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00:00We're often sold a very narrow idea of what a good life should look like.
00:04Fall in love, get married, have children, build a career, stay young, stay desirable, stay grateful.
00:09But what happens when life doesn't follow that script?
00:12Or when you realise the script was never right for you in the first place?
00:16Whatever you choose to do in life, just make sure that you're asking yourself the right questions within those choices.
00:23Pora Nabel is an award-winning journalist, author and broadcaster whose work explores grief, identity, relationships and strength.
00:30After the death of her husband in 2015, she rebuilt her life through writing, therapy and physical strength
00:36and has spent the last decade interrogating what women are told to want and what happens when they start asking
00:42for more.
00:43Her new book, She Wanted More, explores just this.
00:46We all have an idea of what we think our lives should look like.
00:49And I think that the one thing I would just encourage people to do is to release themselves from that.
00:56Today we discuss reinvention, ageing, relationships, being child-free and why wanting more from life isn't selfish.
01:03It might just be the most honest thing you can do.
01:06Pora Nabel, author, journalist and broadcaster, welcome to Well Enough.
01:10Thanks for having me.
01:11It's so great to see you.
01:13I'm really excited to talk about your new book.
01:15It feels like a rallying cry for women and wanting more in your life.
01:19And I'm seeing lots of people talking about iterations of this idea of wanting more online in response to it.
01:27What made you want to write this book?
01:29A number of reasons.
01:30I started noticing a shift in things about maybe four or five years ago.
01:36So this is actually when I was writing a different book called Stronger,
01:39which had a very specific lens and focus on women's physical activity.
01:43And there was one chapter in there that was very specifically focused on older women.
01:49And I interviewed a number of older female athletes.
01:54And these weren't pro athletes.
01:56You know, these were people who had come to some form of physical activity a bit later in life.
02:00And it was really remarkable, their entire mindset.
02:04And it really challenged, I think, my own ageism around things.
02:08So I was interviewing this woman who was in her 70s, who had basically just given up pole vaulting.
02:15And I just remember thinking, A, I can't believe you've been doing pole vaulting up until that age.
02:20But she then switched to heptathlon.
02:23And I thought, OK, that's also something I don't know that I've ever done.
02:27And when I asked her questions about, you know, aren't you scared or worried about falling?
02:31And she said, well, no more than, you know, any other person.
02:34And I think that just was the seed of something, which is I hadn't realized that my view of getting
02:40older was that the default of it is that it's negative, that it's something that you shouldn't look forward to,
02:46that it automatically means frailty and all of these other negative connotations that we have.
02:51And that there are these women who are subverting those narratives and just doing things that make them feel really
02:57joyous and that connect them with community.
02:58When I turned 40, I realized that I had really been dreading turning 40 and, again, had to interrogate as
03:06to why that was, especially because when I entered my 40s, it felt very powerful.
03:11It felt massively clarifying around the things that were important.
03:15And I just felt that at the same time, I was surrounded still by all of this negative messaging around
03:21getting older.
03:22Last year, I really had a fire lit under me that actually I can pull all of these stories together,
03:27including my own.
03:28I have absolutely loved hearing them.
03:31When you talked about feeling weird about turning 40, I had that experience when I turned 30 and I almost
03:37feel embarrassed about that now, because why the hell would I feel negative about the process of aging, growing wiser,
03:45being able to have more agency, making decisions over my own life?
03:49Why would I feel weird about that?
03:50It's a really strange thing to consider.
03:53Yeah, I mean, I had the exact same thing, though, when I turned 30.
03:56I really didn't want to turn 30.
03:57I woke up the next morning and saw all of the 30 birthday cards burst into tears.
04:02And it's because it's pitched as the ending of something and the ending of something that you can't get back.
04:09And I think that this is a very common story.
04:12Not everyone, you know, realizes that in their 40s, some people do take a bit longer.
04:17But it's you realize you're reliving the same story over and over again.
04:23And by that age, I think you've seen people go through different iterations of stuff.
04:28You may have lost people as well.
04:30And actually, you recenter what's important to you.
04:33So, you know, for me, for example, when I entered 40s, I realized that alongside, you know, the narrative, for
04:39example, that we have around body size, right, and the constant shrinking of ourselves, there's an additional narrative now, which
04:45is around looking as young as possible.
04:47And it all seems designed to just rob you of power so that you're never really allowed to feel confident
04:55and okay in yourself.
04:57And I see people in their 70s still struggling with this, still saying the same things that they were saying
05:02in their 40s and 50s about their bodies, about how they look.
05:04And I just looked down that path.
05:07And I just thought, I really, really don't want that for myself.
05:09And also because it never yields the reward that it's promising you.
05:14You know, if you're thin enough, if you're young enough, that reward never actually comes.
05:18Because once you get to the place you think you're supposed to get to, there's another problem that's presented to
05:23you.
05:23I hope you're enjoying this episode with Pornabel.
05:26And we'll get back into it in just a second.
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06:39your healthiest, happiest life.
