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Here's something you probably wouldn't expect from me.I'm Anji, and I'll start with the surprising bit: for twelve years...
10/09/2026

Here's something you probably wouldn't expect from me.

I'm Anji, and I'll start with the surprising bit: for twelve years I worked at Barclays, the last six or so as an Investment Director. And then I walked away from all of it to go and put my hands on people's spines.

Why on earth would anyone do that? Honestly, because I didn't feel like me in banking. I was good at it. But something never quite fit, and it took me years to admit it. Retraining wasn't a tidy career move, it was me finally following the thing I couldn't stop being pulled towards.

And here's why that matters to you: I know exactly what it feels like to be out of your own groove. Competent, getting on with it, but not quite right. So when you tell me something feels off and you can't put your finger on why, I believe you. I've been there. It nearly cost me my health back then, what we'd call burnout now, but getting out saved me.

This is my thing. I'm certain of it in a way I never was about anything before. And that certainty is what I bring to your corner.

A x

A few weeks ago someone got in touch with me after reading what I'd written about movement, and kindly agreed to let me ...
08/09/2026

A few weeks ago someone got in touch with me after reading what I'd written about movement, and kindly agreed to let me share this photo of herself at her desk, because it's where she spends most of her day. Sound familiar? The average office worker now sits for 8-10 hours a day, more than we sleep, and I've been finding out whether sitting really is the new smoking.

The research is sobering: sitting too much is hard on the heart and blood vessels, changes how the body deals with sugar and fat (raising the risk of diabetes, obesity and some cancers), weakens muscles and bones, is linked to anxiety and low mood, and is associated with shorter lifespans. Here's the surprising part though: one workout a day isn't enough to undo it, those molecular changes take time to unwind, so a gym session doesn't cancel out a day spent sitting still. What works better is short, frequent movement breaks throughout the day, and best of all is combining both, regular short breaks plus a proper longer session.

So this week, build "interrupted sitting" into your day, hourly if you can. Vary your position in every meeting or call. Set a timer to move for two minutes, every hour. Pick three small changes that actually fit your schedule and commit to them. Follow along here as I'll be posting daily videos to get you moving at your desk. The alternative isn't pretty. Go on, get up.

A x

06/09/2026

Five minutes a day for a stronger, more stable side đź’Ş

I'm using a 6kg kettlebell here, but you don't need anything fancy to start. A bottle of water works just as well. What matters is consistency, not the weight in your hand.

This simple move strengthens the muscles along your side (your obliques and the muscles that support your pelvis and lower back). These are the muscles we rely on every day for balance, good posture and protecting our spine, but they're so easy to neglect. Building strength here can genuinely make a difference to how your back feels day to day, especially if you're often sitting, lifting, or carrying little ones on one hip.

How to do it:
1. Hold your weight in one hand. Keeping your legs still and your body in one long line, use your pelvis to lower yourself down towards that side.
2. Then lift back up with control.
3. Swap sides and repeat.

Five minutes a day is all it takes. Small, consistent movements add up to real change. Have you tried this one before?

A quieter few weeks here in London after a whirlwind June and July of travel, but "quiet" for a London osteopath still m...
04/09/2026

A quieter few weeks here in London after a whirlwind June and July of travel, but "quiet" for a London osteopath still means a lot going on behind the scenes! Here's a little roundup of what's been keeping me busy:

🏡 A fabulous 24 hours with friends visiting from the Bahamas at their UK home. Jessie loved every minute of the walks with Pete (dog walks really are movement medicine in disguise).

đźš‘ An unscheduled trip to A&E. Don't worry, I'm absolutely fine, but a good reminder that even an osteopath's body needs looking after too. A big thank you to the NHS.

🧺 The washing-machine-breaking, laundry-mountain aftermath of two sons back from bank holiday festivals (Creamfields and Lost Village, if you're wondering). All that hauling of tents, wellies and questionable amounts of laundry is basically a masterclass in why good lifting technique matters! I'll admit, I felt a little left out not being there myself.

