Well Enough Alone - A Guide To Thriving Solo27 Huhti 2025

Paul Dolan: Can you be truly happy alone? (Spoiler: single, child-free women are the happiest)

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 podcast, Get Happier, among others.

He’s spent more than three decades researching how we can measure and value the richness of the human experience, and what he’s found is fascinating.

One of the things we’re often told from an early age is the best way for us to achieve fulfilment is to get married and have kids.

But does the science align with the fairytale? Do we need to partner and procreate to be a fully actualised and contented human? Or can we be truly happy alone?

This is an illuminating and validating conversation about the science of doing life solo.

You can find out more about Paul’s work through his website, learn more about his books here and check out his podcasts here.

To stay in touch with Well Enough Alone, you can follow us on Instagram @wellenoughalonepod or follow Jill @jillstark__

Well Enough Alone is a Spare Room production. Our producers are Kieran Simpson and Trent Bartlett.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tämä jakso on lisätty Podme-palveluun avoimen RSS-syötteen kautta eikä se ole Podmen omaa tuotantoa. Siksi jakso saattaa sisältää mainontaa.

Jaksot(28)

SEASON FINALE: Heidi Clements: Single after 60 – the freedom, self-love and empowerment of age

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 sea...

4 Touko 202541min

Michelle McQuaid: the cost of being a ‘good girl’ – finding freedom from people-pleasing

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, a...

20 Huhti 202551min

Therese Shechter: ‘My so-called selfish life’ – how the child-free movement is reshaping the world

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...

13 Huhti 202543min

Cindy Gallop: I’m unmarried, no kids, dating younger men casually for sex, and I’m blissfully ecstatic.

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 active...

6 Huhti 202538min

Annie Whitlocke: A death doula’s lessons on dying, aloneness and how to live well

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 no...

30 Maalis 202550min

Amy Gahran: Solo polyamory and getting off the ‘relationship escalator’

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 fa...

23 Maalis 202544min

Rosie Batty: On hope, finding yourself amid trauma and grief, and building a life with meaning

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 ...

16 Maalis 202550min