Tonic Talk

Claire Snowdon-Darling is the visionary founder of Balanced Wellness. She is a Senior Practitioner and her practice is based at the head office clinic in Havant, Hampshire. Having been involved in alternative health since 1993 Claire is an expert with a vast amount of knowledge and experience and has helped literally thousands of people to achieve their goals. Claire’s work is unique. She offers cutting edge hormone and digestive protocols that bring together the modern advances in nutritional science with highly effective, effective, specialist Kinesiology techniques. She is renowned for her clarity and wisdom which, combined with her extensive training in a variety of modalities allows her to pinpoint issues and support her clients to transform their lives both physically and emotionally.

Having taught Kinesiology from foundation to advanced levels since 2009, Claire is a Senior Lecturer at Balanced Wellness and is the head of The College Of Functional Kinesiology as the creator of both “Functional Kinesiology”, a four phased approach to working with clients utilising trademarked protocols and methodologies which are now taught to practitioners and “Holding Space” an emotional qualification for therapists to support clients emotional transformation.

Claire is an inspirational speaker and often gives talks on nutrition, emotion and health, both in the UK and Internationally. These dynamic and fascinating talks are highly informative, providing the attendees with tips and techniques they can easily add in to their lives and they are punctuated with both her maverick humour and her deep wisdom and experience. Both her popular blog for The Huffington Post and the podcast “Consciously Healthy” that she co-hosts with Laura Knowles on iTunes and YouTube are regarded by many as thought provoking and entertaining.

Your host Nic Tovey is a relationship and intimacy coach expert in his field, after a fairly ordinary working class childhood in northern England, at 16 I left school and set off in search of adventure and “manhood” and joined the Royal Navy. After 5 years as a Mechanical Engineer and a Diver, I left the Navy, moved to Australia, got married, co-created a couple of kids, and continued a fairly uninspiring but necessary engineering career. Oh and the search for that illusive thing called “manhood” continued.

Nic Tovey has been deeply pondering since boyhood, chasing the elusive “manhood” in all the obvious places; sports, gangs and the military, and coming up short. Until after a life threatening assault and subsequent battle with PTSD and depression, when the man he thought he was fell apart. Nic went on to become a psychotherapist and coach helping other men become their own versions of great men. With powerful and practical wisdom, his Number 1* Amazon bestseller - The (R)Evolutionary Man.

What it means to be a man today is a very different thing than it was for our fathers, and especially for their fathers. We are living in a monumental chapter in the human evolutionary story, where the realms of gender, sexuality and relationships are in a state of massive reinvention. Many of us are waking up to a new way of being, sensing that there's more to life as a man, free from the old and outdated cage of manhood. But there are few examples of how to do what the world today is calling for and we are left trying to work it out for ourselves.

So, join us this week on Tonic Talk has we take a trip down under to explore the word “Man up”, “be a man”, “grow a pair” we’ve heard it all a million times, and we’ve probably said it too, but what does it mean? What is it to “be a man”? This is a question men have been pondering for eons, and in the process, have been setting up some imaginary, barely achievable bar that we’ve been measuring ourselves up against, and failing.

This week on Tonic Talk we introduce you to Redwood (Ellie Williams) is a singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist strategically based between Mid Wales the West Midlands. Known for her powerful, haunting vocals and perfect harmonies, Redwood has been performing on the independent circuit for the last couple of years, stirring up a name for herself. She has shared stages with Quill (Bev Bevan), Dodgy, Nigel Clark and has appeared at numerous festivals such as Mello Festival, Worcester Music Festival and Tenbury Music Festival among others. Her songs have received national and regional airplay on BBC6 Music, BBC Introducing Hereford & Worcester, BBC Introducing Shropshire and BBC Introducing West Midlands.

Redwood (Ellie Williams) takes you on a journey of self discovery talking how she got into music at only 6 years old, her process for writing and her own struggles with mental health at such a young age, we also experience what it means to be Redwood, from silky vocals and dreamy melodies encapsulate Redwood’s song 'The Radio', combining soulful indie-pop styles to create a foot tapping musical masterpiece. Redwood’s catchy lyricism and twangy instrumentals create the perfect mellow ambience, with her lyrics capturing the essence of melancholic feeling, and how music provides an escape.

​’The Radio’ is an upbeat pop song about feeling down! It’s a song about wanting to drown out my negative thoughts by turning the music up on my radio. When I originally wrote it, it started off as a slower song, but then I started playing around with a couple of the notes in the chords on guitar and it sounded so much better in a more upbeat tempo! I got to record this song at Rockfield Studios in South Wales, which was such an amazing experience as the studios have a huge amount of history with other musicians and artists creating music there.” - Ellie Williams

On, this week Tonic Talk - Special Edition 100 Days of Mental Health. We go transatlantic to New York joined by Jim Shoopack who's goal is to save as many lives as he can and eradicate the stigma of mental illness. Jim is a teacher and inspiration for people trying to get back what mental illness has taken from them. He speaks about the hardest 100 days of his life and how he wants to eventually run 100 marathons. He is also fluent in Spanish and has his Doctorate. 

Jim's journey with Mental Health began in February 2001, I started to have the symptoms of clinical depression. The challenge is, for 100 days I didn’t know that how I felt at the time had an actual name. That I could combat it. That I could do something about it. Until I did. Join us has Jim Shoopack takes us through his process over 100 day's, how he took up running, learn about his dog Sonny who he credits with helping to overcome and have the courage to beat his Mental Health. As with all animals, the unconditional love he gave Jim was so necessary and definitely helped …………..A lot. 

The story doesn’t end there, learn about how Jim Shoopack has now completed 21 marathons. Lean why this is so important? Find out about his long term goal long to complete 100 full marathons. Each one 26.2 miles. I want to get the 100 days of life I lost while depressed back. I see a marathon as living two days in one. Is it really? No. But symbolically, you better believe it is.  This week's episode is a must-listen, packed with motivation, optimism, and confidence. We hope more people will talk about their experiences, just like Jim Shoopack always understand, because it truly is ‘Ok Not To Be Ok', particularly if you are a man suffering from mental health issues.

Charlie Russell has joined the Tonic Health Family & Friends this week. He's a Lincolnshire-based singer-songwriter and all-around nice guy. We invited him into this week's episode because he's a man who's not afraid to talk about his feelings, particularly for songwriting, and how emotionally he arrives at a place where he can connect and express himself. During this episode of Tonic Talk, we find out about how Charlie Russell, a regular performer with Spalding Amateur Dramatic Operatic Society (SADOS), came second in the BBC Song for Lincolnshire, after entering the competition for the first time with his song 'Red, Green, Gold and Blue'. He also won the 'best performance' award.

We explore the mental health benefits of singing and songwriting, as well as how music helped during lockdown. Music is an easy way to change your mood or alleviate stress. People use music to control, improve, and reduce negative emotional states in their daily lives (e.g., stress, fatigue). We delve into his musical style, inspirations, and how composing new songs is crucial to his success and creative process. We, discuss his upcoming new album 'A Light In The Dark' acoustic EP released on 30th April, how he feels about retuning to live gigs after such a long time since hospitality and venues had to unfortunately close due a global pandemic.

In this episode, we discuss men's mental health once more, as well as the importance of being open and honest with family and friends about how we're feeling. During lockdown, he would often call his best friend to talk or simply go online to stay in touch. We'll wrap up the episode with a special acoustic song from Charlie Russell 'Future Memories' album called 'Whistle In The Rain.' He's also planning to release three new EPs in 2021, and if you're in the area from April 12th, you can catch him performing live at The Imaginarium in Spalding.