113 - Your Inner Still Space: Calm You Can Take Anywhere

In this week’s episode of Rooted in Presence, we explore how to find calm, grounding, and inner steadiness during the festive season, even when life feels loud, busy, or overstimulating.

Inspired by my Breathwork studio, Still Space Hull, this conversation is about the kind of stillness you can carry, not the kind you escape to.

We’ll talk about how to regulate your nervous system in real-time, how to stay centred in midlife when December pulls you in every direction, and why stillness isn’t about stopping… but about anchoring into yourself, wherever you are.

If you tend to lose yourself in the season (or feel a little on the edges of it), this episode is a gentle return to presence, peace, and the quiet wisdom within you.

 if you'd like some more support with finding your inner still space, whether that is through breath work coaching, or if you're curious about how strength training can lead you to that sense of connection and peace, then feel free to visit me carlykillen.com book in a clarity call or come down to the studio at Still Space Hull (HU1 2LJ).

Thanks for listening to Rooted In Presence

If you’d like to get in touch with a question about today’s episode or find out how I can support you with coaching, here’s how to reach me:
📧 Email: carlykillenpt@gmail.com
📱 Instagram: @thestrongbonescoach

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🌟 For tailored advice or personal queries, email me at carlykillenpt@gmail.com

Thank you for being here, and I look forward to supporting you on your journey to strength, health, and confidence! 💪🦴✨

