Spring clean your life: how to make a fresh start

Is your lifestyle in need of a spring clean? Maybe now’s the moment to pivot your career, pick up healthier habits, or embrace a new life you wouldn’t have chosen, but now need to make the best of? In this episode, Fearne reflects on the Happy Place episodes that’ll give you a bit of a push – or a bit of inspiration – to get you making that fresh start you’ve been thinking about for ages... In this episode you’ll hear from – -Poet Donna Ashworth on making a slow, organic career change later in life, and re-finding who you really want to be under the crap that real life shovels on top of you -TV personality Mille Mackintosh on giving up alcohol and acknowledging the big moment when you realise something needs to change -Author Raynor Winn on being forced into a huge lifestyle change by factors out of your control, and choosing to make the best of a bad situation -Musician Shania Twain on how illness can change you, and how to come back stronger after a huge setback -Musician Kesha on rethinking and embracing a different side of your character, so your personality reflects who you really are, not who others want you to be -Charlotte Church on her career change from singer to healer, and how ceremony can help move you into a lifestyle re-birth If you liked this episode of Happy Place, you might also like: How to stick two fingers up to beauty standards https://pod.fo/e/24cb47 How to laugh when you’ve been to hell and back https://pod.fo/e/2351d0 Saying no: more boundaries, less people pleasing https://pod.fo/e/288e7a Child on the line is a three-part documentary podcast series celebrating the Volunteer Counsellors of Childline, and the brave children & young people who contact the helpline service. Listen here: https://www.childonthelinepodcast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Hi, I'm Natalie Dormer and I'm proud to be an ambassador for Childline. This year, Childline turns 40. To mark it, I've made Child on the Line, a three-part documentary podcast. We hear why children needed a helpline in 1986, how it was built against the odds and the challenges children face today, from abuse and mental health to social media and AI. Search Child on the Line and listen wherever you get your podcasts.

• 0:29Fearne Cotton?

  Hello, I'm Fern Cotton and this is Happy Place. Today, is your lifestyle in need of a little bit of a spring clean? Maybe now's the moment to pivot your career, pick up healthier habits, or embrace a new life you wouldn't have chosen but now need to make the best of?

• 0:45Speaker 02

  I was angry, I was that kind of drunk person at the party that other people are trying to like get away from. They were big warning signs.

• 0:53Speaker 03

  They gave us a week to pack 20 years of life into boxes and leave. Everything that we'd built over the previous 20 years, gone.

• 1:01Speaker 04

  There is a fine line between making people happy and then being like a people pleaser at the expense of yourself.

• 1:09Speaker 05

  I didn't intend to do it. It was so organic that I don't even know how it happened.

• 1:15Speaker 06

  I can get caught sometimes in a dark place, but somewhere along the way, I climb out of it.

• 1:21Fearne Cotton?

  You know what, even more so than New Year, I think spring can feel like a beautiful time for a bit of a fresh start. It's all grey and miserable at the start of the year, so motivation can be pretty low, but I certainly find that I get a real surge of excitable and vibrant energy when the sun comes out and everything in nature is doing its lovely blooming thing. So today, this episode is for you if you're in need of a bit of a push or a bit of inspiration to get you making that fresh start you've been thinking about for ages. You're going to hear from Donna Ashworth about making a slow, organic career change later in life, then Millie McIntosh about the big moment she realised she had to stop

• 2:03Fearne Cotton?

  drinking, and Raina Wynn on coping with a huge change you wouldn't have chosen for yourself. That is a lovely one. Shania Twain chats about coming back stronger from illness. Kesha talks about embracing a different side of her personality. And Charlotte Church, who's also done a massive career pivot actually, talks through the ceremonies that help her basically rebirth herself into a new life.

• 2:30Speaker 07

  I've got big news. I switched to Verizon and got the new iPhone 18 Pro. Shh. I can keep my old phone. And I also get the latest iPhone every year. Shh, anything else? Verizon let me choose Apple Watch Series 12 or iPad on them. Everybody, listen up. Shh. Switch to Verizon and get the new iPhone 18 Pro now. No trade in needed. And the latest iPhone every year with Simplicity Plan. Plus, choose Apple Watch Series 12 or iPad on us. Simplicity Plan with Simplicity Pro required. Plan and device payment purchase are separate agreements with separate terms. Service plan for watch or iPad required. Additional terms apply for all offers.

• 3:00Speaker 03

  There are two types of business owners. Those who are busy and those who want to be busy. Toast is designed for both with tools to keep you humming and help turn grind into growth. That's how you turn busy into business. Toast, built for busy.

