Hi, I’m Ben Searle and I’m a human from Melbourne, Australia. If you don’t know much about me, that’s fair. I spend most of my time doing stand up, performing the function of a comedian. My favourite food is banh mi. Like you, I’m a multifaceted individual with hopes and dreams. Each fortnight night you can read a couple of ‘my ponderings’ ( ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ) from the last little while; maybe I’ll even include a poem! This is my first newsletter so please come along for the ride. Hit the subscribe button and I’ll flick you an email each fortnight. Cheers.
No Sip
I decided that my work Christmas party this year was going to be my last day drinking for a while. I have a funny relationship with alcohol, I’ve never been a ‘have 6 cans in my car before work each day’ drinker, but I’ve definitely lied every time a GP has asked me how many standard drinks I have. I don’t want to take this too seriously, but I’d also like to hold myself accountable so I’m telling people about it. It’s tough because you also don’t want to be one of those pricks that are always announcing their next grand venture before it promptly dies in the arse. Hard to say the best way to go isn’t it. Not sure how long I’ll go for, but I think it’s good to set big goals, but not be too hard on yourself if you don’t quite get there and be happy with the progress you have made. This is great advice from me here, write this down if you can.
It started at high school parties, using alcohol as a way to bring down inhibitions, be funny, and talk to girls. I was able to tap into the part of myself that wasn’t so anxious. All drinking is doing for me now is making me lose whatever day proceeds the day of drinking hungover in bed; that and my sanity. Now lockdown is over, coupled with the pressure to #hustle and #grind in today’s modern world, I’m struggling to schedule in a day to be a piece of shit after getting absolutely obliterated in a local park.
Hangovers for me now just consist of ordering enough UberEats to calm myself down and intense beer fear that I have accidentally ruined my entire life and not remembered it. I’m looking forward to starting the process of morphing from man to moth, cocooning myself in the fibers of change to emerge as the beautiful butterfly of responsibility and sure-mindedness.
Back into Real Life/Treading The Boards Once More
I was one of those people that came back into real-life post lockdown and tried to do too much. I went back into the office a couple of days a week, started a new powerlifting program, performed spots around town, ran comedy shows, tried to study an online course, see my friends, edit videos; all while trying to hang out with my girlfriend, eat right, and find some time for myself and sleep. I burnt out again almost immediately, but I was desperate to get my life back any way I could.
The end of lockdown sent me into a bit of a tailspin, but now I’ve been able to settle into real life again, I’m feeling great. I started stand-up back in 2015, and it’s been my main pursuit for the last 3 years or so since I stopped playing in bands. I was definitely at a loose end without it and had a lil ol’ identity crisis. I guess the positives for me out of lockdown were being able to reassess who I am without stand-up or being involved in the comedy scene. My mate and comic Andrew Portelli and I worked on some videos and that helped both of us rediscover some things we love that we weren’t investing a lot of time in before lockdown. I’m glad I was able to find something I could throw myself into and keep working on.
Now that I have done a few gigs and hung out with other comics properly, it feels like there is definitely a chance to do things differently. Everyone I’ve been speaking to about comedy talks about how they want things to be more connected, less competing against each other, and build a strong comedy scene that more people want to be apart of both from a performer and audience level. It’s been exciting to hear such positive things come out of lockdown.
Some content I’m enjoying at the moment.
How To…With John Wilson
Man, I watched a lot of stuff in lockdown. A lot of weird, but good stuff. My housemate Mikey has this unique skill for picking a good sequence of youtube videos, films, or docos you wouldn’t find unless you go like 10 pages back on kickass torrents. Mikey chucked this on and I was instantly enamored with it. How To… was a show I heard Nathan Field was working on, but I didn’t really expect much of; it ended up being one of my favorite things I’ve watched this year. It’s hard to describe, it’s fucking beautiful, you need to watch it. It’s on HBOmax which is not available in Australia so you’ll have to find a way to watch it ;)
Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton
My girlfriend gave this to my birthday, but I haven’t really had a chance to sit down and read it until now. I’m really enjoying it so far and I won’t say much about it, but I enjoyed this passage.
Chongo Bongo - Mix 1
I love making playlists, I don’t know if they are for many people, but here is a collection of songs that I’ve been enjoying for the last little while. It’s a bit all over the place with some dumb caveman riff stuff as well as some straight-up pop.
Thanks for reading. Find me on Twitter, Instagram, & Facebook. Below you can find a pic of me from, I think year 9 or 10. All the best.
Boy Swallows Universe kicks into hyper drive in the third act out of absolute fucking nowhere.