woman called Alina Tabour. So a man called Lee Mears wrote the preface to my book and some people out there depends on their interests may know of Lee. He's an ex-England rugby player and British Lion and some fantastic stories about Mountain as well. So is how we got to sort of know him in terms of going on mountain walks and finding out halfway up Everest that he had a heart condition he didn't know about. But anyway, a different story He'd be a good one.
Garry Pratt:But his business partner in this is the coaching side is where the woman called Alina Tabour but why I've picked Alina is. She's also involved in some really interesting startups. She is starting to investigate psychedelic leadership, which I think is a really interesting area, but mainly because she's got to my thing, why I'm here as well. She's got a new book coming out which is sort of a business book, but it's aimed at young people, so it's aimed at the leaders of the future and hoping to set people off early on their careers with some purpose and vision. It's called what's it called? It's called Upgrade. It's coming out soon. So I think Alina, with that whole mix of stuff, will be fantastic. Thank you.
Chris Grimes:And psychedelic leadership. That's an interesting proposition. The comedian in these thinking that sort of leadership off their chonks on drugs.
Garry Pratt:Yes, well, it is micro dosing to you know. Free your mind and yeah.
Chris Grimes:Love that Wonderful, and she's the author to be of that tool. That's another thing in the mix of her connection.
Garry Pratt:Is she? A book for young leaders is coming out soon, called about psyched leadership. No two separate things she's exploring as a coach and she's exploring the world of science, which I think is just interesting. But the main reason is I think business books aren't written for young people.
Chris Grimes:It's all about listing, and I see stops are listening at that point. Thank you very much. Here we are now at the complete works of Shakespeare. So now this is borrowed from all the worlds of stage and all the weathered women really players to talk about the seven ages of man. We're going to talk about legacy, finally. So how, when all is said and done, gary Pratt, would you most like to be remembered?
Garry Pratt:Well, maybe you get this from everything I've said, but to be honest, I couldn't really give a shit for being a loving present dad, husband and friend. You know I don't really care about that stuff.
Chris Grimes:That's lovely. And where can we find out now crucially all about you and specifically where we go and find the creativity factor?
Garry Pratt:So. So published by Bloomsbury. You can get it at their website. You can get it on all all digital bookshops and quite a few physical bookshops. Toppings in Bath probably still have the only signed copies still available from my book launch. There's an audio book narrated by a fantastic icon, nathaniel Priestley, and Kindle as well, and all those, so you can find it everywhere. My name, I say, is a good Google name, because you will find my website, you will find my LinkedIn, you'll find other podcasts, so you shouldn't be difficult to find, I don't think.
Chris Grimes:Lovely. So just search for Gary Pratt on the old interweb with two Rs and two Ts and we're off, don't go and watch some.
Garry Pratt:Yeah, the cricketer, that's not me, that's not you Lovely, so wonderful.
Chris Grimes:Thank you so much for gracing us with your time here on the old Good Listening to Show, as this has been your moment in the sunshine of the Good Listening to Show, this is a deliberate sort of you'll enjoy this deliberate sort of coachy question. Is there anything else you'd like to say, gary?
Garry Pratt:Yeah, I thought about this actually a bit. So I think, having researched a book and read loads of business books and I shouldn't say this, should I? But you know, I'm not a business book reader, I'm not your natural I'm in that world now, yes, and you can't write a business book without referencing Gladwell's Outliers and the whole 10,000 hours to be brilliant and something. I thought about this a lot, and I've met lots of people, and back to that point about sort of being inspired by people who just think differently and have different ideas. And then, you know, I'm sort of starting to think my next book should be, you know, celebrating the tinker, you know the person who tries and does loads of things. And I think, you know, we've sort of partly, we all think that's a bad thing and I'm starting to think it's a great thing, you know it has to be brilliant at anything, yes, at least try lots.
Chris Grimes:That speaks to me very beautifully. I'd be very traffic. I can make it into the appendix somewhere. That's great, wonderful. So thank you so much, gary, and thank you so much also for watching on LinkedIn too. If you'd like to be on the show too, just get in touch. Care of the website, thegoodlisteningtoshowcom, and there are a number of series strands that tell you exactly how you can go and do that. So I'm just about to shut off on the old LinkedIn. Anything else you'd like to say at this point?
Garry Pratt:No, well, as I always say, just get outside and meet people.
Chris Grimes:Boom. That's the end of the show, but listen out for a post script where there's even more awesome next to charge your welcome content. Goodbye. You've been listening to the Good Listening to Show here on UK Health Radio with me, chris Grimes. Oh, it's my son. If you've enjoyed the show, then please do tune in next week to listen to more stories from the clearing. If you'd like to connect with me on LinkedIn, then please do so. There's also a dedicated Facebook group for the show too. You can contact me about the programme or, if you'd be interested in experiencing some personal impact coaching with me, care of my level up your impact programme. That's chrisatsecondcurveuk On Twitter and Instagram. It's at that, chris Grimes. So until next time for me, chris Grimes, from UK Health Radio, and from Stan, to your good health and good bye. So, gary Pratt, you've just been given a damn good listening to in this curated journey. Could I just get your immediate feedback on what that was like for you to be in this programme?
Garry Pratt:Yes, it was fantastic, Chris, and I think your word curation is fantastic because I think there's a there is a plethora of podcasts and probably, like anyone who's like me, has written a book or something, you sort of if you get invited to do a lot and to build on this, I don't probably have much of a filter, apart from am I available? People want to listen to me, but you know, I don't think I've done one where not just I don't mean just the sort of pre-structure, but the structure of it and the way you guide it just makes it actually feel like it's just a really lovely conversation, which I don't think is quite uncommon, to be honest. So, yeah, really lovely, lovely clearing to come into and chat.
