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Welcome to Take Control with Nicole, as business owners we experience first hand the fine line between our personal and business lives. During our conversations, we will look at simple hints and tips to create time, reduce overwhelm, and help you to navigate through your journey to where you want to be. If you’re looking for smarter ways to work, and create space and time freedom in your day, then you’re in the right place. All right, let’s go.

Nicole Smith
Hello, hello, and welcome to Take Control with Nicole. Today I’m speaking with the fabulous Lori all about connecting to your inner self. Lori is a body based practitioner using modalities of remedial massage therapy, movement/yoga and mindfulness meditation to help those she works with feel less overwhelmed, more self-aware and connected. Her approach is treating the whole person. She brings her knowledge and understanding of functional movement, movement patterning and thorough understanding of the nervous system into her work and way of life. Well, hello, Lori, so fabulous to have you here today. I’ve heard quite a lot about you from my little circles here and I’m really excited to chat with you about all the things.

Lori Curran

Thanks Nicole, it’s great to be chatting with you.

Nicole Smith
Well, first of all, let’s talk about you. This is what it’s all about, tell us about your journey and about The Humble Nook and all the things that have brought you here today.

Lori Curran
I don’t know if we have time for all of it. It’s quite a long journey, The Humble Nook came about really after the birth of my son, I wanted a career change. I’d started studying remedial massage and some years later, I was stepping into my own clinical space. And it was really about connection, that was what I wanted. And what I was noticing is that when I was on the yoga mat, or when I was on the massage table or when people would come and have a massage, there was just this space that people could connect. And it was why I love nook is we found a place within ourselves like those little nooks and crannies that maybe that we forgot about. When we’re kids, we’ve just got this sense of freedom within our bodies, were expansive, and we would climb the trees and we reach high. And at some point, it felt like there is a contraction within adult life. And that was the purpose of The Humble Nook is that the naming is that it’s both a place and a space. It’s a space dedicated to returning to self that this feeling of coming home of that deep breath, that long exhale, that sighing exhale of like I’m here again, I can feel again. So that’s the process of naming The Humble Nook. That’s what I wanted to name it because as you said, I use these modalities of remedial massage of yoga, of movement, of mindfulness and in the clinical setting, I use them all. I will always send someone home and it’s just like, could you just try this? Could you just try this movement? Or if you notice that, let’s say your digestion is a little bit off, could you try this meditation just so you’re telling yourself not positive vibes only but if you’re telling yourself kindness, if you’re speaking to yourself in a really kind way, well, then that’s going to have an impact on your gut. So we’re bringing all these modalities together. So my journey really, it’s just not linear. I do have a few people who have just gone I wanted to do this in university and they’ve done it and they’re, you know, friends husband, you know, the engineer, right? Like, that’s what they want to do. But mine was not that. And so starting in remedial massage, I worked in a sports setting at a VFL Football Club, and it was a high paced environment, working with sports people, you might have five minutes, you’ve probably at the very most have 15 minutes unless one of the players have come up to you specifically and said, can I have a treatment? Can we make it at this time? Can you stay a little bit after the game? Otherwise, we’re working with 5-10 minute increments, and you’re just making sure they’re prepped to be on the field and that was really informative to me. But I wanted a little bit more, I just wanted to go a little bit deeper with my clientele. And so through my own life work of being a mover, I’ve always been drawn to movement. I then did my yoga teacher training. So I started to bring the two of those in together, I started practising yoga when I was 18. So I drew those in, together, and I just kept on building from there on.

Nicole Smith
There is a real connection with anything we do of mind and body, right? Like, you can’t really do one without the other.

