Life Uncut - Rear in your view of 2022!

Episode Date: December 26, 2022

Hey Lifers! Welcome to our walk down memory lane for 2022! Here we have some of our favourite moments and highlights of the year. We hope you all had a good Christmas and you’re able to have some time off of work and chill out! For each of our guests, we have put the link to their whole episode next in so that you can go back and listen to the episode in its entirety! Hope you all have a wonderful break and we're really excited to see you back in 2023!   xxx Britt, Laura and producer Keeshia    Rebel Wilson : https://apple.co/3YKi8jT Hamish Blake : https://apple.co/3YKHONC Jessica Buchanan : https://apple.co/3Gg2Psh Laura & Matt’s wedding : https://apple.co/3va3kNZ Ellidy Pullin : https://apple.co/3WHVG9v We Love Love the book : https://apple.co/3FNoy9h & https://www.lifeuncutpodcast.com.au/ Esther Perel : https://apple.co/3HVLc1U Johann Hari : https://apple.co/3BXWhM9 Helena Sauzier : https://apple.co/3VkT7cm Dating disaster stories : https://apple.co/3HWTFlJ  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A Life Uncut podcast acknowledges the traditional custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders, past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today. This episode is recorded on Gadigal land of the Aurora Nation. Hi guys, and welcome back to a very freaking special episode of Life Uncut. I'm Laura. I'm Brittany.

We did say that last week was the last episode, but we told you we'd have some special little morsels lined up for you. And well, this is one of them. This is officially. We're not putting out anything else. I know we always say we're not doing anything else and something else comes. Oh, but maybe we will. No, we're not. that we could. We're going on holiday. This is officially the last episode of 2022. We did want

to end it on a bit of a high and a little bit of a walk down memory lane to some of our favourite moments, guests and episodes of 2022. Do you know what? I had to listen to the one of these that we did in 2021. And we started off by saying 2021 was a dumpster fire of a year. Do you remember? It's because we were all stuck in COVID. It was a dumpster fire. It was a bit of a fucking shit show but 2022 was a mighty good year it was such a wonderful year and I look we did a live show for a bit of La Nina whatever it's called La Nina La Nina that thing stuck around for a bit too long didn't it you know everything has its ups and downs but when I look back I just think we just had such a wonderful year together you and I with the audience with you guys the listeners we did

our live show who would have thought we'd still be sitting in your bedroom recording this I know you'd think we'd get a studio or an office by now so we're still in the bedroom you know why it's because we're creatures of comfort, change is scary. Oh, yeah. Okay, this is how much we are creatures of comfort. We have to, every time we record, we sit at the same sides of the desk. We sit in the dark. Everything's the same.

But I'm going to say it now because I'm going to hold ourselves accountable for it now. I think we're going to get maybe a studio next year. Nah, nah. Or somewhere to record. Nah, this is good. I can be in my underwear. I feel free and natural in my own space, which is your space.

But do you know what? My highlight of this year, there's been a lot. We're going to hand this episode over to producer Keisha soon, and she's going to walk you through what are some of our favorite episodes. But one of the things that I feel really, really freaking proud of and something that so many of you still tag us in like daily is We Love Love, the book. I just honestly can't believe I went into, came out the other day in the midst of Boxing Day sales and there it was.

I saw our little book right there on the bookshelf. Wasn't on sale, unfortunately, but it was there. And I still can't believe that after all the work and all the energy that went into that, that this little podcast has its own book out there yeah so looking back for me I mean I love so many episodes but my two highlights okay I have three highlights one was the live show amazing it was just amazing you guys were just incredible the energy was incredible Laura and I love sharing that part with you two the book again exactly the same thing for the reasons we just said it's something that we feel really proud of and we just love and three which isn't podcast related

but it's you know it's in that realm but it's your wedding to Maddie J obviously my sister's wedding too, but seeing you and Manny J tie the knot and you know, you, you guys are the Life Uncut family too. Manny J is a part of this Life Uncut family. I didn't, I didn't realize we were doing like life highlights. I'm like the book. Yeah, of course. My wedding was also a life highlight. I'll throw that one out there as well. But in terms of podcast episodes, I mean, this year has been truly amazing in terms of who we've gotten to speak to. And it's not just been the celebrity-esque interviews that we've done. For me, the ones that stand out the most are the interviews of people who are very ordinary people who have extraordinary stories what was your

favorite interview of 2022 well it's funny you say that because one of the ones I wanted to start with and it's so hard to pick any every single interview we do we walk away and we're like that was the best one I've ever done that was amazing like I mean not all of them well most of them well for me most of them blow me away for a different reason but the first one that jumped out at me that I just was in awe of and hooked on was Jess Buchanan who was kidnapped in somalia when she was working there as a humanitarian worker uh she was kidnapped for three months and her story and the way she tells the story her resolve i really was on the edge of my seat well my favorite one is going back to february and it's one that has stuck with me a

conversation that i i love so much not did i just love the conversation but i also loved that elodie brought her baby into the studio with us and elodie pullen and i got to hold her little baby whilst we did the interview. Now it is from February. It's called grief is love with nowhere to go. Uncut with Elodie Pullen. A lot of you may know Elodie's story. She was the girlfriend of Chumpy, Chumpy Pullen, who passed away. And Elodie has an incredible story around her own motherhood journey, how they went through sperm retrieval to get sperm from Chumpy after he'd passed away and how she has brought her little baby into the world without her partner by her side. She speaks about being a widow, but she also speaks about motherhood in a way that I

