Stillness in the Storms

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Back to Basics: Why Meditate?
Description
You've tried meditation. Maybe you dip in and out of it. You feel a little better for a few days, then life gets loud and you forget. Then you snap at someone, or you fire off the email you regret, and you think "I know better than this." This episode is for you, and honestly, it's for me too.
In this back to basics episode, I bust the biggest myths about meditation. I talk about why we don't meditate to clear the mind, why five minutes really is enough, why a wandering mind is not a failed mind, and why the real test of meditation is not how peaceful you feel on the cushion, but how you handle the family barbecue, the doctor's waiting room, and the colleague who winds you up.
If you've ever felt like you're doing meditation wrong, this is your invitation to start again. Simply, honestly, and from wherever you are.
Key topics
Why meditation matters in real life, not just on the cushion
The seven biggest myths about meditation, busted
The gap between thought and reaction, and why it's the whole game
Why little and often beats long and rare
How to know if your meditation practice is actually working

Companion meditation
Inner Peace Meditations #99: Peace Right Where You Are. A simple five minute guided meditation to go with this episode. No visualisation, no setup, no special place. Just breath, thoughts, and the peace that's already here.
With thanks to
Sin, Margaret, Annie, Melike, Helen, Laura, Adam, Dominique, and a special welcome to Linda who has just joined as a new monthly supporter. You are the reason this podcast stays advert free.
If this episode meant something to you, please share it with someone who might need it, leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or treat me to a coffee at stevenwebb.uk.

Links to Steven Webb's podcast and how you can support his work.
Donate paypal.me/stevenwebb or Coffee stevenwebb.uk
Steven's courses, podcasts and links: stevenwebb.uk

The Dignity of Being Tired: Give Yourself a Break
What if tiredness isn't weakness? What if it's the most honest thing your body is telling you?
In this episode, we talk about why we treat exhaustion like a personal failure instead of listening to what it's actually telling us. I share what it was like being Mayor of Truro, running on empty, showing up to every event because stopping felt like letting people down. We explore why busyness has become a badge of honour, why animals rest without guilt and we can't, and what actually happens in your brain when you don't get proper rest. This isn't about life hacks. It's about giving yourself permission to stop before you have nothing left.
Key topics:
Why tiredness is not a weakness but honest information from your body
The culture of celebrating exhaustion as proof of commitment
What happens in your brain during deep sleep and why rest matters
Thich Nhat Hanh on how animals rest and heal without guilt
Practical permission to disconnect and stop being on call

Companion meditation: Inner Peace Meditations #98 — Permission to Rest
If this episode meant something to you, please share it, leave a review, or treat me to a coffee: stevenwebb.uk
With thanks to: Senga, Sujata, Jack, Denise, Glenn, Aileen, Joe, Laurie, Barb, Audra, Bronwyn, and Emily.

Links to Steven Webb's podcast and how you can support his work.
Donate paypal.me/stevenwebb or Coffee stevenwebb.uk
Steven's courses, podcasts and links: stevenwebb.uk

What Rises When You Stop Pushing
An Easter Sunday conversation about what comes back to us when we finally stop forcing. Steven opens with daffodils appearing on Cornish roadsides and moves into a wide-ranging reflection on renewal — drawing on Alan Watts, Shunryu Suzuki, and Junpo Denis Kelly to explore why the things we thought we'd lost often return on their own. This one speaks directly to anyone at a low point.
All episodes of Stillness in the Storms are brought to you without adverts by the generous donations of listeners treating Steven to a coffee.
DETAILS
Level: All levels Type: Conversational podcast episode Duration: ~20:00 Companion meditation: Inner Peace Meditations EP97 — "Find the Green Shoot"
IN THIS EPISODE
Daffodils on roadsides and what spring actually looks like before it looks like spring
Alan Watts on waves and rhythm — the wave rises, crests, and falls, but the ocean never runs out of waves
Junpo Denis Kelly on what arises first: caring. Anger comes from caring.
Shunryu Suzuki and beginner's mind — meeting the season as though you've never seen one before
A reference to Tony Hoagland's poem "The Color of the Sky" and the line about the end turning out to be the middle
Steven's own recent hospital stay and what it clarified about renewal
A direct word to anyone feeling behind or broken: you're neither