06:41I think because we've been told that aging is all about decline as well, it's about chipping away, it's about
06:48less, it's about going downhill.
06:50All of this messaging talks to us as though we are losing something, right, which you've touched on.
06:56And especially in the health and wellness space, I see it, even if we're trying to talk joyfully about the
07:01process of aging, even in the longevity space, we still treat aging with trepidation and fear,
07:09which is a bit bizarre to me because I see this messaging, and it's so at odds with itself.
07:14It's like it can't wrap its head around what it's trying to do, so it's doing somersaults trying to make
07:19sense of aging.
07:20But at its core, it's still afraid of it, it's still kind of pushing back against it and acting like
07:25we diminish, we dwindle, we lose, which, as you say, it kind of doesn't stand up.
07:32It is a bit of a myth in many respects.
07:34It's a myth, and also, I think, something that I talk about in my book is it's dangerous for women,
07:44you know.
07:44When you consider the end point of something like, you know, you need to be your smallest self or you
07:50need to look as young as possible, it's distracting you from the things that are really important.
07:55Women have a much higher risk of things like, you know, a cardiac event happening in your 50s, and so
08:00heart health is really important.
08:03Women are more likely than men to develop osteoporosis, so that's brittle bones, right?
08:08And so if you are focusing on all of this other stuff, you're not actually focusing on the real stuff,
08:13which is around building strong bones, around moving your body in a way that makes you feel good, because all
08:18of the other conversation is around aesthetics.
08:20And for me, I'm not saying that aesthetics aren't important.
08:24They are important to myself, for example, but they're not the most important thing.
08:28The most important thing, actually, when you think about the long game of it is you just being able to
08:33do the things that you love doing with the people that you love for as long as possible.
08:36That, to me, is the top line of everything, but I don't think that all of that fear narrative takes
08:43you further and further away from that, and so that is why I think that we need to redress what
08:50those fears are about, are they actually legitimate, and maybe what to replace them with instead.
08:56I want to talk about your very cool hobbies as well, because you do powerlifting, you do Brazilian jiu-jitsu,
09:04very, very cool.
09:05And it often makes me think we associate pursuits like that with certain body types and have done for a
09:13long time, and also with men, you know, with, like, kind of chonky powerlifting gym bros.
09:18But what you've just described, actually being strong and powerful and able to lift shopping or lift your grandkids in
09:26your 70s or whatever you want to do, that comes down to how you're treating your body right now.
09:31So tell me about how you got into powerlifting, because I think it's really cool.
09:34I got into powerlifting very accidentally.
09:38So in my late 30s, I wanted to basically get physically stronger, and then I realized I didn't know how
09:45to do that, so I hired a personal trainer who, by coincidence, happened to specialize in strength training.
09:50And so I learned how to do things like lift a barbell, and that progressed into other things.
09:56And I was really enjoying that, but then at our gym, there was this very amateur little powerlifting competition, and
10:04one of the guys said,
10:05it will be really helpful if you join, because it will help other women to do the same.
10:09And I just, like, I didn't even like the sound of the word.
10:12It sounded so intimidating, and I was like, I can't do that.
10:15And my trainer said, yeah, you can.
10:17Actually, this is what it is.
10:19So it's a sport where you lift the heaviest weights that your body can handle, and it's just picking up
10:25things and putting them down.
10:26You eat to fuel your body.
10:28You sleep enough to make sure you're rested.
10:30And actually, the day itself, the actual competition day is really fun.
10:36And I didn't really see how any of those things could be possible, but when I went through the process,
10:40I was like, oh, my God, this is actually really fun.
10:43People offer to help you.
10:44And also, one of the things that I think that we do ourselves such a disservice, especially when you look
10:52at the fitness industry, is the propaganda that there is a particular type of body that is fit.
10:58And actually, if you look at an athlete's body, or you look at athletes in general, there's a very wide
11:05range of what those body types look like.
11:07But in our mind's eye, we think an athlete's body is, you know, really low body fat, you know, visible
11:13six-pack, et cetera, et cetera.
11:15And to me, that's someone who maybe does, you know, high rocks.
11:19It's not necessarily someone who is doing, you know, a particular type of sport, like whether that's powerlifting or athletics
11:27or whatever it might be.
11:28And so, I think that what doing sport did was release me from the idea that my body should look
11:35a particular way, because it's all about achievement.
11:37It's all about optimizing what your performance is going to be.
11:40And I did powerlifting, and I still do powerlifting, and really, really enjoy it.
11:45Because also, being physically strong comes with so many other incredible mental components as well, whether that's from feeling confident
11:54when you're walking down the street to speaking up in a meeting because you occupy your physical space.
11:59All of those things are amazing.
12:01And Brazilian jiu-jitsu has been something that I took up recently, like maybe in the last couple of years.
12:06But that is fun in a different way.
12:09And I think that, to me, I could tell you, you know what, there's nothing to fear about getting older,
12:15and it's not what you think it is.
12:17But for me, it was really important to have physical evidence to show me that actually I am the most
12:23capable I've ever been.
12:24I am the most strong that I've ever been.
