Interview with Nic: Sauna, love & embodiment.
This week we are in conversation with Nicola Stoke (Nic), doctor, breathworker and one of the caring sauna parents of Finn!
The word in the community is that Finn has a magical energy, being a favourite between the sauna attendants and attendees alike. We are very excited to be in conversation with Nic, to find out more about Finn, as well as the ‘how’s and ‘where’s of their sauna journey!
“I am a sauna addict!
I am really interested in my own healing journey, alongside collective healing - and that has been taking me on a meandering route of lots of different things.”
I was on this intense course in Germany and that is when sauna came into my life. I was really noticing how I was having this reset after a sauna. I would sleep so much better than I would any other night! I started there, and then that metamorphosed into cold water immersion, then into breathwork.
Since then I have gone down a variety of therapeutic modalities to understand myself better, to hopefully change for the better the way that I relate to people and how I move through the world. Well that's my goal. We're always learning and it's always a journey. I feel really grateful that I am now at a point in life where I am able to do the things that I love, and I am sharing that with those around me.
How was baby sauna Finn born?
Sauna Finn is a lockdown baby and has parents from the UK and Finland. That's why they called the sauna Finn! The couple bought a second-hand sauna trailer and built it together - I think that is why it has this familial energy vibrating through it. They ran it as a side-business from Exeter, but between that, other work and raising a young child, they could not continue it. So they decided to put it up for sale.
Oggi (sauna enthusiast, also a doctor and Finn’s co-parent) and I heard about it, and he proposed that we go check it out. So we went down there, one day, March 2022, and we had such a beautiful time. The Finnish grandparents were there, so we all sat together, had cups of tea in the couples living room and then we went to the driveway - and there it was…
Our first time using Finn sauna was actually on their driveway. We learnt that their connection with sauna started in Finland. The dad, who is an engineer, became passionate about building saunas, so we talked a lot about how the sauna was built. We really got on with them and we deeply appreciated their story: the connection between them as a family and how much they love sauna.
It is a sauna built out of love. We were there, feeling the care that has gone into it, becoming more excited to bring it along with us.
On our train journey back to London, we already settled on the buy. Four weeks later - Finn was in our lives.
If there was a perfect ritual for Finn, what would it look like?
It's an interesting build in terms of how it was designed. That is a really engaging question because we thought about this before, but it doesn't actually lend itself to, for example, an Aufguss - it doesn’t quite have the space for big towel techniques.
I think it's about being a little bit creative with the space - meditation practices, guided visualisations or breathwork, along with progressively increasing the heat can really centre ‘focus’ within the space.
Some of us have already been lucky enough to experience some of the rituals that you facilitated throughout the time here at Community Hackney Sauna. For the others:
What are some of the rituals you hold in the Hackney saunas and what do you enjoy about them?
I've been running breathwork sessions in the Saunaverse sauna (the big sauna). I mean breathwork is this very nebulous term and there are lots of different practices which I incorporate in a session - though they all come from pranayama techniques (yogic breathwork).
What is really beautiful is that, in the sauna, we combine these breathing practices - and that focus on the breath can support people in adjusting and working with the heat. Breathwork in this context can also enable getting into meditative states very fast.
In the wellbeing world we talk a lot about embodiment. There's lots of benefits to sauna that we could go into maybe another time, but one of the really beautiful qualities is that it encourages presence within one's body. It's the same with the breath, bringing attention to it can help one become more embodied. So when we overlay these two practices, it can become a powerful experience of self-discovery.
The sessions I run are 1h30min long, alternating between hot and cold - practicing in the sauna 10 to 15 minutes at a time. They really vary in terms of content, but I like to use guided visualisation techniques which are used in a lot of practices like hypnosis (supporting meditative states, re-wiring neural pathways).
That's really the goal for these breathwork sessions in the sauna: embodiment and helping you get into meditative states; we know from studies using functional MRI scanning that reaching those states can help us develop more grey matter in the brain, which is incredibly useful for our minds’ health!
A short search on the web tells me that grey matter is associated with cognitive functions such as learning, memorising, reasoning, self-regulation and adaptive behaviour (Boccia, Piccardi, Guariglia, 2015).
My cognitive function right now is saying: I am not letting this treat go!
For those of you who have not yet experienced a (literally) mind altering sauna breathwork session with Nic, this is the call!
Check when one of Nic’s events is coming up our events page, Instagram @drnicolastoke or Eventbrite as The Breath Doctor.
Thank you, Nic! We are grateful for the energy and love that you are pouring into this place and your enthusiasm when sharing yours and Finn’s story with us :-)
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Of course, every Body is different. What matters more than reading about it, or hearing others talk about it, is to experience it yourself and trust your Body’s own reception/experience of sauna heat and community. If you would like to share your sauna encounters with us, send us an email on:
info@community-sauna.co.uk
Be mindful of your individual health and wellbeing needs - if you have any health concerns, it is advisable to consult a medical professional before using a sauna.
See more info on our Sauna Etiquette or FAQs.
Boccia, M., Piccardi, L., & Guariglia, P. (2015). The Meditative Mind: A Comprehensive Meta-Analysis of MRI Studies. BioMed research international, 2015, 419808. https://doi.org/10.1155/2015/419808