Lori Curran
That is this sense of, it’s really interesting that I named this business seven years ago, as this place to come back to self, to feel at home and one of my biggest passions now is because when we work with with massage, the idea is that we’re working with muscular skeletal system. That’s what we’re working with. And when we’re in the Western world, when we’re practising yoga, we see that as we’re practising one leg of yoga we’re practising the arthanar, but the body doesn’t work just in one system alone, it works in many systems, and the nervous system is something that I’m really passionate about, because when the nervous system feels safe, then it’s going to allow the muscles to feel more at ease. Well, that’s what’s controlling the whole body is the nervous system. So that mind body connection that we talk about is actually part of the nervous system. And it’s the vagus nerve. And that’s our 10th cranial nerve for those who are not familiar with it. But that is the conduit, that’s the bidirectional highway between the mind and the body. So we have this vagus nerve, it has these nerve endings that run from our brain, through and down into our organs, it wraps around our heart, it’s, you know, there’s fibres in the lungs, there’s fibres through the organs, there’s fibres all the way to our colon. And what we’re starting to realise is there’s actually fibres at the end of the cervix as well. So a lot of anatomical books are mostly based on sometimes you find that they’re more based on men’s anatomical studies. So I always say that these are new studies that we’re getting into that we can actually start to see that there are fibres around the cervix. And that’s something quite powerful because these are our communicators. This is what we, how would we know that we are hungry if we didn’t have these communicators? How would we know if we needed to go to the toilet if we didn’t have these communicators? How would how would we know what makes us nervous or excited? Or what puts those butterflies in our stomach? These are, these are really important communicators, and joys, although sometimes I feel like those butterflies in the stomach like, oh, I don’t know if I like these.

Nicole Smith
Everything’s there for awareness right?

Lori Curran
It is there for a reason and something that a very wise colleague of mine once said, is that these instinctual communicators that we have, we have to listen to them, because if we don’t, they actually don’t get louder, they usually get quieter. So,those instincts, and I would add to that, whilst they do get quieter, we might not listen to the butterflies. Some of those communications will get louder, so the physiology and the psychology will start to influence each other. So if we start to suppress something, it will show up in the body in another way.

Nicole Smith
100% Yeah, I’ve experienced that. And then all of a sudden, something else will happen. I actually saw as you procrastinati-scrolling as Suz Chadwick likes to call it on the socials, it was a video, I wish I knew who it was now, but anyway, talking about when there’s stressors in the body, in your body, and in the world and in life and if you ignore them, then your body, that’s right it was a doctor. So a doctor was saying that, you know, people go to them and they have a symptom of an upset stomach or a sore, whatever it is, or something that’s not right. And so they’ll give them antibiotics or something to, you know, to resolve that particular situation. Whereas if what people are becoming more aware of is that actually there’s a lot of this that’s connected to external pressures and stresses in our worlds and how, you know, when you are feeling a little bit overwhelmed or a little bit, whatever you do tend to tense up. And I imagine that that is not so good for our bodies to be holding things so tightly all the time. I guess that’s where you come in as well, right? Coming to help to bring awareness to how can we find a way and connect back in with ourselves to be able to work firstly, earlier, identify these things that are arising, and then also have ways to combat them, but be able to work through them and relieve those potential elements that can result from them?

Lori Curran
Yeah, I would say that there are multiple pathways of what you’ve just identified, of noticing, to start with, one of my favourite ways of practising mindfulness, be it on the table, or, you know, at home at night, before we go to bed, or just taking that pause, it’s, I’ve just finished work, I’m going to head home and so whether you’ve got a family, or whether you’ve got flatmates, or whatever your situation is, it’s just like, can you take just a moment to just to stand within your body, and to just notice, and to not judge? Like, we’re so quick to judge that. I can’t do meditation I’m terrible at it. And it’s just like, we can just create awareness and I honestly believe that, if we’ve created awareness, like that’s 95% of the job, like 95% of the job is just the awareness. But it’s within that awareness. Because I don’t think it’s, I’m bad at meditation, so to speak, I don’t love that expression but I do think that there are different ways for people to find that and we do need to be really mindful that to ask someone to go sit in a meditation for 20 minutes just might not be practical for that person. We don’t know, everything that has occurred in that person’s life and so that might not feel safe for them. So we do need to keep that in mind. But if we can take a moment to feel back into the body, we can invite in their sense of, well, what does it feel like to just soften the jaw, even if it’s just 1% or 2%? So we can slowly undo those, those contractions that bracing? Bracing is something that I come across, quite frequently on the table or even on the yoga mat. It’s just like, you can see people’s like, hands and feet gripping onto the mat. It’s just like, there’s a bracing within the body. It’s like, well, how can you find more yielding, but it’s just you and the earth. And the ground force is there’s an evenness between, there’s another way that we can look at it from an essential cymatics lens, which is if there has been my crew, and we’ll refer to them as traumas or reflexes within the body, where something has happened. So I’ve stepped off the footpath and a trams come, I’ve got to step back, it’s just like, well, that might cause the muscle fibres and the nervous system to stay in a contracted state. And so that can cause those muscle fibres to go offline. So we might feel like we’re putting 100% into a contraction, but we’re only putting 100% of the muscle that we are aware of and available that we have available. So we can do movement to bring the whole body back online, which I sort of would liken that to it’s like we’re going from our old school modem dial up, and we’re bringing the body back into, you know, an NBN world so we’re just getting more out of our bodies.