12:26And I'm also the oldest I've ever been.
12:29Which is a really cool combination.
12:31Thanks.
12:31And I also think, like, certainly for me, I don't know if this was your experience, but when I was
12:35growing up, something like a contact sport or, like, something that required a lot of work from my body wasn't
12:44something that was pushed on me.
12:46And I was always told, you know, be careful, be careful.
12:49And I think that messaging is the beginning of little girls thinking they might not be able to do something
12:55or that something might not be for them.
12:56And you stop being rough and tumble, and you stop wanting to lift heavy things or climb on things.
13:02And then you kind of start buying into the myths that we're told about this is what girls do, and
13:08this is what boys do.
13:09And I just think it's really damaging for us, not least because we lose our strength.
13:13Enormously damaging because, you know, there is a very real gender gap in sports between boys and girls, and that
13:19has existed for a very long time.
13:21A big part is how physical education is taught and has been taught, you know, from right back when I
13:27was at school.
13:29And there was this EY study that came out that showed that women who worked C-suite level jobs, who
13:38had done sport at school, indexed much higher in terms of, you know, being able to troubleshoot, having confidence.
13:46And so there were very, very positive carryovers for women that had managed to do that at school.
13:52And so if we have a system which makes it harder for girls to engage in sport, if we have
13:58social conditioning that also pushes them a particular way,
14:01then that does have very real impacts in levels of confidence and, you know, how well they feel in terms
14:07of taking risk and so on.
14:09And that's also why I really stress the importance of community, of, you know, people, even if you don't have
14:15an Instagram account with a lot of followers,
14:17even just like saying, hey, this is what I did with my day will spark someone being able to think
14:22that they can do the same.
14:23Because that's actually how I got into powerlifting, because I saw an old colleague of mine posting a video of
14:30her doing a deadlift on her Facebook page.
14:32And I was like, oh, I didn't know. I didn't know that we could do stuff like this.
14:37So I think that role modeling is also really important.
14:40And you are a role model for so many people now, especially with Stronger, the book.
14:44We were at an event recently and someone came up to you after.
14:48Oh, no, she was in the audience first, wasn't she?
14:50And said, your book changed my life.
14:52Yeah.
14:53And that is really impactful.
14:55That was very emotional.
14:57But, you know, incredible to see, because obviously the more you see women doing things, you think, oh, we can
15:04do.
15:04I can do, which is wonderful.
15:06I also want to ask you about the emotional impact of all of the physical activity that we've just been
15:12discussing.
15:12For lots of people, sport helps them enter a flow state that they're not able to enter otherwise.
15:18And we often think about hobbies as, especially in the age of optimization, needing to be productive.
15:24Like it's got to be pushing us or helping us or making us fit.
15:28But a lot of the time, I do think we discount the mental benefits, like getting into a flow state,
15:35like getting off a screen or like feeling like our body is flooded with happy hormones.
15:40And I wonder how much lifting Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, all of that kind of thing, has actually lifted your mental
15:46health and helped you in that way.
15:47I think flow state is everything.
15:48And I'm really glad that you have brought this up.
15:51So I would say that lifting is not so much about flow.
15:55I follow, for example, a program like a progressive overload program.
15:59And every week I have to try and outdo the thing that I've done the week before.
16:03So what lifting helps me do is whenever I think I can't do something, lifting is the logbook that there
16:09have been many, many times when I've been able to be stronger, to be more capable than I think that
16:15I am.
16:15And actually, my inside thoughts are not always accurate, you know, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is physical, but it's also cerebral.
16:23So it's like chess, but with your body.
16:25So there's lots of rolling around.
16:27There's lots of laughter, but there's also like, oh, my God, I'm going to die.
16:30I need to switch my brain on it to try and figure out a solution because you are dealing with
16:36another human being.
16:37And the variables of what you both can do are vast.
16:40The activity that I love the most, however, is freestyle wrestling, because for me, that's flow.
16:46When I saw two people wrestling, it looked like dancing, but slightly more aggressive.
16:56And I think that with wrestling, because I love wrestling the most out of everything that I'm currently doing, and
17:02maybe that will change.
17:03But with wrestling, you have to kind of pause and move and pause and move and then explode.
17:09And the entire thing is you're listening to something that is not just about technical information.
17:16You're kind of waiting for a moment.
17:19You're feeling what the other person is about to do.
17:21You're trying to gauge what they're about to do.
17:24And that, for me, is flow.
17:26It feels like I'm moving my body in a particular way that is the push and pull against someone else's
17:32body.
17:33But it's also about me tapping into how my body can move and the ways that it can move.
17:38And so you don't have to worry about what the outcome is so much.
17:42You only have to worry about the doing of it.
17:44And I think that that is why that is really special to me.
17:47It's nice to be anchored in the moment, isn't it?
17:49And to not be thinking about anything that came before or after.
17:53If you're just in that moment, that's such a nice experience for the brain sometimes.
17:57It is.
17:58And also it just there's a gratitude, I think, that comes with it because it's it's very the reason why
18:06I really like wrestling is because it's the mixture of physical strength.
