The End of Mind Set

On Friday last week Gareth Davies, the creator of Mind Set Central, suddenly announced the cessation of all the programmes on the station, including the weekly Mind Set Podcast which I take part in at every opportunity. I was away in London when he posted this notice and so only found out about this on Sunday afternoon just before we recorded the final show, see: http://hpanwo-radio.blogspot.co.uk/2017/04/ben-emlyn-jones-on-mind-set-podcast-147.html. He feels that we are not making progress. In his view, the world is still just as awful as it was when he started. 9/11 is now really just another piece of history and the boost it gave to public awareness has dissipated. Public interest in UFO/conspiracy/paranormal issues has declined during the last decade. I was pretty stunned when I heard this and didn't know what to think at first. I understand Gareth's point of view in the sense that he is the one who does most of the work at what can sometimes be a thankless task. He organizes the programme material, edits the recordings, uploads the files and publicizes them. For the rest of us, especially for Reeves and me, the recording schedule every Sunday is at least at a reasonable time of day. Gareth lives in Los Angeles USA and so gets up at 5 AM. He must long for a Sunday lie-in like most other people get. However, I don't think we've made no progress. A lot of my recent observations should give us hope. The response from the listeners has been shock and dismay. A lot of people really enjoy the Mind Set Podcast and they will miss it badly. So will I. Not only has the Mind Set team produced many excellent shows, but for us it's a social routine. Although we live thousands of miles apart and I've never met any of them except Gareth and Alex Fate; we've become good friends. I intend to stay in touch with them all. I regret not making more of The Poker shows now and wish I had put in more of an effort to prioritize producing them. The website will remain up and the 325 Mind Set Podcasts will still be available on the archive, in which I feature on over half of them. There are also the many Mind Tech, Nervous Teeth, Radio Hour, Mind Set Live, Journey Inward and Paratalk shows; all there for you to continue enjoying. What's more, Gareth has not completely closed the door. He says he will reconsider in a few months or a year or two's time and maybe think about relaunching. If so then I'll definitely want to be on board. I'm also considering getting the old team together and starting a new station independently with a similar round table format show. If anything comes of that I'll let you know. In the meantime, I'd like to thank Gareth for his effort for all these years, as well as the other panel members, past and present. I feel no resentment towards Gareth; I sympathize with his position and wish him luck for the future. Thanks, and also apologies, to everybody who has listened and supported the Mind Set Podcast for all these years.