don't think I've heard anybody else speak about it and it's a story that truly just stuck with me so much we are going to hand this episode over to producer Keisha in a second but we wanted to say the biggest thank you to every single one of you who have joined us for the last year who are like well and truly on the life uncut ride we have some incredible things planned for you next year there are more live shows there are some other very fun little secret squirrel things that are in the works at the moment we're really looking forward to it we're really really looking forward to go away having a little break and 2023 is going to be absolutely wild and I'm really looking forward to it well that's it from us Keisha is going to take you for a little walk down memory

lane also Keisha thanks for being just such a rock star part of the Life Uncut team yeah there is so much work that goes on behind the scenes in Life Uncut that Keisha producer Keisha is so so deep in that sometimes she's up to her her neck sometimes she's like get me out I don't want to be here anymore but here she is and we love her for it and Maddie J there's my sister Sherry we have a wonderful girl taylor that works for us as well there is a very small but it's a very mighty team that works for life uncut and we're such a cute little family and keisha thank you for everything that you have done in this past year thanks guys i can't wait to go through last year we called it the rear in your view because one time when we were saying year in review we couldn't

get it out i remember who fucked it up but one of us fucked it up and said rear in your it was brit i listened to the episode i think do you know what maybe that should be what we call every rearing your view yeah it feels fitting this is the 2023 rearing your view and that's it from us guys hello hello how you going have you had a wonderful christmas i'm very excited for us to go through the rearing of you or year in review for 2022 together these are some of the best moments of the year or some of the standout moments i think and i'm very grateful for all of you that wrote in with your favorite moment it made it a lot easier for me to package these up For me to decide, I think that was like the hard point,

was actually deciding which 10 we wanted to put into this. But this entire episode is just some of our favourite moments over the course of the year. And I'm going to be walking you through them and kind of giving you a little bit of a behind the scenes to some of them, some stuff that happened like off mic or maybe what led to the interviews. And for each of the episodes,

if you like the little snippet that you hear but maybe you missed the whole episode, I'm going to put a link to that episode in our show notes so you can find that there. Kicking it off for this year is none other than Rebel Wilson. Now, I think for some of us, our career paths, they take a few different twists and turns, but maybe not as big of a twist or a turn as Rebel Wilson's. One of my favourite moments from this chat was finding out what disease, not a typo,

what disease led Rebel Wilson to becoming an actress. And here's that chat. So I always thought I would go into law or politics. I got into like the best law school after I got my HSC results and was like, yep. and then I was selected I was a youth ambassador for Australia which was a program that Rotary was running at the time and they sent one boy and one girl to different countries and I got sent to South Africa and had like a life-changing experience going to Southern Africa for a year and not knowing anybody and it was crazy then I got the malaria there which was really bad you got

malaria had a vision that I was I was an actress hang on you were speeding through this story I know well there's so much so you're in africa yeah for a year yes you get malaria yeah it was terrible i got a really bad strain so i was hospitalized i caught it in rural mozambique but it takes about two weeks to develop in your system and then i was very very sick got hospitalized with another girl that was on the trip as well and then it was bad it was like this it's hard to describe it's not like a cold or flu it's like you out of your body kind of thing and like hallucinating and everything and then I was like I had this vision that I won an academy award that I was an actress and that I was really good and I came out of hospital saying guys I'm gonna

I think I've got to leave Africa like immediately go back to Australia I got to audition for the drama school I'm gonna be like the next Dame Judi Dench or something like rebel like no like you're not an actress like because I definitely didn't I wasn't glamorous like I was you know an academic girl like I wasn't glamour I didn't look like Nicole Kidman or Cate Blanchett or something so your catalyst for getting into acting your catalyst that was the driving force for you to go cool I'm gonna take this and and pivot my career seriously was malaria yeah well because sometimes they say if you get really sick if you have a life-changing event like that it can really changed the course of your life and I used to love Oprah well I mean obviously I still love

I shouldn't say used to I go all the time and I used to watch her every day in Africa because it was really hard there was a lot going on in South Africa at the time and post-apartheid and a lot of violence and everything and there's a lot going on and so I would watch Oprah every day love it and she'd say oh the universe like sometimes it gives you a whisper and sometimes it's like a full-blown brick wall falling on you with the message and I was like this is a message like this is like this is what I should do with my life so even though I was still in law school I went back and I auditioned for drama like no one would take me at the drama schools who'd you audition for NIDA yeah maybe that first year only just NIDA because I thought well out of the top but

yeah just go to the best one and because my law school was across the road I thought oh maybe I'll do both I am such an overachiever then yeah they didn't accept me so I just did I did law and arts So I did theatre and film subjects at my university at UNSW. And I think we all know that things ended up pretty well. Rebel in the acting world, she's gone on to do magnificent things. Up next in our year in review is Australia's funny man, someone that I think we are all very, very proud to call one of our own, and that is Hamish Blake.

What really hit home for me with Hamish was his perspective on hustle culture and what gave meaning to his life. I mean, arguably, he's Australia's funniest person. he's Australia's most entertaining person his podcast is always at number one in Australia he hosts tv shows that rate it really well he even won the gold logie this year and so I think a lot of us were kind of like oh you know what's next for you like what's the next thing that you want to conquer and here's what he had to say about that but even before when you were like you know why would you go you were you could earn lots of money on radio I don't know my answer to that now

as a 40 year old person if I was like I'm not really gonna do tv anymore if people like but why not like then you won't be famous or you won't make money my answer to that legitimately I know this is a privileged position to be in having sort of like done it for a long time my answer that it was like yeah that's great I will let's I look forward to seeing how that goes those aren't the reasons that I do anything yeah they are kind of like their flow-on effects of of doing this thing that I enjoy doing for now personally for me so 2022 you know like my workload is actually not that intense like i got podcasting with ando we got 40 episodes a year 40 episodes a year grueling then a government mandate to break if you're familiar with the show 12 weeks

