The Tortoise with Brooke McAlary

We’re a little over a week into this month’s Slow Home Experiment of daily meditation, and in today’s episode Brooke talks about why she’s finding it increasingly difficult. Being complete novices in meditation, they have no idea if that’s normal or not but in this episode Ben and Brooke talk about their favourite guided meditations and Brooke looks at why one of the...

Bele Masterman is one of only a handful of repeat guests on the poggie, and this week she’s back for her third chat with Brooke. In a wide-ranging and super honest conversation, Bele and Brooke talk about making big life changes as they become more attuned to the Why in their lives, and why she and her family have decided to move from the inner city to an old orchard outside Sydney. They als...

After last month’s not-so-great finish to the journalling experiment, Brooke and Ben are back with a new Slow Home Experiment - daily meditation. This month they’ve decided not to put too many rules or stipulations on the experiment, but rather simply commit to the daily doing - no matter how that looks. In this episode Brooke talks about why she’d like to meditate in the morning...

As mad-keen travellers, Brooke and Ben now subscribe to the idea of slow travel, exploring more and getting to know places in a deeper, local kind of way. In this hostful episode they answer three great listener questions about: the issue of over-planning how to balance getting things done and enjoying the down time keeping kids occupied on long-haul trips Ben and Brooke also talk about their atte...

We’re moving in to the last week of this month’s Slow Home Experiment and it turns out that Ben and Brooke’s journalling experience has been, shall we say, varied? In this episode Ben and Brooke talk about the mistakes they made and the reason Ben sees this month as a big fat fail. They also talk about next month’s experiment - daily meditation. Head over to http://www.slow...

This week, we have a new Listener Chat with you, featuring librarian-teacher and all-round lovely person, Morgan. When Brooke put a call out on Facebook for Calgary-based listeners a couple of weeks ago, Morgan was the first to volunteer her time. A few days later they got to sit down at Brooke and Ben’s holiday apartment and chat for a couple of hours. There were two big themes that came ou...

In this episode Brooke and Ben look at week three of this month’s Slow Home Experiment, where they’ve committed to spend time each day writing in a family journal. This past week it’s turned into somewhat of a travel journal, but today Ben talks about why he feels like it’s actually taking him out of living in the present moment while travelling, which isn’t at all wh...

Today’s guest is Joshua Fields Millburn - one half of The Minimalists and a delightful human - and he and Brooke look back at his life pre-minimalism. They talk about why he made the shift away from the American Dream (hint: it wasn’t his dream after all) and how he started the process of simplifying. They look at some practical approaches for dealing with clutter and the “just i...

After a very, ahem, relaxed lunch, Ben and Brooke sat down for a chat about the current Slow Home Experiment and the first couple of weeks of their Canadian holiday. The talk ranges from bears, to hiking, to the beauty of taking it slow on the road, before they get down to this month’s surprisingly challenging experiment of daily family journalling. Ben talks about the messiness factor, whil...

Can we incorporate the philosophy of ‘slow’ into modern medicine? Today’s guest, Dr Christine Walker believes so, and is increasingly seeing the benefits of slowing down, becoming more mindful and practicing the mind-body connection in her PT practice. In this episode, Brooke and Christine talk about her personal experience with stress, fatigue and illness and how a realisation t...

This is the first episode Ben and Brooke have recorded while travelling throughout April, so they talk a little about their first few days away, as well as the embarrassing moment Brooke realised she’d posted an unedited version of the podcast before flying out! They also look back at the March experiment of daily yoga - what went well, what was challenging, and whether they think they&rsquo...

RE-EDITED VERSION! (Sorry guys - turns out we needed the vacation!)  In today’s episode Ben and Brooke answer some super tricky listener questions about the deeper issues of choosing to live a slower, more intentional life and, to be honest, they got a little stumped! They include questions about: Planning for the future vs living in the moment How to minimise time spent talking on the...

Brooke and Ben sat down to talk about Week 4 of the Yoga Slow Home Experiment, and specifically how they managed to keep it up over the past week, where work has been busy and mornings disrupted. They essentially learned the importance of being flexible in a number of ways, and again the idea of reducing the scope and sticking to the schedule has been really helpful. Brooke has spent a little more...