• 3:15Speaker 06

  Some travelers want the charm of an independent hotel. Others want the confidence of a trusted global brand. With Series by Marriott, you get both. Each property is uniquely connected to its destination, delivering local experiences and memorable stays, while being backed by the quality, reliability, and Marriott Bonvoy benefits travelers know and trust. Experience the destination without the compromise. Series by Marriott is part of Marriott Bonvoy. Book direct at marriott.com or on the Marriott Bonvoy app.

• 3:48Fearne Cotton?

  Let's do it. We're going to start with Donna, Millie, and Raina. Here's the show.

• 4:14Fearne Cotton?

  I love stories about people's trajectory when it's come a little bit later in life. I think we all know... The stories of people that have had this vision from a very young age and they've worked and worked and worked and they've got to this point in their twenties or teens where it's all started to kick off. You seemingly had this big pivot in your forties where I'm imagining it comes from mindset. It's not like you've got some sort of magic spell that you cast and all of a sudden you've got this huge following.

• 4:43Speaker 05

  I have.

• 4:43Fearne Cotton?

  Or have you? Maybe you can, you can let us know, Donna. But it seems like something shifted in you in your forties that catalyzed all of this.

• 4:52Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 4:53Fearne Cotton?

  Is that true? And if so, what was it?

• 4:56Speaker 05

  I had had enough.

• 4:57Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 4:58Speaker 05

  I just kept thinking every day, I can't keep doing this. I can't keep running this fast. I felt like the sort of lifestyle that we were living, my kids were a bit younger, they were at really good schools, but those schools went really fast and hard. Like you have to do better, you have to do more, you have to do sports, you have to do this. Weekends are homework and weekends are more sports and everybody was sort of moving at such a pace.

• 5:25Fearne Cotton?

  And stressed.

• 5:26Speaker 05

  And stressed.

• 5:26Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 5:27Speaker 05

  And I just thought, I've got a feeling nobody likes this and maybe if I stop and say, anybody else think that this is all just a bit of a joke and we can all just chill out and, and be a bit, you know, flawed? And have a laugh about it and be really happy and we could maybe help one another. That if I did that, maybe people would go, me, me, me. And so, I mean, it was anonymous at first. I had a page. I sort of hid behind the name of the page, which was ladiespassiton.com. And I thought we would kind of pass things on that helped one another. And it wasn't until sort of the first poem or two maybe went viral that I, I went, okay, this is me, this is my name.

• 6:09Speaker 05

  And this is my face. That's another really scary bit. What are you all going to say about my face? Are you going to say horrible things? Um, and I just had enough and I just thought there's more than this. And I think we could have better conversations about everything about depression. I realised I'd been depressed many times in my life and I'd never admitted it. I'd always gone, oh, I'm, I'm highly sensitive, I maybe get a bit down, I'm quite difficult. But no, I had been depressed, you know, I struggled for a long time with eating disorders and I got myself out of those eating disorders. Using affirmations and Reiki and going down the whole reprogramming your thoughts. So I lived on Louise Hay for decades.

• 6:54Fearne Cotton?

  Obsessed with Louise Hay. I still, her book, How to Heal Your Body, I, I have.

• 6:57Speaker 05

  Healed my body.

• 6:58Fearne Cotton?

  I have it, I've got two copies of it.

• 7:00Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 7:00Fearne Cotton?

  One by my bed, one in my little office. I go to it constantly.

• 7:04Speaker 05

  Yeah, I carried that everywhere with me, age eighteen. I mean, who was doing that? And I did a Reiki course for my, I think it was my seventeenth birthday. Because I was trying to eradicate myself off the face of the earth because I was such a perfectionist. Such, you know, had to have all the grades, had to have everything perfect. That, you know, the minute I realised that you could control your eating. And that would make you feel really powerful and that, that, that was my downfall. So Louise Hay helped me unpick all of that and, and find a much healthier, calmer way. And so somewhere within me, that was all dying to come back out. It had kind of been squashed down again by life.

• 7:47Speaker 05

  And being a new mum and, you know, everything just coming at you. My husband and I ran a, a business. A children's play centre, which was seven days a week. So there was never a day where it was shut except for Christmas Day. And New Year's Day. And we thought, this'll be fun. We can bring our kids to work. Because I used to work in magazines and he was in TV. And we thought this'll be a really chill, a nice way of life. I mean, why would you think that a ball pool would be chill?

• 8:14Fearne Cotton?

  They're the worst place ever, quite frankly.

• 8:17Speaker 05

  I mean, I have, I have noise, I have sensory issues. So the noise in itself was.