🎭 Eyeballing Mrs Higgins' incredible outfits in My Fair Lady and plotting how on earth I recreate that look here in London.

🍅 And my tomato forest, which is absolutely thriving. Though even keen gardeners take note: all that bending and kneeling is exactly the kind of repetitive movement that can catch your lower back out if you're not careful.

As ever, it's the little things that keep me grounded. What's been keeping you busy this summer? Tell me below 👇 And if all that lifting, bending or festival-season chaos has left your back feeling it, you know where to find me at the clinic.

02/09/2026

One of the simplest ways to ease back, neck and jaw pain? It's not a stretch, it's your breath.

Most of us breathe from our chest and shoulders without even realising it. Over time that shallow pattern overworks the muscles in your neck and jaw, and leaves your back doing more than it should.

Your diaphragm is meant to do the heavy lifting. When it's not working properly, everything else picks up the slack, and that's when the tension creeps in.

Try this: lie down, one hand on your chest, one on your belly. Breathe in through your nose and let your belly rise while your chest stays still. Slow exhale out. A few minutes a day is enough to start retraining the pattern.

Simple, but it works. If you want more of my little tips like this, pop me a message and I'll send you the details for my Substack.

Yes, that’s a photo of Marks & Spencer on my grid, and no, I haven’t lost the plot. Eight months ago this week, just bef...
31/08/2026

Yes, that’s a photo of Marks & Spencer on my grid, and no, I haven’t lost the plot. Eight months ago this week, just before Christmas, I slipped on a wet floor in that exact store and in seconds went from a physio and yoga teacher who moves for a living to someone who couldn’t put weight on my own leg. A grade 4c hamstring tear and an avulsion fracture. This is the kind of injury that makes even the orthopaedic surgeons pause. This is what happened next ...

My wonderful oestopath and the brilliant team at Fortius sat with me and we made the call: no surgery. Instead, rest, patience, and trust in the body’s own ability to repair itself and to expect a recovery of 6 to 9 months. I spent the first few weeks flat on my back, barely able to do more than lie there. And I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a good cry about it. Losing my usual life of movement, clients and teaching overnight, right before Christmas, was hard. But I used that enforced stillness for something I’d been putting off for years: I started writing the first draft of my book.

What you don’t always see between the “before” and “after” is the unglamorous middle bit. The daily back care exercises I’d been teaching my own patients for years, now doing them myself, over and over, long before I trusted my leg again. Some days felt like progress, others like I’d gone backwards.

Eight months on, and here’s where it gets good. I’ve taught three retreats. I’ve danced in Ibiza. I’ve wild swum in every stretch of water I could find. I even ended up meeting Munya Chawawa along the way (yes, really). And this week, I was back in the gym, able to single leg press on the same leg that eight months ago couldn’t hold my own bodyweight.

Am I fully back to 2025 me? Nope. I still get aches, and my left leg isn’t as strong as it used to be. But here’s what I keep coming back to: the human body is amazing. It is working to heal you, all the time, even when you can’t feel it happening. If there’s one thing this year has taught me, it’s this - get the advice you need, trust the process, and keep going. There’s a lot more to this journey than fits in one caption. Swipe through to see it, month by month.

I'm pretty sure I feel like this every single year. We hit September and (whisper it) admit that the summer holiday wasn...
27/08/2026

I'm pretty sure I feel like this every single year. We hit September and (whisper it) admit that the summer holiday wasn't actually all that relaxing. In our heads it's a panacea. New clothes, ChatGPT itineraries, the best beaches, the best hotels, and then we come home more tired than we left. The Googling, the airports, the hire car, the queues, the teenagers moaning, a pile of washing waiting at the door. A holiday moves you somewhere else. It's rarely the same thing as rest.

