The Life Of Bryony - The Life of YOU: Abigail Dean on Perfectionism, Motherhood & Creative Risk

Episode Date: April 18, 2025

QUICK SURVEY – TELL US WHAT YOU'RE LOVING: We’re running a short survey to get to know you better—so we can keep making the kind of episodes you actually want to hear. Takes 2 mins, promise: https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=3 Welcome to The Life of YOU! WELCOME TO THE LIFE OF YOU! The bonus series where we tackle your dilemmas and share advice to navigate life’s trickier moments. This week, I’m joined by bestselling author and former lawyer Abigail Dean—writer of the Sunday Times hit Girl A and the powerful new novel The Death of Us. Today: 💼 Lily asks whether she’s wasting her ‘successful’ career—and how to start living a life that feels like hers. 📝 We discuss the myth of perfect creativity, and why done is always better than perfect. 👶 Katie wonders if she’s cut out for motherhood—can you ever really know before it happens? ⸻ WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU 🗣 Got a question or a story to share? Text or send a voice note on 07796657512—just start your message with LOB 💬 Use the WhatsApp shortcut: https://wa.me/447796657512?text=LOB 📧 Prefer email? Drop us a line at [e-mail] If this episode resonated with you, please share it with someone who might need it—it really helps! Bryony xx ⸻ CREDITS 🎙 Presenter: Bryony Gordon 🎙 Guest: Abigail Dean 🎧 Content Producer: Jonathan O’Sullivan 🎥 Audio & Video Editor: Luke Shelley 📢 Executive Producer: Mike Wooller A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to The Life of You, the bonus episode where we tackle your dilemmas and share advice for life's trickiest moments. I'm joined once again by bestselling author Abigail Dean. I really do believe that there's this idea you have of this kind of perfect book or perfect piece of art or and I think that as soon as you start putting it into an actual physical form that perfection kind of falls away. Your questions answered right after this. Oh nice Air Canada has a worldwide sale. Wow look at this deal to the Philippines. Nice let's book it.

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at the age of only 36 in the midst of the global pandemic, my world was shaken. Sat in the chemo chair, I set myself a goal of starting a podcast to explore resilience and the power of mindset. And so, When Life Gives You Lemons was born, where I speak to high performing individuals who have been through adversity but come back stronger.

Come and join us on this journey of human resilience and discover how my guests are able to turn their lemons into lemonade. We've got a question from Lily. She says, I'm in a job that's meant to be a good one. Great salary. People seem impressed when I talk about it, but I feel like I'm living someone else's life. I always thought success would feel better than this. I want to do something more creative, but I don't know where to start or if I'd just be throwing everything away. What helped you figure out what was worth holding on to and what to leave

behind? Epic question. So I'm going to give a quite a conservative lawyer answer to this. I'm sorry to disappoint everyone. No, I think it's important. I feel like if you can explore it from a position of comfort, I think that is always useful. So if you can kind of look into like, you know, creative classes, whether you can spend some time at the weekends and evenings kind of investigating that kind of creative thing that you want to do, that gives you the ability...

Without having to give up the job. Without making that kind of real two-path decision. I think that helps. And I think then you kind of you get to know whether you've got a particular passion or idea that is worth that that big leap But yeah, I'm sorry. That's I feel like my my writer answer would be go for the creative thing live your own life but my I've got more of a sort of a bit more of a I do

Answer there don't have to make a decision today But you can start exploring it in a way that doesn't sort of isn't all or nothing and doesn't scupper everything. Yeah, and it doesn't have to that investigation doesn't have to be kind of perfect because I think when my twenties when I was trying to write and failing miserably at writing, I had these really grand ideas about what writing entailed. It was kind of like, I needed hours of time and I needed to be kind of sat in this particular chair

at this table with no one else in the house. In a writing room. Yeah, and I think investigation does not need to be done in a writing room. Leave those ideas behind. Where do you write? Because I write, I literally have written my last book on the sofa because my what writing room that's it's the spare room of my

brother was living in it which is yeah there's those I think a sofa is a sofa is great beds great I try to write I do have a little office at home and that's why I like to write but a lot of a little office at home, and that's why I like to write, but a lot of The Death of Us was written in the notes section on my phone. Really? Yeah, yeah, I have like a laptop that I cart around that's like cracked from being in handbags,

and sometimes if I'm on a bus or something and I feel like I'm really enjoying a particular scene or I've got ideas for another scene, I think it really helps not to be precious about where you kind of do your creative thing because I think the more specific you are, the harder it becomes to do it. Yeah, in a way, those are just ways of limiting yourself.