• 8:22Fearne Cotton?

  Too much.

• 8:22Speaker 05

  Um, but I was definitely just looking for deeper conversations with people. And I thought, you know what, maybe I'll start it in a really dramatic way.

• 8:32Fearne Cotton?

  But why poetry as well? Because, you know, you could have expressed yourself in.

• 8:35Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 8:36Fearne Cotton?

  Plethora of ways, whether it was just expressive writing.

• 8:38Speaker 05

  Expressive dance.

• 8:39Fearne Cotton?

  Or dance, or just, you know, creating a website where you're chatting to people, there's forums. But poetry is so specific. Why that? Is it something you'd always leant on personally just for fun?

• 8:52Speaker 05

  I think there's always somebody in a friendship group that writes poems even for fun. You know, like, oh, can you, is that you? I'm obsessed with poetry. So there you go then. And I was that person. So as a teenager, I wrote poems in my diary. About the boys everyone fancied, yeah, fun. Heartache, you know, the desperation of teenage angst and heartache. And then I became a songwriter. So I was a singer at the time and I started to write songs. So the lyrics, the beauty of a few words, I mean, I listen to other people's music and it's the lyrics for me. If they're with the right music and they're done in that way, magic is made. But the lyrics are so important and I've always been obsessed with the power of words.

• 9:37Speaker 05

  The right words in the right order at the right time, just when you need it. If someone passes it to you or you hear it, it's healing. It's like affirmations, you know, it's like all of that. They can do so much. So I didn't intend to do it. I didn't at any point go, I write poems now, that's what I do. I would write little paragraphs and then I would write quotes and then I would maybe just, you know, write about my day and then the poetry came. And so much so, it was so organic that I don't even know how it happened. It just unfurled.

• 10:12Speaker 02

  I think there's so much stigma attached to just any kind of drinking problem. But I, yeah, I didn't have the kind of dependency where I was drinking every day to get through the day. I would get withdrawal from alcohol. I would get very severe anxiety and I would then I would self-medicate by drinking more, drinking again. Or with prescription pills to cope with how awful my hangovers were. Which was also just a very unhealthy, toxic kind of cycle that I got into. But admitting I actually had a problem was really hard for me for a long time because I felt that there was so much shame around it. And also people kept saying to me, oh, you know, you had too much to drink, but, you know, you don't have a problem.

• 10:57Speaker 02

  So people kept kind of saying to me, oh, come on, you don't have a problem. And then I started to think, well, if I did have a problem, I would be judged. So I felt like I. Just kept telling myself, oh, it's not that bad. And over the years, things would happen and I would just, I was like, this isn't like, that's not really, that's not okay. And I was kind of scaring myself and having, but I'd have periods, so I wouldn't drink at all, maybe a month or six weeks. And I'd feel really good. So I kind of convinced myself, I don't have a problem because I can stop. But then when I went back, the same things would always happen. I'd always try and limit the amount I had. And once I'd had, you know, two or three, all my resolve would crumble.

• 11:40Speaker 02

  And I never knew when the kind of responsible amount was, like, I just would have a couple and then just keep chasing the feeling it was giving me and be the person that just wanted the night to go on and on.

• 11:54Fearne Cotton?

  You didn't have an off button?

• 11:55Speaker 02

  Didn't have an off button. If I had one, I wanted a hundred.

• 11:57Fearne Cotton?

  I've got friends that have exactly the same thing. There's, there's no off button. You're out, you're having a great time. And I guess when you look at whether other people are saying you've got a problem or not, or what the definition is of a problem. I think with anything, whether it's alcohol or it could be anything that you, you know, is detrimental. It's a problem if you say so, if you know that your life could be better.

• 12:20Speaker 02

  Could be anything.

• 12:21Fearne Cotton?

  Could be anything. But I don't think we should have these parameters that say, if you're drinking X amount, it's a problem. It's if you feel that it's derailing you in life in some ways, or you could be living in a better way, then you decide whether it's a problem or not. And you, you had a specific moment, you talk about in the book, that was a bit of a wake up call where you thought, right, I have pushed it too far. Enough's enough. So just tell us about how, how that happened. And, and in that moment, what really got you rethinking about your drinking habits?

• 12:50Speaker 02

  In the last year before I decided to stop, I had a couple of nights out, a couple of situations where they were big warning signs. One was, actually two of them were weddings, one was a hen. Often these occasions where the kind of drinking is. Kind of part of a big social gathering. The last, the last one was at a wedding. Um, I was out with Hugo and I had planned to not drink very much, really kind of been like, okay, this is a really important wedding. It was one of like Hugo's best friends. And I don't remember much after the champagne reception, like just, it's all a blur. But it all just went a bit peatong.