Transcript

Carly: 0:46

Hello and welcome back to Rooted in Presence. I'm Carly, your Hullst, and today's episode is super special. One quite close to my heart because it's inspired by the very essence of my breathwork studio still space Hull. We're heading towards that festive season. I might have mentioned it once or twice, and this time can feel truly nourishing for some and overwhelming for others, or perhaps a mix of both depending on the day, the Hullur, or how you are feeling. So today I want to explore how you can find your own still space, not as a place you have to go. although it's great if you want to come visit me, but as a feeling you can carry with you w busy, loud or lifey the season becomes. So let's talk about why it's still space hu exists. So when I named my studio still Space Hall, I wasn't thinking about stillness as the absence of movement far from it. For me, stillness is a feeling, a sense of centeredness, a settling, a groundedness in your own energy. You're not frozen, not stuck. That sense of presence and stillness isn't about staying in one spot or sitting in complete silence, although that can be really nourishing. although not accessible to to all when we're, are used to that really busy type of life. But it's more about knowing you can bring yourself back to you even in the middle of a busy city center or a busy life. And that is symbolic of the studio too. Still. Space Hall is right in the heart of Hall's Old town. Surrounded by shops, people, restaurants, even nightclubs, just around the corner. And yet the moment you step inside, everything drops away. And people have been saying, wow, it's just so calm here. And that's what I want this episode to offer you to a moment where everything else just drops away a moment to land. So as I've mentioned, December can offer a lot of contrast. Some of you listening absolutely love the season. The lights atmosphere, the energy, the opportunity to catch up with people you might not have seen in months or perhaps all year. And others feel that pull to retreat, they find anything else, a little overstimulating. The emotional weight starts to feel heavy and perhaps as memories or pressure. Perhaps some of us feel both in the same week or the same day. I definitely relate to that. So before we go any further, I want to say whatever your relationship with this season is, it is valid. Nothing is wrong with you. Your nervous system is simply responding to what it needs. So whether you're in celebrations or. Sitting on the outskirts, there is wisdom in both. So I read something recently that really stuck with me and it's about how movement without stillness just becomes momentum, a rush, a restlessness, a kind of keep going no matter what. Feeling without ever quite knowing where your center is. Actually, it reminds me very much of a. Song by Sia, an artist I really enjoy, and her song Unstoppable Talking about being a Porsche without breaks. And people often use this song as a celebration, as that real feeling of feeling unstoppable. Which yeah, that's great, that's empowering, but I seem to see that differently. I mean, this lovely, expensive car. Has no breaks. That's just a recipe for disaster. And to me, that song really speaks to that sense of perhaps feeling outta control, not knowing how to return, how to bring yourself into slowness and perhaps just still carried on by the world without any means to take control for yourself. Well, that's just my tHullughts on the song anyway. But this is what I mean by by this, the world is busy fast. We have a lot to do. So being able to create our own stillness at the terms we want to, and not waiting for illness or something else to stop us or get in our way, that is true power. So when I say still, stillness isn't the absence of movement, it is actually what gives movements. Its meaning when you lift weights. It's that pause between the reps, between the sets that builds strength when you breathe. It's the space between the inhale and the exhale where your nervous system really recognizes itself when you speak, hits the pause before you answer. That brings clarity. Stillness is where we catch ourselves, and funnily enough, it's also the place many people resist the most. Being still, even for 10 seconds can show us what's really here in our bodies. But the moment we can tolerate that stillness, we can start to trust it and then we can start to carry it. So something I share inside the studio, and I guess throughout everything I do, is that stillness doesn't end when you walk out of the room. The retreat, the workshop. You take it with you, just like the breath, and you can find stillness in that space between sets at the gym, on a walk between the shops when there's no one speaking to you. Before you step into a busy gathering in the car, before you go into the house, wHull can relate to sitting on the driveway. That is one way that we can take that pause. Even just sitting mindfully with a cup of tea and quite often perhaps in the bathroom, and we just need that moment alone. Yes, we've all been there there were many times I would retreat off to the NHS stalls just to take a breath. Not the most pleasant, but sometimes you've got to do what you've got to do. But this is stillness in motion within our lives. It's not about stopping your life, it's about founding that moment inside your life when you can return to yourself. So here are some gentle and discreet tools you can use anywhere, even if you are surrounded by people. So we have breath awareness for when you feel that pull to perfectionism. Um, remember here, we don't need to change the breath. It's all about noticing it. So when you feel yourself rushing, criticizing, comparing, or you're trying to do it all, keep up with everything. Just simply notice how it feels to breathe. What is happening on your inhale? how easy is it to exhale? Is the breath getting stuck at the top of the chest? Where are your shoulders? Can you bring them down from your ears just a little bit? Notice what your jaw's doing. I often need to relax my jaw and just notice if you're bracing or holding clenching. And this is all information. We don't need to fix it. We're just here as a compassionate witness. And when we can do that, the softening comes naturally. Awareness is the practice, so you can't get it wrong. And there's something I've been experimenting with more recently as I've noticed some stickiness in certain muscles and some parts. I found it hard to expand my breath into. So I've been doing some breathing into my back, so you can actually choose to send your breath to any part of your body if you want to. But I think between the cycling, the carrying a heavy backpack, the top of my back is just feeling a little stuck down recently. So perhaps when you have. A little more time to focus. You can choose to breathe into a part of your body that perhaps your breath hasn't been going to. So for me, I to put my awareness into just the top of my back and as I inhale, I just see kinda expand my ribs around the back, around the top, just a little bit more. That tiny expansion on the inhale. And then just seeing what I can release in an exhale. Perhaps comparing it from one side of the body to another, the front to the back. It's just a simple way to reconnect that embodiment, especially when your mind is busy. And of course, we have a mini body scan. Now, we don't even need to close your eyes for this, but you can simply send awareness to feel your feet. Are they on the floor? Can you feel them in your shoes? Can you spread that awareness up to your legs? Can you feel the seat or that surface beneath you? Are you aware of your spine? how's that feeling and feeling? Your breath feeling, your response to your breath, and perhaps even softening your face. My face as we speak. Sometimes we feel like we have to stick a smile on all day. I'm definitely prone to that one. This can be a simple 30 second reset, perhaps even sometimes more affected than a full on meditation. And of course there's movement. So during strength training or any movement practice. See if you can bring that attention consciously into that tiny pause in between your reps at the top of a lift. Just before you change directions, putting the weight down, can you tune into your muscles working, really feeling them, and you notice the ground beneath your feet? Pay extra attention to that, especially if you need a balance. And again, see how your breath wants to sync up with the movements, how it supports you by bracing your tummy, your abdomen, and how it allows you to release. And perhaps instead of scrolling on the phone between your sets, I'm very guilty of this. Can you use that time to feel? And this starts to cultivate that kind of stillness that stays with you on the outside of the gym as well. And of course, stillness does not mean isolation. Sometimes being with someone feels grounding to you is another form of finding that still space, that person you can be truly yourself with. So a text, a check in, sharing a cup of tea, the breath together in the studio, that co-regulation is one of the most powerful forms of self-care. So as we move through that festive season, let this be your reminder. You don't need to move. You don't need to choose between movements and stillness. You can be out in the world celebrating, resting, working, caring, and navigating your midlife journey, and still carry your own inner still space. Stillness is not something from outside of you. Not something you need to go and find. It's already yours. So if you'd like some more support with finding your inner still space, whether that is through breath work coaching, or if you're curious about how strength training can lead you to that sense of connection and peace, then feel free to visit me@carlykillen.com book in a clarity call or come down to the studio. It's still Space Hall. I'd love to show you around. So until next week. May you walk with presence, meet yourself with compassion, and remember, you already carry everything you need.