terrible then you know kind of legos at the end of the year but my as i sort of said before my goal is to be unbusy because the kids are little and again i know how lucky i am to be in this position but i'm like if i'm going to use what we've worked for for anything i will use it to buy time and I love saying no I spend my whole time saying no to other shows or ideas because I want to be at home I want to be doing more living I want to be doing more enjoying life stuff especially post you know after two years lockdown again total luxury but that's my this is how I want to spend the time I do I'm not interested in leveraging as hard as we can I'm just not I'm not really interested in the next level I'm not trying to rapidly like

ascend which I think is like such I mean it's such a great thing to hear in terms of like you would think that someone who's just come off the back of winning the gold logi is like what can I like what's next what's the biggest piece yeah how can I wriggle out of pretty much everything that gets asked of me being in that position and winning the gold logi I think a lot of people's expectations would be like well what's next and having the agency and the ability to be like there doesn't actually have to be a next yeah that plays out in the same way I guess it comes to meaning and like i really enjoy what i do and i love that it makes people laugh and that people enjoy the shows and i do take that seriously but to just do stuff to be famous or to be on tv

it doesn't mean anything like it doesn't mean anything to me i don't care about it at all but what does mean something is like walking to school or with your kids by yourself not as fun Let's make sure we include that in. That guy from down the road is back again. I forgot the kids. But that's what means something to me. Like being able to go on family holidays, like that means something to me. Again, I know not everyone's in that position,

but for me that is 100% the filter I'm putting it through. Like does this have meaning? Working in TV is fun and it is a really enjoyable way to have a job, but it does not mean everything to me at all because just other things do. Now to take you behind the scenes a little bit of this particular episode, we ran into him at a coffee shop around the corner and I'll never forget we had such a nice chat about expectations and he gave us some really good advice on how to view things like

expectations of the media world and living up to what people want from you and that was a really special moment for me actually. We were then interrupted by someone who ran past and asked him for a dollar, which is a joke that you'll get if you are a Hamish and Andy fan. up next in our year in review is a very special episode this is actually the one that brit referred to in the intro as being one of her standout moments from the year and this had me glued to the speaker i'm of course talking about jessica buchanan her story of resilience and pushing through trauma is one that i think it's quite hard to actually believe unless you hear it straight

from her mouth she was kidnapped by somali land pirates where she spent 91 days fighting for her life in the desert while the kidnappers tried to negotiate her ransom with the American government. Jess was eventually rescued by the same team that killed Osama bin Laden. And here is Jess telling the story of how they initially were taken. About 15 minutes into the ride, somebody comes up along the right side of us, another vehicle and cuts us off so that we can't proceed and splashes mud up all over the windows and the windshield. And I'm just like, you know, I'm used to like crazy driving and stuff in this part of the world. But I'm like, God, what a jerk. Who drives like that? Come on, let's get moving.

And then I hear the crack of the butt of an NK-47 on the car hood. And I start hearing all of this angry screaming, men screaming in Somali and some other language I don't understand. And then my door is pulled open. Abdi Rizak is dragged out. This man dressed in a police uniform gets in and he has an NK-47. He puts it to my head and he starts screaming at the driver to drive. And we just take off like, you know, bats out of hell. You know, we're up on two wheels. We're down. We're up, you know, on these really rugged, rudimentary roads. And then we're heading south, which does not make me feel good because south, like the further south in Somalia you get, the closer you get to al-Shabaab, Islamic extremists. I don't know who these guys are.

I don't know what they want. I don't know where they're taking us. I'm thinking at this point, maybe they're just carjacking us, right? Like maybe here, like take my wallet, take my password. Here's all my rings, like take everything and just drop us out on the side of the road and we'll walk back to town. So you're still feeling optimistic at this point. You're still feeling like, okay, I'm just going to be robbed and it'll be over soon. I mean, I'm hoping, I don't, I would not say I'm feeling optimistic. I'm like trying really hard not to have a panic attack because really all I can think is like, whatever this is, even if they do just drop us off and we walk back to town, like everything has changed from this moment on. And then the other thought

that keeps going through my mind is just like, this is bad. This is bad. This is so bad. This is so bad. It was like, in my memory, I don't, I think it's just because everything was so like traumatic that you know that like weird like circus music you know like a scene from a movie where it's like everything's going weird and wacky and like all everything's spinning like that's what it felt like right like he's sitting back there he's like going through all my stuff like throwing it behind him my passport my lovely wallet from Ethiopia like all this stuff and I'm just like watching my whole life be like emptied out in front of me as I'm being driven through the desert. And I'm thinking like, what the fuck is happening? And Paul finally turns around to

like check on me. And I whispered to him, what is happening? And he looks so sorry for me, like gives me this look. Oh my God, you haven't figured it out yet. And then he just says, we're being kidnapped. As I said, all of the links to these episodes, if you happen to have miss them are going to be in the show notes and this is one that I can't recommend more going back and having listened through it is just it's one of the most incredible stories I have ever heard in my life next up in our year in review was the event of the year at least for us it was something that was five years in the making a reality tv show later and of course I'm talking about Laura and Maddie J's wedding now it was hard to pick a moment from this because there were just so many

just the wedding was the best it was just so much fun but this particular moment I remember looking over at Brit while we were you know in the ceremony and you know when you're at a wedding and like you're trying not to cry because you know that it's going to make your makeup just run all over your face it was kind of as though everyone in the crowd just let that go and everyone I looked at was tears everywhere particularly Matt. Matt definitely didn't have dry eyes during this moment it was a very special part of Laura's vows and this is what happened I wrote this it's a story and I wrote it into my vows as I wrote this I was like is this a really weird thing to put into your vows and then I was saying the story out loud I said it I think