Chris Grimes:Wonderful and that was a real pleasure for me to reciprocity right back at you and, in all sincerity, I really do want to come to the Mallorca trip that I know has been postponed. In fact, can we just do a quick thing for you about your other trip, Because you're doing something epic in the desert, I remember and I forgot to ask you about that. Yes, Can I? Oh, I am recording. Sorry I'm still down so I can edit. So, yes, thank you for that lovely feedback. Do you want to talk about what you're doing across the desert?
Garry Pratt:You know the link to that, actually, because the reason I'm doing that is Belinda Kirk, who wrote the book. You know the Adventure Revolution and the Explorers Connect, because she put me in contact with a man called Alan Crofts who's a crazy serial desert explorer. Once you get to know him and you sit around campfires having stories and these straight faces you know dry as anything but talking about, you know digging his own way out from under his jeep that collapsed on in the Simpson Desert in Australia when he was on a solo trip for two days and he's, you know, near the earth. Experiences that are just matter of fact. You know we have to do that. They'll get out slowly by then.
Garry Pratt:So anyway, crazy desert explorer who wanted to do two things. One, he wanted to cross the Faines Neffard Desert, which is sort of in Saudi, on the Jordanian border, because it's in Lawrence of Arabia. It's called the Sun's Anvil, you know, the legend has it that the Bedouin won't cross it alone. And in the day because it's too horrible. So, shifting sand stone, a horrible desert. But the reason it had come up again was because it's also being subject to a big archaeological survey called a Paleo Desert project and turned out that 200,000 years ago it was a temperate zone, one of the roots out of Africa and it's in Saudi.
Garry Pratt:So the land of oil. So you know, you've got climate change. So came together that he wanted. He said, well, I want to cross it, but why don't we do it in electric vehicles and not use any petrol in the land of petrol? So that's the challenge. So you know, crossing a desert in EVs. So we've got the challenge of, you know, evs charging. We're so totally self-supported out there on our own for, you know, two and a half weeks, there's no roots through it because it's shifting sand. So you're finding the whole time.
Chris Grimes:How will you recharge? Because obviously there's not many sockets around in the middle of the Anvil, the Devil's Anvil.
Garry Pratt:No, so we have lots of sun.
Chris Grimes:Yeah, so there can be solar panel charging.
Garry Pratt:Yeah, we've got sponsorship from a really advanced solar panel company that do these roll out arrays. So the simple answer is solar. But we won't also be. We're not in a rush, so you know, there may be days where we just have to recharge, if you like. Yes, yeah. So you know we're not on a race, we're on a. You know, will these vehicles do it and can you find a route through this desert and at the same time looking for these features that are starting to find archaeologically? So hence my sort of introduction. So I'm now part of a team of six. We're off in May, got great support so far from some sponsors and from, you know, the British Embassy and the Royal Geographical Society. We have the lovely Charlie Borman of Louis McGregor and Charlie.
Speaker 3:Borman on the Longway.
Garry Pratt:Rail. Who's supporting us? Because we're supporting a charity called Action for Stammering Children. He got a stammer as a kid. So did Alan. Michael Palin's the patron of stammering children. So it's all. It's my first real expedition, but you know you have lots of moving parts that need to come together. But we think we're almost there, so we should be off there in May. And by the way it makes it sound lovely, it's actually going to be horrible, as far as I can tell.
Chris Grimes:Well, incredibly intrepid, and I think I did share with you that joke.
Chris Grimes:I said that if you are going to go walking in the desert you must be sure to take a spare car door with you so you can wind the window down when it gets hot. And, by the way, I couldn't help hearing you mentioned the sort of connection to the connection to the connection when I first set out on this podcast. At the top of my tree is so Michael Palin. So the day I can talk to Michael Palin will all know I've made it. It could be that you could plant seeds in the desert. I've got other paths that I'm. He doesn't know I'm coming for him, but I am.
Garry Pratt:Someday Well, we are potentially not confirmed, but he's supposedly going to be at our post exhibition event with the ACS A friend who wrote a comedy book, one of the wards last year for her first novel and so, yeah, fiction, much cleverer than my type of writing. But you know, basically there's a character in it which is an angel, who is Michael Palin and is totally based on Michael Palin, and she acknowledges this, so her real hope is also to me. Yeah, the character to him.
Chris Grimes:Yes, so maybe I should talk to her to talk to him, to talk to her to him and talk to you and keep talking to you. Wonderful, thank you so much. This has been a real delight. Thank you very much, and thank you also for watching on LinkedIn and the awesome Gary Pratt If you're not connected to him on LinkedIn already, you should be so and also thanks to Dave Stewart for doing that wonderful drop in testimonials. I've never done this. I don't know what happened on screen for you. Did he appear on screen for you?
Chris Grimes:Yeah yeah, yeah, I don't know what that would look like. Yeah, he appeared as a little video on screen.
Garry Pratt:Yeah, yeah, so yeah. Well, I shall drop Dave a note too.
Chris Grimes:Yes, big ups to both of you and I'll see you very soon. And yeah, keep me posted about the other trip to Mallorca in the autumn and count me in.
Garry Pratt:Well, do take care.
Chris Grimes:Chris. Thanks, Gary. I'll let you know when it all goes live in terms of publishing. Bye, Thanks for watching.