• 13:28Speaker 02

  I was crying, I was angry, I was just that kind of drunk person at the party that other people are trying to like get away from. Because I was just such a mess. And it's, it's really uncomfortable to think about myself at that wedding. But it's also such a good reminder why I don't go back to drinking. And a couple of days after that, I had a big argument with Hugo at the wedding. And the next day he said to me, it had happened, you know, so many times where he said, like, I'm really like done. If this, if this, you know, keeps happening, it's going to end our marriage. And he didn't give me an ultimatum of like, if you ever drink again from today, it's over. He just said, I can't keep going through this with you. And I also knew that it was really damaging our relationship.

• 14:12Speaker 02

  But it took me then about another five days. And then I had my like last drink. That basically happened after drinking with friends on holiday, going to bed, not super late, not, I wasn't particularly drunk that night. But we would be out drinking a few nights in a row on holiday. And I went to bed and I woke up the next morning, we were staying on a boat. And I woke up and felt very intense anxiety straight away, but I wasn't able to tell if it was real or not. Like I felt, I went straight to a panic attack and I felt like I couldn't breathe. I felt like I couldn't get air in my, my throat, felt like it was closing. And I started to blackout, I woke Hugo up and I started to blackout, I was on the floor and I could see my children's faces. And I really thought.

• 14:58Speaker 02

  I wasn't aware I'm having a panic attack, I'm hungover, this is anxiety. It was like I was in the panic attack and thought I was about to die. And when I calmed down and like later that morning, I was really shaken up and I went for a hike with Hugo just to like talk and I said, I need to stop drinking. And it was the scariest thing to say because I knew once I'd said it out loud, I was gonna have to stick to it. And it felt so scary.

• 15:26Speaker 03

  I bet.

• 15:27Speaker 02

  I felt like my life, I didn't know what my life was gonna look like. I didn't know how I was gonna socialise, how I was gonna have fun. I thought that was the only way I could have fun. And it was, yeah, I was terrified at that point, but I knew that was my rock bottom.

• 15:45Speaker 03

  I'd been living in this place in Wales that I'd bought with my husband Moth. It was our dream home, a place we'd thought about for probably a decade before we actually bought it. It became not just our home, our family home, but our business where it was the main source of income, but where all of our life was tied up. But then sadly, in the background of those 20 years, we'd had this financial dispute with a lifetime friend that ended in a court case that saw us being served with an eviction notice from that place. That place that we'd put our heart and soul into, that had been so central to our lives. And they gave us a week to pack 20 years of life into boxes and leave.

• 16:31Speaker 03

  Which was hard enough in itself and seemed like the worst thing that was ever gonna happen. But then in that week, my husband Moth had a hospital appointment that we thought was going to be routine, turned out to be anything but. And he was diagnosed with a neurodegenerative disease that had no treatment and no cure. And the best advice they could give us was, don't get too tired and be careful on the stairs. So we were about to leave, it was, it was the last moments. The bailiffs were knocking on the door and we were, we were hiding under the stairs actually because we, not that we... We thought a miracle would happen, but because we just weren't ready to take that last step out of the house.

• 17:15Fearne Cotton?

  How could you be?

• 17:15Speaker 03

  How could you be? But that moment, that was the moment when I spotted a book in a packing case. And it was a book about a young man who'd walked the southwest coast path with his dog. And just then, in that awful moment, it seemed like the most obvious thing to do. Fill a looks at, go for a walk. Why wouldn't you?

• 17:33Fearne Cotton?

  I was so taken aback by that, reading the salt path, that, that you had the strength, I guess, and the energy with all of that going on, which is emotionally depleting, physically horrific to go through because you're having to just move your whole life out of, as you say, your home, your heart, your soul, like everything that you'd built. And rather than go, right, how do we start again? What is possible? You kind of pushed it to one side for a bit, to have this time and space to go on this epic walk. And you didn't have an end date or you had like a loose idea of where you'd like the walk to finish. But really it was like, let's just get a backpack and walk.

• 18:14Fearne Cotton?

  And I find that just remarkable, that, that, that you had that inner strength and that, I guess, there must have been something deep within you that was intuitively pulling you towards that walk.

• 18:28Speaker 03

  I think, I think at the mo- that moment, that moment when we said, yes, let's walk. I think it was just the idea of following a line on a map. Because at that point, it was, as I said, all of our lives were wrapped up in that property. So it was like the whole framework that we'd built, everything that we'd built over the previous 20 years, gone. And it just left a void. So the idea of following that map almost gave us a sense of purpose, a sense of reason to the days, a reason to go on. Because at that point, I think I felt like there was no reason.