I read it out to my sister and I read out to a few other friends and and they were all a bit like where are you going with this but then it ended up being like the one thing that everyone was in tears about because I think the message of it is important it's still important to me but okay I'll read a bit of it out this is my wedding vows which is weird okay do we have some music we can overlay okay this is what I read to Matt I wrote the other week I was telling you about a podcast I had listened to where Hugh van Kylenburg was in his kitchen this one morning stressed out over the kids and work when his nanny came in and asked her how her morning was she said she'd been for a run and had breakfast with a girlfriend all before 8 a.m on a Tuesday after the nanny walked out he

then said to his wife that he felt genuinely jealous and a little bit resentful of people who can just get up in the morning and have no responsibilities. Hugh's wife then showed him this article that she had just been reading and it was about how life is made up of seasons and how whenever we are in a season of life we often spend much of it wishing that we were in a different season. It'll make me cry again. I told you this story and you asked me if I felt like that to which I replied sometimes you paused and then you said I don't relate to that because I am in the season of my dreams I have thought about that a lot since then especially when it came to writing these vows and I want you to know that I am in the season of my dreams with you and

I promise to never take that for granted as I know life doesn't get any better than this I will cry Every time I read it. Guys, I feel like I'm intruding on a moment. You are. It's my wedding dress. And I'm like, I'm right here. But honestly, for me, oh. Let's leave that audio in.

We just kissed again. Because I can't edit that out. No, but if you want to leave the room for about five or maybe six minutes. Oh, please. I've heard it too. Next up in our year in review was a very special episode that we recorded with Elodie Pullen. and this is the one that Laura spoke about in the intro as probably being, like, the standout moment for her this year.

Elodie lost her partner, Alex Chumpy Pullen, in an accident while Chumpy was spearfishing near their home in the Gold Coast. Their families decided to go down the path of something called posthumous sperm retrieval, which is what led Elodie to having their beautiful baby girl, Minnie. This recording was so special because Elodie was in Sydney and we said, oh, you know, just bring Minnie along if you want to

and so she brought Minnie along and she was there for the whole recording. she's just such a beautiful baby and in this clip Elle speaks about how you try to keep your life moving forward while you're experiencing grief. We as a society we're so adverse to talking about grief because it makes people uncomfortable you know like seeing somebody else's pain and dealing with somebody else's grief often will avoid asking big questions that result in them being upset because we kind of don't want to we don't want to upset someone but the hurt is still there regardless of whether you talk about it or not how do you start I don't even think you start but like where do you start to work through that grief I think and everyone obviously handles

these situations completely different I've got widow friends that I've now met that have also lost the loves of their life and I've met them on social media and so we've like banded together and we sit up late at night and chat and that's how that's literally how I got through at the start but I remember the first I mean I don't know if it was like the first night but I just remember in general thinking how can I go back to our house and sleep in our bed and go back to like our life and our things like but then also how can I not would I want to be anywhere else do I want to pack up everything and move you know there was like all that going through my head but the safest place for me felt like my room in our house was like my little sanctuary and

that's where I felt safest to grieve and to process everything and I didn't want to even leave my house I didn't want to do anything but be in our space weirdly I don't know if it was because I felt like he was there or I just felt like this protection in the house in such a vulnerable time where like I was just completely broken into pieces and and I was so glad I felt grounded in our house because I couldn't imagine and this would happen to a lot of widows or you know people going through massive loss they need to up and move and maybe also because COVID was around I couldn't just fuck off overseas and like restart and I had had a dog and do you know what my life essentially apart from chump being completely gone I just kept doing what we would

do every day I just kept going to the beach in the morning with my dog and walking her and just keeping some sort of routine in my life I had all my friends and family around me constantly I was barely alone you know what you just keep going like I just didn't have a choice and people are always like you're so strong you're so amazing I'm like I'm not amazing I'm not strong I just actually don't have a choice and I think I think I'm such a rational realistic person and I was just like I either die here today with chump like let my or not maybe not physically die but like let myself just die or I just pick myself up and I just keep going well that's my only option right like you said everyone experiences it differently and no one is ever going to be able to understand

what it's like but were there ever moments where you felt guilty like in terms of you were having fun with your friends or you were laughing or maybe you weren't thinking about him for 10 minutes while you're doing something did you have moments of guilt like I shouldn't feel this reprieve and relief when he's not here it's such a catch-22 so I'd find myself like out with friends laughing my head off having a great time just months after but don't get me wrong people would say like hey if you don't mind me asking like you know or bring up chump or ask something and I'd be like hey you're not reminding me like it's always here it's right here so yeah I would be having fun and I would kind of feel guilty but then when I'd go home and crawl into a hole or say whether I'm

alone or with someone and I'd like howl or like just be super have a really depressy day or like a big wave of grief would come and I'd just be debilitated I'd feel also so guilty about that because I don't want him I just I don't want him looking down on me like just kind of dying you know or yeah so I don't know I'd feel there's just literally no right or wrong I felt so guilty about anything I did I think that episode really struck a chord for a lot of people especially ones that have experienced grief in their own lives Elna has a book and a podcast of her own if you would like to hear a little bit more from her something very massive that happened in 2022 to was that Laura and Britt wrote a book. Now that book was actually written over the space

of a year and a half and as I think a lot of us would relate to, a lot happened in that year and a half. It was when we were all in COVID lockdowns across the world. Lots and lots changed and one thing that particularly changed from the start of writing that book to the end of writing that book for Britt was her being in and out of love. Now I know that the side of Britt that we see on the podcast a lot of the time is jovial she's the first to take the pierce like the first to crack a joke and I love that about her but this particular moment on the podcast was a real standout for me because this was a bit of an insight into the very very vulnerable and real side of Brit and it's all about when you're dating and you just wonder when it's going to happen for