Yeah, at least for me, yeah. 100%. Because actually, I think written is better than not. Yeah. And you're right, it's finding those sneaking those little moments. I wrote my first book on maternity leave while my child was asleep. It's not ideal, but you know, it got done. Yeah, yeah.

And nothing I really do believe that there's this idea you have of this kind of perfect book or perfect piece of art or perfect song or whatever your kind of creative passion is. There's this idea of this perfect thing that you will create. And I think that as soon as you start putting it into an actual physical form, that perfection kind of falls away, you know? And actually it's way better to create the thing during it between feeding your baby at night or on a bus, rather than awaiting

this kind of mythical perfect creation that will just never ever come. This is a paid advertisement for better help. There's this myth that at a certain point in your life, you should just have everything figured out. Our careers, our relationships, our self-worth. But the truth? Nobody has it all together. Not really. And that's okay. For me, therapy has always been the place where I can be myself and work through the things that hold me back. Perfectionism, people pleasing, the fear of getting things wrong. It's a space where I don't have to pretend and honestly that's been life-changing. With over 5,000 therapists in the UK already, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health

professionals with a wide variety of expertise in mental health. Our listeners get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com slash bryony. That's betterhelp.com slash bryony. That's b-r-y-o-n-y. Okay, Martin, let's try one. Remember, big. You got it. The Ford It's a Big Deal event is on. How's that? Uh, a little bigger. The Ford It's a Big Deal event. Nice. Now the offer? Lease a 2025 Escape Active all-wheel drive from 198 bi-weekly at 1.99% APR for 36 months with $27.55 down.

Wow, that's like $99 a week. Yeah, it's a big deal. The Ford It's a Big Deal event. Visit your Toronto area Ford store or Ford.ca today. This is from Katie. Katie says, I'm in my mid thirties and everyone around me seems to be having kids, but I can't shake the fear that I'm not cut out for it. Also, all of my friends with kids look like they're exhausted.

How do you know if you're cut out for being a mum? And is there anything I can do beforehand like a fairy test? I like, you know, what a great idea of a fairy test. I feel like they should make us, I do remember that when I was, they were like, you can go home now from the hospital. I was like, is someone going to come and like investigate whether I'm allowed to take this baby home? to come and like investigate whether I'm allowed to take this baby home? I'm not sure there is anything that you can do that will test that out. I don't think

there's anybody who is naturally kind of equipped to be a mum or not equipped to be a mum. There are just kind of people struggling and trying. But I think if there are big doubts, it's worth listening to the doubts. I think certainly the fact that your friends are having kids is not a good reason, I would guess. I guess I would say to have kids. Because what is that there? I mean they're around for a while. But also I do just think we are getting to the stage now where we are accepting that you don't, you know, like, yeah, maybe you don't want to have kids. And that's really okay. And there are different, you know, talking about a theory test, but there are different ways of experiencing parenthood

without having to go through the, you know, like, I definitely think of having children in your life that aren't biologically yours, you know, like, I think that's a really, that's just as beautiful, you know, in different ways, but just as important. You know, my sister doesn't have kids, but she is such a crucial person to my daughter, you know, and her auntiehood is absolutely critical to my, to Edie, you know, like she came, she was with us the whole weekend, it was my daughter's 12th birthday party, you know, there were just different ways of showing up. And I would say to Katie that just like, don't compare yourself to your friends, don't try and do their lives, do you, you know, and if motherhood happens, well, you're just going to have to go with that.

Yes. And if it doesn't, then that's the path that you were meant to be on. And both of those lives will be wonderful in different ways. There's not a right decision, I don't think, when it comes to Totally. agonizing about having children because, yeah, there'll be kind of wonderful elements and terrible elements potentially to both. Yeah. And I have friends as well who have desperately wanted children and it hasn't

happened for them and their lives are incredible now in totally different ways you know that they could never have imagined. So just you do you Katie listen I say these three words a lot and maybe they feel meaningless, but just trust the process. Trust what the universe gives you, Katie. Yes, and then your friends probably are exhausted. I think that is accurate. Yeah, yeah. They probably are. The path might be less exhausting. But perhaps not. Your nose will make crop up. You do you. You do you. Thank you again to Abigail for all of her warmth, insight and honesty.

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