• 19:04Fearne Cotton?

  The first sort of initiation into that walk was tricky and you had very small amounts of rations of food and at times you didn't know where your next meal was going to come from. But like you say, there was so many incredible, and I'm sure at the time felt quite sort of surprising. Positives that came out of this really treacherous time for you. One of them being that Moth's health seemed to really improve on this first walk on the salt path where you were. You started in, was it North Devon and then you moved right down to South Devon, South Cornwall. A huge walk. And as you say at the start of of us talking, you were given this loose advice, you know, don't let him get too tired. Don't tackle stairs, chill as much as you can. And you did the absolute opposite.

• 19:46Fearne Cotton?

  Like you could not walk anymore if you possibly tried, day in, day out, sleeping on the floor, intense. But you both started to notice these improvements. So first of all, can you just tell us the the nature of CBD? What what does that mean for for a human body? What are the symptoms? And and how did you see those symptoms dissipate over time?

• 20:07Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, corticobasal degeneration, it's a neurodegenerative disease. It sort of manifests as as coordination issues and people have problems with walking, with fine motor issues. But then it develops into something far more aggressive that that eventually can affect the way you think, the way you you process and eventually leads to swallowing difficulties, which inevitably don't end well.

• 20:38Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, that is is unbelievably just catastrophic to hear that diagnosis. You've been with Moth since you were a teenager. He's the love of your life and all of a sudden, not only are you losing your home, but you're being given that news in the same week. I still kind of can't get over that you just didn't go, fuck this, I give up, I can't, I can't take anymore.

• 21:00Speaker 03

  Yes, but you've said it there, Fern. He was, he was everything. We'd met when I was, I was 18 in a college canteen. I'd looked up and seen this young man across the other side of the canteen dipping a Mars bar in a cup of tea. And just in that moment, it was like, it was just, I just knew without question that he was gone. And then we we had spent the rest of our, well, the whole of my adult life with him. And just the idea, the idea of letting go of that seemed utterly impossible. So so to not do something positive.

• 21:41Speaker 03

  As a walk turned out to be, Yeah. would have needed us to do something that accepted all that negativity and accepted that we were in a really bad place and that Moth's time with me was going to be short. I couldn't accept that. So the only other thing to do was something positive.

• 22:02Speaker 07

  I've got big news. I switched to Verizon and got the new iPhone 18 Pro. Shh. I can keep my old phone and I also get the latest iPhone every year. Shh, anything else? Verizon let me choose Apple Watch Series 12 or iPad on them. Everybody, listen up. Shh. Switch to Verizon and get the new iPhone 18 Pro now. No trade in needed and the latest iPhone every year with Simplicity Plan. Plus, choose Apple Watch Series 12 or iPad on us. Simplicity Plan with Simplicity Pro required. Plan and device payment purchase are separate agreements with separate terms. Service plan for Watch or iPad required. Additional terms apply for all offers. Some travelers want the charm of an independent hotel. Others want the confidence of a trusted global brand. With Series by Marriott, you get both. Each property is uniquely connected to its destination, delivering local experiences and memorable stays

• 22:47Speaker 07

  while being backed by the quality, reliability, and Marriott Bonvoy benefits travelers know and trust. Experience the destination without the compromise. Series by Marriott is part of Marriott Bonvoy. Book direct at Marriott.com or on the Marriott Bonvoy app. Then I thought, what if I've scaled businesses? What if I scaled my philanthropy? What if I did as much in one year as I've done in my whole life? See how your wealth could have even greater meaning at creativeplanning.com/impact.

• 23:17Speaker 07

  At Lowe's, this Veterans Day and every day,

• 23:19Fearne Cotton?

  military members, veterans and their spouses get automatic MyLowe's Rewards Silver Status benefits. Plus, 10% off eligible purchases with no annual limit. It's one way we honor and give back to those who have served and still do. Learn more and verify now at Lowe's.com/military. 10% discount can't be combined with another offer. Exclusions, terms and conditions apply. Loyalty program subject to terms and conditions. Details at Lowe's.com/terms. Subject to change.

• 23:47Fearne Cotton?

  All right, let's get back to the show with Shania, Kesha and Charlotte. I think like most other massive Shania fans, to have you back with a new album is monumental for so many reasons. One of them being, if anyone watched your amazing documentary, where you were talking about your health issues that you'd had that had affected your throat hugely and your ability to sing. To have you back producing music is incredible. So how's your throat at the moment?

