The Maslow Podcast – episode 1 [transcript ]
GERY: Hello, everyone.
CHLOE: Hello.
GERY: You’re listening to the Maslow podcast, a podcast about human needs.
CHLOE: An offshoot of Maslow magazine, a platform inspired by Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, dedicated to exploring what it really means to live a fulfilled life today.
GERY: I’m Gery, a host and podcast editor, alongside…
CHLOE: Chloe, your co-host.
GERY: Recent studies show that there is a loneliness epidemic among young people.
CHLOE: According to Harvard research, the UK is 20th among 22 countries in human flourishing.
GERY: And honestly, it makes sense, we are all craving connection, meaning and sense of belonging.
CHLOE: That’s where this podcast comes in. The Maslow Podcast is your weekly reminder of the human needs we all share and how to meet them in a modern world that often tells us to ignore them,
GERY: Fundamental needs like safety and food,
CHLOE: the need for belonging
GERY: and finally, self-fulfillment. Each week, we’ll talk to experts, from campaigners to psychologists and nutritionists to creatives to dig into the things that make us feel grounded, connected and truly alive.
CHLOE: So, whether you’re figuring it out, feeling stuck or just looking for real conversation, you’re in the right place. Let’s get into it.
[Sound of train]
TRAIN ANNOUNCER: You next station is Stratford change for the central line, DLR.
GERY: Hello, everyone.
CHLOE: We’re here at Stratford Community sauna, interviewing Shaun Wood, who does sound baths in saunas.
[Sound of sound bath]
CHLOE: How was your day? How was the sauna?
SHAUN: The session was nice. Yeah, it was really relaxed. I was a bit tired, so I was grateful to have saw the sound bath session myself.
CHLOE: Lovely. And how long have you been doing sound baths?
SHAUN: About four years ago, I started helping my mum with her sound baths. And then almost two years ago, in September 2023 I started doing sound baths in the sauna in Hackney Wick community sauna. I pitched them the idea of doing sound baths inside sauna, and they were like, let’s give it a go. The trial went well. It started selling out, and I’ve been doing them ever since.
CHLOE: And how long has your mum been doing sound baths?
I think about five, six years. She’s a multidisciplinary therapist. She does all kinds of things like massage, yoga teacher. She’s a doula. You name it, she does it.
I think she went to a sound bath and was blown away by it. And then, then did a course, bought the guns and singing bowls and everything. And, yeah, it’s been quite a nice thing to see my mum go from purely sort of somatic body, body work to incorporating sound, especially as a musician myself, I was like, ‘Oh, my mom’s getting into playing.’ That’s, that’s, yeah, quite a sweet thing.
It’s a nice thing that we can share, I feel like she’s found the almost abstract, intangible benefits of sound. Whereas doing yoga, it’s very clear what, often, what you’re getting from the different postures. You’re improving your flexibility, your balance, your physiological awareness. When you’re experiencing a sound bath, the actual thing that is affecting you be at the sound or the vibrations of the instruments, feels like more of an abstract thing, but people report having amazing experiences as a result from almost like having, dreamlike visions, to just people just being like, I’m so super relaxed right now, or that was a really emotional experience, even though you know you’re in effect, just playing some sounds with a relaxing sensibility.
The instruments themselves are, I think, special because they aren’t just playing a single note. Often, they have multiple notes sounding at the same time when you play them, and they’re very sort of complex sonically, which I think adds to their therapeutic effect. Because there are multiple things going on at once. It kind of confuses your brain. You have to relax. That’s the way I see it. And I think, I think there is also something, something to being in a space where the person that is leading the session is basically just allowing you the opportunity to just relax and be or to bring your attention to your body in a calm, centered way.
CHLOE: What do you find is the general age demographic of people who come to the sound bath saunas.
SHAUN: To be honest, it’s really but it’s, I think it spans all ages. I don’t think, I’m not sure if I’ve had anyone in the late 70s in a session of mine, but I wouldn’t rule it out. I Yeah. So, for example, today’s sound bath. I don’t think anyone in there was below or like was mid to early 20s. But I do also get, you know, early, mid early 20s people. The other day, there are some, some lads in there who literally looked 19, you know, so, so, yeah, people of all ages.