18:10So all of the weightlifting stuff that I do with some of the technicality that I get from Brazilian jiu
18:16-jitsu.
18:16Right.
18:17And I think that there is something to be said for not being actually anchored to my body in a
18:26particular way in the sense that you cannot be worried about aesthetics while you're doing it.
18:31Like, you know, I don't even feel like a woman when I'm doing it.
18:35I feel like a creature.
18:37And I know that that sounds like a really odd thing to say, but it feels like I'm I was
18:43about to use the word reduced, but it's not reduced.
18:45It's amplification where you are your physical movement.
18:49And that to me is something that is really I'm really grateful for it because there have been times when
18:56I haven't been able to move my body in that way.
18:57And after I finish a class is it's so physically exerting.
19:01But after I finish a class, that's when I know that I'm physically able to do all of the other
19:06things in my life as well.
19:07So I can relate to what you said there, because I have this joke with my friends that I am
19:13sometimes goddess, sometimes goblin.
19:16And I think tapping into that real kind of like primal sense of what it is to be a human
19:21being is really enjoyable sometimes because you're not performing femininity or womanhood in any kind of way.
19:27But you are being innately human and that is satisfying.
19:31The idea of finding something that gives you so much power, strength, presence, joy.
19:37I think a lot of us are looking for that, specifically when we're going through a challenging time or a
19:42dark time.
19:42And we're often told that there's a whole toolkit for survival at our fingertips.
19:48But sometimes it can be really hard to find that thing that gives us hope and gives us an anchor.
19:53And I think what you do so brilliantly in your work is you kind of signpost to these things.
19:58And I know in the past you've talked about enjoying meditation and that being useful and balancing the kind of
20:06physical with the cerebral and with the mental health stuff.
20:09I think as a journalist and someone that's covered wellness yourself, you probably have a really good sense of, more
20:15so than maybe the average person.
20:17But I also think that you've spoken about the impact of grief and tragedy in such a way that also
20:23helps signpost people to those things in a way that's not just kind of, I don't know, arbitrary, but very,
20:30very poignant and very, very useful.
20:31And I wonder if I can ask you about some of those moments in your life that you've written about
20:35so beautifully in your books where you had to create a toolkit because you didn't really have another choice.
20:41Yeah, so all of that came from losing my husband about 11 years ago and very suddenly.
20:50And I think that at the time there wasn't really, we didn't have the kind of conversation that we have
20:58now around mental health, let alone grief.
21:01And Cariad Lloyd, who is one of my favorite people, has done incredible work in this space for opening up
21:09a conversation about this stuff and being able to discuss it in a way that is very human, that also
21:15includes humor, you know, as well as great compassion for yourself as well.
21:21I think that for me, it's not so much a toolkit because I just think that everyone's experience of grief
21:27is different and it's not linear and there are times when you might have an okay year and there are
21:33times when you might have a terrible year.
21:35I think that whether it's talking about grief or whatever it might be is the emphasis that how you feel
21:43about something in one particular year or point in time is most likely and liable to change, you know, in
21:50a few years.
21:51And that's really important, I think, for people to understand.
21:54I think the other thing as well is just that we all have an idea of what we think our
21:59lives should look like.
22:01And I think that the one thing I would just encourage people to do is to release themselves from that.
22:07I think that the areas in which I see people really struggling and in a lot of pain and suffering
22:14around is that they think that when they're making a decision that this is the decision that's going to last
22:19the rest of their lives, right?
22:21And I get it.
22:23Sometimes people want guarantees and they want to know that everything is going to be okay, but nothing lasts in
22:29life.
22:29Like, not the good things and certainly not the bad things.
22:32And so when we talk about things, for example, like being in flow, it's not just about our physicality.
22:38It's also about our mental space as well.
22:40And I think that there are terrible things that happen in people's lives, you know, all the time.
22:46And sometimes those things end up bigger than other things.
22:50But I think that overall, it's just important for people to remember that there is an upwards trajectory through it.
22:57The length of time that that takes is very different and individual to all of us.
23:02But it's important to remind people that that trajectory is possible and that it does happen for everyone.
23:08I really agree with you.
23:09But I think what you've said is so spot on because should is a real kicker.
23:16And I think so many people are trapped in should.
23:19My life should look like this.
23:20It should have gone this way.
23:22I should be like this.
23:23I mean, there's a huge source of anxiety for me every day.
23:26But I also think we hold that a lot because we're still stuck in the same cultural loops a lot
23:34of the time.
23:35Women are expected to do things in a particular order or we expect our relationships to look a certain way.
23:42You've written really beautifully about your relationship not looking the way that you thought it was going to.
23:48And I think that gave a lot of people a lot of clarity on their own relationships.
23:52It really helps to hear someone's lived experience in that way, I think.
23:56Yeah, I would say that one of the things about being in your 40s for sure, and women in their
24:0350s will definitely co-sign this, I'm sure, is that this idea that you have a fixed outcome to everything.
24:13That if you get married, your life is going to be sorted.