Nicole Smith

Hopefully it’s a good version of NBN you know, there is some fibres that don’t like to talk.

Lori Curran
I’m not that techie. So I feel like if I pitched in anything to this conversation, my brother would be like, stop talking now, stop talking now.

Nicole Smith
But I do love that analogy though because you know, hopefully everyone, I don’t know who’s listening out there, so do you know, have you experienced dial up internet? Let me know because I remember it after school we get home and like I’ve just seen my friends but they’ve got to get on MSN. Where as now the world is just so instant and go go go.

Lori Curran
I was going to add to that, that would be the third pathway that I would have gone down is the how instant everything is and how you said that stress and the stresses in your body is how do we find our way back to a fantastic physician? Dr. Dan Seagal created this window of tolerance, which is based on our nervous system and how we can stay in a state of slow. So if I was to describe it as we have a wave, and we have two parallel lines, where we start the wave, where sympathetically arousal would would come up. And so whatever it is that we need to do, that creates a sympathetic arousal, which is not a sympathetic state, it’s just the arousal, I need to get myself out of bed, I need to make myself breakfast, it might take a little more when I need to have a difficult conversation or confronting conversation, or I’m running late to something and the elevators all full. We do need that sympathetic arousal and our system is such a beautiful system, that it’s been designed that bidirectional nerve that I was talking about the vagus nerve is to calm us down, after we’ve done those, after we’ve done those things. But if we don’t activate that parasympathetic system, because we move from one thing to another thing, and we keep those that sympathetic arousal high, we are more likely then to move into a sympathetic state. And this is based on the body actually doesn’t know the difference between confrontation with a colleague, with a person on the street, with someone who is experiencing road rage, the list can go on, it doesn’t know. The body doesn’t know the difference between that and being chased down the street by a Lion, it’s going to see it as the same, because the physiological response is the same. So we need to work out and it’s not just a nervous system approach because once we have activated the nervous system, the endocrine system is also involved. The immune system is also involved. So we’re working with multiple systems, we do need those pockets of space to remove both the stress and the stressle. And that’s why that suppression that we were just talking about, oh, well, I just, you know, if I just tuck that in that corner of the body, it’s still there. It’s still playing out within the body. So we need to have, I believe, you know, the more tools that can go into our toolkit to help us through these things. And a girlfriend and I were having a conversation the other day, and there’s this, it’s I don’t think it’s perception but there is practising yoga and what draws you to yoga. And we both, I guess, giggled, it was just like, it was never a sense of, it’s just like, enlightenment, it’s just like, oh, I don’t want to be enlightened. I actually just want to be able to get to tomorrow. Like, I just want to have a moment to myself, and so I can get to tomorrow. And that ties a lot into the work that I do in that sense of self care is that we, we often negotiate and then restructure our own self care practices, thinking that they’re only for us. I can tell you right now that my son, he knows that I am just more pleasant to be around if I’ve gone for a run, or if I’m in my window of tolerance. We have these practices, and they actually really do influence those around us and I think that at the time of the recording of this, it’s the end of the year, we’re starting to see that sense of because ultimately, when we’ve got more capacity, the window of tolerance is just broader. And that’s not to say, we can add more to the to our to do list. It’s not about that. It’s about just having more capacity and more fluidity to be in that state of flow. And to be within that connection to set.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, this, you know, I’ve said this multiple times over the last year. I’m very, actually my email going out tomorrow, Am I excited that 2022 is coming to an end? Hell yeah! It feels like this year, for me in particular has been this, and in general, from conversations I’ve had, it’s almost the catch up here. You know, we’ve been in lockdown for so much over the last few years and so this time, everyone’s got to do this got to do that got to be this good data, data, data data that is up and it’s like rolling, rolling, rolling, rolling, rolling, rolling. And as you said, that has a real impact. Even if you as a human is trying to maintain a beautiful rhythm of how you like to work, and everyone else is like fast laying around you. I’ve noticed in my personal world right now we’re going through a very big shift of energies. I’m hyper aware of how energies impact and influence me and humans around me and I now I’m so aware that when other energies are too heightened, I’m like, hey, what can we do to bring it back down. And now we’ve got two kids and a nine month old puppy. So it’s very evident when the energies are high in our home, that everyone is just like, jumping on tables, and dogs are jumping up and doing all the things and it’s their voices go high. And I’m like, let’s just reconnect. Take a moment. Because if all of us come back down, then it will start to even itself out and be a more enjoyable place to be in. And we can actually communicate and connect with each other, versus just running and trying to do 100 things at once.

