Ed Stott & The Big Life Questions

Stefanie Sword Williams says the difference between the hard workers who succeed & the ones who don't is self promotion. But if the idea of networking makes you cringe, taking compliments is excruciating & your inner critic shouts you down before you can even remember your password for LinkedIn, how do you start to self-promote? Stefanie is the author of Fuck Being Humble: Why Self-Promotion Isn't...

If you've been listening to the podcast for a little bit now, you'll know I'm all about finding new ways of working, dreaming big & making it happen. The TRICKIEST part of this though, can be figuring out WHAT you want to do. There are few people as qualified to talk on this as today's guest. She is a podcaster, business owner, DJ, best-selling author & presenter known as FlexMami. She's written a...

TRIGGER WARNING: This conversation very briefly touches on eating disorders. How can we raise young women who like themselves in a culture that tells them not to? Kasey Edwards is the mother of two & the Co-Author of Raising Girls Who Like Themselves, which she wrote with her husband Dr Christopher Scanlon. They spent 10 years researching & speaking with the experts to figure out the non-negotiabl...

Sometimes climate guilt & grief can be overwhelming. But, as well as not feeling very nice, overwhelm is a fairly useless state to be in. So how do we manage these very scary & real emotions & turn them into something positive? My guest today is Dr Beth Hill. She's a program development coordinator at Psychology for Safe Climate - they're a not for profit whose sole purpose is helping people with...

If you feel like there's always something else to do, you're never doing enough & your time is slipping through your hands no matter how much you try to control it this episode is for you. Madeleine Dore spent 5 years searching for the secret to productivity only to wind up writing a book exposing our obsession with doing more. In this episode she dismantles hustle culture & shares some better way...

Our periods are often thought of as being a right old pain - both literally & metaphorically. BUT, are we missing out on an opportunity by just letting them roll on by each month WITHOUT making the most of the hormonal cycle that comes with them? Lucy Peach says yes, absolutely & that our menstrual cycles can be our superpower if we just learn to let them. Lucy is the creator of award winning thea...

If you've tried to practice mindfulness only to end up frustrated or falling asleep mid-meditation you'll know how hard it is to develop a mindful practice that you'll actually stick to. but there are some real benefits to perfecting this practice. The good news is that there are some simple & fun ways of adding it to you daily routine. To understand why mindfulness is so powerful & what's going o...

We all know them & as the saying goes, if you don't you probably are one (awks). Difficult people can be the bane of our lives & often we can end up piling more energy into managing them than in the relationships that actually add value to our lives. So how do we deal with them whilst protecting our own energy & when is it just time to call it a day?  Dr Rebecca Ray is a Clinical Psychologist & he...

Forgetting someone's name, misplacing your keys or completely blanking on the time of the meeting you were supposed to be in - these are pretty familiar lapses in memory all of us experience but how do we know if our memory is working properly or if there's something to be concerned about? Dr Anne Unkenstein is a clinical neuropsychologist who has worked with people who experience changes in their...

When you plan what you're going to do with your day do you consider how much fun is in there? Well according to organisational psychologist & behavioural scientist Mike Rucker, you absolutely should be - it will make you healthier, more productive & improve your relationships at home & at work. Mike is the author of The Fun Habit: How The Pursuit of Joy & Wonder Can Change Your Life. In this episo...

The average person will go on 126 diets in their lifetime - how depressing is that? Think of all those hours wasted counting calories, the number of social functions spent obsessing over the menu & days determined by the number on the scales. It is time to ditch this toxic cycle, the diet culture BS & start to build a great relationship with food. Today my guest is going to teach you how. Lyndi Co...

I have been working from home full time, alone now for over a year & let me tell you IT IS HARD. So when I saw on Twitter that journalist Rebecca Seal had written a book on this, I knew I had to get her on. The book is called Solo: How To Work Alone & Not Lose Your Mind and to get the answers Rebecca spoke to all kinds of people - organizational psychologists, behavioral scientists, and even solo...

