Interviewer: Helen Clare from 'Run better with yoga', it's good to have you on the show.

Interviewee: It's great to be here, thank you for inviting me.

Interviewer: And is it sweltering hot in Cornwall as it is here in the East of England?

Interviewee: It is, Cornwall is amazing today. I spent a little time in the garden today, it is sunny. 

Interviewer: I know, it's beautiful. But it's actually a bit hot in my office.

Interviewee: It's been a warm [00:00:39] I think.

Interviewer: I think it would be good for our listeners and our viewers to get a background of who Helen Clare is, the business that you set up. It's quite inspiring to see your posts on Instagram, that's where I started following you and saw your different posts. I am quite jealous on where you are running, all of these beautiful hillsides and seasides. What was it like growing up, where did you grow up and what led you into this path?

[00:01:10] Interviewee: Okay, sure. That's quite a story. So I actually grew up near where you are now. I grew up in Essex, up until I went to university and I did a lot of travelling. And I started practising yoga around that time, so my early twenties were when I started practising yoga. Throughout my youth, I was a competitive swimmer, so I came to yoga from quite an athletic background and I wanted to use that as a way of balancing out all the athletic endeavours and training sides of things that I was doing. I ended up living in Japan for a year after university. And that was the time where I started to get further into the meditation side of yoga and started to really experience the well-rounded practice that it is. I travelled for a few more years longer, I started running a lot more than swimming. Running is much easier to do when you are traveling, you can do it anywhere. And then I ended up down in Cornwall. I've been in Cornwall for 10 years now. Just before I arrived here, I trained as a yoga teacher. So I trained as a yoga teacher from Scotland after all my travelling through Australia and New Zealand, Japan. I came down to Cornwall and that is where I started teaching. I started working with a lot of runners here and that's where my yoga has grown from it, the last 10 years. It evolved into what it is today. But taking my athletic background, going deep into my yoga practice and then see what I can share with people. And now, what I love to do the most, is help runners to run better using a lot of the principles from yoga. So helping them to avoid injury and helping them to run in a much more natural way. And a lot of that can come from a yoga practice. 

Interviewer: And less injuries, I suppose? 

Interviewee: Absolutely. Yes.

Interviewer: So tell us about your business, you say it's been going 10 years. What was it like in the beginning? Has there been a rise or has it been a steady growth?

[00:03:28] Interviewee: Yeah, I think there has definitely been a growth and an interest in yoga over the last 10 years. I think there's no denying that. And I think, from a personal point of view, when you're growing the business in a location, people start to hear about you and that's another reason why your business is going to grow. So yes, my classes have definitely grown in size over the years and it is lovely to have word of mouth recommendations. So I have a lot of students now and I get to see a lot of students on a one-to-one basis as well as in group classes. And I have retreats down here as well.

Interviewer: So do people travel to your retreats from around the country?

Interviewee: Yeah, they do. From around the country and from around Europe as well. So I've recently had a few people who were from Belgium and Holland. And definitely all around the UK. I've done a couple of retreats over in Portugal as well where we've had international students there as well. 

Interviewer: I saw your website, you've got a digital business going on as well. Are you offering videos online?

[00:04:37] Interviewee: Yeah, apart of my weekly blog, I send out a free video each week, yoga for runners, a specific aspect of yoga that they can do at home or sometimes a running tutorial. I've started this digital aspect of the business to try and help more people experience 'Run better with yoga' and the things that I do. So yeah, I have an online program now, where I can get on track and I have people around the world using it and getting all benefit from it.

Interviewer: So the reason I ask is because it would be good to get some of your business advice. Because there's a few people doing this type of thing and obviously the market's wide open and there's a lot of need for online training. I'm going to be also providing some video training on my platform under my personal brand. So what kind of advice can you give for people who are just starting out, they want to do this e-learning or video series, what is the first step that they're going to take? 

Interviewee: The number one thing has to be your free content. So make sure you are offering something free and valuable every single week. So whether that's a blog post or a podcast, like what you're doing, or a video in my case. So people have to be able to see that, that you have somebody really valuable to offer and then they're going to start following you and eventually go further with you and perhaps buying a product or course.

Interviewer: It's about getting that brand loyalty first. Giving some value. 

[00:06:10] Interviewee: Yeah. You've got to show people what you can offer and they have to know they can trust you.