Brooke is a long-time reader of Paul Jarvis’ Sunday Dispatches and long-time listener of his Invisible Office Hours podcast, so she was super delighted to sit and chat with him about simplicity, writing our wills, Netflix and priorities. They also spend quite a bit of time talking about the importance of being our true self online, and the BIG difference between that and sharing things we ha...

When we first started this month’s Slow Home Experiment, the last thing Brooke and Ben expected were tears. And yet, late last week, on Day 18 of the experiment, Brooke found herself crying (yes, really) as she stood in her first ever tree pose. She went on to bust out a fairly decent crow pose on Day 19 too and feels like this past week of the experiment has been a game-changer. She’s...

James Wallman is an ex-adman and trend forecaster - which doesn’t necessarily sound like Brooke’s typical guest - but when you learn he is also the author of Stuffocation and the person who coined the phrase ‘experientialism’ it starts to make a lot of sense. Brooke and James talk about minimalism’s branding issue and why he thinks that experientialism is the way to m...

This month’s Slow Home Experiment of 30 days of yoga is proving super fascinating. And while they’re only two weeks in, Brooke and Ben are starting to get a glimpse of everything that’s involved (both physically and emotionally) in a regular yoga practice. Before they had actually practiced yoga, Ben and Brooke thought it was all about being zen and chill and effortlessly moving...

Brooke often talks about the importance of taking that first step, rather than focusing on the bigger picture, but what if that first step actually proves to be our downfall? In this episode Brooke chats with Anthony Ongaro of BreakTheTwitch.com about his online shopping addiction, the realisation that it was costing him the life he wanted and what happened when he recognised that “Amazon is the o...

Last week Ben and Brooke told you they’d teamed up with the awesome Adriene Mishler of Yoga With Adriene for a new Slow Home Experiment - 30 days of yoga! Now they’re a week in and already feeling the massive benefits of slowing down and doing yoga every day. This week they chat about the initial struggle to get up and out of bed half an hour earlier every day, as well as the inevitable challenge...

A few months ago Brooke received an email from a listener who was struggling with an insanely hectic work life. She’d just listened to an episode of the podcast where a guest suggested people who feel overworked should simply find a way to work fewer hours. And while she understood the meaning behind the advice, it didn’t apply to her life - at all. She asked if there was a way she could use slow...

Well, crack open the chocolates and pass all the lollies! The no-sugar experiment is over! In this episode, Brooke and Ben talk about the past month’s experience of eating virtually no processed sugar, how they feel now and what they plan on changing now they’re out of the experiment phase. They also answer a couple of questions about the kinds of foods they ate regularly over the past month and w...

To celebrate episode 50 of the podcast, Brooke and Ben sit down to recap all that’s happened over the last couple of months at Pogpast HQ. It’s been a busy time and they’ve received a lot of emails asking how slow living and self-employment can fit together. Ben gets pretty honest, sharing the challenges as well as the benefits of running his own show, while Brooke also looks at the changes she’s...

There’s just one week left in the first Slow Home Experiment and today Brooke and Ben talk about how they’re feeling now that they’ve completed nearly an entire month of eating no processed sugar. They also talk about some of the more interesting reactions they’ve had as a result of this experiment… It’s fascinating to hear what happens when they start talking about food, even in a very experiment...

One of the most common requests we receive about the pogpast (apart from more singing from Ben) would have to be to feature more “normal people”. That is, people who don’t work online, haven’t written a book or aren’t teaching others how to slow down and simplify. Because, for the vast majority of people who listen to the podcast, who are balancing work, family, friends, health, home and external...

We’re more than halfway through the first Slow Home Experiment and Brooke and Ben share how they’re feeling now the cravings and low energy have passed. In this show they talk about the different kinds of foods they’re craving and how they’re feeling both physically and mentally. Ben also gets into the habits side of things - turns out the recent episode with Gretchen Rubin had a big impact on him...