24:17If you have kids, tick, tick, tick.
24:20I've done all of the things and my life is going to be great.
24:23You know that it's not.
24:24You know, it's not that choosing those things can't be wonderful and they can't be fulfilling, but they're not the
24:30end point to something.
24:31They're not the solution to something.
24:33And, you know, a couple of weeks ago, my sister and I were on holiday in Spain and we were
24:37sitting on the beach and behind us there was a group of 30-something women.
24:42And we could hear their conversation and they were talking about, you know, things like whether or not to get
24:46married and whether or not to have kids.
24:47And my sister was like, I want to give them advice.
24:50I said, we can't be those people.
24:53But there was just so much we wanted to say, but you can't because otherwise you're just two women rudely
25:00interrupting someone's conversation that you shouldn't be overhearing.
25:02But what we would have wanted to say to them was that you, whatever you choose to do in life,
25:10just make sure that you're asking yourself the right questions within those choices.
25:15Everyone loves the love story and I know why we do, because we believe and want to believe that love
25:21will save the day, but it doesn't.
25:24Love is an incredible thing to experience if you have the privilege to experience it in your lifetime, but it
25:30doesn't always save the day.
25:32It doesn't always win.
25:33And even when you're entering into a relationship for, you know, the best of reasons in your 30s or your
25:3920s, whenever it might be, the reality that that is going to be the same relationship with the same person
25:4520, 30 years down the line is, I would say, not an impossibility, but it's very, very unlikely.
25:51And so what that requires actually is a continuous renegotiation and an evolution of that relationship.
25:58And I don't think that we're told that in our 20s and 30s.
26:01I don't think we're told enough that actually the evolution, the communication part of it is really important because when
26:07you are in your 40s and you've been together with someone for maybe like 15 to 20 years, you have
26:12to have that renegotiation.
26:13Otherwise, you just end up moving further and further apart from each other.
26:16And I would just like there to be more honesty in how we talk about relationships for people, especially in
26:23their 20s and 30s, because I think that they are told, I certainly was only told one part of the
26:29story and not the part of what to do when things get really difficult or, you know, actually, it's normal
26:35for things to be different.
26:37It's normal for you to want different things.
26:40The idea that, you know, you are going to be with the same person that you met in your 20s
26:47and 30s, given that the average life expectancy we're now looking at for people, you know, in their 20s is
26:53going to be maybe around 90.
26:55That is a tall order.
26:58That is a tall order because that is how my parents' generation and their parents' generation, they would stay with
27:04that person, you know, until one of them died.
27:08And I think that we have this mythology that those relationships were incredible right to the very last breath.
27:14And I don't know about you and your family.
27:17I am definitely thinking of, you know, people in my extended family and family friends and so on.
27:23Most people tolerate each other.
27:25If they're lucky, they still love each other towards the end.
27:28But I don't know that longevity of a relationship is necessarily a marker that it's a good relationship.
27:33However, that is what I was brought up with from not just, you know, my own family, but everything in
27:39society.
27:40I mean, I couldn't agree more.
27:42And I think expectation versus reality is a kick in the head.
27:45When you get to a certain point, you realise, oh, life is not a Disney movie.
27:50And there's a lot that I have to contend with.
27:53And our sex and relationships education as teens does not set us up for healthy relationships.
27:59Well, think about the lines that get trotted out on reality TV shows, right?
28:04So, for example, a show like Love is Blind, which I do watch.
28:08The thing that people say over and over again, these are people who have very different backgrounds from each other.
28:14But they go, you know, I just want to be chosen.
28:16You know, I want to meet my person.
28:19My dudes, we live on a planet with billions of people.
28:22There might be more than one person and that's OK, you know.
28:26And the idea of being chosen.
28:28OK, and that's fine.
28:30I totally understand that.
28:31So you're chosen.
28:32Now what?
28:33What does the rest of your life look like now that you're chosen?
28:36What does being chosen mean?
28:38That's what I would like people to ask themselves.
28:40It's a very good question.
28:41And I guess we have to ask ourselves as well, where does that need to be loved come from?
28:47And is there power within us to give ourselves what we need sometimes?
28:52Because I think women are constantly asking ourselves, how can the external world give me what I want?
28:58And we're not often taught tools for sitting with ourselves, feeling comfortable, feeling confident.
29:04And I do think we have, you know, a whole universe inside us that can help us feel really secure.
29:11But we're not often taught to tap into that.
29:13I don't think we are.
29:15I mean, so let's say the title of my book is She Wanted More.
29:18And something that I've had to really explain to people is it's not more stuff to do, you know,
29:25because we do have a problem, especially for women, in terms of needing to justify how you spend your time,
29:31the productivity thing, right?
29:33Even on your days off of your time needing to count for something.
29:37And trying to extricate yourself from that is really, really hard.
29:42And so more could just be more time alone.
29:46It could be just doing things by yourself, peacefully, whether that's reading.