Interviewer: Yeah. Building that trust is a big thing. So I had some questions lined up. Thanks for telling us about yourself and it's great to get to know you. I want to know the benefits to the cardiovascular system, also the benefits to your mental and your physical being with running. Because you hear a lot about running being bad for the knees. Cardiovascular is not that good anymore, you always hear conflicting advice, don't you? And as the years go on, advice changes. Because yours is called 'Running better with yoga', what do you have to say about running in particular and cardiovascular?

[00:07:08] Interviewee: Okay. Well just first off, running should not hurt your knees. If it does hurt your knees, you're not running in the right way. That's one of the main things I help people do. I help them to get strong and balanced, so that they can run with correct alignment. Then you won't getting any pain or serious injury. As for the cardiovascular, I believe that we definitely need a cardiovascular element. We have to have that in order to have sufficient fitness to strengthen the heart, improve the whole blood pumping system and lower our cholesterol and lower our blood pressure. It can strengthen our immune system. So I think it's definitely still an essential part of what we need to include in our weekly, daily activities.

Interviewer: So would that look like doing a bit of strength training, but not totally neglecting high cardiovascular, breathing really heavy type stuff?

Interviewee: Yeah, definitely. I teach runners yoga routines that are strengthening and mobilizing. So that might be something they do in the morning. They get their strength work. They might do a longer strengths session on a day when they're not running. Or they might do a shorter one and then go for a run and get that heart rate up. They're working their spiritual system and they're getting the body moving. And then after that, they might do a post-run yoga session, which is going to be a recovery session to stretch out, release the muscles and the tissues then.

Interviewer: I've been listening to a doctor, Joe Dispenza and I haven't yet got to the part of his book where he talks about walking meditation and it just sprang to mind, is there such a thing as running meditation?

[00:09:08] Interviewee: Yeah. So when you get into the flow of it, it becomes like a moving meditation. And I think for me, I have to be here in Cornwall along the coast path, when there's no one else around and I have the wildlife and the ocean crashing against the cliffs and I don't have to think about anything else. I can just go into my rhythm and follow the coastal path and flowing with the environment. And it becomes this really peaceful, calming state of mind. So that I would relate to and call that a bit of a moving meditation. 

Interviewer: What if people that aren't in such a beautiful part of the world, what do you suggest?

Interviewee: That's a good question, because I know not everybody is as fortunate as I am. I would say that you can probably still find at least an element of that. Most cities are going to have a park at least to run around. I know a lot of people who actually prefer to run on roads. It depends on your personal preference and maybe there is sort of this rhythmical sense of running on a flat road just with that buzz and the traffic in the background, maybe that can be meditative as well. We've got to experiment, give it a chance. You've got to get into it and you'd have to be able to run in a comfortable way. If you're dealing with injuries and niggles and complaints, it's not going to be quite such a meditative experience, is it?

Interviewer: Yeah. You don't want to be thinking about pain in your joints when you're trying to zone out. 

Interviewee: Exactly. Learn to run properly and then it can become really, really enjoyable. 

Interviewer: So what are some of the things that you would do for somebody who might come to you, they might say that they really want to do this, but have had knee problems in the past or hip problems. What are some of the exercises that you'd give them?

[00:11:02] Interviewee: That can vary so much from person to person, which is why I love to work on a one-to-one basis. Most of the times though, I would run someone through a series of very simple tests. I would test the strength of particular muscles, particularly around the hips. I would test for tension and over-tightness in the muscles, again, particularly around the hips. And then I'd watch and observe them in a simple yoga routine and I can see further where areas of potential weakness and potential tightness are, and then I can tailor a sequence to suit them. Where we are going to strengthen the areas that they need to strengthen and release tension in those other areas where they need to do that.

Interviewer: Do they get almost immediate feedback from doing these exercises? Because I'm thinking it's hard work sometimes. And if they don't see results, they might tend to give up. 

Interviewee: Yeah. So, in many cases you can see results really quickly just from a session or two. Depends on the situation, obviously. But if there's a real either weakness or tightness, you'll start to see results quite quickly. It might take a few weeks, but all of my students have seen positive results.

Interviewer: What does it take mentally to do this? Because it's one thing to say "Alright, do this stretch". But sometimes that's hard and sometimes it takes more than just trying to do it. How do you teach them mentally to go beyond and really push past the limit? 