WHO IS THIS FOR?
You're going through a difficult period and need to hear that it doesn't last forever — without being told to think positive
You're curious about Alan Watts, Zen philosophy, or contemplative ideas but want them grounded in real life, not theory
You've been forcing yourself to recover, improve, or move on and it's not working
You want a thoughtful Easter listen that goes deeper than chocolate eggs
You enjoy Steven's conversational style and want something reflective to sit with over a cup of tea

WHAT YOU'LL TAKE AWAY
A different way to think about low points — not as failure but as the turning point of a wave
Permission to stop forcing renewal and trust that some things return on their own
A felt sense of being spoken to honestly by someone who has been there
Fresh ways into Watts, Suzuki, and Kelly that connect to everyday experience
The companion meditation (IPM EP97) as a practice to carry the themes further

ABOUT STEVEN WEBB
Steven Webb is a meditation teacher, podcaster, politician, and the host of Inner Peace Meditations. A former mayor of Truro in the county of Cornwall, Steven continues to split his time between politics and the contemplative work he is best known for. After a life-changing accident left him paralysed from the chest down, he found his way to inner peace through mindfulness, Zen philosophy, and the teachings of Alan Watts and Shunryu Suzuki. He now helps others find calm and resilience — especially those who find meditation difficult. Steven lives in Cornwall, England and shares his work at stevenwebb.com. You can also find his podcast on politics and public life, Stillness in the Storms, at https://stillnessinthestorms.com/
KEYWORDS
stillness in the storms, renewal, spring, Alan Watts, Shunryu Suzuki, Junpo Denis Kelly, beginner's mind, Easter, inner peace, low point, waves

Links to Steven Webb's podcast and how you can support his work.
Donate paypal.me/stevenwebb or Coffee stevenwebb.uk
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Finding Inner Peace: Do You Need to Be a Buddhist?
Host: Steven Webb Website: stevenwebb.uk
Have you ever caught yourself collecting meditation apps, lining up Buddhist statues on a shelf, and wondering if you're doing peace wrong? In this honest Sunday morning episode — recorded while recovering from an operation and still on painkillers — Steven asks a question that quietly nags at a lot of seekers: do you actually need to call yourself a Buddhist to find inner peace?
Steven traces his own path from collecting the accessories of Buddhism to hitting rock bottom at forty, when inner peace stopped being a nice idea and became something he genuinely needed. What he found was that suffering doesn't come from life itself — it comes from our relationship to it. The clinging. The resistance. The stories we tell ourselves about what should be happening instead of what is.
Drawing on Alan Watts's famous reminder that "the menu is not the meal," Steven makes a gentle but clear distinction: the label, the tradition, the institution — that's the menu. The direct experience of stillness, right where you are — that's the meal. He also explores Jun Po Denis Kelly's Mondo Zen approach, where awakening isn't reserved for monasteries but happens in ordinary, messy, everyday life.
Along the way, Steven touches on the different branches of Buddhism — Theravada, Mahayana, Tibetan, Zen — and points out that the core practices of meditation, mindful awareness, and compassion don't ask you to believe in anything at all. He shares one of his favourite insights: that every one of us interprets reality differently through our own senses and brain — and understanding that simple fact is where real compassion begins.
Steven's conclusion? He's not a Buddhist. Not really a Christian either. But the teachings of compassion, understanding, and love that run through all traditions? Those he agrees with completely. And the world, he says, could use a lot more of all three.
Key Takeaways
Suffering comes from our relationship to life, not from life itself. It's the clinging and the resistance that create the pain, not the circumstances.
The menu is not the meal. Labels, traditions, and institutions point toward inner peace — but they aren't the experience itself. Direct stillness is.
You don't need to be a Buddhist to practise Buddhism's core teachings. Meditation, mindful awareness, and compassion require no belief system.
Awakening happens in ordinary life. Jun Po Denis Kelly's Mondo Zen reminds us that you don't need a monastery — you need honesty and presence, right where you are.
We all experience reality differently. Understanding that each person's brain interprets the world in its own way is the beginning of genuine compassion.
Enlightenment isn't a permanent state. There are more enlightened moments and less enlightened moments — and that's perfectly fine.
Compassion is the common ground. Across every tradition, the call is the same: more understanding, more love, more kindness.