you and Brit also spoke about struggling with the feeling of worthiness of love when you started of writing it. You wrote it when you were in love with Jordan and then it kind of transitioned through your breakup. And I know that we have touched on that, but what was it like going back and having to rewrite some of those chapters? So like, so that the tense made sense, you know, and I think like being able to go from speaking about your relationship in real time, in terms of like how you felt to having to go back and rewrite chapters retrospectively, it's almost was like a cruel trauma to have to do that it was horrific it was and I mean you know I'll try not to cry again because we've already cried once in this episode you're allowed to cry it's okay

no but it was well I haven't even I haven't thought about it for a little while because I really buried it again like once I pressed go and sent it to the publishers I was like I'm just not going to think about that until I have to but until I read it and then Laura makes me talk about it on a podcast it was horrific it was um it was the things like because it was probably a year between when I wrote about you know the love chapters and the penguin chapters the finding your person and all those really beautiful things that we've done going back and rewriting it so I had to go and change things like there were sentences like uh and you know this is how I knew he was the one and I feel so lucky I found the person in my life that to changing that to

I thought I had found the person in my life I all past tense I had to go and rewrite the whole book and there were some parts that I left as is there were some parts I took out because I'm like that can't be in there anymore because it's too beautiful. It's like, it's too like, it just didn't fit the narrative anymore. So there were some parts I had to remove. It was definitely reliving what was my happiest time of my life. And it was a really like cruel reminder that you don't have that anymore. And you're back to, you know, writing chapters about solitude and being on your own and writing when I was talking about fertility and freezing my eggs and things like that I froze those and I did that with Jordan like we did that you know he was there holding

my hand the whole time and we had talked about that life together so going back in and revisiting that and realizing that well that might not end up like that anymore so I might not ever have a child anymore because I am getting older I am single I'm alone again so it was a bit of a sick joke in a sense well I wanted to ask you about that side of things because I know that when you wrote Fertility? And not even when you wrote it, when we did the whole episode around fertility, you were in a very different phase. Like you had a plan for what you wanted to do. You were like, you know, at least even if you didn't have a plan, you had a backup, which is the whole point of freezing your eggs. How do you feel about that now?

I said this to you just a couple of days ago, actually. This like off the record, Laura and I were actually just having a real conversation. Sometimes it happens. sometimes it happens and it was about I've had this real moment in my life in the last couple of weeks or the last like maybe a couple of months where it's a bit of a change so I've always said things over the past few years since I've known Laura I always said things like maybe it's not for me you know maybe love's not for me maybe kids aren't for me maybe that's not what's meant for me I've realized now I don't think I ever actually believed that I think I said those comments in the depths of despair I was feeling really down it was easier just to voice

this negativity and have a moment where I was like, whoa, it's me. But I don't think I actually ever believed it. I think I was saying these as throwaway comments like, oh, well, Brittany, get over it. It's not for you. But deep down, I still thought it would happen. And now I've transitioned to, I genuinely am thinking that now. I'm like, wow, maybe this actually really isn't for you. And it's made me realize that I don't think I believed it earlier. So it's, I feel like I've gone into this, a new phase I haven't been in yet where I am 35. I'm already 35 very single I am 99% sure I don't want kids alone like I know there's nothing wrong with it I know there are people that go down that track maybe I'll change my mind in a few years if I

hit 40 and I'm still alone maybe I will but now I don't think that's a journey I want to go down alone so then you have this shock realization where you're like fuck it actually might not happen for you I think with that the only thing I want to say is when you say maybe because you kind of bundled them together and I want you to be aware of this you said maybe love's not for me maybe kids aren't for me definitely bundled them together they're two different things yeah and that's really important because like love is for you and that's you projecting like how you feel about yourself but they don't live together you can tears are coming I'm like everyone's talking to me but they don't like if you decide that you don't want to have kids that's okay but that's

decisions on you. You can, and you will find someone that you love and want to be in love with. Those things do not sit together. And they just want you to be really conscious when you're talking about it because like you are so worthy of being loved. And then you get to decide whether you want to have kids. I know. I know. I love you. I guess that's why it was such a hard chapter because I know there are a lot of women out there that are in my position where you get to a point where you're like I just want to give up I don't want to do it anymore something's wrong with me something's inherently wrong with me because I can't find it everyone else can find it and I know that that's a really relatable thing and I guess that's why I talk about it because

people feel these things and they they feel like they're the only one that feels them but they're not everyone goes through these these times of their life and you are right I know I know for me it'll happen one day but you get to a point where you're like when is that day what do I have to do differently what do i you know and it's exhausting for this to have space in the back of your mind totally and a lot of women it holds a lot of space especially as the years get older you don't want to think about it everyone says don't think about it don't think about kids don't think about dating don't think about finding the one just let it happen you can't you can't just let it happen when you're a woman that is aging with a biological clock and that is the thing i

want to drive home it's the fact that we there are limitations and it sucks fucking sucks but There are things you can do about it, like freezing your eggs, but there are limitations and it does take space in your mind whether you want to accept that or not. Just so you know, the book We Love Love, available at all good and bad bookstores. You can also grab it online from our website. There's a link in our show notes if you want to grab yourself a coffee.

There is also the audiobook if you would like something to listen to over Christmas while a lot of podcasts are on break. Coming up next in our year in review, oh, this was such a biggie. We got to speak to the world-leading expert on relationships, Esther Perel, and I can still remember when the text came through to our group chat about this interview, like we were all just losing our fucking minds. Esther Perel was the creme de la creme.

