the book that changed my life
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Hi guys, welcome back to another week's episode of Pretty Lonesome. This week I come to you from yet another hotel. I just got back from Paris Fashion Week and now I'm in London and I'm gonna have the best day ever today because I first am filming this podcast and then I'm gonna go meet up with my friend and we're gonna do work together, do some laptop time, which is my favorite kind of time, and then we're gonna go have a sauna when we might go swimming. Oh my god, it's gonna be such a good day. Last night I went out and I had, well, when I was...

a friend, I was looking through my camera roll this morning and I saw a picture of a receipt that I took last night. We ordered 14 margaritas last night and I've said it once and I'll say it again. This is the thing about tequila is I'm a fully functioning person this morning after seven drinks. I fucking love tequila. Why did no one tell me about it sooner? Okay, I feel like I'm going to drink so much of it that I'm eventually going to like build up a genuine like my body is going to be like this is poison and we know this now and we're going to give you a hangover and we're going to make you sick.

because that's what happened to me with vodka and I understand vodka is like way fucking worse for you than tequila but like I used to drink it and never get hungover I was also much younger but not too young but I was also much younger wink wink so like I get it like I didn't I wasn't gonna get hungover like you are much more resilient when you're you know for lack of better wording a child so I get why I wasn't hungover then but like

Anyway, I don't know. Whatever the fuck. I love that I'm not hungover. Like, I can definitely tell I had a drink last night, but I don't feel like shit. I also did have a Joe and the Juice this morning, which always brings me back from the dead. But you guys, today's going to be a bit of a different episode. And I will tell you why, okay? We're doing book club.

bitches and I don't know if you want that and I don't know if you care but you're gonna care just give me if you're about to click off the podcast because you think fuck you I didn't come here to learn okay just give me five minutes of your time I beg of you okay this is the book I've been reading it's called Women Who Run With The Wolves and this book was recommended to me by my friend and the book was recommended to her by a couple of women in her life

And the one thing, the tagline that I keep hearing about this book is every woman should read this book. I've heard it out the mouths of about three different women now. And then I bought the book and the little thing that it says at the bottom is everyone who can read should read this book. And that's a review by Maya Angelou. So I feel like that's a pretty, you know, decent review.

at first was a little bit like, I don't know if I'm going to care about this book because they just kept saying the same thing in different words, which is essentially women are like wolves, we're wild and we are like demonized. Okay. And I was like, yeah, I get it. You only needed to say it once. Why am I on page 25 and you just keep giving me metaphors and shut the fuck up. Then I got to page like 58 and I was crying on the Eurostar reading it. And I, if you still want to click off, let me read you an excerpt

from this book that was the moment that I was like okay I have to read this book I have to read the entire thing and I think this book is going to help me because I felt every single one of the things that she was saying and I realized my soul is dying okay and I'll tell you how I realized that let me find the page though because I've just lost it what are some of the feeling toned symptoms of a disrupted relationship with the wildish force in one's psyche

To chronically feel, think or act in any way of the following ways is to have a partially severed relationship or have lost entirely the relationship with the deep instinctual psyche. Using women's language exclusively. OK, emphasis on that. These are feeling extraordinarily dry, fatigued,

frail depressed confused gagged muzzled unaroused feeling frightened halt or weak without inspiration without animation without soulfulness without meaning shame bearing chronically fuming volatile stuck uncreative compressed crazed feeling powerless chronically doubtful shaky blocked unable to follow through giving one's creative life over to others life sapping choices and mates which hilarious wording by the way also retweet uh work or friendships

I don't know how you say that word.

All right, I keep going. Okay.

Fear one will run on, run out, run down. Cringing before authority. Loss of energy before creative projects. Wincing, humiliation, angst, numbness, anxiety. Afraid to bite back when there's nothing else left to do. Afraid to try the new. Fear to stand up. Afraid to speak up. Speak against. Sick stomach. Butterfly. Sour stomach. Cut in the middle. Strangled. Becoming conciliatory or nice too easily. Revenge. Emphasis on revenge. Okay. Afraid to stop.

afraid to act, repeatedly counting to three and not beginning, superiority complex, ambivalence, and yet otherwise fully capable, fully functioning. Okay, emphasis, and yet otherwise fully capable. Okay, emphasis on that. ♪

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These severances are a disease, not of an era or a century, but because an epidemic anywhere and anytime women are captured, anytime the wildish nature has become entrapped. Okay, if I haven't just convinced you to read this book, I don't know what will, okay? Because when I read that list of words...

I felt every single one of them and I couldn't sit back and be like, oh, yeah, I feel every single one of those. Let me do nothing about it. OK, because why do I fucking relate to every single thing on that list? I feel all of them and I feel all of them at once. OK, and I can't do it anymore. So it's like if this book can fucking help me, I will read it 15 times. OK, now I'm going to I'm going to tell you something that made me cry from this book. OK, and I'm not going to give you any spoilers. OK, not that there's really a plot line, but she begins to talk.

