The Story Behind the Name...

The Birth of 'HB Healthy'

HB Healthy is the business name which has been slowly emerging over recent years, and this year with the arrival of a new logo so it feels like the right moment to share the story behind the evolution of this name.

The word healthy means 'wholeness'. To be healthy, whole and complete does not always translate to the absence of physical disease, but relates to our sense of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual wholeness, our ability to connect with and support this natural inner state of being whole.

The name HB Healthy came to me in the months before my dad passed away in 2017. We did not know (consciously at least!), that dad was going to suddenly leave his physical form, but the timing of the seeds for this name arriving seemed to be aligned with this significant event.

My Dad was known by many as JB (for his initials), so in some sense I took the HB part of the business name from that, simple. I started by putting it in the email footer amongst all the business information without saying anything to anyone about it, just to get a feel for it being there. The strange thing about this is that the last email thread with Dad (which were usually infrequent!) happened during the weeks leading to his passing, and being his usual observant self, he had seen the new addition in the email footer and commented that he liked the new business name / ‘tagline’. Always a big source of impartial support and guidance, I took his feedback as a seal of approval, and the idea for the new name stayed!

Alongside the simplicity of my initials, there was also an element of playfulness to this new name. Some friends used to call me ‘H’, and so the name ‘HB Healthy’ was a playful reminder to myself to ‘be healthy’! The significance of this runs deeper, and relates to a personal journey with health…

The definition of health and what is deemed ‘healthy’ holds different meaning for everyone, but what I have learnt is that it is not only what you do in life that creates health, but also ‘how’ you do it.

Around 10 years ago I ‘thought’ I was pretty healthy, but in fact ended up having although not serious, what was for me a fairly major health crisis, in that it left me for some time completely unable to do most of the things I enjoyed doing (working as much as I wanted to, attending Yoga classes, exercising, seeing friends, travelling, etc, etc), and with just about enough stamina left to sometimes work at minimum capacity to keep things bobbing along. In total this went on for over a year.

Initially, I felt embarrassed about being unwell, as though I had failed, and on some level let the side down! I was at the beginnings of my profession as a self-employed health practitioner, surely I should be the picture of health! I felt I was letting clients down by not being able to offer many appointments and needing to take a lot of time off, and that I was not living up to the image of what I was offering!

During this period of ill-health meditation practice took on a whole new meaning (because sitting or laying down was literally all I was capable of at times, and there was not so much space for thinking either!). With this a lot of realisations came, and the whole experience turned into a beautiful opportunity for learning, for personal growth, as I began to reflect on and reassess many aspects of life, including my mindset. I truly believe that this shift in mindset was a significant factor in my health improving again.

I began to realise that prior to becoming unwell, I was doing many things which are considered ‘healthy’, but in a very unhealthy way! I was exercising regularly (probably too much, including too much Yoga asana!), I was eating vegetables and other healthy foods (probably too little and completely at random!), I was meditating every day (probably too rigidly as another thing I was squeezing into the schedule!), I was working doing what I loved (probably too hard, sometimes all night, without giving myself proper days off, working so hard probably also gave me a feeling of being ‘important’!). Overall, I was really excited about life, but with very little balance or grounded-ness. I was running at everything top speed, sometimes in what felt like a thousand directions, with a whole lot of adrenalin! On reflection, I see it as no wonder that I ended up unwell and am grateful to my body for the wakeup call! I now believe this experience of ill-health ripened me into a much better and more compassionate practitioner and human being. I am glad it happened!

I feel that the word heal-thy represents ‘healing thyself’. This reflects that we all have this innate healing ability within us, this capacity to be whole (regardless of what challenges life brings), sometimes we just need a nudge for it to be set in motion. I feel that this is what I offer, a little support and encouragement along the way on your own self-healing journey, to reconnect with your wholeness of being.

This is where the course Yoga and Herbs for Healthy Peaceful Living comes in. I have developed this course not only as a professional with skills to share, but as a human with a story from which I have learnt so much. It is from this personal experience of health and all the learning in the past 10 years that this course has evolved, and I am really excited to share it with you!