• 24:18Speaker 06

  It's good. I'm very happy with it. You know, I've had quite a bit of time now to become acquainted with the way it works and how to use it. It's a learning, it's an ongoing learning and discovery. So I've been through one visit, uh, residency, Vegas residency. That makes sense. Vegas, whatever. Anyway, Vegas residency. You know, which is a lot of singing on stage and then the recording of this album. So I'm now about to head on a tour. That'll be the first tour with the new throat, with my new like throat structure is really the way it is, or my new laryngeal structure.

• 25:02Speaker 06

  And I'm feeling good about it. I have the volume that I, and the projection that I missed for so many years and control that I missed for so many years. I still have a lot of work to do in maintaining it. And, and you know, and that's like, I can't wait to get back in the studio and make more albums while I still have it. So I'm feeling very celebratory about the fact that I still have it. I want to use it as this important music expression that I, you know, would be very sad to live without. But I may not have this forever. So yeah, I want to hurry up and make more albums and

• 25:39Fearne Cotton?

  Make all the albums.

• 25:40Speaker 06

  Make all my albums before I'm not able to sing my songs anymore. I mean, I'll be very happy for other people to sing my songs. I really think that that would be a huge pleasure for me anyway, as a songwriter, a whole other kind of pleasure. But I do not take for granted the fact that I can sing them right now. And even though I do sound a bit different and everything like that, I'll take it.

• 26:00Fearne Cotton?

  I don't think you do. I think you sound just exactly the same as you've always sounded and that's why I was so glad to hear this this album. I mean, and also because it was so unfortunate and and this tiny moment where you get a tick bite, you get Lyme's disease and then it affects your throat in such a way, that is absolutely devastating. And of course, not only do you, well, you obviously you had surgery in the end, but you had to retrain your your voice and and retrain yourself to sing. But also there's that whole confidence piece that all of a sudden you've got to build the confidence to get back out there, to get back on a stage. How did you do that?

• 26:35Speaker 06

  Well, before I had surgery is when I really, really, really had to test my courage and my commitment to being able to control my voice again. Because before I had the operation, the surgeon said, I really think you need to go through a year of trying everything else before we do surgery. So all the physiotherapy, the speech therapy, the the voice jam, the the everything, that was noninvasive. So I did that and I did manage to do one residency that way and one tour that way and one album that way. But it was not sustainable. I was exhausted because it took me an hour and a half to warm up

• 27:19Speaker 06

  and then another hour and a half of a show. It wasn't physically possible. And on top of that, the condition was deteriorating anyway. I mean, just the tension was just getting more and more slack with my voice. I either didn't sing again on any level that was going to be satisfying or I got this operation. So now I have two crutches on either side of my larynx in the voice box.

• 27:46Fearne Cotton?

  It's incredible and it's so brilliant that it worked and that the the the voice training got you back to to singing again. Thank God. I mean, it seems like throughout your life, from from what I know of it and from watching your documentary and having followed you for a long time, that you are incredibly resilient, like any any problem like this throat situation that comes your way, you are able to pick yourself back up again and that. Goes right back to when you were a teenager. Why do you think that is? How are you able to to keep getting back on your feet after these huge life knocks that you experienced?

• 28:25Speaker 06

  I think resilient is a good one word, at least that describes me very well. I agree that I am resilient. I am not, however, you know, someone that just bounces back every time she hits the ground. You know, I don't just bounce back. I'm depending on the situation, depending on where I'm at in my life. I sometimes, you know, I can get caught sometimes longer than I want to in a dark place or in a discouraged place. But somewhere along the way, I I climb out of it and or snap out of it. Or however you want to put it. I mean, I think that that term like just snap out of it.

• 29:07Speaker 06

  I don't think it's necessarily an insensitive thing to say, especially to yourself. It's like, OK, allow yourself to feel you're down, you know, recognize that you are or and whatever your negative state of mind is. But at some point, you got to snap out of it. You got to just fucking get on with it, you know. You got to find the strength to carry on and carry on with a good attitude. So I can be hard on myself sometimes when it comes to that. But maybe that's part of my resilience. I don't know. I'm just not somebody to give up and quit. I'm not somebody to allow myself to linger to the point of self destruction.

• 29:48Speaker 04

  I was so young when TikTok came out and people seemed to really like that song. So that indicated to me that that's what I was useful in is that arena, making people happy, making people dance. And I do love that. So that's where the confusion kind of came in. Is that I like seeing people happy. I like making people happy. But then there is a fine line between making people happy and then being like a people pleaser at the expense of yourself and becoming a caricature of who you are. And I just kind of had to take a step back and.

