If you want to know how to be happy alone and show up proudly and unapologetically as your authentic self, you need to listen to this episode. This is our season finale and what a way to close out season two! (Thank you all for listening!) Jill speaks with the incredible Heidi Clements, a social media sensation who has inspired women all over the world with her empowering outlook on ageing, self-acceptance and how to thrive as a single, child-free woman in her 60s. Heidi is a screenwriter, autho...
May 04, 2025•42 min•Season 2Ep. 14
What do we actually need to live a happy life? Are marriage and children the pathway to fulfilment, or do they actually make you less happy? This week, Jill talks to someone who has studied these questions in depth and come up with some illuminating answers that not everyone wants to hear. Professor Paul Dolan is one of the world’s leading experts on happiness, a professor of behavioural science from the London School of Economics, the author of several books on happiness, and host of the podcas...
Apr 27, 2025•40 min•Season 1Ep. 13
How do we let go of perfectionism and people-pleasing and learn to put our own needs first? This week, Jill speaks with Dr Michelle McQuaid, an internationally recognised positive psychology expert, about how more women are breaking free from damaging people-pleasing patterns and living as their authentic selves. Michelle is the author of six best-selling books, and an honorary fellow at Melbourne University’s Centre for Wellbeing Science. Her life and work explore the intersection of mental hea...
Apr 20, 2025•52 min•Season 2Ep. 12
To have kids or not have kids? In a world where marriage and parenthood are still seen as the expected life path, what does it mean to defy convention and choose a different way? This week, Jill talks to award-winning documentary filmmaker Therese Shechter about her revolutionary film, My So-Called Selfish Life and the unstoppable rise of the child-free movement. In a world where reproductive rights are under attack, Therese explores how the freedom to choose whether or not to become a mother ha...
Apr 13, 2025•44 min•Season 2Ep. 11
This week’s guest is the very definition of thriving solo. Cindy Gallop is a trailblazer for single, child-free living. She’s torn up the rule book, rejected outdated societal expectations, and actively celebrates her solo life. She’s also someone who is open about the fun she’s having as an older woman dating younger men casually for sex – a trend she says is the relationship model of the future. In this episode, she talks to Jill about why she loves being unmarried and child-free and the liber...
Apr 06, 2025•38 min•Season 2Ep. 10
What do death and dying have to teach us about getting comfortable with aloneness and living a good life? It’s a subject that’s often taboo and shrouded in fear and secrecy, but it’s also something none of us can avoid. But what does a good death look like? Is it a lonely and frightening experience? Or can it be something profound and beautiful, with as much to teach us about how to live as how to die? This week, Jill talks to Annie Whitlocke about her work as a death doula, providing emotional,...
Mar 30, 2025•50 min•Season 2Ep. 9
If you’ve ever been with a partner and asked, “Is this relationship going anywhere?” or been swept up in a romance without stopping to question if it’s really what you want, then you may already be familiar with the “relationship escalator.” It’s a phrase coined by journalist, Amy Gahran, to describe the default set of steps society expects all intimate relationships to follow. She challenged the cookie cutter approach to modern love with her groundbreaking book, Stepping Off the Relationship Es...
Mar 23, 2025•45 min•Season 2Ep. 8
This week’s episode is one we’re really honoured to bring to you. Our guest is someone with boundless courage and compassion, who has shared some of her most vulnerable moments with the world so that others might feel less alone. Rosie Batty is, as she says, the member of a club no mother wants to join. She lost her 11-year-old son, Luke, in 2014 when he was killed by his father that thrust her into the national spotlight as passionate campaigner on the issue of family violence. In this raw and ...
Mar 16, 2025•51 min•Season 2Ep. 7
Season 2: Episode Six Jacinta Parsons: On reclaiming your forever self, the wisdom of older women and lessons from living with chronic illness Reaching mid-life and reckoning with the ageing process can also be a time of invisibility and isolation, particularly for women. Living with a chronic illness can also be a lonely place. It can feel like the world is moving on around you while you’re stuck in freeze frame. But what if these experiences were actually the birthplace for bringing forth the ...