[00:12:46] Interviewee: I think where yoga is different to just doing a series of stretches, is that it does encompass much more than just the stretches. You make it part of your routine. It involves breathing, finding focus and awareness, really becoming aware of your whole body and feeling what's happening. And those poses can become really enjoyable and very calming. And there's that relaxation element of it as well. So, I make a sequence for someone and then I suggest how they can make it part of their routine. And if you can start to implement it at the same time regularly each day or every other day, or whenever, it becomes more of a habit. And because you're getting more from it than just doing a stretch, you're getting all the other benefits, enhanced awareness and the mental benefits, more clarity. You're getting the relaxation side as well. It becomes a more enjoyable process and you can feel more benefit. I think when you feel benefit from something, then you have motivation to continue. 

Interviewer: Yeah. What's going on in my head is this world where people come to you every morning and you are like their guide and then they do the yoga with you. Like the old aerobics thing where you go to a class and everyone just follows the leader. Is it similar to that or do you just say "Hey guys, come for a few sessions. This is the routine and you've got to go and do that at home"? What does it look like for you?

[00:14:23] Interviewee: If I do a weekly class - which I do, I have weekly students that come see me every week - I will lead the class and I'll walk around as I'm teaching and I will help people as I'm teaching them through the sequence. So that's a little bit different. They are following my instructions for an hour and a half. If I see someone on a private individual basis, they'll come to me perhaps with an injury or post-injury and I'm trying to help them through something, then I'll give them a personal sequence and then I'll send them home with that sequence with suggestions of how to implement it. And I'll stay in touch with them throughout the week to motivate them and answer any questions that they have. And then we'll meet up the following week and we'll see what differences there are and do some other tests and I can tweak and modify the sequence that they have. And then on a retreat, I get to spend longer with the groups, I see them for a morning strengthening and mobilizing session and in the evening for this relaxing session and then get to speak to them individually in between about their own little individual things. So that's a lovely experience, because you get to spend much longer with someone and learn more about how you can help them.

Interviewer: And the relationships are strengthened, then people get to know you better. Great way to build rapport with your following.

Interviewee: Yeah. It's lovely to spend that time with people. Especially if they've been coming back for retreats for a few years or if you know someone's been following you online for a while.

Interviewer: How has this type of training - yoga and running - helped you to overcome any challenges in your life where you could say "Doing this type of thing has really helped me to overcome this challenge"? Is there anything that comes to mind?

[00:16:16] Interviewee: I don't think I've had any major challenges to overcome in life, but I know that both the yoga and the running seems to have enhanced my life greatly. I can't imagine my life without them. And I know that there's definitely been a mental and emotional shift since I started practicing yoga. I think yoga has this amazing ability to allow you to just sit back and become more mindful. You start to observe yourself more from within and you start to respond more carefully to other people and throughout life rather than reacting instantly. So it's definitely been that, that I've noticed. And similarly with running, we already talked about that moving meditation element. You get to go out and just run and then everything feels much better. 

Interviewer: That's brilliant. Let's go on to nutrition. Do you have advice to give our listeners? There's lots of different advice out there now. You've got the keto, which is good for some people, but maybe not for others. Some people need carbohydrates, maybe. And there's the Paleo diets and there's so much different advice out there about what we should be eating, vegan diets. I spoke to a guy from the Original Gym here, Jon Nicholson. And his advice was simple and it didn't really have any kind of rules about it. It was just to eat, as much as you can, whole natural food, not processed food. But he didn't mention anything about meat and fish and all that, but as far as nutrition goes, to make sure that your body is primed, in tune, as in best performance. What do you think? 

[00:18:14] Interviewee: So my opinion - and in my experience from both personal experience and my experience from seeing results in my students - I recommend a plant-based whole foods diet. So it's a vegan diet, but rather than just using that word vegan, we say plant-based whole foods. So, completely natural foods, unprocessed. Lots of high alkaline foods to keep our PH-levels up. If we allow our PH to drop too much and become too acidic, then that's when we're at much higher risk.

Interviewer: What would those foods look like? The high alkaline ones?

Interviewee: You want high alkaline foods, which are really dark leafy greens. Spinach and kale in particular, spring greens, that kind of thing. And other vegetables as well. Fruits for carbohydrates.