For me, a really important part of this book was about relationships and what happens to your soul. Generally, what happens to your soul when you ignore its instincts, okay? Because this is something I do and it's something I have done and it's something that I feel I may always do, okay? And that is to completely write off my instincts and I'm not alone. I have a friend who's very similar to me and she's actually my sister's friend. But over the years, we've realized that her and I have a freaky amount in common. And the way that we found this out was that our parents used to have meetings about us when we were younger. Yeah.

Like support meetings, okay? Because we were both just such, for lack of better wording, fucking terrible children, okay? So we've found out that we're very similar. And she relates to me on this fact, which is...

We have never been wrong. My instincts, my gut has never been wrong. My foresight has never been wrong. I have never misjudged a situation or a person in my life. But I've been in abusive relationships and I've had horrible friendships and I've done things that don't serve me and don't feed me and I've been miserable.

because I've put myself in miserable places. So why? Because I knew before I even did those things that that was what would happen or that there was something innately wrong about the situation and that it wasn't for me, but I would do it anyway. Why? Well, she talks about a story and this is a really good story. And it's about this man called Bluebeard. And I don't know if people know this story. I'd never heard this story. It's like a fairy tale, kind of. But she talks about this young girl and she has two sisters.

And this man called Bluebeard comes to try and marry them.

one of them. And they all go, oh, we don't like you because your beard is blue, right? Something's wrong about that. But he takes them out on his horses and he picnics them in the woods. And the youngest daughter says, I had fun today. And I guess his beard isn't really that blue. I'll marry him. So she marries him and he takes her to his castle and they have a marriage, a relationship. One day he needs to go out of town for work. So he hands her a chain of keys and

And he says, whilst I'm away, you may do anything you like.

and you may use any key to any door except this one key. Don't open that door. And so she goes, okay. And so she calls her sisters up and she says, well, she doesn't call them because I guess it's like ancient times. She like sends a fucking pigeon. She's like, hey babes, got the fucking house to myself. Come over, we'll pop some pussy. And they're like, got it. So they rock up and they're like, okay. He said you can't open that one door. She's like, yeah. So they go, okay, let's go find that fucking door then. She's like, yeah. So they go and they find the door that the key opens. They open the door. Guess what's behind it? Dead bodies.

women's dead bodies, okay? Once they open the door, the key bleeds and it won't stop bleeding. She tries to hide the key. The man comes back. He says, I get a feeling that you've opened my door because where's my key? She goes, I lost it. No, you didn't. He finds the key. He sees it's bleeding. He knows she's opened the door. So he drags her to the same door and says, now you're going to become one of them. I'm going to kill you.

And she pleads to him, let me make my peace with God before you take my life. And that's how she escapes. And when I read this story, I thought it, I saw it in a shallow way. I saw, okay, so she knew his beard was blue. She convinced herself it wasn't that blue. Obviously the beard is a metaphor. Let me tell you the point of the fucking story. Because, wow. Like, I didn't even pick up on like the three, the themes. Let me find it. One sec, guys. So she's titled this part of the story, Naive Woman is Prey.

And it's true, okay? The youngest sister, the most undeveloped one, plays out the very human story of the naive woman. She will be captured temporarily by her own stalker. The young wife has fooled herself. Initially, she felt fearful of Bluebeard. She was wary. However, a little pleasure out in the woods causes her to overrule her intuition. Almost all women have had this experience at least once. As a result, she persuades herself that Bluebeard is not dangerous, but only idiosyncratic and eccentric.

Disallows this inner knowing is crucial, okay?

This error of judgment is almost routine in a woman so young that her alarm systems are not yet developed. She is like an orphan wolf pup who rolls and plays in the clearing, heedless of the 90-pound bobcat approaching from the shadows. In the case of the older woman, who is so cut away from the wild that she can barely hear the inner warnings, she too proceeds smiling naively.

I'm gonna fucking rip my clit off, okay? You may well wonder if this could all be avoided, as in the animal world, a young girl learns to see the predator via her mother and father's teachings. Without parents' loving guidance, she will certainly be prey early on. In hindsight, almost all of us have at least once experienced a compelling idea or semi-dazzling person crawling in through our psychic windows at night and catching us off guard.

Even though they're wearing a ski mask, have a knife between their teeth and a sack of money slung over their shoulder, we believe them when they tell us they're in the banking business. I'm gonna fucking throw up. You guys, I'm begging you read this book. I'm begging you to read this fucking book. Also, one thing this book made me realize, which is kind of off topic but it's actually not,

When men on podcasts call us females, it's become derogatory. The word female, if I hear a man refer to women as females, I'm fucking out of there so fucking fast, right? And it's because it's too, to me anyway, the reason I don't like the word female, other than the fact that only bad men use it. So I'm like, okay, bad, bad, bad. The real reason that I never liked it in the first place was it sounds biological. It sounds like a creature.

