Curiously Connected

16/09/2025

Great words Martin McPhilimey MSc MRes - Scientific Consultant

Every breath you take begins with a small cluster of neurons in the brainstem generating its own rhythmic electrical impulse. This spontaneous spark initiates movement, drawing air into the lungs, transferring oxygen into the bloodstream, and fuelling the body’s metabolic demands. In that moment, breathing is not simply a mechanical act: it is the foundation of arousal, readiness, and the perceptual intensity that prepares you to engage with the world.

Breathing is not merely air flowing in and out. It is the root of your vitality—the thread that binds your physiology, emotions, and behaviours. It is both the rhythm of your body and the quiet scaffolding of your mind. Philosophically, it sits at the threshold between the unconscious and the conscious, a biological reflex that you can also shape with awareness. In this way, breath embodies the paradox of human existence: automatic yet voluntary, physical yet spiritual.

It is time we began to recognise that the way we breathe shapes the way we live. Breath patterns influence our perception, our states of arousal, and ultimately the way we perceive the world itself. By changing our breathing, we alter not only our physiology but also the lens through which we experience reality.

Science is only beginning to map the profound relationship between breath, brain, and body. We are still scratching the surface of how respiration interlaces with attention, emotion, and selfhood. Yet, what is already clear is that conscious engagement with breathing- what we call breathwork, offers the possibility of profound shifts in health, resilience, and meaning.

This is why our mission as a industry together is to raise awareness, deepen understanding, and create pathways for individuals to use breath as a tool for connection, connection to health, to each other, and to the deeper significance of life itself. If embraced, breathing has the power to help humanity move towards lives that are healthier, happier, and more deeply aligned with purpose.

14/09/2025

Spending dedicated time mastering a regulated, smooth and coordinated breathing pattern can reap massive rewards in health and performance.

If you are looking for a breathing ‘MOT’ messsage for an appointment. I provide a physiotherapy level assessment with step by step guidance for optimal trchnique.

Suitable for
- Gaining confidence in your breath - particularly when reliant on inhalers
- Reducing breathing anxiety
- Improving performance
- if you notice you breath shallow or fast
- most chronic health conditions

If this sounds of interest I’d love to hear from you 🌱

07/09/2025

Another wonderful weekend providing craniosacral therapy supporting Reclaim Your Self Yoga Retreats at The Dell Of Abernethy in the Cairngorms National Park.

Saturdays energy was one of bringing calm, helping settle the chaos of travel and settle into the richness of retreat 🌱

Sunday, wild and windy - reflecting the deep and profound work on the table 🪴

When only one session is available, its remarkable how the body knows to make the most of what’s on offer 🙌

05/09/2025

Katiewhiteyoga these words have landed in a particulary delicious way this morning, just having watched the red glow of the sun rise

The untouched hours of the day..

Priming my nervous system for presence…

Starting the day already having done the hard thing…

M O R N I N G R I T U A L

September 15-19th 6:45-8am FLOW (promise I will end at 8am)

Early morning yoga is sacred. Movement and breath in the untouched hours of the day prime your nervous system for presence. You operate on a different frequency throughout the day when you've started the day having already done the hard thing.

FLOW classes are based on the Rocket Ashtanga sequence - in the MORNING RITUAL we'll explore the same dynamic sequence for familiarity and progression throughout the week.

I would encourage you to book for all 5 days to experience the benefits of consistent practice. Life, however, has it's own rhythms that need tending to - so of course, drop into the days you can.

Drop ins, monthly unlimited, 5 & 10 class passes can be used.

x Katie

20/08/2025

“Rooted in presence, relationship and embodied wisdom” describes the attributes of my life’s calling - craniosacral therapy. Every story, every session, every body deepens the layers of possibility.

Powerful words below 👇

Our hands hold stories of comfort, connection, and care. To place a hand on a wound, a heart, or a weary body is to return to something timeless: the truth that we are all made to care for each other.

In Craniosacral Therapy, our hands become listeners— tuning into the body’s natural rhythms, its subtle tides and pulsations. This is not about imposing something from the outside, but about creating a safe space where the body’s innate healing intelligence can emerge.

Our touch becomes a bridge — where our electromagnetic fields attune, nervous systems co-regulate, and something shifts at a level deeper than words.

We’re inviting the whole system back to a place of coherence, safety, and trust. This is why healing with the hands is so profoundly human — it reminds us that true healing is never just physical; it’s energetic, emotional, and relational.