29:51When I did this survey alongside the book and I asked women what they, you know, for example,
29:57especially women who are parents and single parents at that, you know,
30:01what they wish they were able to do if they just had some time,
30:05most of it was reading and or going to the gym or just doing some form of physical activity.
30:10So it's not necessarily doing things for other people or acquiring more identities, right?
30:16I think that there is definitely something to be said for just wanting to be left alone.
30:21But I do think we live in really polarized times now as well when,
30:25especially when I look online, maybe not in person, but I see it playing out on social media,
30:30on kind of message forums, in dark spaces like the Manosphere.
30:34You see people having very different expectations of one another.
30:38And I do worry about young people and what their expectations are of relationships.
30:43Because if we're talking about this enormous swathe of empowered women in their 50s and 60s
30:48who have said, no, enough, I'm not going to live by a cultural script.
30:52But we're also looking at the other end where we're looking at 18-year-olds
30:56who think that they have to perform a certain way to be accepted, to be chosen,
31:01to fit into a type of relationship.
31:03And often the expectation can be quite harmful, I think.
31:06It can be.
31:08I think the distinction now, for example, when it comes to aging,
31:14is that women who I spoke to in their 40s and 50s and above,
31:21the worry is always about looking older, right?
31:24Whereas for younger people, the shift is younger people are worried about becoming older.
31:30And I interviewed Anita Bhagwandas, who is a brilliant beauty journalist, who explained that to me.
31:36And that wasn't something that I had realized, that we had gotten to the point where younger people are terrified
31:44of actually growing older, growing up.
31:46And there's also a really weird paradox in that, because when you are younger, when you're a teenager, you want
31:52to be older.
31:52You want people to think you're older.
32:23Yeah.
32:24You want people to think that, you want people to think that you'll be turning into them.
32:30But I think that something we do need to maybe address is that this perpetuation of ageism that younger people
32:39are involved in, which I was involved in when I was their age, is bolstering and strengthening the prison that
32:46they will have to enter when they get older.
32:48And so there is a part of me that struggles to know what the solution is to that, because I
32:55think that what we're seeing at the moment is very alluring.
32:58And it promises again, and to say it's a tale as old as time, if you look a particular way,
33:04if you are a particular way, then you can shortcut all of these negative things and you'll be accepted and
33:11everyone will love you.
33:12And when you see people online who seem to roadmap that, I think it's very, very difficult to build a
33:19counter narrative to that.
33:20Yeah, it's a bit weird to me as well that we've entered this kind of bizarre time where we see
33:26people who have clearly got a filter on talking about how they're against filters.
33:30The cognitive dissonance there, like it really messes with my head when I'm seeing these videos pop up.
33:36Yeah, I mean, it's completely that. So it's the filters, but it's also on TikTok a lot.
33:43For example, you'll get people in their 40s and 50s who post videos of themselves and, you know, and put
33:50their real age and people will go, oh my God, like you don't look your age at all.
33:54And I'm like, these people have clearly had like cosmetic work.
34:00And there's no, there's no shade to that. If you want to get cosmetic work done, get cosmetic work.
34:05But that cognitive dissonance of someone who's had cosmetic work being praised for not looking their age.
34:12I'm like, yes, they achieved what they wanted to achieve with that.
34:16But that's not a flex. It doesn't, it doesn't mean anything.
34:19You don't see the interior of anyone's life or what it looks like beyond that tiny little screen that you're
34:26seeing.
34:26And it is weird, isn't it, that we're kind of celebrating people for looking young.
34:30Like people say to me, oh my God, you don't, you don't look that old.
34:33And I'm like, I'm not really flattered by that because I'm quite happy to be the age that I am.
34:38So a little trick that I've started to develop only recently, to be honest, around the someone making a comment
34:45about your age and saying you don't look your age and so on.
34:47If someone pays me a compliment that takes me out of my mind and body as it exists now, I
34:55don't want that.
34:56I don't want to be anywhere near that, actually, because it makes me feel icky in my own body.
35:00It makes me feel like I'm now performing a version of myself.
35:04So the minute my body starts to feel like that, I either have to say something kindly and politely, or
35:12I walk away from that person.
35:13Or I change the subject, because I just don't want to, before I just used to do this like little
35:19giggle and go, oh, you're just, you're too kind.
35:22And now I'm just not, I'm not doing that anymore.
35:25It makes me feel like the person that I am, that I've worked very, very, very hard to be, is
35:31not acceptable as is.
35:33It's like, I need to be cosplaying as something else, as a younger person, in order to be complimented.
35:39And I refuse to do that.
35:41I love that.
35:42You mentioned AI as well, and I want to go back to it, because I feel like we have to.
35:46Okay.
35:47And I also read something that you said recently about dating apps and AI, and the fact that you kind
35:52of want to opt out of them, because there's such a reliance on AI now.
35:56And I'd love to ask you a bit more about that.
35:58I think that dating apps are tricky.
36:02I think that sometimes when I've used them, actually more often than not, when I've used them in the past,
36:07it's kind of been great.
36:08You know, I don't have the time to do it old school style of like going to a bar or
36:13whatever it is.