Interviewer: I found this difficult, because I'll wake up in the morning and I want to follow this. I've been challenged to try the vegan diet. I did it for a few weeks and I just wanted rump steak on the barbecue. But then after that, I think "Let me try the keto".  And that's also difficult because I wake up in the morning, I'm like "Okay, cereal". No, cereal is not going to work. It's processed first of all. And if I was on a vegan diet, having eggs is not an option. Breakfast is quite a tricky one, isn't it? What do you have for breakfast on your mornings?

[00:19:56] Interviewee: Well, for breakfast, I do tend to have porridge most mornings. I try and find the most unrefined oats that I can and then I put in chia seeds for protein. So I think that's a good breakfast. Or if you had the time to make a chia seed [00:20:14], coconut milk overnight, then that's also a great really high protein breakfast.

Interviewer: And no sugar?

Interviewee: No sugar.

Interviewer: That's tough.

Interviewee: Maybe you could add date syrup, that's good.

Interviewer: Okay. So you recommend a vegan diet and has that not hindered you in a physical way as in doing sporting things? You don't lack energy?

[00:20:41] Interviewee: No, I have enough energy for sure.

Interviewer: You are getting enough protein in there?

Interviewee: Absolutely, you don't need to eat meat for protein. We get more than enough protein from a well-balanced plant-based diet. And we need to think about also digestion. If we can eat foods that digest easily, then we are left with more energy. So if you go and eat your rump steak, that's gonna put a lot of effort on your digestive system, you are going to be left with less energy. But if we can eat something that's much, much easier to digest like vegetables, then we have much more energy to go run then. 

Interviewer: Yeah. So I read the Sadhguru book, 'Inner Engineering' and he mentioned that fact, when you eat a raw vegetable, that digests in a quicker time than a cooked vegetable, I think you said that. Which is quite an interesting thing. They said that fruits and vegetables digest within two hours in the system. So that's very quick and that we should chew our food a lot, as much as we can, so that our stomach doesn't have to do as much work. I thought it was interesting advice. And I have seen the results myself where I've eaten vegetables and I find that my energy is good after a while, but you don't get that immediate satisfaction, like eating a doughnut, for example. You don't get that immediate rush. And maybe it's an emotional thing. Do you think that we are emotionally attached to our food in the way, we've got maybe a bad relationship with food?

[00:22:18] Interviewee: Yeah. I think many, many people have an emotional attachment to food, for sure. And that can take a while to get over. Perhaps it shouldn't be a case of cutting off the stuff that you love and enjoy 100% straight away. But doing it gradually, cutting down on those high sugary foods gradually is going to be much easier process. You're not cutting yourself off straight away, but you're starting to feel the benefit. 

Interviewer: How long have you been doing the vegan diet?

Interviewee: Almost 10 years.

Interviewer: 10 years. And this is about as long as you've had your business going on? 

Interviewee: Yeah, yeah. So I was mainly vegetarian before that. Then, when was vegetarian, I adjusted a couple of years and then it just came about naturally, really. I just felt like I naturally didn't want to eat dairy anymore. Realized that I was then living pretty much a plant-based diet. 

Interviewer: Let's talk about getting older now. How do you see the future going for yourself, doing this type of exercise? Are you like "I want to stop when I'm 70" or "I'm going stop when I am 80"? How do you see yourself aging in this process?

[00:23:56] Interviewee: That's a good question, because I have thought about that, too. I can't see myself stopping what I'm doing for a long, long time and I would like to think that I am still definitely practicing yoga through my seventies and eighties and possibly even still teaching it. There are plenty of yoga teachers that have gone into their seventies, into their eighties and still been teaching yoga. I think it does have a way of keeping you young. So fingers crossed that happens to me as well. And running as well. I know plenty of runners who are running into their old age. I think if you have that proper efficient strength and mobility, you look after yourself, you're eating the right foods, then there's absolutely no reason why you would need to stop running. Because running is a natural thing to do, we were made to be able to run and move across the land. So yes, we're going to get older, obviously. And that is going to have its effect and we might start to run a bit less or a bit slower, less often, but I can definitely see myself still running. Yeah, definitely until 80, let's say.