Like you have a female bird, you have a female bear, but you have a woman. I'm a woman. That's my personhood. Like my womanhood is my personhood. I'm not just my sex. I'm my...

womanhood is an experience and it's like a cultural thing, right? I'm not just a fucking female. That's my body. Like I never liked it. Why are you degrading me to that? And this book keeps referring to women as females and it does so because it's consistently likening us to animals and it's so empowering and it for me kind of brought back the power in the word female and

Because we do have, we are similar and we do have parallels to females in the wild, right? Female wolves, especially in this book that she has. If you read it, you'll understand what the parallel is with the wolves. But anyway, it's bringing the word female back in a sexy way. So you guys should, if that pisses you off, you should also read this book. Anyway, I will continue, okay? We'll be book clubbing. There was one line that really scared me. This is what really scares me.

Because it's real, okay? When the youthful spirit marries the predator, she is captured or restrained during a time in her life that was meant to be an unfoldment. Instead of living freely, she begins to live falsely. The deceitful promise of the predator is that the woman will become a queen in some way, when in fact her murder is being planned.

Guys, when I told you my skin was crawling when I fucking read that? Because I understand that it's in the story of Bluebird, her actual murder was being planned. In the real world, it's the same shit. And I'm not even going to get into it too much because there are things on the internet that I won't go into from my own personal life, right? Yet.

But to have your murder being planned whilst you are being promised like gold and oh my god, just read the fucking book. Just please read the book. That was that was actually that must be the point of this because that must be where I lost my thing because I had to put the book down after I read that line because I was going to fucking stop on the Eurostar and that was just not my vibe that day. I just took a nap instead.

and sat on it, because I was like, oh my god, it's like the book was made for me. I also find this interesting. So remember how I said that this girl has sisters who don't marry Bluebeard?

And she also has a mother who went on the picnic with her and never told her not to marry Bluebeard. And so whilst the sisters and the mothers know, we don't like Bluebeard, his beard is blue and that's not normal. They never stopped her marrying him and they never said anything but they knew, we're not going to touch Bluebeard. Okay, and this is why.

Interestingly, in the tale, the older sisters demonstrate some consciousness when they say that they do not like Bluebeard even though he has just entertained and regaled them in a very romantic and paradisical manner, fuck that. There is a sense in the story that some aspects of the psyche represented by the older sisters are a little more developed in insight, that they have knowing, which warns against romanticizing the Predator.

The initiated woman pays attention to the older sister's voices in the psyche. They warn her away from danger. The uninitiated woman does not pay attention. She is as yet too identified with naivety. Say, for instance, a naive woman keeps making poor decisions in a mate.

Somewhere in her mind, she knows this pattern is fruitless, that she should stop and follow a different value. She often even knows how to proceed. But there is something compelling, a sort of Bluebeardian mesmerization about continuing the destructive pattern. In most cases, the woman feels if she just holds on to the old pattern a little longer, why surely the paradisical feeling she seeks will appear in the next heartbeat. At another extreme, a woman involved in chemical addiction most definitely has at the back

of her mind a set of older sisters

who are saying no, no way, this is bad for the mind and bad for the body. We refuse to continue. But the desire to find paradise draws the woman into marriage to Bluebeard, the drug dealer of psychic highs. Whatever dilemma a woman finds herself in, the voices of the older sisters in the psyche continue to urge her to consciousness and to be wise in her choices. They represent those voices in the back of the mind that whisper the truths that a woman may wish to avoid for they may end her fantasy of paradise found.

This part is about, this next part is about the key and the significance that the key holds. Because I didn't understand it the first time I read it because I'm still learning and I'm like really fucking stupid when it comes to this shit, right? I don't know how to take care of myself yet. I am the naive woman that she's talking about the whole time. And it's a shame, but I am. And so when I read this, I was like, oh my fucking God, that's what that is. So let me,

Let me just read you this passage and then we'll talk about it, okay? We'll discuss, okay? So the fateful marriage occurs, the mingling of the sweetly naive and the dastardly unlit. When Bluebeard leaves on his journey, the young woman does not recognize that even though she is exhorted to do whatever she wishes, except that one thing, she is living less rather than living more.

So even though he's given her a chain of keys and said, do whatever you want, because he said to her, you can't open this one door, she's not living more. She's living less, right? Many women have literally lived the bluebeard tale. They marry while they are yet naive about predators and they choose someone who is destructive to their lives. They are determined to cure that person with love.

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AKA the dead bodies, right? While it may be the woman's actual mate who denigrates and dismantles her life, the innate predator within her own psyche concurs. As long as a woman is forced into believing she is powerless and or is trained to not consciously register what she knows to be true,

The feminine impulses and gifts of her psyche continue to be killed off. When the youthful spirit marries the predator, she is captured or restrained during a time in her life that was meant to be unfoldment. Instead of living freely, she begins to live falsely. This episode is brought to you by Mejuri. You know, I had a thought the other day. Since Rwanda jewelry becomes something we only bought on special occasions...

