On this week’s episode of the podcast we wanted to talk about love, specifically how we move away from our societal obsession with romantic love and instead cultivate a more expansive, inclusive notion of love. One that releases us from the pressure to find “the one” and instead encourages us to find the romance in our platonic relationships.

According to Pew Research, one in four people will now remain single for their adult lives; the number of people getting married has fallen significantly (in the US have decreased by 60% since the 1970s and 90% of the world's population now live in countries with falling marriage rates). Meanwhile, birthrates are falling globally and have actually halved since 1963.

Yet, despite these changes in the extent to which coupledom, marriage and the traditional family structure are changing, culturally we are still seemingly fixated on romantic love as the pinnacle form of love. For women in particular, there remains so much pressure to find a husband and hence become a wife and a mother, as though our societal worth is pegged solely upon those two things.

And then there’s the so-called ‘single tax’, aka the aka the additional finances single people shoulder by virtue of not having a partner.

But this wasn’t a depressing conversation about the perils of being single. Quite the opposite. Instead it felt to us like a much needed, deeply galvanising discussion about all the ways in which we can find great romance in our lives outside of the prism of marriage and the traditional family structure. It was a reminder to all of us that there is so much to be celebrated in designing your life on your own terms and not waiting for someone to come along in order to create the life you truly want.

Joining Emma-Louise on the podcast was writer, poet and author of Arrangements in Blue, a book exploring a life lived in the absence of love, and Poppy Jay, the Bafta award-winning director and co-host of the Brown Girls Do It Too a BBC Sounds podcast.

Book tickets to the next live recording of the Sex Talks podcast here.

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On this week’s episode of the podcast, I’m joined by the wonderful Anna Mather.

She’s a psychotherapist, bestselling author and someone intent upon taking therapy out of the therapy room and into the real world, offering therapeutic insights via her instagram, online courses and in-person events and also through her podcast The Therapy Edit.

She joins me today to discuss her brand new book: The Uncomfortable Truth, which tackles head on the ten unavoidable truths that sit at the heart of so many of our most common fears.

From learning to face rejection and getting more comfortable with vulnerability, to overcoming perfectionism and learning self-acceptance, Anna articulates how we can apply her approach to overcoming fears to the context of dating and relationships.

You can purchase Anna’s book here.

Enjoy!

Cindy Gallop is the founder of Make Love Not Porn, a platform for people to post real-world sex videos. It’s not porn, she says, it’s social sex.

Now, she’s on a mission to raise $1 million in crowd funding in oder to build a sex education academy that will operate alongside her Make Love Not Porn.

Set to launch later this year, the Academy will will cover a broad range of topics, including masturbation, LGBTQ+ sex and relationships, first-time sex, menopausal sex, period sex, disability sex and erectile dysfunction. Users will have access to a vast range of sex education content, all vetted by human curators and searchable by age appropriateness, cultural sensibility and comfort level.

During this live recording of the podcast we delved into the problems with our broken sex landscape, how parts of the mainstream porn industry have fed into the rise in toxic masculinity and rape culture, the value of good sex education and what we need to do to create a better culture around sex for everyone.

We were also joined by actor, presenter, activist and the CEO of IWeigh, Jameela Jamil, who is an early-stage investor in the MLNP Academy, and digital consultant and former journalist, Freddie Feltham.

If you are affected by the issues discussed this please seek help via the below:

Rape Crisis are open 24/7 for anyone who has experienced something sexual without their consent. Call free on 0808 500 2222 or visit their website here.

Samaritans are open 24/7 for anyone who needs to talk. You can visit some Samaritans branches in person. Samaritans also have a Welsh Language Line on 0808 164 0123 (7pm–11pm every day).

116 123 (freephone)

jo@samaritans.org

Freepost SAMARITANS LETTERS

samaritans.org