You’re far from being alone if you identify as a people pleaser – more than half the female population are too! In this episode Jacqui will talk you through how you can identify whether you (or someone you have a close relationship with!) are a people pleaser. You’ll hear a bit of live therapy, as Antonia opens up about her own experiences as a people pleaser and Jacqui works through some techniques to tone down her – and perhaps your! – people pleasing ways. Jacqui takes us through some great exercises, with some homework to try out on someone close to you who you feel comfortable with. Maybe there’s something you’d normally do to people please – like in Antonia’s case, you might always let friends choose where you go for dinner where you meet up. What would happen if you said you’d like to go to your favourite spot, or go to a restaurant you’ve always wanted to try? Another great exercise is one Jacqui heard on Simon Sinek’s podcast, which involves asking your closest friends exactly why it is that they are your friends? And we want to go beyond the surface level, with the obligatory responses of ‘because you’re kind, caring etc!’. Ask for specifics and examples! Here’s a handout with some more info from Simon Sinek’s exercise: https://simonsinek.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/FriendsExercise.pdf We’d also like to say a big warm thank you to our wonderful sponsors of this episode: The fantastic folks at Woop, who keep our bellies deliciously full and warm, and the lovely team at Emma who ensure we get a good night’s sleep! Sponsor Codes: Woop are offering our listeners 30% off their first box. Just use the code PODCAST at the checkout.

This is the one Jacqui has been very much looking forward to discussing – and it’s a biggie: attachment styles. Yip, our relationship in those very early years with our primary caregiver does go on to impacts us as adults – not just in our romantic relationships, but in all facets of our lives, from friendships to the workplace. Gaining an understanding of how your early relationship with your primary caregiver has informed your interactions as an adult can be incredibly powerful. It can also be very challenging work, so this episode of What Matters Most is sure to bring up a lot of feelings. Be warned! If you want to do what Antonia did and take a quiz to find out which attachment style you are (it’s optional to do what Antonia did and encourage all your friends/family to do it for an interesting chat around the dinner table!!) then head to The Attachment Project and take the Attachment Style Quiz. And, if this episode – understandably! – brought up a lot of emotions for you, exploring your early childhood, Antonia recommended you take a listen (if you haven’t already) to an earlier episode of What Matters Most. Episode III: Inner Child, also explores the idea that the experiences we have as a young child really impact how we operate as an adult. There’s also advice on how you can get in touch with your inner child and understand them a bit more. We’d also like to say a big warm thank you to our wonderful sponsors of this episode: The fantastic folks at Woop, who keep our bellies deliciously full and warm, and the lovely team at Emma who ensure we get a good night’s sleep! Sponsor Codes:  Woop are offering our listeners 30% off their first box. Just use the code PODCAST at the checkout.

We’re back! In Volume VII of What Matters Most, close friends Jacqui Maguire, a clinical psychologist, and Antonia Prebble, actor and presenter, get to the bottom of what the mental load is, how this dynamic occurs, what we can do to change our own behaviours and how we can have those tricky conversations with our partners to create a more equal distribution of tasks in our homes. It's a conversation that is sure to stir up some thoughts (particularly for women – yip, research shows that 90% of females feel the carry the burden of the mental load), but hopefully it will give you the tools to examine what is happening in your household and how to go about making changes. If, like Antonia mentioned, you found Jacqui’s tips helpful on how to have a conversation with your partner about the mental load, you might also enjoy Volume II of What Matters Most: How to Have Difficult Conversations. We’d also like to say a big warm thank you to our wonderful sponsors of this episode: The fantastic folks at Woop, who keep our bellies deliciously full and warm, and the lovely team at Emma who ensure we get a good night’s sleep! Mentions: That wonderful ‘mental load’ comic by French artist Emma (yes, she just goes by one name!), can be found here If you want to read more from Allison Daminger – that Harvard PhD Student who researched The Mental Load, you can head here. And if you want to read up more about that 2017 study into female breadwinners by a non-profit organisation, you’ll find that here! Sponsor Codes:  Woop are offering our listeners 30% off their first box. Just use the code PODCAST at the checkout.    

If you’ve ever found yourself pulling multiple all-nighters to meet a long-known deadline, or are constantly putting off things on your to-do list, you might be one of the estimated 20% of the population who procrastinate. In the final episode of the first season of What Matters Most, good friends and co-hosts Jacqui Maguire, a clinical psychologist, and Antonia Prebble, actor and presenter, have left the procrastination episode until (***joke alert***) the very end .  In Volume V of What Matters Most, the pair delve into the different neuroscience theories around why we procrastinate and Jacqui says that it’s not a time management issue, it’s an emotional regulation one. They also look at why we even put off things that we enjoy or we know are good for us, and why self-compassion, rather than self-judgment, is the key to helping us bring a better workflow into our lives.  Hosted by: Antonia Prebble & Jacqui Maguire Produced by: Roar Collective Co-Produced By: Antonia Prebble & Jacqui Maguire Music: Goodboy Music

It’s no wonder so many women aged in their late twenties to early forties are feeling paralysed by overwhelm. We have SO many decisions to make, all while we wade through SO many expectations – whether they’re ones we’ve put on ourselves, or ones that exist from our families, social media, or society as a whole. These dilemma-filled few years (eek, should I have a baby? Is it already too late? Am I with the right person? Should I be focusing on my job?!) are referred to as ‘The Panic Years’ – a term coined by author Nell Frizzell and in Volume V of What Matters Most, Antonia and Jacqui do a deep dive into what brings them about and how to navigate your way through them. Jacqui outlines three steps to calming some of that overwhelm, figuring out what you actually truly want (not just what you feel pressured to do) and how to put steps in place to try to get there. Along the way Jacqui and Antonia share their own struggles with The Panic Years, what to do if your panic isn’t that you don’t know what you want – it’s that you know it, but it goes against societal norms or, it’s out of reach. Plus, Antonia shares why that advice to treat people how you’d like to be treated, perhaps isn’t the best approach after all. Jacqui finishes this volume with a wonderful exercise to define what is important to you – The Holistic Wheel of Life! Link Here Hosted by: Antonia Prebble & Jacqui Maguire Produced by: Roar Collective Co-Produced By: Antonia Prebble & Jacqui Maguire Music: Goodboy Music