You Know Yourself

Knowledge can be received. Skill has to be practised, and it rusts the moment you stop. Brett walks the structural difference through the guitar: the scale pattern is knowledge, the smooth playing is skill. In YKY terms, knowing your body, mind, soul and spirit is knowledge; exercising them is the skill, and a guitar nobody plays is just an ornament.Which is why leaders love knowledge: it can be handed over. Skill never can.You Know Yourself: a new simple spiritual philosophy.

A very popular spiritual idea says there is no choice: you are being lived, free will is only a feeling, so surrender and accept. It sounds liberating — you’re freed from the weight of choice by being told you never had it. But how did somebody arrive at that proposition? Did the teacher choose to believe it — and choose to write the books, build the organizations, and stand in a lecture hall booked on purpose, declaring there is no choice? “I cannot speak English,” said inperfect English. Brett’s counters, the Cycle of Disempowerment reading of “nothing is yours,” and the one question the idea can’t answer: are youchoosing it, or being made to believe it?

You Know Yourself: a new simple modern spiritualphilosophy.

What’s the objective? Brett asks the question nobody can answer in one line: if the objective of society is disempowerment, we’re achieving it perfectly — and ifit isn’t, we’re failing spectacularly. Neither reading is right or wrong. An amoral look at outputs versus objectives: the Edinburgh/Brighton driving metaphor, the missing government leaflet, why he won’t design the better system,and why offering an alternative perspective is the only objective he’ll claim.

You Know Yourself: a new simple modern spiritualphilosophy.

What does spiritual actually mean? Brett’s bugbear: people who say ‘I’m very spiritual’ and can’t define the word. His answer: your spirit is the part of you that deals with choice, no more, no less — including the choice to smoke cigarettesand down half a bottle of whiskey. If the word means everything it means nothing, and an undefinable word can’t be challenged, which is why the guru industry requires it to stay mystical. A reclaiming of the word as practical,foundational, and testable while you listen.

You Know Yourself: a new simple modern spiritual philosophy

Brett sits with a question instead of an answer: who is You Know Yourself actually for? Along the way he catches three of his own defence systems in real time — treating dismissal as proof the Cycle of Disempowerment exists (the same move cults make), wanting an audience so he can get validated, and the ego wanting this to be for everybody. The maybe-answer: people who’ve been seeking for years and still don’t feel at peace — and anyone who likes questioning and wants one more thing to question. There’s nothing to follow. No course, no retreat, no donation.

You Know Yourself: a new simple modern spiritualphilosophy.

Brett admits it plainly: he suffers from the Cycle of Disempowerment too. Not immune, not a guru, not free from it. So who is he to talk about it?

This episode sits with that fair question from both sides — including whether demanding authority before someone may speak is the leader-follower paradigm in action — owns themotives behind making the channel at all, and ends the way it always does: with the answer returned to you.

You Know Yourself: a new simple modern spiritualphilosophy.

My definitions of body, mind, soul, andspirit are one interpretation amongst many — and I know that.

In this episode, Brett acknowledges that his definitions aren’t the only ones. Religions, philosophies, and spiritual paradigms have defined those four words for thousands of years. He explores what it means that he doesn’t engage withother definitions — not because they’re wrong, but because his are intentionally simple, practical, and foundational.

Using a music analogy (advanced musicians and beginners playing together), Brett shows how basic definitions don’t exclude advanced ones — and how his framework might actually sit alongside existing interpretations rather thanreplacing them. He also reflects on accidentally creating ‘the beginner’s guide to being human’ and noticing that nobody else seems to be offering the basics.

Not the one and only definition. Just one. Practical, everyday, and applicable. That’s enough.

You Know Yourself — A new simple spiritual philosophy.

Does individual awareness actually change anything within the structure of society? Or is it just an ego exercise?

In this episode, Brett interrogates whether his entire project has a point. If empowering individuals doesn’t change the societal structure — the Cycle of Disempowerment — then what’s the purpose of pointing at it? He honestly considers the “no” argument: other people have raised structural awareness before and nothing changed, individual change doesn’t equal structural change and maybe the whole thing is just narcissism.

But he also offers a reframe: maybe we’re using the wrong metrics. Maybe the point isn’t changing the structure — it’s changing your relationship to the structure. The cycle might still be there, but how you relate to it, interact with it, and receive it might be entirely different. And that’s not nothing.

The resolve: it’s both. And structural change proposed by a leader might just be the Cycle of Disempowerment starting over.

You Know Yourself — A new simple spiritual philosophy.

Is there a difference between describingsomething and prescribing something? And if there is — where does You Know Yourself sit?

In this episode, Brett interrogates his own intent. By describing the Cycle of Disempowerment, he’s — by implication — describing the opposite: free yourself by exercising your body, mind, soul, and spirit. That sounds like a prescription. A “should.” And he can’t deny it’s there, even when he catches himself saying the word “should” mid-argument.

But unlike the leaders he critiques, Brett offers no fixed outcome, no dependency, and explicitly says people don’t have to do anything with the material. The resolve: there’s no clean answer. It’s both — describing and prescribing — and owning that tension might be more honest than pretending it doesn’t exist.

You Know Yourself — A new simple spiritual philosophy.

There’s a difference between choosing help and complying with help — and most of us have been trained to do the latter without even realising it.

In this episode, Brett clarifies a distinction that sits at the heart of You Know Yourself: the difference between consciously seeking and scrutinising help as an empowered person, versus passively complying with whatever help authorityfigures, systems, and the wellness industry tell you that you need.
Every leader — from politicians to spiritual gurus to the wellness industry — follows the same script: ‘You don’t know this, but you need this. This is the only answer.’ Brett examines whether YKY itself risks becoming just another system to comply with, and explains why YKY deliberately offers no end result, no course, no retreat, and no program — just observations for you to test, critique, and decide for yourself whether they’re useful.
The difference between an empowered person and a disempowered one isn’t in knowing the answer. It’s in the willingness to experiment.
You Know Yourself — A new simple spiritual philosophy.