Mejuri approaches fine jewelry a little bit differently. Each one of their pieces is handcrafted by jewelers committed to quality craftsmanship as well as ethical and sustainable jewelry production. Created by women for women, Mejuri is breaking down barriers in what has long been an exclusive and occasional category of men buying for women.

In 2020, the brand launched the Mejuri Empowerment Fund in support of higher education for underrepresented women and non-binary individuals. Because fine jewelry doesn't have to cost the world, feel good about your jewelry in more ways than one. Start stacking your favorites, shop online, or visit the website to find a store near you. Hey y'all, Marce Martin here with a little Tampax story. One time I went on vacation in the Bahamas with some friends, and of course I got my period.

I didn't want anything to stop me from living my best life on my trip. So I was like, why not be brave and try Tampax? Before that, I really just thought tampons were for adults, and I definitely thought they'd be uncomfortable. Guess what, y'all? They really aren't. It might take a few tries, but once it's in right, you shouldn't feel it, which is great. For a better way to period, just add Tampax.

So then you can think, okay, the importance of the key is really not what I understood, right? Bluebeard forbids the young woman to use the key that would bring her to consciousness. That's everything, right there. That's everything in the line. He gives her everything except the one thing that will let her know the danger she's in or who he is, right?

Emphasis on that, okay? Without this knowing, the woman is without proper protection.

Bitch, I'm actually gonna shit my pants. If she attempts to obey Bluebeard's command to not use the key, she chooses death for her spirit. By choosing to open the door to the ghastly secret room, she chooses life. Bitch, I will stop right now. In the tale, her sisters come to visit, and they were, as all souls are, very curious.

The wife gaily tells them we can do anything except for one thing. The sisters decide to make a game out of finding which door the little key fits. They again have the proper impulse toward consciousness. So you see, this is...

I'm about to have some kind of a revolution. We just, it's still like loading, but I don't think I've ever been so glued to a book in my life. And I only got this book like two days ago. Okay. And you know what? Touching experience. I went into the book. So my friend, basically I was staying at my friend's house with another one of my friends. She woke up before me and she went down to this like library room that my friend has and

And wow, sounding rich. That's kind of crazy to say, actually. But she went down, she picked this book off of a bookshelf. And when I asked her, like, what are you reading? She was like, I don't know. I just found this book on the shelf. Okay, this book found us, bitch. This book has a spirit.

She said, "I know I found this book on the shelf." And then I spoke to this lady about it and she said, "Oh yeah, if there's one book you should ever read in your life, it's this book." The first book she picked off the shelf, okay. At this house we weren't even meant to be at 'cause we got too drunk the night before, okay. This book found us, it has legs, okay. It has a spirit. Anyway, she reads me an excerpt from the first page, which was, I can't remember what the excerpt was that she read me. I think it was something like this. This is like the second, oh, it's the fourth page.

There's a woman's issues of soul cannot be treated by carving her into a more acceptable form as defined by an unconscious culture, nor can she be bent into a more intellectually acceptable shape by those who claim to be the sole bearers of consciousness. No, that is what has already caused millions of women who began as strong, natural powers to become outsiders in their own cultures. Instead, the goal must be the retrieval and sucker, I don't know what that word means, of women's buceous and natural psychic forms. Okay, lots of big words in this book. Okay, but...

She wrote me something like that and I was like, oh my god, I have to fucking read it. Like, I have to read it right fucking now. So we decided we were going to do a book club. So I went and I bought my own copy of the book. And when I entered the bookstore, I asked the woman, I said, hi, do you sell Women Who Run With The Wolves? And she said, yes. I said, where is it? She said,

It's in the psychology section. First of all, what the fuck? Why don't we have our own section for that? This is not a psychology book, although it kind of is because the woman who wrote it is a psychologist, kind of, among other things. But she studied psychology, among other things. Anyways, she leads me to the psychology section and I pick out the book. I go back to pay for it. And she's like, can I ask you who recommended you this book?

I was like, oh, my friend's reading it. And a lot of women in her life have told her that it's a book that everyone should read. So I thought I would come pick it up. And she looked at me and she was like, OK, I read it a couple of years ago. And she said, I read it like loads of many years ago and no one ever buys it. But I keep it on the shelf because I think it's such an important book. I was like, oh, you fucking agree. Yeah.

Everyone is like... It's like a secret club. Like, if you've read it, you, like, have to get other people to read it. She was like, yeah, I keep... Like, no one buys this book. She said, you're the second person to buy this book, like, ever. But I keep it on the shelf because I read it and I think it's important to keep on the shelves. Bitch, I fucking love you. Do you want to go on a date? Okay? You are my mum's age and I'm in love with you. So I bought it and I walked out the bookshop feeling so good about my purchase because I was like, ugh. Like...