Lori Curran
And it feeds into each other, as well. What I was just going to add is that those end of year feels, it’s very hard to stay regulated in a world that is dysregulated. And it’s interesting, I think, really interesting as Melburnians and Victorians because we did do it. The toughest lockdowns, we have the longest lockdowns. What did we learn? Because I often reference 2019 as a very, very fast year. I know a lot of people that got to the end of that year, and were just really quiet like at that edge. And it does feel like, what happened over those two years? Because if we’ve just gone back, if we’ve just gone back to this normal, I don’t actually know what normal is. I don’t know.

Nicole Smith
Everybody’s normal, is different. And I think when people do acknowledge that, because I know that yes, I’m a massive people. I love going out. I love being social. I went to an event last Wednesday, and it was a full day event. I knew I was going to be out the next few days. And that’s my pattern. I know it. I’m like, give me the people and then I’m like, don’t give me the people. And I accommodate for that. But I still fight it. I still try and do the things. And my body’s saying no and my mind saying no. And then something else is going yes. And it’s that because of those external factors. Well everyone else is moving really fast. Why is it okay for me to take a moment and just sit? Then I’m like, because it is okay. This is what you need. Listen to what you’re saying. Yesterday actually was, I don’t know if you know much about numerology things, I really don’t. But the becoming aware, my present moment. And I sat down and I lay down actually just for a moment for school pickup and I looked at my phone, actually wasn’t school pick up because the time was 333. And those numbers are about sort of resting and connecting with me, and I was like, okay, well, thank you. Yes.

Lori Curran
There was a universe, you know, that’s your angels sending you a message, isn’t it? I do feel and I come from an energy perspective, that is the purpose of taking time out of, of reconnecting. I personally I like running. But I also know that that’s not for everyone. But my best mate and I have been friends for 15-16 years. And she’s gone for one run with me. One run.

Nicole Smith

That’s like my best friend as well. She loves running. We lived in Greenwich in London for a bit. And she used to go running around Greenwich Park and I’m like, okay, I’ll come with you. I went a couple of times. And I’m like, yeah, that’s your thing.

Lori Curran

Exactly. It’s about finding that expression of movement, that is best for you, to help you connect to to yourself, because the world is very head driven. And if we’re not careful, like I think it was, what, 14 years ago the movie Walle came out and I think everyone laughed at the idea of it’s just so cool. How silly could humans get and it’s just like well we kind of really like technology. But how do we find that balance and I feel I’m much like you, I love my people. And I love seeing people and I love connecting to people. But I also do really like my solo time. You know, I recharge in that solo time. And that’s something that I’m continually learning and sometimes pushed to a threshold is, you actually do need to take this time out to yourself, and more so I’m really starting to notice that is that when I’m more in just my inner, so just as I’m just getting ready to believe it’s just like, you really just need to have a couple of days, like not full days, but it’s just like, just no night plans. It’s just like, okay, well, what can you do? Are we going to read a book? Or are we just going to have a, you know, like a home cooked meal, like just has some real home time connection? So if my son, not that he doesn’t often, but if he jumps in the kitchen or how can we sort of honour that space together within the household, rather than trying to push the energy where it’s just not going?

Nicole Smith
Yeah. And pushing anything’s hard. Pushing anything is off the hill, it’s like, let’s make it easy and enjoy all the things that we’re doing. And, you know, I don’t like the word boundaries, but it’s really establishing what you need as an individual, what your family unit needs. And then once those things are in place, that’s when the other things can come into play as well.