36:14And also, I don't know what people's ages are or whatever.
36:18So I fully appreciate that it shortcuts a lot of that messy nonsense.
36:23But what concerns me about going back on them recently and having conversations with people is it feels like there
36:30is a real disconnection.
36:32And dating apps, I think there is some element of that anyway, where it's the gamification of meeting people romantically.
36:39There is so much choice on there.
36:42We all have busy lives and time.
36:44So we're putting basically the bare minimum effort to want to get something out of it that we expect the
36:51maximum result, right?
36:52It's quite a meaningful thing to come out of a human fruit machine where you pull the lever.
36:56I know.
36:56And I sort of was explaining this to a friend where I just said, think about the amount of effort
37:01and time that you put into your job.
37:03You put a fraction of that into dating, but you want, you expect results that are similar to the results
37:08that you would get with your job.
37:09But you just don't put the time and energy into it.
37:12And I'm not saying that's why, you know, dating isn't successful, whatever it is.
37:16But none of us really put the amount of time and effort.
37:19And dating apps, I get it, like help us with all of that.
37:21But the thing is, is that it's the gamification of it, I think, that turns it into an exercise into,
37:29I want to have a conversation with someone really quickly, make a connection, and then move to meeting up with
37:35them in real life.
37:35And I want to do that in the most efficient time possible so that I don't waste my time if
37:40this person ghosts me or if they don't turn out to be the person that I want them to be,
37:44which I don't know.
37:46I would like to think that I know something about romance.
37:48Like, that's not romantic at all.
37:51But I also understand how people get very jaded by it.
37:54And the issue with AI at the moment, which is something that's being integrated into apps, is that people can
37:59use AI to formulate their responses to people.
38:02So for me, that's like an even further, that's one more step that's taking you away from actually connecting with
38:08another human being.
38:09And you see it in the responses.
38:11They're so bland and they're so boring, and I just can't do it anymore.
38:14But also, cut out the middleman.
38:15And if you want to chat to Claude, just chat to Claude.
38:17Why are you doing it through Hinge?
38:19It doesn't make any sense.
38:22Yeah, I mean, that's slightly terrifying to me.
38:24But something that I do think is really cool is the upswing of real-life dating events, which I have
38:30seen a lot more of,
38:31that do seem less cringy than, you know, the real-life dating events that I saw coming into the market
38:40about 20 years ago.
38:41Yeah.
38:41I mean, I agree with you.
38:43And I do think nothing beats a personal connection.
38:45You meet someone, you catch a vibe.
38:47You know, it makes a lot of sense.
38:49But also, you know, I worked at Cosmopolitan, and during that time I worked a lot with dating apps, and
38:55I defended them.
38:56Yeah.
38:56And I thought, you know, there are many good reasons that someone might use one, but I also, I do
39:01feel that the negatives are starting to outweigh the positives there.
39:05So, it's a very interesting landscape, but I think we all need to be mindful and think critically about them.
39:12Yeah.
39:14Partnership is often the pinnacle for us.
39:17We often think about the success of our lives in terms of having met a partner and those boxes that
39:22you talk about ticking.
39:24Are we going to get married?
39:25Are we going to have children?
39:28And the more people I speak to on this podcast and in my job as a journalist, the more I
39:34see different versions of what life can look like, whether that's through the lens of parenthood or marriage or divorce
39:41or separation.
39:42And it's very interesting to me that although we're sold a blueprint that looks a particular way, I've met very
39:49few people that actually live by that blueprint.
39:51I mean, how do we break away from these narratives?
39:54I think that from having interviewed a number of different women who have made choices, you know, like getting married
40:01and having children and equally women who haven't, you know, and especially, for example, when you look at the realm
40:09of having children and so on, and it's complicated and there is nuance to it.
40:15And I would say that, for example, for example, for myself personally, I thought I would have children.
40:22I then didn't see how that was going to be possible.
40:27And so you have all of these different terms.
40:30And so some people say, you know, child free by circumstance.
40:32Then I wasn't sure about whether or not I would have them on my own, maybe like via a donor.
40:37And then actually I made a definitive choice that, no, I didn't want them, you know.
40:41Now, I was lucky enough to be gifted the time to think about whether or not I wanted children.
40:48But until that point where I actually made a definitive choice, it does slightly horrify me that I was just
40:56going to have them without thinking about whether or not I was going to be a good mother.
41:00Not just thinking about having a baby, but having a toddler, having a teenager, having an adult child.
41:07And the more I thought about it and also interviewed women who kind of had a similar mindset, the more
41:14I realized that, for example, my parents' generation, they were not taught to question things like this.
41:21The whole point was that you got married and you had kids.
41:24And I also don't know what that means for people who aren't hetero, you know, like the suppression of identity
41:31within that is, and all of those lives that were suppressed as a result of having to follow that story.
41:40When I look at things like negligence in parenting.
41:44So, for example, when you are someone who says that you've chosen not to have children, you know, people will
41:49say things like, oh, but you'll never know a love like it.
41:51And isn't it selfish and all of this kind of stuff.