I don't know. It just feels like it feels like this book is meant to be read, you know? And at this point in my life, I feel like it's found me at a perfect time. It's found me at a time where I'm genuinely about stuff fucking tweaking. So this is probably good for me right now. But it may impede your girl summer. You know what I need? I need Blondie to release the fucking short and sweet album ASAP because I'm sat inside reading feminist psychological literature and listening to Gracie Abrams. And as much as I love that, it's meant to be your girl

hot girl summer okay this is not what I had envisioned I think it's better for me than probably what I had envisioned of my hookup cultured hot girl summer okay driven on yachts by terrifying men who may well murder me okay yes this is healthier yes this is safer but this could happen during the winter okay so blondie I'm gonna need you to like bump up the release date for short and sweet okay gonna need you to do that please please I might have to rejoin my Sabrina Carpenter fan account

Who said that? I didn't say that. I see you guys on Stan Twitter, by the way, talking about me. Shut the fuck up, bitches. I see someone say, I used to know this girl from Stan Twitter. No, you didn't. That was Adeline. She was a big fan, Adeline. She was actually kind of popular. You guys don't understand how long I've been working this social media job, okay? This is not my first rodeo, okay? I was like...

Kind of lit in 2014. Don't tell anyone. It's not even true. I'm lying to you. I never had Twitter. Especially not Stan Twitter.

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Oh my god, I sat on my foot for so long that now it's gone like, not only has it gone numb but it's got that like static feeling but like it's so intense. I don't know what it is about that feeling that makes me want to like throw up and like laugh hysterically but it makes me, I hate it. I think it's hot today. I think like I'm looking outside, the sky is kind of blue. London needs to get its shit together because why the fuck is it nearly July? And also I don't want it to be July because it's my birthday soon and I don't want to turn another year older.

I don't like that I'm at this portion of life where I think I'm old because...

I spent my whole childhood excited to be in my 20s. Like that just was like the dazzling age for me. Like I didn't really give a fuck about being a teenager. I was actually really scared to be a teenager because my mum always told me that like teenagers are these like horrible people that are mean to everyone. And I thought that like when I became a teenager, I was going to have to do graffiti. And I don't know why I thought that. Like I just thought they always had this really scary vision of me from when I was like six years old that when I turned like 15, I was going to have to like climb up on those bridges and do graffiti on them and stuff. And I was so scared.

Like I thought that was like a requirement and I was like terrified to be a teenager because of that. But I never did do graffiti yet. I would like to. I never have.

But so I was scared of being a teenager, but I always look forward to my 20s. And now I'm in my 20s and I'm like, oh my God, I'm old. And my life is over and I wish I was six. Which isn't true, by the way. People who, people, anyone in their 20s who ever says I feel old is mentally ill. And it's also a feminist issue, okay? And I was down that hill because, um, I don't, like men peak in what, their 30s, 40s? Like they just keep getting better and better and better. Um, and...

And I don't like the feeling that my currency is running out by the second because I'm 23. And it makes me really fucking sad because I'm like actually panicking about it, guys. Like I'm like, oh my God, do I need a facelift? Like I actually genuinely thought that to myself the other day. I was like, maybe I could get a facelift because I saw this like tiny little line by my smile where my makeup increased. And I was like, oh, time for a facelift. Bape!

You actually got your period six years ago. Like, I don't know how to tell you this nicely. You're a child and everyone else except you knows that. And so I don't know what the fuck you mean, facelift. And I want to punch myself because I know. Here's the thing. I trust myself, quite genuinely trust myself, to one day become a really wise older woman. Like, I genuinely am in love with like 15 year old Madeline because I'm like, she's just I just know that bitch is cool. I know she's everything I'm not. And I know she's cool. And I think she has probably really good hair.

So I'm like, I know that that version of me is going to look back at 23 year old me and be like, you're so...

So young. You are so young and you have so much potential. And I hear her. Right here. But I'm like, no, you don't get it, Mads. I'm old. You don't get it. Like, 23 is just not what it used to be. I'm like, old. No, I'm kidding. But like, it is upsetting. And it's not even upsetting that I think I'm old. It's upsetting that I think I'm old. It's upsetting that anyone in their 20s would ever be self-conscious about their age. And I've never heard a guy say it. I'm kidding. Sorry, I'm going to become insufferable. And let me tell you something about men.

Fuck all of them. I hate them. But they're so hot. And it's so sad. Oh, it's so sad. And like, so are women. And as a bisexual girl, right, they're both sexy. So I'm like, sometimes I'm like, if you're having, if you're going to go and have like a big revolution about how much you hate men, because I do that every three years. I have a cycle where I'm like, I wake back up. Like there's, there is very few men in this current modern society who can completely not be.

put you in a box. It's very hard to find that. Who can genuinely let you be what you need to be and feel what you need to feel and see you and actually see you. Every couple of years, I go through a phase where I remember that and I'm like, oh God. And then I do something drastic about it.