Thank You to Our Supporters
New monthly supporters: Stephen, Kaylin, Allison
One-time supporters: Femke, Hannah, Andrew, Tracy, Helen, Tiffany Lynn, Gem, Ulysses, Anonymous, Suta, Jess, Leigh, Gerit, Cheryl, Krysia
Your generosity keeps this podcast going — thank you.
Stay curious, and I love you.
Steven

Links to Steven Webb's podcast and how you can support his work.
Donate paypal.me/stevenwebb or Coffee stevenwebb.uk
Steven's courses, podcasts and links: stevenwebb.uk

Episode Description
You've built a life. You've done the things you were supposed to do. But underneath it all, there's a quiet question that won't leave you alone: "Is this all there is?" In this episode, Steven Webb shares the deeply personal story of lying in a hospital bed at eighteen, paralysed and unable to speak, wrestling with the two biggest questions of his life. What he discovered is that "is this all there is?" isn't a sign of ingratitude or crisis. It's a doorway to something extraordinary: wonder, mystery, and the breathtaking magic of not knowing. Drawing on the wisdom of Rumi, Alan Watts, and Zen teacher Shunryu Suzuki, Steven explores how we can trade our cleverness for bewilderment and see the world through beginner's eyes again.
Who Is This Episode For?
This episode is for anyone who has ever looked at their life and felt that quiet ache of "is this it?", especially when everything looks fine on the outside. If you're in midlife and questioning what it's all been for, if you feel guilty for wanting something deeper when you know you should be grateful, or if you've simply stopped seeing the magic in everyday moments, Steven Webb recorded this conversation for you.
What You'll Hear in This Episode
Steven opens with a vivid image of a butterfly landing in front of you and asks when you last truly saw the world for the first time. He then takes you back to his hospital bed at eighteen, where two questions rattled around in his mind for months: "Who am I?" and "Is this it?" He explores why this question tends to arrive in midlife, when the forward momentum of building a career, a family, and a life finally slows down enough for you to look around and wonder what it was all for. Carl Jung's idea of the second half of life as a turning inward sits alongside Rumi's invitation to sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment, Alan Watts' beautiful image of the unknown becoming a window rather than a blank space, and Shunryu Suzuki's teaching on beginner's mind. Steven weaves in a story about a little girl discovering that the world through a caravan window is the same world outside the door, and his own moment watching a wave at the Headland Hotel and realising that exact wave would never happen again. The episode closes with a powerful reframe: the question was never really "is this all there is?" The question was always "am I paying attention?"
Memorable Quotes from This Episode
"That question is not a sign that something's wrong with you. It might actually be one of the most important questions you've ever asked." — Steven Webb
"You are not ungrateful. You're not broken. You are not having some kind of crisis." — Steven Webb
"Not knowing didn't become a wall. It became a window." — Steven Webb
"Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment." — Rumi
"In beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in an expert's mind there are few." — Shunryu Suzuki
"The magic is in not knowing. The magic is in the fact that right now, in this moment, you are a conscious being in an incomprehensibly vast universe, and you have no idea why. And to me, that's not depressing. That's breathtaking." — Steven Webb
"The question was never really, is this all there is? The question was always, am I paying attention?" — Steven Webb
Try This Today
Next time the "is this it?" feeling visits you, don't push it away. Go outside or look out of a window. Pick one thing: a tree, a cloud, a bird, a wave. And look at it as if you've never seen it before. Because in a very real sense, you haven't. That exact moment, that exact configuration of light and shadow, has never existed before and will never exist again. Let yourself be bewildered by it.
Supporter Thanks
This podcast is completely free and has no adverts or sponsors. It is made possible entirely by the kind people who treat Steven to a coffee. Every contribution pays for the podcast and supports all of Steven's work.
A huge and heartfelt thank you to this episode's supporters: Angie, Helen, Suja, Suzanne, Lorna, Liz, Daphne, Sarah, Mikey, Jen, and Venetia. And to the monthly supporters: Joe, Audra, Sin, Jack, Glen, Barb, and Venetia. Thank you also to the wonderful supporters on Insight Timer.
If this episode helped you, please consider buying Steven a coffee. Even one makes a difference.
About Steven Webb
Steven Webb is a meditation teacher, former Mayor of Truro, and C5 tetraplegic. He has spent decades learning what it means to find peace in the most difficult circumstances. Through Stillness in the Storms, he offers honest, warm conversations to help people navigate life's hardest moments. Through Inner Peace Meditations, he provides guided meditations as companions to each episode.
Find out more and explore all of Steven's work at stevenwebb.uk
Connect
Website: https://stevenwebb.uk
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