She was just the person that all of us wanted so badly to get onto the podcast, so this is a super exciting moment for us. She has such nuanced perspectives on human psychology, surrounding relationships and sex. I particularly loved what she spoke about with desire and eroticism. And to be honest, I could have pulled any part of this interview as the highlight. I actually really struggled to pick a certain couple of minutes to do for this highlight reel. But yeah, everything she said made me kind of have an aha moment, I suppose.

So I hope you enjoy this part of Esther Perel. If one partner is very sexual and wanting it a lot and the other partner is not coming to the table, is this relationship doomed? But I don't think that I have nearly enough information when it's presented like this. My first question when one person is so much more interesting than the other is to ask the other person, do you enjoy it? First of all, do you enjoy it? Then I'll know why you don't want to do it as much as the other person. Then the next question is, how does your partner reach out to you? I mean, what is foreplay like? And if it's a five minutes before the real thing, then I can also understand that for a lot of people, that's not enough.

Actually, foreplay should start at the end of the previous orgasm, you know, or a person says, you know, my partner doesn't talk to me the whole day and then suddenly they turn around and they want to just kind of get into it. No, that doesn't work for me. I'm totally disconnected. Or, you know, one person saying, I have high testosterone, I have high desire, I get aroused, that doesn't say nothing to the dynamic in a relationship. That just says, you enjoy having sex or you like it or you need it or you want it that's all i know now tell me what goes on between the two of you if i'm a camera on the wall what am i seeing am i seeing one person just suddenly you know say here i am what's up with you why you're never interested

or do i have a person who actually knows how to elicit interest you know by by reaching out The one thing that is very important, though, is that it's OK to be responsive. Not everybody is an initiator. Some people don't necessarily want to do something until someone else says, how about? And then gradually they bring them into the experience. But if you think of it as I always want and I have to talk you into it and I have to, you know I did the dishes and now hopefully I'll get some that sounds like their relationship but okay I appreciate so much that this is the perspective that you come to this conversation

with and I think it's so important for a lot of people who have a mismatch in the sex drive in their relationship because they can definitely become that one person feels like the villain like they're withholding sex but I know that from my personal experience like I became a mom in the last two years. I've had two children in a very short period of time. And so my whole identity has changed. What I need in order to get in the mood to have sex is different to when we first started dating. Very much, very much so. Yeah. And I think that sometimes, you know, it's very easy to fall into a pattern of arguing about sex. If at, like you said, 11 o'clock at night, that's when they're like, well, I'm ready now. And what do you mean you're going to reject me?

And it's like, well, guess what? I'm fucking tired. It's 11 o'clock at night. And I've just been up all night the night before. It's almost like you're setting yourself up or that person setting you up to say no, to then be angry. And I think a lot of people still, if they're the one rejecting or not coming to the table with sex, it can feel like they're the problem. So let me change this whole dynamic for you. Number one, I'm going to give you three little snapshots. First of all, you have your little one. You tickle them. You nibble them. You lick them. You look at them in their eyes. They look at you in their eyes.

They're adoring gays. And it feels almost the same kind of pleasure as you had in the first days when you met your partner. It has that kind of charge. And basically, at the end of the day, when you say, I have nothing left to give, I also want you to know that sometimes it's because there is nothing more you need. You already are satiated. All of that is erotic.

It's not sexual, but it's erotic. It's very pleasurable in that way. And that is for you to then know that sometimes that makes the partner feel very lonely, very separate, and that they want to know that you can still have some of those feelings with them as well. That's the first thing. The second thing is that when your partner approaches you and you want to say, I'm tired, I think it's very important to also say, I really like that you still approach me. It feels really good. I hope at some point soon I find my way back to us. I know that at this point I've been really absorbed. If you've been nursing, you've been stimulated plenty very differently, but it creates a

certain kind of saturation. and what's important is not to tell the other person now you want how come you think of this and I'm so tired and I have nothing in me is to actually say I so need you to it's so important for me that you continue to want me even at a time when I don't know that I want as much but it doesn't mean I don't want you it just means that I am in the beginning of those few years of it's basically till the second one is about two or three and then if everyone's on occasion you say i'm not in the mood but can i please you be giving because it makes the other person feel like you know the experience of being generous hasn't disappeared the fact that you have less desire

is temporary it's a transition and it's exactly the state that you are in and these things are what preserves the couple during those few more fragile years now interviewing our next guest was one of my personal highlights for the year. It was actually while Britt was away filming the challenge, so I got to sit in on this episode. And to give you guys a little bit of a behind the scenes look at this one, I actually have a background in medical science. So I worked as a researcher before I got into media and eventually joined the Life Uncut team. And Johan Hari was someone that I met initially through the internet about five years ago. And that was because we had a research topic in common. For this interview, it was the first time that we ever got to meet

in person so it was like a real special moment for me personally and I just loved that we got to share his wisdom and his knowledge because he is just, he's just on a whole other level of the way that he explains these things that he goes into such in-depth research about. So in this episode we spoke about our lost connections which just so happens to be one of the titles of his books as well and his latest research, Why We Can't Pay Attention. Now this particular snippet I thought was really relevant to all of us because a lot of us have social media and we probably aren't aware of how the algorithms work in all of our apps i certainly know that i'm not we spoke at length about how we feel a sense of validation from engagement but also how algorithms targeted

a particular type of engagement and this is what he had to say the design of the machinery is driven by just one idea which is how do we get people to scroll longer and longer and longer right so the algorithms all the computers are set up to figure out okay track everything and figure out what it is that keeps people scrolling right and those algorithms this wasn't anyone's fault they didn't design it that way but they just stumbled across an underlying truth about human psychology right the kind of fancy term for it is negativity bias but it's very simple everyone will have experienced it you will stare longer at something that makes you angry or upset than you will at something that makes you feel good 100 if you've ever seen a car crash you know exactly what i mean right you