So I'm like, why can't you just fuck girls? Like you find them equally as attractive and they're really nice and they smell way better. I'm like, why can't you just do that? Well, unfortunately, I go through phases where I'm like rabid. I'm actually rabid. I'm wild. There's just something about the disrespect that I fucking love. Can't get enough. I don't care. Fucking arrest me. You won't. You can't. Hope. But it's like, it's really stupid because I'm like, I could get like the nicest girlfriend, but I won't. Not right now. And then

And then when I'm ready to, like, respect myself again, I'll just be ready. So there's some things in life you just have to wake up and be ready. And sometimes there's not a process. Sometimes it's literally just you wake up one morning and you're like, oh, okay, I'm here now. You know what I mean? And it just happens. And it's like when you've been in a bad relationship for ages and you cannot seem to get away from them and you cannot seem to stop loving them. And then you wake up one morning and you're like, oh.

I don't like you. You know? Like sometimes you just can't beg yourself for something. You just have to wait and then suddenly you're like, oh, I'm over that now. Cool. It's the same thing like sometimes you'll be going through a terrible breakup and then just one minute you're like, oh, wait a sec. Like I don't actually give a fuck about this anymore. And it's the best fucking feeling ever. I remember when it happened to me with my last breakup. I was, I remember where I was. I was walking on this road and I was about to turn the corner into my street and I asked myself if I still fancy this person and I went,

I don't. And then it was done. I was like, oh my god. I don't love them. I don't fancy them. I don't want them. And then all the other stuff hurt less because I was like, I don't want them back. I don't care what they did. I don't care about this person. Just like that. I remember exactly where I go. I remember the way my feet looked on the pavement as I was looking down at them and

having this fucking revolution. So sometimes when I need to like have these crazy revolutions and revelations and whatever the fuck, I just like don't pressure myself into it. Cause I'm like, yeah, when it's time, it's time. This bitch can't be asked to do anything. You know what I mean? She's just going to do exactly whatever the fuck her body decided to do. And then one day we'll randomly decide all that's done with and all that's gone. And I'm going to do the next thing now. And it drives my friends fucking insane because it doesn't matter how much advice, it doesn't matter how much anything, I'm just going to do what I'm going to do until I'm not anymore.

So, that's, you know, I don't know what that's called. Do I have anything to tell you about Fashion Week? No. Did I not get up to anything at Fashion Week? I went out one night, but that was it. I must have done something interesting. Well...

Next week on Pretty Lonesome, we will have read more of this book because guys, mind you, everything I just read is like on one page and I am up to page 49, I think. So I am like very barely cracking the surface of this book. If you want to go and purchase one, I would genuinely recommend this is cheap. It was like, well, it was $14.99.

But you know, if it's going to change my life, I feel like 15 bucks is not bad. If you want to read it along with me, I will post. I feel like I need an obscure fourth platform, like a forum. Okay.

like a chat room um but I feel like we need somewhere that we can discuss I mean I'm gonna discuss it I guess there's a comment section okay fine there's a comment section but I'll try and post like updates on what page I'm on if you guys actually want to read along with me because I think it would be fun and then I already have a second book lined up when I'm done with this anyway I promise not every podcast episode is going to be about books don't worry if you're a fan of god knows what the fuck it won't always be like this I just think that this one is

too important for me to not yap about right now. Also, I don't know if the author is still alive, but from what I understand, she actually does one-on-one work with people. Like, you can hire her. And I may have to do that if she's alive. Um, Clarissa Pinkola Estes is her name. Is she still alive?

Don't know. When was this written? That will tell us. How the fuck do you find the date of a book? Can you tell I haven't gone to university for two years? Like, that's actually insane. First published in the UK in 1992. Okay, so she's probably still alive. It's also interesting because in one of my recent podcast episodes, I think it was like three weeks ago maybe, I talked about how...

I met with the girl that I call my little sister and how she's like 15, 16. And I remembered that I made me realize I've matured. Nothing's ever made me realize that before other than like, obviously, I know I've grown up since I was 16 and I deal with things much better and I'm a different person than I was.

it actually made me realize how my nervous system, my central nervous system has grown up and how my brain has chemically matured, right? Which I knew, but I didn't know. But it made it very clear to me because I saw a mirror of myself in her and exactly how I used to think and feel and how everyone used to think and feel at 16. And I realized I didn't feel or think that way anymore. And that is not something you learn intellectually. It is literally your body maturing and not sending off signals like crazy anymore, okay?

And, and it's, it's, it's just interesting. It ties in with this book a lot, like how, how girls grow up and why we go through these phases of like self-destruction and not trusting ourselves. And just like, it really is making so much make sense for me because I'm like, why did I do the shit that I did in my teenage years? Why did I date those people? Why did I do those things?