Interviewer: Not giving up. I think you've done well in your business, you obviously have these retreats, have people around and go digital as well. Is there a plan for the business to go into different areas or expand or are you happy at the moment that it is as it is?

[00:25:35] Interviewee: It's going to expand, but within what I have already. So I'm gonna stay with my retreats, but my retreats might go to some different venues. I might adjust the content. I regularly do long weekends here in Cornwall, maybe I'm going to extend them to four weeks. Because there's a lot I want to teach on the long weekends, particularly this year, I felt like I needed more time. So I might extend those. I've just launched my first online course and I'm about to film my second online course, so that's going to be launching in October. And then I have ideas for another one for next year. So retreats and online courses. Just giving people more value and looking at what my students really need and I want to be able to offer them that. 

Interviewer: So what is it that you want to teach people at these retreats? You said you didn't have enough time. What is it that you think you missed out? What's the most important things that you want to get across to people?

[00:26:39] Interviewee: It just a lot that we can cover in terms of the yoga practice and different ways of practicing that I want to share with people and that is going to ultimately enhance their running ability. Obviously, you're never going to be able to teach everything on a retreat. A retreat is always going to be an infinite amount of time. And the idea really with it is to inspire people to continue with it. But on these retreats, as well as the yoga, there's also the running workshops. And it was quite hard to fit in all the elements of natural running that we want to cover in a long weekend. So just having maybe a bit more time for that would offer people more to take away with.

Interviewer: I interviewed a lady, Joyce Crawford, she walked a hundred miles in 24 hours. And I spoke to her about the mental challenge of doing that race over 24 hours and trying to stay awake and get there in time. She does nature walks all the time. So always walking out in nature. I'm interested in that connection we have with nature. I just wanted to explore that a little bit with you before we go. How important is it and what benefits do we get from being out in nature? Do we have to think about it differently? Do we have to take our shoes off and walk on the ground sometimes? What do we need to do? 

[00:28:18] Interviewee: Well, I think if you have the opportunity to go barefoot outside whenever you can, I would. The physical perspective of strengthening your feet, I think is an absolutely great idea. But if you don't want to go to barefoot, and it's not always practical to do so, just being outside in nature has incredible benefits to your overall well-being. So it's definitely been shown that being outside in nature boosts our mental well-being, it boosts our inner joy that we have. It makes us feel happier. 

Interviewer: What do you put it down to? Is there a reason for that or can't we put our finger on it? What is it? Why does it do it to us?

Interviewee: I don't know exactly why nature has that effect on us. I think we could maybe find out, but I would say it's where we are meant to be. We're not really meant to be cooped up in boxes and in buildings. We need to be outside in nature. And I think that's our natural habitat and that connection with wildlife and with trees and being in the grass and listening to the ocean and feeling the sunshine, all of that together gives us an incredible boost.

Interviewer: Yeah, I think that the very fact that we need to breathe every few seconds shows our reliance on nature. And the fact that the trees give us oxygen and we give them back carbon dioxide. It's a beautiful relationship.

[00:29:58] Interviewee: Yeah, that's exactly what it is, that relationship.

Interviewer: Yeah. So, Helen, it has been great talking to you. I'm going to put your links on the YouTube description. So for anybody watching on YouTube, check out the description. You'll get some links to Helen's business and a go for a retreat in Cornwall. That'd be great. So I don't know if they get booked up pretty quickly, do they get full quite quick, Helen?

Interviewee: They do tend to sell up pretty quickly, yes. So dates for next year will be up in the autumn, so September or October are released then, the 2020 dates.

Interviewer: So people have to wait a whole year pretty much, if they want to join?

[00:30:44] Interviewee: There will be two or three retreats next year. But yeah, just a couple of months to wait to find out when the dates are to book. 

Interviewer: And how do people follow you? What's the best way? What's the single point to say "Hey, I want to get a hold of Helen", if they don't click on the link, where would they look for you?

Interviewee: Well, the best place is the website runbetterwithyoga.com. And Instagram @runbetterwithyoga. I'm on there regularly.

Interviewer: So you got that name nailed. This is it, Run better with Yoga. 

Interviewee: Yeah. Nice and clear, to the point.

Interviewer: Brilliant. Helen, it has been great talking to you. Thanks for being on the LifeShot podcast.

Interviewee: Thank you so much.