stared longer at the mangled car wreck than you did at the pretty flowers we say this about you know you could receive a hundred good comments on something or even five nice comments on something they will not even reach you but if you receive one thing that hurts you that makes you feel invalidated or question your sense of self that will rock you whereas the the compliments the niceties everything else it's as though they don't even exist because we can be so negatively geared that's a really powerful example of negativity bias and it's very deep in human nature probably when you combine two things a business model designed to figure out what keeps you scrolling plus negativity bias right so what these algorithms discovered is best way to explain it's picture two

teenage girls who go to the same party and go home on the same bus and one of them does a little video for tiktok status update whatever and they say what a nice party i had a great time everyone looked good well you know we danced this or that whatever right and the second girl does a video or an update where she goes karen was a right skank at that party her boyfriend's an asshole just an angry imagine that girl does an angry denunciatory rant right so the algorithm is scanning to look at the kind of words you use and it'll put that nice state that nice video that nice data is updating to a few people's feeds right but the second update it'll put into far more people's feeds because it knows if you see something angry what do you mean karen's a skank

you're a fucking skank you can see how that triggers an argument that causes engagement I fucking love this because we see this and we've had this conversation internally in regards to influencers I think a lot of influencers engage outrage culture they get really angry and often it's around things that you should be angry about but they will verbalize how angry they are as a way of growing their following because it is a really fucking great tactic people love to see someone angry and outraged about an injustice and we are so much more willing to follow that to get on board with that it is a crusade it is a plight rather than following someone who you know is just happy not that we need to be happy all the time or positive that's not what i'm saying but

it is a tool and i don't think people are aware that it's actually a tool that some people and influencers have clocked into as well those influencers are consciously or unconsciously learning the rules of the system they're operating in so just like the teenage girls on the bus an influence is going to clock if i do all these nice posts if i say oh look i read this nice book and wasn't it lovely you know you're not going to get much traction if you go have you seen what this bitch did right it's going to get a lot of traction so i feel it happening to myself i don't look at social media now i've got an assistant i give my tweets to do it sounds very grand yeah because i feel myself becoming cruder and nastier when i'm on it because you see oh i said this nice

thing and it looked like hardly anyone noticed and i said this nasty thing and look now people are talking about me there's some degree to which this is just human psychology but we're operating in a machinery that is supercharging the worst of our psychology right and that doesn't have to happen we can't change the negativity bias that's just a natural part of human psychology but we can't stop the machines fucking jabbing a knitting needle at our negativity bias all the time right so if we change the business model in the way we've talked about you get out of that trap right in a subscription model they don't want to make you angry suddenly they're like oh you want to feel good let's start giving her feedback where she feels good not feedback that makes her angry

upset and hostile right see I also think that there's like a whole other element to this and Johan I know that this is something that you are extremely well researched in and that is our brains and the way that they work in a similar way to how drug addiction works with social media you know we now have so much research that shows us that when we post something on social media that gets likes and gets comments and gets any type of interaction we get a release of dopamine in our brains and that's the same thing that goes up when you take just about any illegal drug and so not only do we have these massive tech companies that have designed these algorithms to keep us scrolling and keep us engaged we also have our own brains that are being programmed and kind of rewired

that every time we post something that might create you know outrage culture as we're talking about we get more interaction and so we get more of that dopamine being released into our own brain So it's kind of like a storm in a teacup of all of these different factors with how our brains are working in terms of social media. It's interesting though, the irony in that, which I find is that all of that comes down to this want for connectedness, that this want for like being part of a community, to feel validated, to be liked by your friends. You know, a lot of that is what it's geared around.

It's still feeling like you're part of a community, but we almost are lacking connection because of it at the same time. Coming up next in our year in review, this particular episode was actually a bit of a brain baby of Laura's. She wanted to do this episode for years and years and years, I think probably from the inception of the podcast. And it was all because it kind of struck a chord with her, like her relationship with alcohol during her twenties. She has some pretty complex feelings about it. So for this whole episode, we were actually joined by Eleanor Sauzier and Danny Carr and it was all about the choice to go sober from alcohol. So for this particular highlight,

segment we are chatting with elena sauzier and i think it was interesting for me as someone who like i wouldn't personally identify myself as having a problem with alcohol so it was really interesting to hear from the perspectives of people that experience things like blackout or you know their behavior changes when they get drunk or maybe their character changes and they do things that they're embarrassed about and i guess one thing that i had thought people who tend to go sober it's because they had done something so catastrophically bad or like their life had just hit rock bottom and that's why they needed to turn things around and this particular episode really taught me that that wasn't the case it never really sat right with me like this

is quite a hectic example but like i look i never drank i never wanted to be because i think there's this whole rhetoric and story around people that stop drinking and it's like oh my god why like what happened in your life that forced you like as if I had to hit rock bottom for me to stop drinking where it really wasn't that way it was just that like I would go out and maybe once a month I would totally have like this four hour period that something happened and sometimes I would do something that was really crazy and I'd have no idea until someone kind of like jogged my memory and would be like no this happened and I'd be like but how like that's not me some of my friends make a joke about it but I'm like it's actually quite a scary thing it's like an alter

ego and I have friends that will be like yeah my alter ego comes out and I'm like cool sometimes she's fun but sometimes she's really destructive and it's actually quite scary so like the times that I realized how detrimental it was was when someone was holding me accountable so when I was single I would go out have a big night in my mind it was a fun night and I didn't have anyone the next morning to say to me look you did or said this thing that was really unacceptable but when I was being held accountable when I was in relationships I would say probably every single boyfriend of mine was like you got a bit weird last night or you said something really horrible or you were really flirty with someone else or you just did something that was so out of character