I think maybe because I’m 30, I think I appealed to 20 somethings and 30 somethings perhaps a bit more directly, but I think it’s just, it’s broad. It’s like, if you like going to the sauna and you want to try out a sound buff you might come along to my session. I think there tend to be more female or femme people in my sessions or at least work initially. But I think that just tends to be like more, or to generalize, more of a tendency towards trying different things for wellness, but the gender balance has been, has been shifting over, over, you know, a few the past couple of years. Maybe it’s with the kind of bring your boyfriend along to a thing, and they’re like, Oh, this is actually good, you know,
CHLOE: So, because Maslow, Maslow the podcast, as well as Maslow the magazine, is kind of about meeting human needs for belonging and self-fulfillment. Do you think there’s a belonging or a community aspect to sound baths or the community spa … spauna, haha a new word
SHAUN: the spauna, spawning community. Yeah. I think there’s definitely community aspect to coming to the sauna. It’s definitely the kind of place that people come to every week. You know, I think a lot of people are like, this is, this is my weekly routine, or multiple weekly routine. And I think the sauna sound bath tends to be, you know, a cherry on top wellness treat in amongst their common sauna routine. So I think the people that come to my sessions most regularly might come once a month, and because the session for the most part, is silent, though, in between the 10 minute rounds, you can, you know, cool off, chat, etc., I think it, it feels communal, but there’s not a lot of, like interpersonal connection necessarily, though, though people do make friends as well. I’ve, you know, I’ve seen people make friends in the few minutes in between the different sessions.
But, yeah, I think just having a place like the community sauna. I think venues are really important for providing community, not necessarily, I think more so than sessions in and of themselves. Those sessions are great because they provide a focus to the activity. I think having a place that you know where you can do all these different things and meet people that have something similar in common with you, even if it’s just looking after your wellbeing, I think, is enough to provide a sort of platform for wellness and community building.
I’m quite interested in nutrition, and I do meditation daily, or at least try to. I go on meditation retreats that are pretty intense, which, which, I think, yeah, are, I don’t know, like a significant thing that I do for my mental and spiritual wellbeing. And I, yeah, I do regular exercise. I’m learning gymnastics, which is quite fun. So that’s a, that’s definitely a wellbeing activity, also a communal activity, because, you know, you’re at the gym with other people, and you know, if you do a good flip, everyone claps, which is nice. But, yeah, I do, I do prioritize my wellbeing, but I do also do a lot of different things and do a lot of work, so I find myself oftentimes burning out. And actually, these sessions help me to find space to unwind as well. I get benefits from the sessions when I do them, yeah, I think like, if I’ve had a busy week, and then they come in and do a sound but. I feel, yeah, I feel a lot better. There’s something cleansing
CHLOE: what kind of meditation retreats are there?
They’re silent, yeah, they’re silent meditation retreats, yeah, yeah, the passenger meditation as taught by S. N. Goenka, who, yeah, who isn’t, is no longer alive, but there the recordings of his teachings are played as part of the meditation program. It’s, yeah, it’s 10 days of lots and lots of meditation a day. And yeah, it’s, it’s very difficult, but very, very rewarding.
CHLOE: How long are they four at a time?
SHAUN: 10 days. Yeah, well, you can, after you’ve done your first 10 day you can then do three-day ones. But 10 days, I think, tends to be the common course then. So, the meditation retreats are in Suffolk and Herefordshire, but also went back in London, there is a meditation there’s a guy who basically has a shed that he lets people come in to come to meditate. And so like, I think, like 7pm every evening, or 10 till 1pm on a Sunday, you can go to the Dhamma shed as it’s not as it’s known to meditate with other people, but also you can, you know, do it in the comfort of your own home, if you’d like,
GERY: how did your life change, from like not doing this to doing this? Now? Did you notice, like, anything, maybe in your body or mind, that has shifted ever since
SHAUN: I have learned to find more stillness in my in the way that I interact with life. I think having to even just like a calm space, even if you don’t want to call it a therapeutic one, a space where people have come to find some calm and some quiet, and either to reflect or just to kind of be present in in the moment requires you to be, to kind of be less, sort of ego, egotistical, or even just less energetically intense. I think beforehand, I was quite an energetic person. I still am quite energetic, but I think I was a bit more, more of a chaotic energy than I am, than I am now I’ve calmed down a lot, which I’m grateful, grateful for something that my mum, whether whenever I was initially helping her sessions, she’d be telling me off for being too like, I don’t know, for Just like, being bit too loud or a bit too hasty. And so, I’m grateful for her showing an example of how to hold a session. And through my own practice, both performing sound baths, and also my meditation practice, or just general, like reflective practices, I’ve come to come to better embody that.