A retreat is not that. It's not a holiday and it's not a boot camp. It's space, time, and a pause to work out who you are right now. In Spain we start at 8am in the yoga shala looking out over the sea, breakfast is at 10.30 with our chef Javier, and the day is yours until lunch. The pool, the hills, treatments with genuinely wonderful therapists. We come back together at 4.30 for breathwork and yoga nidra, eat dinner as a group at seven, and there's one afternoon completely off. Every one of those decisions, like where to eat, what to do, whether everyone else is happy, has already been made for you. Hooray!

That's the actual difference. For one week the questions stop. You don't check TripAdvisor, you don't keep one eye on anyone else, you don't do a single thing for your partner, your teenagers or your inbox. Around 50% of my September guests rebook, and about half of everyone in the room on any given retreat has already been before. One of them put it better than I ever could: "I came wrecked. I left restored."

So this isn't really a hard sell, but it is a nudge. If you need time (and I suspect a lot of us do), September in Spain is where I'll be, with a shala, a pool, and nothing on the schedule but you. Message me to grab one of the last spots before the year fills back up.

A x

Meet the muscle you've probably never thanked: your diaphragm. It works around 20,000 times a day, every single day, wit...
25/08/2026

Meet the muscle you've probably never thanked: your diaphragm. It works around 20,000 times a day, every single day, without you ever telling it to, and yet most of us have no idea it's even there.

It's not just about breathing. This dome-shaped muscle helps stabilise your spine, calms your nervous system, and can even affect how well you perform in a workout. But here's the catch: its performance can drop 20-40% as we age, and things like poor posture, stress and one-sided movement patterns quietly compromise it long before we notice.

The good news? A few minutes of intentional breathing a day is enough to bring it back online. As the old yogic texts put it: when the breath is unsteady, the mind is unsteady ... when the breath is steady, the mind grows steady too.

I've written a full breakdown of how your diaphragm works, why it matters more than you'd think, and simple ways to start training it. Message me for the link, or for any advice. My inbox is always open.

25/08/2026

A look back at this beautiful six-day Advaita Vedanta & Yoga Retreat at Shambala Gatherings comes to a close, I’m taking a moment to soak in the peace and beauty of the Swedish forest.

Alongside Swamini Chidekarasananda Saraswati, we’ve spent our days exploring Advaita Vedanta, yoga, meditation, mantra chanting and breathwork. Held by restorative practice, nourishing vegan food and long, unhurried hours immersed in nature.

There’s something special about stepping away from everyday life to learn, reflect and reconnect. Advaita Vedanta teaches us about Oneness; yoga invites us to feel that connection through body, breath and mind.

As an osteopath, I spend my days telling patients to rest, to move well, to listen to their bodies, and I can’t ask that of anyone if I’m not doing it myself. Time like this isn’t a break from my work, it’s part of it. I can’t pour from an empty cup, so this is how I keep mine full.

Six days of learning, movement, stillness and wonderful company in this beautiful corner of Sweden.

NatureImmersion MindfulLiving ShambalaGatherings SwedenRetreat

24/08/2026

A look back at this beautiful six-day Advaita Vedanta & Yoga Retreat at Shambala Gatherings comes to a close, I'm taking a moment to soak in the peace and beauty of the Swedish forest.

Alongside Swamini Chidekarasananda Saraswati, we've spent our days exploring Advaita Vedanta, yoga, meditation, mantra chanting and breathwork. Held by restorative practice, nourishing vegan food and long, unhurried hours immersed in nature.

There's something special about stepping away from everyday life to learn, reflect and reconnect. Advaita Vedanta teaches us about Oneness; yoga invites us to feel that connection through body, breath and mind.

As an osteopath, I spend my days telling patients to rest, to move well, to listen to their bodies, and I can't ask that of anyone if I'm not doing it myself. Time like this isn't a break from my work, it's part of it. I can't pour from an empty cup, so this is how I keep mine full.

Six days of learning, movement, stillness and wonderful company in this beautiful corner of Sweden.

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