Mental health podcast created by former LA DJ and mindfulness coach in Southwater

Following a chance encounter, Paul Rumsey and Shirley Blanch – who both live in Southwater – have joined forces to create a community-based weekly podcast..

‘The Mindfulness Café’ is recorded in Paul’s home studio and aims to help encourage and motivate people through these difficult times.

Mindfulness coach Shirely said: “Each week we focus on ways we can empower ourselves over our health and wellbeing.

“I got started in this several years ago after losing my father to cancer and so now I help people learn how to emotionally regulate better using mindfulness, meditation and resilience techniques to reduce their stress and improve their health.

“We also invite expert guests as well as regular people to share their stories of how they’ve transformed their lives to help inspire others.”

An American by birth, Paul Rumsey has some tales to tell.

He spent his formative years in the UK developing a passion for DJ’ing in the local clubs eventually becoming the Roadshow DJ for Radio Caroline.

In 1983 he decided to return to California where he worked at a number of radio stations and became a popular nightclub DJ in LA where he met a vast array of celebrities such as Stevie Wonder, Donny and Marie Osmond, Richard Branson, Billy Idol, Lemmy, Ian Astbury and Wayne Hussey to name but a few.

He was also the production co-ordinator for the Bob Hope USO Show in Las Vegas, as well as producing and hosting the successful LA based radio show ‘London Calling’ and LA correspondent for Radio Mercury back in the day.

However, Paul decided to leave his broadcasting career behind and head back to the UK to start a family with his new wife to pursue a corporate career in IT, offering greater financial security for his growing family.

Shirley said: “Then Paul found himself in the same situation as so many other people are in right now, with no job, no income and no purpose.

“This took a heavy toll on his mental and physical health causing a huge strain on family life, but his passion for broadcasting had never left him and it was this that helped him through these challenging times, focusing on his online radio station KJAZZUK which he had set up and after a near death experience in 2011.

“It took many months for Paul to start rebuilding his life, but thankfully he found work and started to focus more on his health and wellbeing, so decided to join a gym.”

It was here that Paul and Shirley met and it led to the idea of The Mindfulness Café, – a weekly podcast that could be used to help and inspire others going through their own journey.

Paul decided to use the KJAZZUK platform to develop the podcast which he and Shirley co-host, where expert guests and members of the public share their stories and knowledge.

Paul and Shirley are always looking to spread the word to encourage more people to come forward and tell their stories of how they’ve overcome difficulties in their own lives to help and inspire others.

Shirley said: “We’ve been refining the podcast up until now, but we’re at the point where we want to spread the word to help bring the community together in a sense of wellbeing and personal empowerment to help combat the current mental health crisis and impact of Covid.

“It’s something we do in our own time, we don’t currently profit from it – it’s just our way of giving something back and doing something we love.”

If you have a story to tell that you think would help other people in these challenging times, get in touch with Paul and Shirley by emailing [email protected]

The Mindfulness Café can now be found on Apple Podcasts, Podbean, Stitcher, Alexa and YouTube.

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