Inside Rylan’s Mind

For the first 23 years of my life, I had never driven a vehicle. Then I decided to get both my bike and car license, and what I expected to be a straightforward process somehow turned into a full-blown saga. From choosing a driving school and studying hundreds of learner's license questions, to dealing with RTO bureaucracy, failing my bike test spectacularly, accidentally turning on windshield wipers during my car test, obsessively practicing figure eights, and eventually surviving a redemption retest, this journey had way more plot twists than I anticipated. In this episode, I'm basically reliving the entire experience, sharing the mistakes, frustrations, funny moments, and lessons learned along the way while thinking out loud about what it actually feels like to learn driving as an adult.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

In this episode, I talk about going to my first ever Comic-Con alone after years of wanting to attend one. What started as a spontaneous decision turned into something much bigger: an unexpected deep dive into nerd culture, comic book history, collectibles, cosplay, and the realization that I might care about this world far more than I thought. From missed buses and overpriced food to buying my first Spider-Man comic and learning about Marvel’s history, this episode is less of an event recap and more of a story about rediscovering a dormant interest in adulthood.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

I basically talk about the part of tracking your life nobody warns you about, not the tracking itself, but building the actual system behind it. The templates, layouts, rules, formulas, workflows… all that. I realised making a tracker that’s actually useful and User-friendly is weirdly hard. Every time I “fixed” one thing, something else broke. Then came the endless testing, redesigning, finding edge cases, simplifying things, overcomplicating them again, and slowly realizing I might be spending more time optimizing the tracker than optimizing my life. If you’ve ever fallen down the spreadsheet/habit tracker/self-improvement rabbit hole, this episode will probably hit a little too close to home.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

I talk about how I track habits, workouts, sleep, food, body weight, expenses, media and more using apps + Excel sheets. I share real stats, surprising patterns, progress made, and why data might be one of the best tools for self-improvement. If you’ve ever wondered where your time, money or effort actually goes, this one’s for you.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

I went into this New Year’s party thinking I might either kill it or completely flop… and somehow I did both. I start off unsure, end up owning the crowd, accidentally become the DJ, and then slowly lose control of the entire night to chaos I couldn’t really fight. Somewhere between running the show and sitting outside alone before midnight, I’m just thinking, did I actually enjoy this, or did I just execute it well? And somehow, at the end of all that, I get paid more than I expected and almost lose my phone in the process.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

This episode is basically me going through a tier list of 80+ random pet peeves and deciding which ones are just mildly annoying and which ones make me irrationally angry for no reason. Somewhere in between, I also realize I do some of the same things I hate, which is… not great. It’s chaotic, a little judgmental, slightly self-exposing, and mostly just me thinking out loud about the weird, specific things that get on my nerves. If you’ve ever been annoyed by something stupid and couldn’t explain why, you’ll probably relate.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

This episode is a reflection on what 4,000 liked songs actually represent, not taste, not curation, but a living timeline of moments, moods, and phases. I talk about how I “like” music generously, how Spotify quietly became a background constant in my life, and how its algorithms seem to mirror (and sometimes manipulate) my emotions with unsettling accuracy. From rebuilding my library after deleting it, to chasing nostalgia, to experimenting with sound for focus, this is less about music and more about memory, identity, and the strange intimacy between a listener and an algorithm.Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

After 190+ episodes of talking, reflecting, and overanalyzing relationships, I’m trying something different, ranking red flags and green flags in a tier list format. But instead of blindly labeling behaviors as “good” or “bad,” this episode questions what those labels even mean. Which traits are actually dealbreakers? Which are context-dependent? And how much of this is personal bias versus universal truth? This one’s part experiment, part self-reflection, for anyone navigating dating without a clear rulebook.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

In this episode, I share the story of a family outing to a hyped-up café that felt way too fancy for us the moment we walked in. What started as a simple dinner turned into a chain of mix-ups, missing orders, wrong dishes, and awkward moments at the table. The food surprised me, the service confused me, and the whole night made me realize how strange expensive dining experiences can feel when you don’t fully belong there.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis

In this episode, I talk about how I found out I have a sunlight allergy, something I didn’t even know was a real condition until my skin started reacting every time I stepped outside in the daytime. From random itching during college walks, to self-diagnosing through weird experiments, to finally getting a formal confirmation from a dermatologist, this episode traces the whole journey of how I went from making fun of people who use umbrellas in the sun to becoming the guy who can’t leave the house without one. It’s a mix of storytelling, self-observation, small absurd moments, and the strange realization that sometimes your body has rules you never agreed to. If you’ve ever had to adjust your life around something inconvenient, confusing, or slightly ridiculous, you’ll probably relate to this one.

Check out my other work: https://linktr.ee/rylanbanis