Lori Curran

Boundaries can be, it doesn’t have it doesn’t have to be a dirty word. It can just be an overused word, I think, from context. It’s, you know, 2020, it’s just like, I think a friend of mine was just like, seriously, if I hear pivot one more time, I’m just gonna cry, or, you know, a whole war, we’re all being resilient creatures. And it’s just like, are we? Because I feel like we’ve got the context of resilience room. So in the space of what it is, I really like parameters, personally over boundaries. And also knowing that that’s going to change? I do think when people put in a boundary, like they’ve built a wall but I feel like parameter is interchangeable. Based on where you’re at, where your family’s at or, like, what kind of day you’ve had. I messaged a girlfriend yesterday and said, oh, do you have a moment just to have a chat? I just want to workshop something with you? And she said, no, I’ve had a really rough day at work. Let’s chat tomorrow. And that was it. Like, and that’s great. Because it’s just, you know, we, that’s not well, no, she can never chat to me about anything. It was in that moment. She listened to what she needed. And she needed that space.

Nicole Smith
I speak about Kathy Rast on every episode. So Hi, Kathy Rast. We have been friends for gosh, not actually a long, long time, couple of years to three years. Business colleagues and then extended out to friends. She’s a linguistgeologists. So she focuses on language and how that’s used in the world. But that is one of the things that we work together is how we actually communicate with each other. And so we’re very aware of, of these things. It’s, you know, what do I need to bring to this conversation? Sometimes it’s just as simple as I just need to get this out and be witnessed. Or sometimes, you know, we do want a little bit more of or we may need a little bit of helping hand or a brainstorming situation. And I think being able to put that out there. Do you have capacity to dadada today?

Lori Curran
It’s one of it’s one of my biggest learnings, a friend and I started to do it with each other. And I did, I wrote the message and I was about to write what I wanted to ask. And I was just like, no, you actually need to ask before you put this into a text message. Because if they don’t have space for it, and that’s in the text message, but what you’re talking about and how we can communicate with each other to bring it back to to the body. We’re continuously communicating with our bodies, whether we realise it or not. And so in, you know, disembodied world through no fault of our own. Sometimes it’s just like, look, I’ll put it out there. I had a day on Saturday where I just had to clear the slate and prioritise and say okay, I actually need to rest. And it didn’t come from it came from me, it came in very an indirect way, or it was just like you actually really need to rest. But then it came from somebody else saying, I’m actually just going to let you rest because I don’t think that you should push yourself to go out on Saturday, I actively chose to disassociate, it was decided, you know, what I’m feeling everything is just a lot right now. So I’m just going to just shift my focus to a TV show, I’m just going to put a little bit of energy here and just not to feel too overwhelmed with what I’m feeling. And so that that can be helpful, that can be helpful, what we, what we do need in those situations, if we choose to take that pathway into that state, we need to know, we need to know the map to come back.

Nicole Smith
Instead of the exit strategy.

Lori Curran
Because that can happen, where it’s just like, oh, I’ve laid down on the couch and what happens if you’re still there in for five days? So we do need to have the tools, those nervous system regulation tools, those tools to be able to cue back into the body. But how are we moving through the world and communicating with each other through nonverbal cues? In a disembodied world. Because if we’re all up in our heads, we’re not connected to our bodies. And then we’re still having nonverbal conversations with people. So the more that we know, not even just through me, there’s some extraordinary movement teachers in this world that can help us all get back into our bodies. And that is just a beautiful thing.

Nicole Smith
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Nicole Smith
It’s wonderful when you start to notice that there is another way and that there, you know, there’s places like what you’ve got here, you know, The Humble Nook that people can actually go to and become aware and learn different ways and alternative ways of operating working in our this is how that’s connected to their sound. Okay, this is a situations of how I can, you know, take that next step down to whatever it is. So this is what you do, right? At The Humble Nook and all the things but underlying it’s that supporting people to become aware and understand how they can use the tools.