Mar 09, 2025•44 min•Season 2Ep. 6
This week’s episode is a really juicy one so buckle up! Can we have a fulfilling, safe and healthy sex life when we’re unpartnered? Is sex an essential part of the human experience or are there other ways to find intimacy? Our guest this week is Cyndi Darnell, a certified clinical sexologist, psychotherapist and couple's counsellor based in New York. She works with singles, traditional couples and people in open, polyamorous, kinky and consensual non monogamous relationships. She walks us throug...
Mar 02, 2025•53 min•Season 2Ep. 5
Today’s episode is one that many of you asked us for – what does it take to have a child on your own? Whether you’re sure you want kids, still trying to decide, or want to be child-free, this week’s guest has many life lessons that can help you figure out, or reaffirm, what’s right for you. Alexandra Collier was 37 and living in Brooklyn with the man she loved when she woke up to a ravenous hunger to have a baby that unfortunately her younger partner didn't share. What happened next is an extrao...
Feb 23, 2025•52 min•Season 2Ep. 4
We live in an age when we’re more connected than at any point in history. But in our terminally online timeline, many young people are feeling a profound sense of loneliness, isolation and pessimism about the future. They are often disengaged from politics and less than hopeful about modern dating and relationships. Our guest this week is someone who has tapped into that feeling of apathy and disconnection and created a powerful platform for social and political change. Hannah Ferguson is the fo...
Feb 16, 2025•53 min•Season 2Ep. 3
Imagine being the star of a reality TV dating show as one of the most visible eligible bachelors in the country, and you find love in the full glare of the public eye only to have your life fall apart. That’s what happened to Dr Matt Agnew, when he appeared on The Bachelor , fell in love, broke up, then felt himself slowly unravel. In this week’s episode, Matt speaks with courage and candour about his battle with mental illness, living in the spotlight, how he’s found happiness alone, and why he...
Feb 09, 2025•55 min•Season 2Ep. 2
We’re back for season two and what a way to kick off, with Australian broadcasting icon, Yumi Stynes – a fierce and fearless trailblazer who knows all about finding your strength when you are very much on your own. Yumi opens up about surviving some very public media pile-ons, and how she manages the hateful trolling that has made her fear for her safety. She also shares her journey through two divorces, how it helped her cultivate a robust sense of self, and why we she threw a huge party to cel...
Feb 02, 2025•45 min•Season 2Ep. 1
Claire Mason: on sobriety as a path to single freedom, self-love and happiness Can quitting drinking be the key to a happy, single life? This week, Jill talks to podcaster, body positivity advocate and digital creator, Claire Mason about her journey from party girl to sober queen. They share stories about their history of binge drinking and what happens when you can no longer numb your emotions with alcohol. There are many parallels with choosing to be single and choosing an alcohol-free life, a...
Sep 08, 2024•44 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Our friends are some of the most important people in our lives. They’re the people we can be 100% ourselves with. And for many single people, they are our family. So why are friendships seen as lesser than romantic or blood family relationships? This week, Jill talks to journalist and author, Gyan Yankovich, about her book, Just Friends , and what would happen if society treated friendship with the same reverence and respect as marriage. Can a friend be more than just a friend – can they be some...
Sep 01, 2024•43 min•Season 1Ep. 11
This week, Jill talks to TV presenter, public speaker and proud Warumungu/Yawuru woman, Megan Waters about growing and healing through times of struggle and why time alone is an essential part of her self-care toolkit. She also talks about her deep connection to her Indigenous culture and how kinship and community have helped her build a strong sense of self. Megan is open about her battle with a chronic health condition, the impact it’s had on her mental health, her plans to freeze her eggs, an...
Aug 25, 2024•40 min•Season 1Ep. 10
One of the best things about solo life is the freedom to live life your own, without having to run decisions past anyone else. But one of the more challenging things is how expensive it can be to live alone. You have the same household costs as couples but only one income. Whether it’s booking a room in a hotel, paying for health insurance, or forking out for power bills, groceries and living expenses, it all costs more when you do it solo. We’re essentially paying a single person’s tax. So, how...
Aug 18, 2024•50 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Why are single people often ignored by policy makers? And is that about to change? This week, Jill is joined by writer and political commentator, Lauren Beckman, to dissect Vice Presidential candidate J.D. Vance’s attack on “miserable, childless cat ladies” and how this group is becoming a potent voting bloc. Single person households are the fastest growing demographic and yet we’re often treated like we don’t exist as politicians make their pitches to “working families.” The number of people li...