GERY: And why did you feel like you have to change that part about you?
SHAUN: my scattiness came from a place of impatience and a place of needing to constantly stimulate myself in some way, and though I love my energy and my capacity to be fun and lively, I think with an increased capacity to be grounded and still, I can be lively, but from a less unstable place, which also allows other people to see that modeled, so that they can better embody that for themselves.
GERY: So now you’re essentially focusing your energy better in a better way,
SHAUN: more efficiently.
CHLOE: It’s a lot of responsibility as well, like holding that space, being responsible for that space,
SHAUN: yeah, yeah, I think so. I think I’ve, people have told me horror stories of going to sound bath sessions where people have not been good at holding that space. They either they’ve they just weren’t mindful of just simple, practical things like not whacking a gong too close to someone’s head or, you know, but or in general, just you can sense that they’re a very anxious person, and which is like, there’s nothing wrong with being anxious. But I think in that space, when you’re trying to help people to be to feel at ease, or feel like you in a way, you’re holding them, can mean that you might not feel safe to fully, kind of relax and release.
So, yeah, it is a big responsibility, and in a way, fake it till you make it is true, like if there is a responsibility upon you to embody a certain way of being, and there are people sitting in the sauna waiting for you to do that. I think it is a lot easier to just be like, Okay, I’m going to do that, because it almost takes more energy to fight against that expectation. So, I think it’s actually remarkably good. I’m a big proponent of social pressure. I mean, I think it’s useful, like, if I want to do something that perhaps I’ve been avoiding, I often tell a friend that I’m going to do it, so that there is some social expectation for me to do it, which helps me to do it. And I think the same is the case in these sessions. People expect me to hold the space vaguely in a certain way, and so I’m better capable of doing that. Yeah, so I’m so that’s why I’m grateful for these sessions, because they encourage you to snap out of your everyday rubbish, and to just be present and to hold that space.
Yeah, I feel capable of dealing with whatever arises. Yeah, I also just my, my person, in my personality, in my relationships to my friends. I’m often, often a caring role. So, like, it’s not like, it’s not something that that I’m having to put on. It’s just I’m, I’m, you know, stepping back into that role that i often embody, and I enjoy embodying. I like helping people. I if you were to psychoanalyze more, maybe, maybe there’s a sense of wanting to have control over, over things that aren’t like destabilized, and to help find more stability, and to help people find more stability, which and therefore find help myself to feel more stable, but in general, also like I just like people. It just, it’s just I get so much positive feedback from my own body when helping people.
CHLOE: What would you say to say a 24-year-old Shaun or just a random 24-year-old just kind of got that chaotic energy like is just constantly having to stimulate themselves? What would your advice be to them? From this phase,
SHAUN: I would say, start meditating. I’d even step further back. And I would say, if you genuinely want to find more peace in your life, then seek out practices that help you to do that. And I found useful way to help you to have the discipline, to start to learn practice is to do something, do a retreat. It doesn’t have to be that, you know, that school that I’ve went to, you know, there are lots to be learned from, lots of different places. And, you know, there’s lots to be learned from therapists and, or even just talking about with your friends and trying to work it out through just conversation. Or, you know, I’ve started doing little voice notes to myself to kind of do a little interior monolog to work out things that are happening with me emotionally, like there are loads of different ways to help yourself find more calm and to find more groundedness. But what I would say is just start and try to do it regularly, even if it’s just 10 minutes a day, because you’ll find that once you’ve got that entrenched that as a habit. Then bit by bit, you know, week by week, you’ll get new insights that will come up and more. And you know, more things will process, and you’ll realize more things about yourself, and you’ll be you’ll become more of an honest, accountable, capable person, which is, which is what, ideally what you want. And I think, recognizing that you aren’t perfect, even though you’re even if you’re a capable person, recognizing that there is still more that you can refine about yourself, you know, in order to be a better person in the world, I think, is the best thing.
[Sound of sound bath]
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