🌀 At Craniosacral Collaborative, we believe in lifelong learning rooted in presence, relationship, and embodied wisdom. Our courses are designed to support your growth as a practitioner, deepen your capacity to meet others, and awaken new layers of connection — to yourself, your clients, and the world around you.

Image with appreciation to 🙏🏼

04/08/2025

04/08/2025

25/07/2025

25/07/2025

Highly recommended

You are the steady Earth
You are the flowing Water
You are the burning Fire
You are the expansive Air
You are the still EXPANSIVE Space

Coming Home - An exploration of yourself through the lens of Elemental Yoga Theory & Forest Bathing

Yoga Weekend Intensive August 22-24th 2025

15 hour yoga intensive to look deep into yourself through the lens of Elemental Wisdom. Through vinyasa yoga, pranayama, meditation, mantra you'll quietly tune into the conversation you're body is in with nature.

Leave feeling more in tune, more connected, more peaceful within yourself and the world around you.

Hands on assists, alignment workshops, how to of pranayama, meditation and a led Forest Bathing session - part retreat, part training, all expansive ✨
Friday 5-8pm
Saturday 10-5
Sunday 10-5 includes Forest Bathing

This weekend intensive is ideal for:

Yoga teachers seeking to gain in depth knowledge of Elemental theory and implement it into their teaching repertoire with a theory-informed foundation

Anyone interested in understanding how philosophy met with the physical practice of yoga, meditation and pranayama supports physical, emotional, and energetic balance

Those looking for understand how to move, breathe and be in relationship to nature.

Those curious to explore a full weekend dedicated to themselves

At my studio in Grantown on Spey and Forest Bathing in local woods.

3 spots left

02/11/2024

Comparison of Craniosacral Therapy and Myofascial Relaxation Techniques in People with Migraine Headache: A Randomized Controlled Study
"For the participants in this study, CST and MFT techniques reduced migraine headache, temporomandibular disorder level, drug consumption, and functional disability levels, and increased cervical region ROM. These results suggest that CST techniques could be considered in migraine treatment as one of the clinical practical applications within the framework of a certain protocol."
Click on this link: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1556370724000208

23/10/2024

Such great advice — and…. craniosacral therapy can support optimal fluid movement within the brain to help this process.
If you have never experienced the calming and deeply nourishing effcets of this subtle, yet profound therapy - give it a try!
Reported benefits:

🌱 Very calming

🌸 Re-establishes connection with self

🌱 Improved sleep quality

🌸 Improved ability to fall asleep

🌱 More grounded

🌸 Improved vitality

🌱 Improved sense of regulation - emotionally and physically

If you have experienced craniosacral therapy - please pop a note of your experiences in the comments below!

Did you know one night of lack of sleep drives inflammation of the brain?

Light from TVs, bulbs will be detected through the eye and send signals that to the brain that it’s daytime.

The glymphatic system will not relax without darkness, with incomplete stages of sleep come the increased risk heart disease, and autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis

If you are suffering from any health issues, don’t discount low quality sleep.

The reason is that we have an inbuilt dishwasher system that clears the brain of toxins at night. It’s important because the neural signals tell the rest of the body how to operate, so if toxins build up in the brain.

During deep sleep your brain relaxes and allows the release of CSF via tight junctions and communication with the ‘glymphatic’ system.

The glymphatic system is a fluid-transport system that accesses all regions of the brain. It facilitates the exchange of cerebrospinal fluid and interstitial fluid and clears waste from the metabolically active brain.

It exports fluid and solutes from metabolically active neural tissue. The organization of brain and ocular (eye) fluid flow can be divided into four distinct segments.

The first segment of the brain glymphatic system includes CSF production (purple arrows) and circulation in the subarachnoid space (SAS, light purple arrow).

This is why it’s very important to make sure you limit blue light exposure to your eyes after dusk.

Light from TVs, bulbs will be detected through the eye and send signals to the brain that it’s day time. The glymphatic system will not relax without darkness, found in the complete stages of sleep.

Other interruptions are breathing. If you breathe through the mouth at night, the brain has to monitor the airway, make sure to breathe through the nose, to help this system clear properly and pump CSF up the spine.

Blue light blocking glasses are one tool. Mouth taping is another tool. Watching the morning sunlight, with deep nasal breathing, helps to tell your nervous system to relax 12 hours later!

Do you feel like you wake up tired or unrefreshed?

16/10/2024

Always good to have the back up

This pre-registered systematic review and multilevel meta-analysis examined the effects of receiving touch for promoting mental and physical well-being, quantifying the efficacy of touch interventions for different ways of administration.