• 30:30Speaker 04

  Like reevaluate the kind of album I was gonna make. And there were all these voices in my head that were like screaming inside of my head. And they were unavoidable during lockdown. You know, usually I'm so busy that I can just be like, oh, I'll get to you later. But in the silence, I really felt like it was time to address and give voice to especially rage. I grew up thinking women, like, we can be all of the things. But the one thing I really cannot be, there's nothing more unattractive than an angry woman. And that was just this feeling I've had since I was very young.

• 31:15Speaker 04

  I don't know who said it, or if I just like internalized that from culture, or if it's purely just in my head. But I always kind of thought you can be anything, any kind of woman, but not angry. And I have addressed my anger on this album. So I'm like wildly curious what people are gonna think about that.

• 31:36Fearne Cotton?

  Hmm. Anger's really brilliant because actually you can turn it into this fire.

• 31:42Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:43Fearne Cotton?

  And this passion. And I've probably come to a similar realization, I don't know, in the last sort of few years, and have been wanting to release it. I don't want it in me. And I think that's what ends up happening when we have those, and they're very widely spread cultural beliefs that, you know, women should act a certain way and not show any anger. It ends up living in our bodies, which is so, so unhealthy for a start. I've been doing these workouts where you make like wild, animalistic noises. And my neighbors think I'm being like murdered. But I am wildly letting it out. And at first I found it really excruciating to hear my own roar. I was like, oh, that's horrible, like mortifying.

• 32:27Fearne Cotton?

  And now I'm like goosebumped hearing it and making those sounds. But we're taught to keep it in.

• 32:33Speaker 04

  Yeah, I feel like, don't you find that freeing?

• 32:36Fearne Cotton?

  It's the best. It's the best. Because I think when you keep it in your body, it does, it manifests. Did you, I mean, I probably had all the cliche things of just like tension. But did you have any physical manifestations of keeping stuff in?

• 32:50Speaker 04

  Oh, my God, you're kidding.

• 32:53Fearne Cotton?

  A few.

• 32:54Speaker 04

  A so many. The whole, like, there's the masculine and feminine side of the body. And like, my whole feminine, from the bottom of my foot to the jaw, like, all the way, is just so tight because I felt like, just so protective from like, and then the masculine side would step in, which, you know, for me correlates with work. And that side's fine, but it was more like, the masculine in me was protecting the feminine in me versus allowing both to show and be balanced. Which is something I work on, I do like acupuncture.

• 33:37Speaker 04

  And that was actually where the anger thing came from, is I was getting acupuncture and the doctor was like, "You have so much anger, you need to go on a mountain and yell." And so then, when I was recording with Rick Rubin, I looked around and I was like, huh, I'm on a mountain. And so then I was like, get the microphone out, let me yell.

• 33:57Fearne Cotton?

  Yes. Oh, it's so good. Even just to make, just to make sound freely and not feel bad about it, like, knowing it's safe to make any sound you want and not care about that. I know that was a huge part of the process for you working with Rick, was that he allowed you to be you and use your voice as it comes out naturally. And that's something that you were previously worried about, getting used to using autotune and him encouraging, hearing the scratches, the imperfections and the real rawness to your voice. How was that? Just, that must have been quite an exposing process initially.

• 34:32Speaker 04

  Very uncomfortable. It's kind of similar to like, I used to wear so much makeup, and again, it was really fun, but now, just like, I'm not wearing wigs, I'm not wearing a ton of makeup, like, just really showing who I am, presenting who I really, really am. It's so much scarier, but it's also very liberating and I'm finding real power in it. A lot of what we do here is what is really missing in the world. So the world is really direct and penetrative and fast and, you know, deep and hard and, you know, and actually, I just want this to be like-

• 35:10Fearne Cotton?

  A real softening, an opening, a gentleness, a slowness. And a lot of it be about rest, because I just think people's nervous systems are fried and we just need to rest and come to a place where where we're sort of just held in this Welsh bosom of this valley and I just to, you know, be be allowed, be feel safe enough to to just rest and enjoy and play. A rule of these practices and methods, things that have helped you over the years personally. Yeah, to be honest, nature saved me in so many ways. It's been

• 35:49Fearne Cotton?

  it's been a real balm at the times when I've been going through, you know, some of the most painful griefy, whether it's, you know, losing people. I went through, uh, I lost a baby, which was really traumatic and I gave birth to her at seventeen weeks and that was really hard and and I was just never inside. Like I I spent the whole summer just outside recovering, connecting. And nature just soothed me, like just really soothed me back to back to some sort of balance and health. And, you know, singing and sound, there's so much science now about

• 36:30Fearne Cotton?

  how we heal and and of course, as as I've said, there are a myriad of ways to do it. And there are, and people, people do it in different ways, much like learning. Different therapies work for different people, but I think sound music, singing, connecting with voice, vibrations and the vibrations of music and sound is something that can, it's it's very universal, it's very easy to access. But it's it's really, it can be really transformative. So I think that, yeah, these are all all things that I myself have found really useful in the past ten years.