Lori Curran
Yeah, yes, supporting people. I can only be a present. I’m just a facilitator in this space, and how people receive it is up to them. So it mostly is just supporting people. Whether they want to relieve aches, sprains, strains, tension, if they’ve got specific injury, there’s something that they’re coming to to work on immediately. If they’re anxious, if they’re stressed, they can come for for multiple for multiple reasons and what you said about going into the the doctors and and here’s the what I’m here for and here’s the medication for it. I have full respect for I think any doctor who studies for the time that they do the hours that they that are expected of them and but it is very I find that their job is made very very challenging within the timeframe, because to be able to see someone through the whole lens through that bio psycho social model, where it’s taking all factors of their life into account. And to be able to form a relationship with them, I find would be very challenging, but what we are starting to understand about Voc and if it sticks out of my area of expertise is how we can refer people whether it is well, why don’t you go? Do you feel like you go talk to somebody about this? Or specifically, I would like to see you work on this with this person. I have some really beautiful people who work with Eastern medicine so through Chinese medicine and herbs, and that’s been really supportive for a lot of people. Especially post COVID fatigue and brain fog, and, and to again, help support and regulate the nervous system. Perimenopause, menopause, those really transitional stages of people’s lives. But when we’re never just working with one system and Gable Matej refers to the endocrine nervous system, immune system, he calls it the super system. It’s the psycho immuno endology. Neurology. So it’s a super system that he is working with, that we are working with, because we are always working with ourselves. So this is my jam, I refer to myself as a body based practitioner, because it is all about coming back to the body. And we just need to know, through a conversation with someone how we need to do that.

Lori Curran
And it’s that, you know, being able to start the conversation and finding their path because yeah, we can’t do it all. I don’t like the word. It’s funny. Keep saying I don’t like the word twice actually saying it’s really interesting. But in our house when my kids go, I can’t do that. And like, hang on a second. Let’s talk about that. Really can’t you?

Nicole Smith

Do you have a favourite word? If you don’t like if you don’t like some words? Do you have a favourite word?

Lori Curran

Fabulous is my favourite word. I say that on the daily. It’s sparkly and nice. That’s how I know when, when you hear me say fabulous. It’s like, yeah, yes that’s connected with me, that is that’s it. That’s it. But I can’t imagine, you know, in what you do and what doctors do all have that that time limit. And then you have a bit more time with your your humans. But that could be a really challenging thing to try and diagnose wider scheme. And it’s fabulous that, you know, we do as humans, collect people and connect with people that we can go, hey, you know, this is who you need to go and talk to well, this is what I would suggest you have a look at investigating to. Oh, fun. Before we wrap up, this has been so obviously we’ve had a great we plan to have since when we do these, but I say at every start. I’m like, wherever it goes it’s exactly where it’s meant to go. But before we wrap it up, I would love you to share about your thing that you’re doing next year.

Lori Curran

So I have two very special Retreats for 2023. One is a three day immersion with a colleague and friend of mine, Dr. Rebecca Andrews, and it’s called Rest and Recover. Three day workshop, we meet each day so you don’t stay with us. It’s in Melbourne, it’s from the 24th to the 26th of February. And in those three days we address stress, burnout and fatigue. And when we dive in, we deep dive in we’ve got movement practices, we’ve got educational learning, we have rest practices, we dive into what is rest, nervous system regulation, the effects of cortisol in the body cymatics, the influence of Chinese medicine and the type of Chinese medicine and vitality and our way way of being. We look at sleep science. And then we look at the relationship. We have two guest speakers and they come in and one talks about sleep science and another comes in and talks about the relationship between disembodimennt in a more capitalistic society and, and how that can can influence or the influences that has has on us. And that’s not for anyone who is just experiencing burnout, stress and fatigue. Because what we do know is, whilst we can move towards healing those and, disclaimer, this doesn’t happen in three days, I wish it could, but it does not. This is a tip of the iceberg. It’s the disrupter. And so this is actually really great for anyone who, you know, has has the precursors, if we can work in a preventative state, and that’s what I do love about Chinese medicine. If we can work in a preventative mannerism for for vitality then we’re really getting somewhere.

Nicole Smith
Much better state when you can prevent rather than reacting to.

