Life Matters - Separate stories podcast

If you've ever tended to a homegrown tomato, you'll know the joys gardening can bring. And with the price of groceries climbing, many are looking to grow fresh produce at home and bring down household costs. But between the up-front investment, manual labour and those seemingly endless visits to the hardware store for supplies, can you still come out in front?

Do you ever have that moment where a minor interaction with your parent makes you feel like you're suddenly a child again?  Or have you, as the parent of a fully grown adult, felt the need to step in and take charge of your offspring's life? The parent-child relationship is a two-way street. It takes both sides to figure out how to relate to each other as adults -- and that can be especially tough...

This week, the Aunties help out a listener whose beloved teddy bear was destroyed by the neighbours' dog. When the eye-watering bill for repairs comes in, is it reasonable to expect the owners to pay up?

Sir David Attenborough, one of the most influential individuals of our time, is turning 100. For decades, his work in conservation and contribution to science has made an immeasurable impact on the world, stretching beyond the bounds of nature. In recognition of his milestone birthday, a group of producers created Sir Dave Day to celebrate his life and ongoing legacy.

For its entire existence, the Met Gala in New York has always been for a handful of elite philanthropists and celebrities raising money for an exclusive institution. But this year felt especially dystopian. One billionaire in particular had a lot to do with that. Jeff Bezos and his wife Lauren Sanchez Bezos reportedly paid $US10 million to sponsor the event, and even for this traditionally high-en...

Every day, thousands of Australians rely on blood transfusions to not just survive, but to live a normal life. And while it's estimated one in three of us will need blood or blood products in our lifetime, only one in 30 donates.  So how can we encourage more eligible donors to sign up and give the gift of life?

Rates are rising again, the cost of grocery staples is going up and people are feeling it.  Calls to the National Debt Helpline are up 21 per cent compared to April last year, and many households are starting to look more closely at their budgets to figure out where they can make meaningful savings.  In most cases, cancelling streaming services or skipping a daily coffee isn't going to cut it. So...

Are you someone who dreads an early morning meeting, or do you find it hard to stay engaged in the afternoon? Your biology plays a big role in when your energy peaks during the day — these patterns are known as circadian rhythms.  But the workforce isn't set up to suit everyone's needs, so how do you get the best out of everyone when people are most productive at different times of the day?

A gap year offers a chance to travel the world and step outside your usual routine before settling into "real life" and all the responsibilities that come with it.  For a long time, the gap year has felt like an Australian rite of passage. But the reality is, many people never got that chance. A recent survey from travel company Intrepid found 80 per cent of those over 55 missed out. So a new kind...

In Australia, it's estimated that 1 in 4 women and 1 in 14 men have experienced violence from an intimate partner. While public awareness of this national crisis has improved, there remains a gap in understanding when survivors speak up about their experiences of gendered violence. So often, the response is: why didn't they just leave?  The reality is much more complicated. Many feel tied to their...

Your friends are the family you choose for yourself, and even though you know how critical your friends are to your life, these relationships don't get the same formal recognition as your birth family. A Swedish company has reversed this by trialling "friendcare leave" for a year, paying their workers to check in with friends to combat loneliness. So how did it go, and is it something that could w...

We've been turning to the online world for health advice for decades now, but the medium — and the message — has changed drastically over that time. Earlier this year OpenAI revealed there are 230 million health and wellness queries on ChatGPT every week, and our social media algorithms have in-built confirmation biases that show us content we're likely to be interested in. So who are the people w...

New research has explored which voices we find more attractive and how our sexuality might shape the kinds of speech that turns us on.  Though, it might not come as a surprise to learn that deeper voices are considered more attractive to everyone except straight men. But what exactly shapes the way we talk, and our desires? And how do our voices reflect power, status and our place in the world? 

Parents have never had more options to give their child the best start in life.  But when it comes to choosing the "best" school to provide your child a quality education, that decision can be costly. Jane Caro argues that the gap between public and private schools has widened, and turned what many would consider a basic right to education into a minefield of parental guilt.

Dinner delivered to your door, one click and a package is on its way, location sharing so you don't have to text your partner to ask when they'll be home, or an AI chatbot to help you word an awkward email. So much of the technology in our lives is designed to optimise convenience and sand down the rough edges of everyday living. But in this quest for convenience, have we maybe lost something alon...

When Life Matters asked our listeners to share the stories of their mother wounds, it opened up another conversation of unmet needs: the father wound.  These relationships can be complicated by absence, emotional distance and "dadmiration" — the idea that societal expectations of fathers are so low, they're often applauded for putting in minimum effort. So in an age where Bluey's dad Bandit is see...

This week, the Aunties are advising a Life Matters listener on the politics of the group chat. When a friendship fades out, is it OK to remove the ring-in? Or is it better to create a new chat on the side? What happens if they find out they weren't invited to the side chat?

Is there a piano in your life? Does it still get played? Or does it sit silently in the corner, gathering dust while you decide what to do with it? Those in the piano industry estimate at least 3,000 pianos are sent to landfill each year in Australia, often because they're costly to maintain, difficult to move, and hard even to give away. So what can you do with a piano that's at the end of its li...

Are some places just cooler than others? This week a tribunal in Victoria reversed a decision to block an application for a new McDonald's in one of Melbourne's trendiest suburbs. While the council had argued it wouldn't fit with the "cool vibes" of the rest of the street, the tribunal decided actually, there's no true authority on the subject. So how does a place create an identity and protect it...

Australia sends 26 million tonnes of rubbish to landfills each year, and we're running out of room. Sydney is on track to run out of space in the next five years. 

Goal setting, vision boards, manifestation — however you do it, the concept of setting an intention and striving towards it can give us purpose and meaning in our lives, pushing us beyond our limits.  Recently, the Japanese Shinto ritual of misogi has been gaining traction online. It's a simple concept where each year you set yourself one main challenge that's so hard you might actually fail.  The...

Do you have a favourite blanket that you only bring out when it gets to a certain level of cold? When the temperatures drop there are certain rituals and attitudes that emerge as we try to make ourselves cosy. Some Scandinavian countries have words to capture this exact feeling. But what does getting cosy mean in Australia, and why do so many of us relish the opportunity to rug up?

Hurling insults on the field was once widely accepted in sport. But this week the AFL  — and elite athletes across the sporting spectrum — sent a clear message that homophobic comments on the field can't be excused simply because they were said in the heat of the contest. So what changes now for players, fans and the game itself?

The grief of losing a loved one is different for everyone. For some people it's private and hidden. For others it becomes a force for action — setting up support groups, raising funds and awareness, or even changing the law. Advocacy gives grief somewhere to go, but it can also take a personal toll. How do you make sure the cause you've taken on doesn't become too much to carry?

How firmly do you hold onto your ethics when you're in the grocery aisle? With prices rising and everyone watching their budgets, you might be reconsidering the top-tier free-range eggs or the sustainably farmed tuna. So how do marketing companies play on our efforts towards ethical consumption, and once you break the habit, are you likely to return?