• 37:10Fearne Cotton?

  But also that I'm training to do now as well. So I'm training to be a practitioner myself in sound healing and learning from elders and wise people, how to, how to. Hold people, how to hold people to, you know, dig deeper or have a, have a deep delve, but also just how to hold them and bring out the joy in a play. That's so gorgeous. It's really exciting to hear you talk about that and the fact that you're, you know, you're up for this, not only a new challenge in, in terms of creating this, this whole place, this retreat, but also taking yourself on a whole new path career-wise to become a practitioner. And I think, like you've just said, you know, when you go through something traumatic or very deep, you often are then spurred on to walk down a completely different path.

• 37:53Fearne Cotton?

  And I'm so sorry to, to hear about the loss of your baby. I didn't know about that. And having had, you know, a lot of friends who have experienced the same, that grief is also of course teamed with your body having been through so much. And like you say, nature is so important. I think we underestimate it in those times where we're emotionally, mentally and physically going through stuff. It is, on a cellular level, it's doing something. You know, how, how did that impact your healing from, from such a tricky time? I feel like I, I just, I really allowed myself to be intuitive.

• 38:36Fearne Cotton?

  I felt very wild and very feral and there was things that I just had to do. And I think in grief, you, you allow yourself all sorts. Do you know what I mean? Like you really, you get a bit feral. And I think just to help, help us move, move into those spaces and move through those spaces, to, to be able to create ceremony was a huge part of it for me. So again, I'd never, I'd never done anything ceremonial before. I'd never, I didn't know about any indigenous practices. I didn't know about any Celtic or witchy practices or again, there's loads of things to choose from. But I was just going completely off of this just sort of intuitive drive.

• 39:21Fearne Cotton?

  But, you know, we created this, this funeral for her in, in our garden, outside, in nature.

• 39:28Fearne Cotton?

  We had our friends and family there. We wrote all of the words ourselves. We sang, we and you know, I I made the space for the the couple of days before I had sort of, you know, decorated all the space, which ended up being this circle and and honestly, I had, I was, I was so far away from any of that sort of stuff of of ritual or ceremony or understanding it, or even it being, you know, for me at all. I was just like, oh, gosh, no. I mean, I used to be a Catholic, but I've got no idea about that sort of stuff. And I think from that experience, it was just like, oh, oh, my gosh, that, what we, what we did there, that, that was magic. It was almost like we imbued the ground, the earth,

• 40:13Fearne Cotton?

  with such intention and power that now when we go to that place, which is Billy's garden, it's like, it's, it feel, it's got an energy, like it really feels different to how it did before, when it was just a bit of fields. It's been such a powerful thing for me in my own healing journey. And I suppose, you know, you, you must feel the same, Fern, to be doing what you're doing as well. You, you've got the happy place, you know, which is a, a huge help for people, really starting to educate and help people a lot of the time who maybe don't think the wellbeing stuff or anything esoteric is for them, just making it much more accessible.

• 40:57Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, thanks, Charlotte. Bloody lovely human. I love what Charlotte's doing. I think she's remarkable. I love following her beautiful place, The Dreaming on Instagram and looking at all the beautiful pictures. I must go one day. Charlotte was entirely right with that. I really do hope that by hearing stories like the one you've just been listening to, you feel more confident to trust your gut and make the change that you know will make you happier, essentially. I bet you've got more resilience in you than you realise, too. Are you enjoying hearing these hopefully helpful little collection of stories from the show? There are loads of other episodes like this that you can listen back to, depending on what you're needing a bit of support with. There's one on sticking two fingers.

• 41:38Fearne Cotton?

  Up to beauty standards, one on why laughter is a great tool in hard times, and one on how to set boundaries and say no to. There'll be links to those in the show notes, but there are loads more you can discover in the back catalogue if you have a little scroll. Right, until next time, big thanks to the producer, Anushka Tate at Happy Play Studios, and of course, you, go on. Maybe now's the time to rip up the rulebook and make that fresh start.

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