In this episode of The Dark Side with Verity, Verity sits down with Sarah, founder of Book Besties Darwin, a growing community and lifestyle brand bringing women together through their love of books.

What started as a simple love of reading has turned into a powerful community where women connect, share stories, and build friendships.

But this conversation goes far beyond books.

Sarah shares the story behind Book Besties, the reality of building something from the ground up, and how having supportive people around you can make all the difference.

We also talk about:

• Growing up with your partner and navigating life as high school sweethearts• The reality of building a business when you’re figuring it out as you go• Why community matters more than ever right now• The courage it takes to start something new

Sarah’s story is a reminder that the most meaningful businesses often begin with something simple, a passion, an idea, and the willingness to take the first step.

If you’ve ever dreamed about building something of your own, this episode will inspire you.

In this episode of The Dark Side Podcast with Verity, Verity sits down with Sarah from Book Besties Darwin to talk about building community, entrepreneurship, relationships, and the story behind one of Darwin’s growing book communities.

Sarah shares how her love of reading eventually turned into Book Besties, a community and lifestyle brand bringing women together through books, connection, and shared experiences.

The conversation explores:

• How Book Besties began• Building a community business from scratch• Being high school sweethearts and growing together• Entrepreneurship and having supportive partners• Why community matters now more than ever

This episode is for anyone who has ever felt the pull to create something meaningful.

Sometimes the best ideas begin with something simple, like a love of books.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity

In this episode of The Dark Side with Verity, Verity Jo Coonan explores why going slow is often the most intelligent nervous system strategy available.

In a culture that rewards urgency and intensity, she explains how speed can override safety and why true capacity is built through steadiness, not force.

Verity unpacks how the body interprets pressure, why healing cannot be rushed, and how moving slowly creates deeper integration, clearer decision-making, and stronger leadership.

This conversation reframes slowness as strength, safety as strategy, and regulation as the foundation for sustainable growth.

For anyone who feels behind, tempted to push, or caught between ambition and exhaustion, this episode offers a grounded alternative.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity

In this episode of The Dark Side with Verity, Verity Jo Coonan explores the often-overlooked foundation of powerful facilitation: the Nervous System of the person leading the room.

She explains why technique, scripts, and intensity mean very little if the facilitator’s own body is dysregulated. The depth of a space is not created by performance, it is created by capacity.

Verity unpacks how co-regulation works, why participants subconsciously track the facilitator’s state, and how unprocessed urgency or ego can leak into a room. She speaks to the responsibility of leading nervous-system work with steadiness, integrity, and embodied safety.

This episode is essential listening for facilitators, coaches, and space holders who care about how their work is held and who understand that true leadership begins with self-regulation.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity

In this episode of The Dark Side with Verity, Verity dismantles the myth that nervous system regulation makes you soft, slow, or less ambitious.

She explains how true regulation sharpens leadership, strengthens boundaries, and increases decision-making clarity. A regulated system does not remove drive, it removes chaos.

Verity explores why ambition built on dysregulation leads to burnout, and why sustainable growth requires steadiness in the body first. This conversation is essential for facilitators, coaches, and entrepreneurs who want depth without depletion.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity

We talk a lot about depth in Breathwork, healing, and facilitation, but far less about discernment.

In this episode, Verity explores why knowing when to guide, when to pause, and when to do nothing is one of the most important skills a facilitator can develop.

This conversation goes beyond technique and into nervous system literacy, ethical holding, and the quiet intelligence that allows real change to happen safely.

This episode is for facilitators, coaches, and practitioners who feel the responsibility of the work they hold and want to do it well.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity

In this episode of The Dark Side with Verity, Verity Jo Coonan explores what happens when healing stops being private and starts becoming something to perform.

In a world where inner work is increasingly documented, filtered, and shared, Verity speaks to the quiet pressure to always appear healed, regulated, evolved, and self-aware and the nervous system cost of turning growth into an identity.

She unpacks how healing can begin to feel like a costume that can’t be taken off, how constant self-narration interrupts integration, and why striving to “do healing right” can actually pull people further away from their bodies and their truth.

Through personal reflection, lived experience, and grounded nervous-system insight, Verity shares:

• How healing shifted from something intimate to something performative

• Why embodiment and integration matter more than presentation

• The difference between real regulation and spiritual perfection

• How over-sharing can replace internal safety

• And why healing doesn’t owe anyone proof

This episode is for anyone who feels the pressure to always respond consciously, to use the “right” language, or to be the example, even when they’re tired, messy, grieving, or human.

Because healing isn’t content.
It isn’t linear.
And some of the most honest work happens where no one ever sees.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity

In this episode, Verity Jo Coonan explores the real cost of holding space and how that cost changes as capacity grows.

Holding space is one of the most powerful skills a facilitator, coach, therapist, parent, partner, or friend can develop. But when it’s done without nervous system support, boundaries, and embodiment, it can quietly become exhausting.

Verity reflects on the early years of facilitation, when holding space meant absorbing emotions, carrying stories, and needing to find ways to release after every session. She shares how this work transformed once she built real internal support and how holding space shifted from something that drained her to something that genuinely lights her up.

In this conversation, Verity speaks to:

• Why burnout isn’t failure, it’s a capacity issue

• The emotional residue that often goes unspoken

• How the nervous system determines what can be held safely

• Why knowledge without embodiment isn’t sustainable

• And how holding space becomes energising when practitioners are truly resourced

This episode is for the big-hearted humans the ones people naturally open up to, the ones who are often “the safe one,” and the ones learning how to hold others without losing themselves.

Holding space isn’t about fixing or saving anyone.
It’s about creating safety, presence, and sustainability for everyone involved.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity

Heart Rate Variability (HRV) isn’t about how deeply you breathe, it’s about rhythm, regulation, and safety in the body.

In this episode, Verity Jo Coonan breaks down what HRV actually measures, why it’s one of the strongest markers of longevity and nervous system health, and how Breathwork directly influences emotional resilience and stress recovery.

You’ll learn the science behind HRV, how it reflects the balance of your autonomic nervous system, and why steady, simple breathing patterns are more effective than intense techniques. Verity shares practical, trauma-informed ways to integrate HRV breathing into daily life, without tracking obsession or over complication.

This episode is an invitation to build capacity, not force calm. To trust your body’s rhythm. And to remember that resilience is created through consistency, not intensity.

🎧 Listen now and be sure to share this episode with anyone who needs to hear it.

Connect & Train with Verity

● @verityjocoonan @vidya_certification

● Join Breathwork & healing ⁠APP @vidya.app

● Follow us on @thedarksidewithverity