All Writing by Jamie Miles

When the next wave hit, I thought in earnest: am I going to drown?

None of the waves were especially big, but the first one caught me off guard, knocking me off my feet and under.

Down The Drain

A fight over tap water in Tallinn, and the small, absurd battle against a city’s growing devotion to Big Bottle.

Escaping Your Phone’s Gravity: Part 3

There’s a free dumbphone hiding inside every iPhone. Here’s how to find it, and why it beats every app promising to do the same thing.

#13: Holidays & Remembering Too Much

I didn’t realise my body was a blabbermouth, but there it was, giving away all my secrets like some toddler who had learned to talk but not the art of discretion.

The Creative Cost Of Remembering Too Much

Getting stuck on a wrong answer and getting stuck on a grudge are the same failure in disguise. Here’s the science, and three ways to force the redirect.

The Fish’s Tail

The lessons and progress from another three months of writing Jamie’s Journal, and a revised editorial focus.

#12: Future Forgetting & Clowning

In this week’s piece, I’ve broken down the different kinds of future forgetting that most often trip us up, along with their likely causes, so you can better support your memory. I’ve also included a newsletter-exclusive.

Future Forgetting: Understanding The Most Common Form Of Forgetting

With past forgetting well-covered in previous pieces, let’s focus on the greatest cause of memory frustration and unpack the anatomy of future forgetting, why it’s vulnerable, and how to use the If-Then Technique to more effectively keep our promises.

#11: Nine Funny Filters & A Funeral

It’s been a dislocating fortnight. By popular demand, find your guide to writing satire inside. Today is also Father’s Day. My intention was to write about my dad but last week, my Nana Bapa – my mum’s dad – passed away.

How To Write Satire: A Practical Guide To Being Funny

Satire is never just a joke; it’s a thought-provoking challenge to the status quo, making it a skill worth learning. Whether your goal is to be more engaging, invoke change, or both, let’s unpack how to write something sharp and funny about the world.

#10: Fixing Your Forgetting & Brighton Improv

‘I have a terrible memory. What’s wrong with me?’ is the next addition in my series on memory. Instead of giving you more memory tools, I wanted to share how to diagnose why you forgot and how to fix it.

Why You Keep Forgetting (and How To Fix It)

Our memories are not ‘good’ or ‘bad’ in any meaningful general sense. Instead, they are specifically fallible. They fail in particular ways, under particular conditions, for particular reasons. And these reasons are largely diagnosable.

The Foggy City: Part One

‘You’ve been here a while now. Do you prefer San Francisco or London?’ Fran, Britney, and I were having lunch in the canteen. I finished my bite and answered without hesitation. Souring my colleagues’ excitement wasn’t my intention, but I can’t deny that seeing their…

#9: Magnetic Conversation & Writing Satire With The Onion

You might remember what to say, but struggle to express it. So while I continue to chip away at the next memory-focused article, ‘Why We Forget and How To Fix It’, I wanted to share the recipe for having magnetic conversations I learned from my improv practice.

The Art of Magnetic Conversation: Build Up, Not Out

Learning to bring a conversation to life turned out to be simpler than I expected, and the insight came from an unlikely place: improv.

Specifically, from realising I’d been misreading its foundational principle, ‘Yes and…’. Once I corrected my understanding, I started noticing it everywhere, especially in the people I find the most magnetic to talk to.

Creative Company

I found Vincent the way you find most good things: in a bookshop. We were both attending a signing event by one of our favourite authors and happened to be neighbours in the queue. As seems to be custom for my best friends, Vincent promptly left the country.

#8: Muscle Memory & Dark Chocolate

I’ve turned to one of the forgotten cousins of memory: the comeback. This week is about the power and consolations of muscle memory, repairing my broken body, and the strange way I’ve been eating dark chocolate.

The Oil Layer

This week, I figured out that the entire wellness supplement industry was, for most practical purposes, a very attractive wall of nothing. I did this while trying to fix my eyes. Nobody was particularly interested.

The Comforts of Muscle Memory and The Man Who Came Back For His Son

Your past effort is never wasted. Even after injury, illness, or years of neglect, your body and brain retain far more of what you built than feels possible and, when you return, you recover it far faster than the first time you built it. So let’s get into the consoling truth and change how you approach your next comeback.

#7: The Actor’s Memory Trick

I’ve gained weight!

Why that’s wonderful will make more sense once you read this week’s story… which is, unfortunately, nowhere to be found.

The Actor’s Memory Trick: The First-letter Technique

Actors don’t memorise lines through repetition, they make lines memorable by understanding the intention and meaning behind the words. That’s the engine behind their incredible feats of memory.

#6: My New Unaddictive iPhone

This week’s story is a reflection on what I’ve realised after re-entering the world of writing in public. It turns out, my model for life has changed, which was a surprise to me.  

Escaping Your Phone’s Gravity: Part 2

A few of my friends saw my new habit and followed suit, so I thought you’d also enjoy my trick for being less of a doomscrolling phone-zombie.

The trick is well-known: turn your phone screen black and white. But how I do it is different.

Snakes and Ladders