and the regret and the shame I would feel from it because I'd be like but I wasn't like I wasn't there like I physically was like I'm I can't believe that that's me and obviously I've the scars there like I've hurt that person and they're gonna start thinking like well how often are you going to use this excuse of you blacked out so you said something horrible or you blacked out you're flirting with someone else and also how far can that go like I've slept with people and had absolutely no idea that I slept with them and they would come back to me the next day and be like you came over and you slept with me three times and you were totally lucid and I'm like what oh that's a scary thought isn't it it's terrifying so I started getting to the point especially in

my relationships and especially with Tom when I was like I think this is the love of my life and I was sort of doing these things very rarely but still doing them but I was like imagine if I went out and slept with someone else blackout drunk whilst I'm dating this man that I love so much and I know it's within my capabilities because who knows like I could do that last up for our year in review I know it's getting to the end of it but one of our favorite things about the podcast for sure like we say it is a joke every week but we always say it's time for our favorite segment accidentally unfiltered but it's because it is so funny and there's just something so relatable about other people doing dumb shit that embarrasses themselves it definitely makes me feel

better about myself so we decided to do an entire episode a standout bonus episode of your dating disaster stories this particular one is a bit of a compilation of the worst or the best i don't know Dating disaster stories. I met a guy on Plenty of Fish. We were making out in the back of his car and it was getting really steamy. Now, next minute, he gets up and says that he's really hungry and he needs food ASAP. Like literally in the middle of making out in the back of his car,

he's like, ping, I need food. Hard work. Yeah, he's hangry. All right. So we're about 20 minutes away from anywhere and he insists that he follows me in his car. So not only does the makeout stop, she has to get out of his car, get back into her car and he says i'm gonna follow you to this place where i'm gonna pick

some food up so she's driving and he is behind her okay halfway there i notice he turns down a side street i pull over to call him he had blocked me and i never ever heard from him oh my god so he was making out with her got a hunger pain or did he we'll never know he didn't it was a made-up hunger pain what an elaborate story to try and go someone why wouldn't you just say i'm not feeling this i'm not vibing this what happened in that exact moment if a few minutes ago you were into the makeout what has she done that has turned you off so much that you were like i need to abort this mission and it's like a it's like an fbi chase like he's like i'm gonna turn down the street and lose her and then block her also they're completely uncomfortable because

if you've gotten if you're in someone's car in the back of their car and it is getting hot and steamy but you want it to stop and you want the person to get out of your car it's kind of an awkward situation to be like hey i'm not vibing this can you please go i fucking love that i'm a bit hungry let's i'm gonna smoke bomb it's like on bridesmaids you know when they're in bed in with the she's in bed with a dickhead and he's like so I really want you to leave but I don't want to seem like an asshole it's like exactly that maybe she's like okay I'll just go and he's like yeah I just love that no like he obviously when he was driving he'd obviously it was so premeditated that he was blocking her on things whilst he was following her in the car he was

doing an illegal maneuver he was on his phone whilst driving and then he was like now I can make my grand getaway what would you do what's your excuse you're making out in the back seat would you just be like I'm done or would you say I'm so hungry or would you say I've got diarrhea I'd just be like I'd be like my bowels are loose I think I just no I'm not gonna say excuse me my bowels are loose what is wrong yeah imagine how turned off you'd be there's if there's one way to lose someone is to tell them you've got loose bowels I think I would just have to say I'm not vibing it I don't think I'm I'm just not that creative that's like a level of creativity that I don't have in my being okay next one I was going on a first date we decided to go to a cafe

for a coffee and brunch how much can go wrong as my date is arriving at the table i can see him walking up he pulls out his nokia phone now i get very awkward at the best of times but especially on first dates so he whips out this brick of a nokia and honestly who has a nokia these days who has a nokia trying to make lighthearted joke i say man that has got to be the oldest phone i have seen this decade i really dug into this about why he would be using such an old brick i'm trying to break that friendly wall you know i even went so far as to say that phone just took you from an eight to a six ha ha ha i think i'm really funny turns out people don't use nokias anymore it was his insulin pup oh oh bless but we're gonna make him feel self-conscious about something that he

can't control her saving grace they've been together two years okay right so i think that This is, I think this is a cute time, but the worst part, like, did you really have to throw in there that the phone took you from an eight to a six? Like, that was a real, because an insulin pump's on you, that is part of you. But also, like, everyone likes a little bit of, not everyone, but a lot of people enjoy a bit of riffing, a bit of riffing early on in a relationship. Not like, you know, straight up insulting each other, but a bit of a riff. Yeah, she thought she was hilarious.

She's like, I'm locking this down. I'm funny. I'm going to make this really lighthearted. And then the poor guy, but they've been dating two years, so this is great. Well, that is it for your Rewind Your View of 2022. I hope that you really enjoyed that episode. I really enjoyed making that episode, actually. Just getting to go back and listen through those particular highlight moments was, yeah,

it was cool. It made me have a lot of laughs. It made me think about things. And it just made me remember how bloody lucky we are to have such great guests on the podcast. Hope you all have a wonderful New Year's. And we will be back in January. I'm not going to give you an exact date because Laura and Britt have this horrible habit of like saying we're not going to drop any episodes. And then all of a sudden I get a text message

that like, oh, we're going to do a bonus episode, but I'm fairly certain there won't be any episodes until the end of January. And I can tell you that the guests that are lined up for the start of next year are absolutely killer. I think you're really going to enjoy a lot of them. So I'm really looking forward to that. I hope you are as well. And yeah, like I said, have a great new year and we'll see you back in 2023. Oh, I nearly forgot. Oh my God. How could I sign off a podcast episode of Life Uncut without this? Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friends and share the love because we love love. We'll be right back.