And I think I failed to recognize because here's one thing about me. I don't forgive myself for anything. Can't do it. I can't see. Oh my God, there's a contact lens on my hand. I really was drunk last night, guys. I picked them out in my bed. That's fucking far. I hate when people do that. But I really find it hard to forgive myself. I've said this before, but no one really knows what I'm talking about because it's not something I talk about on the internet. But I'm really like, I find it hard to forgive myself for any mistake I ever make because I don't see how I can validate being stupid. This is my thing because I don't validate stupidity for

anybody. I understand why people make certain mistakes and you can understand something but I very really severely struggle to validate those things and reading this book mixed with meeting with my little sis I'm like I see why I made those mistakes now and I see who I was at 16 and I see who everyone is at 16 and I'm like so much is clicking in my head. So much I'm realizing is

Because you exist as yourself 24 hours a day, seven days a fucking week, and you don't see the changes happen. They happen gradually and they become normal to you very quickly. And so sometimes it's important to actually take your fucking time machine and go back and look at yourself and be like, that's why you did that, babe. I think it's the first time where I've ever felt like I can even slightly empathize with the stupid things that I did as a teenager and the stupid people that I dated and the decisions that I made and the impulses that I followed. Because the thing is,

I can forgive myself very easily if I hurt myself doing something. Well, not forget. Actually, I don't think I've ever forgiven myself for anything ever. Lol. But it's easier. But the second that I hurt somebody else in the process of doing something stupid and impulsive, like I hurt my mom because it stressed her out and she had to see me hurt and she had to be hurt because I did something stupid. Like, I don't like that I know that I made my mom sad in my teenage years. Yes, I understand.

It's because I was struggling and there was nothing I could have done. I couldn't tell myself, well, you need to stop having a fucking panic disorder because you're making your mum sad. Even though that's what everyone tried to tell me. That's not going to fucking help me. I need help. First and foremost, you have to help me so I can help her. And so I always find it hard to forgive myself, even though I fully understand what the situation was and that it wasn't my choice and it wasn't my fault. I still find it hard to like write that off because I still hurt someone in the process and it sucks. And it's just the way life is, right?

and I still made her sad and I still made her scared and I still made her anxious and I still made her worry about me and yeah she's my mom and I know there's nuances to it and I know it's her job to worry about me but it's not the point I still feel weird about it god knows why um

But this book is so powerful in helping you have empathy for those experiences mixed with me seeing this fucking kid. I love my little sister. I really do. She's like the most precious thing to me. But I just didn't realize I wasn't still 16 till I saw a 16 year old.

And I realized I don't have the first thing in common with her. It's like, oh my God, thank God. And thank God for that. God bless, you know? Everyone at some point gets to grow out of being a teenager. And that is worth all the money in the world, I think. That is worth all the therapy and God bless, I guess. Okay, well, I kind of don't want to finish doing this podcast episode because then I have to go do my work and I don't want to. But I like my hair. Do you guys like my hair? I don't know if it still looks good, but I got it done. I went to the tattoo, tattoo?

to show it for Couture Week and oh my fucking god

I've never been so obsessed with a collection in my life. Usually I am obsessed with fashion because it looks fucking nice. It's fashion. But I was looking at this collection and I was thinking, who the fuck do I need to bribe for me to get these pieces, my hands on these pieces? I need to wear them. My ideal style that I feel like I've never, it's never actually been on my body. Like I've never actually dressed the way I want to dress, which makes me fucking furious. And I know everyone feels the same way. It's like,

even though if I had the money to dress the way I wanted to dress, which like I kind of could afford it maybe, but like it's not the point. Like I can't afford to dress like that every day. And also I don't even know how. My ideal style is like Devil Wears Prada. Every single fucking outfit they wore in that movie put it on me right fucking now. Right fucking now. It's also very Sex and the City. Sex and the City? I don't fucking know. But it's very like those vibes.

And the Petit Couture show was the closest I've ever seen to realizing that dream of mine. And like the Chanel show, duh. But like, obviously like every, it's a little bit of everything in Devil Wears Prada, but like these outfits, they struck a chord. I was like this, I've been visualizing these, visualizing these for a very long time. And I don't know, I don't know if it's possible for me to wear them because I believe the couture so bad, don't really know what couture means, but like, I think it's a one of one. I think all the one of one, hello.

I think Orchid Tour pieces are one of one which is really annoying because I really want to wear them. Please. Guys, please. Guys, please. I swear. I'll be so careful with them if you just let me wear them. Please. That actually just gave me the ick. I need to go. I need to go. I need to go. Also, you want to know something funny?

this hotel that I'm in right now is the walls are paper fucking thin and I know the person next to me can hear me right now because I like heard every word of their conversation earlier like every word like as if they were in my room and I know she's sat in there thinking someone has severe schizophrenia in the room next to me.