41:55And it's almost like they whitewash every person that they might have met who has been raised by an abusive
42:02parent or a negligent parent.
42:03I also think that those people exist.
42:05Like I know people who have had those type of parents, you know, I'm very lucky that that's not the
42:09case with me.
42:10But not everyone is supposed to be a parent.
42:12And I wonder, again, about the collateral damage, the inherited trauma that people have as a result of being raised
42:20by people who probably shouldn't have had children.
42:22And so I think that being able to talk about these different aspects of identity is really important.
42:28For example, even now, you know, if you belong to the queer community, people assume you don't want children.
42:35And that's not the case at all, you know, and no one has the right to chime in on what
42:40you want to do with your body, with your life, with your partnership, unless it is something that is of
42:47physical harm to you.
42:48Like that is I realize that's my ethos around it.
42:51But at the moment, we are having a conversation about being, you know, child free and what that entails.
42:57There are people who are childless, you know, involuntarily and being able to acknowledge the grief within that, which, you
43:05know, maybe 10, 20 years ago, we didn't have a word for that.
43:08We didn't have a space for that.
43:10So I do think that having these conversations are really important because at the moment we have a we do
43:17have a very heteronormative, you know, this is one identity, one way of being.
43:21And that's just not the way that the world is, you know.
43:25And I think that being able to also just elevate these stories and to say to people, you know, your
43:29life may have been one way for the beginning part of your life, and it could be something completely different
43:34for the other half of it.
43:35That is also really important to me.
43:37Yeah, I really agree with you.
43:39I think we we're lucky now in that there is more of a nuanced conversation happening around parenthood and more
43:45people are considering what that looks like in myriad ways.
43:50But I also do notice that I'm a woman in her 30s, and I'm in a relationship.
43:55And therefore, people just ask me all the time, when are you going to have kids?
43:58And I just think, oh, wow, okay, I didn't expect it to happen quite as frequently as it does happen.
44:04But it happens all the time.
44:06And you have a kid, and then they'll ask you when you're having the other kid.
44:09Right.
44:09And that's how you learn to just tune people out.
44:12Yeah.
44:13Because you'll just keep getting asked the same things over and over again about what the next thing is going
44:18to be.
44:18Because then I think, do you want to have a chat about my fertility?
44:20Because we can go, we can do it.
44:23I would love to ask you a bit more about your own wellness non-negotiables, the things that keep you
44:28feeling happy and healthy and the things that you do day to day that not help you achieve perfection, but
44:34just help you kind of get to that baseline.
44:36My wellness non-negotiables are that I have to sleep.
44:43I have to have a decent amount of sleep.
44:45I know that there are some people that can subsist on very little, but that is not me, nor will
44:51it ever be.
44:52So there are things that I have to do to make sure that that happens.
44:57So that means not watching TV after a particular time.
44:59I'm still atrocious, unfortunately, with my phone, and it's a work in progress.
45:03But I do try and read before I go to bed because that also really helps me to get off
45:08to sleep.
45:09But I am of the age now where I leave things early because I want to get to bed.
45:15Because I'm not saying that new and wonderful experiences can't happen, but I have seen a lot and done a
45:21lot.
45:21And more often than not, I would prefer to be in bed.
45:24In the morning, I think that this is the only real routine that I have apart from the no TV
45:31thing at night thing.
45:32But in the morning, I will get up and I will make myself go outside for a short walk.
45:36I think ever since reading that thing about the importance of having, you know, sunlight in your face, on your
45:43eyes,
45:43and that waking up your body, that is actually something that really works for me.
45:48And because I work from home, it means that there is a clear delineation between me waking up, me going
45:54outside and then starting my day.
45:56And I would say that food is really important to me.
46:00So nutrition, just making sure that, you know, I am well-fueled and that I'm eating things that I really
46:06enjoy and that make me feel good.
46:09And definitely, I would say training in the gym, doing some form of physical movement is really, really important to
46:16me.
46:16And that could be a mixture of lifting or grappling on any given day.
46:22And I think that that might be it.
46:24Yeah, I mean, I knew there'd be some lifting in your well-enough formula.
46:29But I also manage my social battery as well as I can.
46:33On Saturday, I had a whole day and an evening of being out.
46:37And at the end of it, I just almost wanted to cry because I just had, I was like, I
46:42have nothing left to give.
46:43I can't do this.
46:45So I have to make sure that I've got spaces of emptiness in between, you know, seeing people because I
46:51can't, I can't do that a lot.
46:53But I think aiming for what you can is the whole ethos of well-enough.
46:56It's the whole idea behind this podcast.
46:58And I think you've touched on that beautifully.
47:00So, Pornabel, thank you so much for joining me for Well-enough.
47:03Thank you for having me.
47:04If you enjoyed this conversation with Pornabel, I know you'll love this interview with author and psychotherapist Owen O'Kane
47:10on grief, anxiety, and the ways loss can shape us long-term.
47:15Thanks again for watching.
47:16We'll see you next time.
47:17And in the meantime, stay well.
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