There've been some brilliant examples of what boundaries aren't & how they shouldn't be used swirling around the news this week. But Dr Rebecca Ray says that setting true boundaries is actually the kindest thing you can do in a relationship. So what are they really & how can we set them effectively & unlock their power as the ultimate form of self-care? Dr Ray is a clinical psychologist & the auth...

Regardless of whether you're doing Dry July this month, it's a great reminder to take a step back & have a look at the role alcohol plays in our lives. It's something that journalist & author Jill Stark has been working on for over 10 years now since she wrote her first book on the topic which she re-released this year. In this episode she shares her story & how to develop a more mindful relations...

We are obsessed with chasing happiness, but writer Cyndie Spiegel says we should be focussing more on joy. In particular the teeny tiny moments of it. She calls them 'micro-joys'. She discovered them during the most difficult year of her life & says they can help us all to find hope especially when life isn't okay. Cyndie joins us to explain what micro-joys are, how to spot them & how they can hel...

Jessica Nabongo is the first black woman to travel to every country in the world & 89 of those trips were solo. If you've got a spot on your travel bucketlist but no travel buddy or if you're just keen for a life-changing adventure, this is the episode for you. Jessica shares her top tips, biggest mistakes & reasons why you should absolutely be heading off on the trip of a lifetime, regardless of...

Finding the elusive balance between utilizing technology and social media for our work, relationships, and overall happiness is no easy feat. It's a constant struggle, and sometimes it feels like these digital distractions have become an all-consuming time suck. We live in the 21st century & for many of us that means that giving up our phones, ignoring our inbox & deleting social media just isn't...

Prepare to have your beliefs about nutrition shattered! This week, renowned nutrition expert Marion Nestle exposes the well-kept secrets of the food industry.  As part of the Insiders series, we've heard about how our food has been manipulated by companies who are trying to make it more enticing & even addictive. But what about the people who have nothing to do with what's in your food, and everyt...

Did you know that sleeping with an eye mask on can improve your memory? Or that getting the right amount of light at the right time of day can help to boost your mental health? Me either! But these little hacks & tips are what today's ep is all about. Professor Penny Lewis is an expert in sleep engineering, she's a neuroscientist & the author of The Secret World of Sleep . Penny explains what happ...

Whilst some of the tech our kids use is incredibly useful, the majority is a direct route from advertisers to their brains. So how is advertising & tech targeting our kids, what impact is it having on them & how can we protect them? My guest today is Dr Susan Linn. She's a psychologist & the Author of Who's Raising the Kids? Big Tech, Big Business & The Lives of Children . Susan explains how tech...

TLDR: Learning the truth about how your clothes are made is overwhelming but there's one simple & wonderfully life-enhancing thing you can do about it. I want to put that up front because, if you (like me) are likely to skip past this episode & continue to bury your head in the sand because the state of fast fashion is so damn depressing, you may well believe there's nothing you can do about it. T...

Let's take a closer look at what's happening to our food before it gets to us - how it's designed to be addictive, marketed to get us hooked & how that's changing pretty much everything in and around us. Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter & New York Times Best Selling Author Michael Moss is the author of Salt, Sugar, Fat - How the Food Giants Hooked Us & Hooked, How we Became Addicted t...

There is nothing more irritating than being told you're 'hormonal', but hormones do play a huge role in the way our brains operate. So what's really going on up there? Dr Sarah McKay is a neuroscientist & the author of the Women's Brain Book: The Neuroscience of Health, Hormones and Happiness. We explore our brains & get to the bottom of this relationship between our brains and our hormones so tha...

We know so little about getting a great nights sleep ourselves, it's no wonder we're baffled when it comes to helping kids get quality rest. But, that's what we're going to tackle on today's episode of That's Helpful with me Ed Stott. My guest today is Sarah Ockwell Smith, she's a gentle parenting expert (she was actually the first person to coin the term) & the author of The Gentle Sleep Book as...

Despite previously working as a war correspondent, when New York Times journalist Damien Cave moved to Australia from the US, he was shocked by the Aussie approach to risk taking. Our national loves of nippers & surfing turned what his own country had taught him about risk & how it should be managed on its head. He says it's changed not only his life but his family's too & he's since written a boo...