Aug 11, 2024•1 hr•Season 1Ep. 8
If a romantic connection is something you see in your future – whether for one night or forever – then you do not want to miss this week’s episode. Jill speaks to Alita Brydon – dating expert, body positivity champion and creator of the cult social media phenomenon, Bad Dates of Melbourne on Facebook. Just because you enjoy time on your own doesn’t mean you can’t still dip your toe in the dating pool. And what a cesspit that can often be! If you want to survive the modern dating scene, you’re go...
Aug 04, 2024•38 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Danni Duncan: on choosing not to have children, and the rise of the child-free movement. The pressure to couple up starts early in life, but it’s not just a pressure to be partnered, it often comes with an expectation that you will also want to have children. In a world where the nuclear family is still the archetype, it’s often seen as a biological imperative to become a parent. But more and more people are choosing to be child-free. The number of women having children has been steadily declini...
Jul 28, 2024•45 min•Season 1Ep. 6
From an early age we’re told that that the dream is to find our soulmate, have the big wedding, and then live happily ever after. But for a long time, that fairytale was one only straight people could aspire to. On the day same-sex marriage was finally legalised in Australia, Stuart Henshall was proposed to live on national television. He and his fiancée became the first couple to ever get married at Sydney Mardi Gras, tying the knot on top of a giant wedding cake in front of the world’s cameras...
Jul 21, 2024•47 min•Season 1Ep. 5
In a world obsessed with partnering up and settling down, it can sometimes feel like you’re a square peg in a round hole if you’re on your own. So how can you learn to not just accept your own company but actually love it? Is loneliness something we can banish, or is it a necessary part of the human condition? And how do you deal with pressure to be coupled and/or have children, from people in your life who may mean well but are not respecting your choices? Today, Jill speaks with Dr Ahona Guha ...
Jul 14, 2024•47 min•Season 1Ep. 4
What happens when the life you planned comes crashing down around you? Jess King faced a major betrayal that changed everything. But in rebuilding herself from the ashes of that crisis, she found freedom and strength in her own company. Jess is one of Australia’s leading curve models, a body positivity advocate, and a content creator. She’s walked runways across Europe, Asia and Australia for some of the world’s leading fashion labels, and is on a mission to inspire young women to be confident a...
Jul 07, 2024•37 min•Season 1Ep. 3
As single people, we’re often pitied or seen as living half a life. We’re just incomplete puzzles desperately searching for the missing piece to make us whole. But what if the risk is not what we’ll miss out on if we don’t organise our lives around a romantic partner, but what we’ll miss out on if we do? Today, Jill speaks to Dr Bella DePaulo – the world’s leading thinker on the single experience about her research, which shows that for millions of people in every corner of the globe, being sing...
Jun 30, 2024•44 min•Season 1Ep. 2
Fearless and fabulous at 51, Yvie Jones is one of Australia’s most well-loved TV personalities and a proud and unapologetic long-term single woman. In this raw and candid conversation, she talks about love, grief, body image, self-worth, and how she’s built connection and community while doing life solo. And for the first time, she shares behind-the-scenes details of what really happened in that viral moment on I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here – when she refused to be weighed on camera – and h...
Jun 23, 2024•54 min•Season 1Ep. 1
This is a podcast for anyone who’s ever been told that being single makes you incomplete, or life will only begin when you find “the one.” I wanted to make it because I was tired of outdated cultural narratives that told me there were only two life paths available to us – “partnered and happy” or “single and searching.” There is a different way – solo and thriving. With more solo households today than at any point in our history, single people are the fastest-growing demographic. And yet, being ...
Jun 16, 2024•7 min0
Well Enough Alone is a celebration of solo living that tears up the “sad and lonely” single script and embraces a path that can be joyful, expansive and fulfilling. Because there is more to life than “partnered and happy” or “single and searching.” There is solo and thriving. Hosted by best-selling author and award-winning journalist, Jill Stark, this podcast is for anyone who’s ever been told that being single makes you incomplete. Or that life will only begin when you find “the one”. To leave ...
Jun 08, 2024•1 min0