Lori Curran

So that’s one and the second is, in June, from the sixth of June to the ninth of June, we’re going hiking in Tasmania. So that is, along the Three Capes trail, I’ve teamed up with the Tasmanian walking company. And so they are supplying us with their beautiful lodges and foods. So we’re hiking, but it’s a very lush, hiking adventure. So I do believe that there’s a lot of people who want to immerse themselves in nature. And the idea of setting up a tent is like the thing that rules them out. So this is you don’t have to do that. And this is just an opportunity to nurture yourself in nature, and immerse yourself in nature take a pause mid year, because as we know, I speak to a lot of people at the moment that I’ve just got to get through to the end of the year. And it’s just like, what does drive that self talk? Of how can we take a break in the middle of the year, that’s a short break, to really reset and recharge and through that, over those four days that we’re away, I’ll be facilitating some educational chat about nervous system and a deeper understanding of the nervous system and guiding some meditation practices, so that you can kick off your own meditation practice to take home so they’re my two offerings for 2023.

Nicole Smith
That sounds amazing. Like I know, whenever there’s like those big moments that happen, you know, I go outside and ground. I take the shoes off and just stand outside.

Lori Curran
I was just up in, I wouldn’t say North Queensland but I don’t think it, I feel like a lot of sunshine coast folk will be like “we’re not that far north”.
So I was up in Queensland about a week ago and in inland so in that hinterland area and to have that sense of warmth and feel completely wrapped by nature and I am an urban dweller, I don’t live far from Melbourne CBD, I do live along a creek which is great to ground for there is always a little hum of the traffic or a hum of you know, the bells of the trams and and to be just soaked in this Interland forest was I would describe it as you know, I felt like I was at home I was just like, ahhh, this is heaven. And it’s just such a it’s such a powerful regulator.

Nicole Smith
I’m just in the midst of planning my first actual, not solo camping trip with the kids, but me and a girlfriend and her kids we’re going to go camping to a campsite but it’s got a river and it’s you know, I’m like, how can I go without a trailer? Anyway Tetris car, but I’m really excited because it’s that whenever people are not laugh, but they’re like you camping and like, yes, I love it. It’s just something about it. And when we can have a fire and the kids are just they just love it because of all the fresh air and Charlotte’s just in her elements, my four year old and it’s just about finding that thing that you know allows you the space to be able to connect back within.

Lori Curran
I feel like nature is the sweet potato of like, like, it’s, you know, it’s low GI, like it comes into the body. And we don’t, you know, we don’t really notice it’s just like a better use. Compared to continuous dopamine hits. What that, you know, can do because we don’t we don’t know, we actually, we the science is still starting to form about what that’s doing so if we can, I’m the same we holiday over summer and and it’s you know, it’s a beautiful disrupter for the for the family to just be like, let’s go for a surf, let’s go for a run, let’s go down to the beach. Let’s just go for a walk. And as the kids get older, you can you know, it’s going to watch the sunset and, and it’s it’s it’s making memories. It’s making memories and young people to also understand the benefits. I think people can make judgments and be like, oh, you go camping. And I don’t really understand what that means. We’re all human.

Nicole Smith
I guess they look at me with my and I guess that’s the thing. We try not to judge a book by its cover. But just that’s just innately sometimes what we’ve been brought up with, you know, look at me with my sparkly nails and my heels and my headbands. And you’re like, ah, huh? I’m like, No. I mean, yes, let’s do it. Let’s get out there. So good. Is there anything you’d like to leave us on before we jump into the questions and finish up? It’s been such a fabulous conversation.

Lori Curran
I honestly, this has been a great conversation, if anything, it’s just like, what is one thing that you can do very minute? I’m all about micro practices. So if there is anything that you feel if you can take away one thing from this conversation, it’s okay, well, how can I connect myself? How can you connect yourself? What is something that you can do? That’s not going to take you more than a minute that you can weave into your life and think about it as how is that going to weave into your life? So okay, well, if it’s, I really want to make sure that I take three deep and conscious breaths, that’s what I want to do each day. Okay. When are you going to do that? What’s going to get you there? So when you step under the water in the shower, that’s what will get you there? So building it in in a really practical way. What is it that can help you connect to your body? And and how can you do that?

Nicole Smith
You’re so right for our community. And I say this because you’ve said the word weave, which Kathy Rast again, she is actually a weaver. So I’ll send you her thing. But micro actions and how are we going to do it? You’ve just summarised that beautifully, because it doesn’t have to be the big bold thing. Right? Every little moment forward will get you to wherever your journey is. Amazing. Thank you so much. All right, you ready? Okay, what is your go to app that creates ease in your day?