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also you know something fucking funny I was in Ibiza and me and my friend had had like I don't know 10 drinks and we're drunk in our room we were having mojitos and so I ordered more and on room service and the guy comes to give me the drinks and I had to return two drinks to him because we ordered a mojito and they'd given us like actual piss like they'd pissed in the cup and so I gave them back to him I was like we don't want to drink these ones like could you just like remove them like and

I'm going to take them back to the kitchen as he was like giving me the new drinks that we'd ordered. So I was like, you can take these back, right? And he looked around. Mind you, there's like 10 mojito glasses all empty. He's like, you want me to take the rest of them? I was like, oh yeah, that would be perfect. Like if you could clear them out. Yeah, thank you. And then he was like, you didn't like these two? The ones that were full? I was like, yeah, me and my friend, like we didn't really like those ones. Like they just like taste really weird. Like they don't taste like a mojito. He's looking at me like, okay, all right.

My friend comes out the bathroom crying with laughter because the bitch hid in there. I don't know why. She thought it was fucking funny. Like the second he knocked on the door, she hid in the bathroom. What the fuck is wrong with you? She always does it to me too. So she comes out crying of laughter. She's like, Madeline, do you know what's really funny? I was like, no, what the fuck is funny?

she's like he thought you're crazy I'm like why it's like he didn't think I was here he thinks you're by yourself and you keep referring to your friend and the second person in the room he doesn't know he thinks you're lying and I looked back on the interaction I was like wait you're right I looked fucking crazy I'm like surrounded by empty glasses like yeah me and my friend don't really like those ones could you please bring us new ones yeah you can take the rest of the glasses thank you we just didn't really like those ones yeah she was a

pissing herself with laughter. She's like, Madeline, you looked insane. Fuck you, actually, because she's right. Do you guys like this nail varnish color? Because I got them done in France and the girl who does my nails, actually in love with her, but the girl who does my nails...

She didn't have like a pinky, this was like a nude and I usually go for like a pink and I usually go for something a little bit more see-through. So she gave me this because it was the closest we could get to a neutral and I just needed it for the show. And we all kind of thought it was like a little bit ugly. We were like, fuck it, like I'll just take it off and like put on my normal, I use this pink Chanel one normally. So I was like, I'll just take it off when I get back home and like put on my normal color.

But now I'm like, it's kind of growing on me. It's kind of elegant, no? And I feel like because I have this slight, sorry, let me talk into the microphone, ideally. Because I have like the slightest bit of a tan, I'm like, I feel like it actually is kind of cute and elegant. I'm with my new ring. Guys, this is my aura ring. I'm not paid by them. And I talk about them a lot. And people are going to stop thinking I'm getting paid. I'm not. It has little things on the inside. And it tracks my heart rate.

and my oxygen saturation. I don't know how the fuck it does that. So it tells me about my sleep, when I'm in REM sleep, when I'm in deep sleep, when I wake up during the night. It tells me if I'm stressed. It tells me about my oxygen. It tells me about my heart rate. And it is... First of all, I don't know how I went my whole life without knowing how I've slept at night because this is the best piece of information in the entire world is knowing if I've had a good night's sleep or not. And...

It's like I feel more ready for the day when I know, okay, you've got so much REM sleep. Because I obviously don't really understand what the fuck REM sleep is and what the fuck deep sleep is and which one should I be in and should I flick between them? I don't know. I'm not a scientist, bitch. It dumbs it down for you, okay? So it gives you a score. You slept 87% well, okay? You might feel a bit tired today. We've adjusted your suggested amount of exercise based on your sleep. Okay, marry me.

Okay, that's an act of kindness. Marry me. You must want to. So it's really good. It was expensive. It was like 400 pounds or 500 pounds. But yeah, the second I heard about this, I went, I'm fucking born. Because I was in Cannes for Cannes Lions. And these two girls had these rings on. And they were talking about their sleep score and their stress levels. I was like, you're gonna have to explain to me what the fuck that is right this very fucking second. So they told me it's this aura ring. I ordered one on the fucking spot.

Guess how many hours I was stressed for yesterday? Four. Four hours of pure stress. And you have to wear it for five days before it'll start to track your stress levels because it has to get to know you and your rhythms. This must be my sixth or seventh day with it now because yesterday was the first day that it told me my stress levels. And it said that I was stressed for four entire hours, which is, I feel like an understatement, if anything. But it's really interesting. I obviously have a panic disorder. I have panic attacks.

anxiety the whole fucking shit show so I'm like very interested to actually see what toll that is taking my body and how my heart rate is throughout the day um and it tells you your average heart rate your heart rate during your sleep it's really interesting um and it's my new favorite fucking thing they better pay me they better pay me they won't but anyways that's it that's my spiel for today I'll see you guys next week on next week's episode of pretty lonesome

Love you so much. Thanks for watching. Yeah, that's it. Bye. Bye.