Lori Curran
I thought about this one and I’m Spotify. Music, meditations. It’s got the works. I saw the other day. They put books on there. I’m like, I’m in heaven.

Nicole Smith
Books? Oh, that’s cool. Oh, great. Yeah, I use Spotify every day. Yeah, amazing. It’s funny, isn’t it? When we say apps, everyone’s like, oh, because like, obviously, I’m here. Talking about business tech. People like ClickUp and Canva and stuff like that. But yes, Spotify amazing. Okay, are you an online, paper or hybrid to do list lover?

Lori Curran
I am definitely a hybrid. No one can see me right now. But it’s just like, I make lists. I make notes. And I put them in books. I journal in books. I am also transitioning into more digital just for fluidity when it comes to a book book, like it’s it’s always going to be a tangible book. I haven’t quite crossed over to the Kindle.

Nicole Smith
Okay. Oh, this will be an interesting one. What will you do if you create more space in your world?

Lori Curran
This one stumped me because I do believe that the idea of if we could create more space in the world, we would want to do more. And I don’t know if I want to do more. Like, I feel that this for for any person who is working any capacity or job and also parenting, if I had more space in the world, I would just spend more time with my kids. I think that would be what I’d really want to do. But it would just be a hybrid of would I do more, or would I be more? Would I just have longer lunches? Or would I have longer dinners? Or would I read on the catch? So I don’t know. I don’t know if there would be so much productivity to my more space in the world. But there would be a lot of a lot more just being.

Nicole Smith
I love that. I love that. Because that is what when I think about space, it’s not about feeling it.

Lori Curran
Yeah, and I’m also a recovering over filler.

Nicole Smith
So many of us out there.

Lori Curran
So that one really did it got me because I was just like, oh, I like to Potter, I’ve just started doing some clay.

Nicole Smith
Actually pottery? Not just pottering around?

Lori Curran
I just started doing some pottery. And I was just like, oh, I’d like to do that more. But it’s also it’s not about the doing.

Nicole Smith
It’s yet being in the moment and the experience of it. There’s this real, really beautiful alignment between creativity and the act of being creative, and business and being, you know, people that are here I sing and I love dancing, and all of those things. Yes, it might take time. But the act of doing that and the reaction and what I get internally is so much more. It’s the recharging.

Lori Curran

Yeah. And well, that’s why I started. That’s why I started playing it because I needed a creative hobby. I just needed something that was outside of what I was doing, or what I am doing, whether it’s my meditation practice, or running, or my yoga practice, or creating projects for the, for the business, I needed something outside of that, that it was just about me, and totally imperfect.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, beautiful. Where can everyone find you? Because I know, they’re gonna be like, where is The Humble Nook?

Lori Curran
So The Humble Nook, the physical clinic is one that you come into, I don’t do mobile treatments, is in Fitzroy, in Melbourne. And you can find me at thehumblenook.com all appointments can be made there. You can also find me at various workshops. So whether it’s at Rest and Recover, I have resources online in terms of yoga and meditation. I do occasional pop ups throughout the year. I work seasonally. So I was a co host of the Winter Solstice retreat. So you can find me in those little pockets. best form of communication is via Instagram I’m the_humble_nook. And at Facebook, The Humble Nook so all of those have forms of contact as well.

Nicole Smith
Amazing. We’re going to as always put all the details in the show notes and also the links to your beautiful retreats next 2023 I think if you’re sitting there having those feelings of let’s just wrap this year up, maybe go and have a have a squizzy over there and get yourself all set for 2023. Yeah, so amazing. Well, thank you so much. And for everybody who is out there listening today, I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day and enjoy creating space and time freedom. Bye now.

Well, there we go. Thank you so much for joining me today. It’s been such a pleasure having you on board. Have we connected on social jazz? If not, please come on over. Say hi, I’m on all the platforms at the artisan solutions. So I’d really look forward to seeing you over there. And if you enjoy today’s episode, don’t forget to tag me and I’d love it if you could leave a review. And of course, share this with others so others can come and join us next time. All right, that everyone have a fabulous rest of the week and until next time, see you then.