Live Well Be Well with Sarah Ann Macklin | Health, Lifestyle, Nutrition

This week I'm joined by Arthur C. Brooks, Harvard professor, bestselling author and one of the world's leading experts on the science of human happiness, and someone who has spent his life answering one of the most fundamental questions we all ask and what does it actually mean to live well?
We explore happiness, meaning, love and what the science really says about building a life that feels worth living.
Arthur Brooks is a professor at Vanderbilt University and senior fellow at Harvard Business School. He is the author of 16 books including three number one New York Times bestsellers. He has spent decades studying happiness not as a feeling but as a skill and teaching people how to practise it.
What we explore together:
Why happiness is not a destination and what the arrival fallacy is really costing you
The four idols your brain tells you will make you happy and why they never do
What the neuroscience of love actually looks like and the two things that keep couples bonded
How the failure journal works and why writing down your disappointments makes you happier
Why meaning and happiness are not the same thing and which one actually lasts
What it means to love and be loved and why Arthur believes that's the whole answer
Love, Sarah Ann 💛
My book 'Healthy Shouldn't Be This Hard': https://www.amazon.co.uk/Healthy-Shouldnt-Be-This-Hard-ebook/dp/B0G1DHNRV5
This episode is sponsored by:
NOWATCH: The compassionate health tracker Connecting body and mind with unique stress recovery insights so you can live fully today
👉 15% off with code LWBW15 at https://nowatch.com/
The Great British Veg Out
👉 https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/p/t…
Reset Your Health
👉 https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/s/r...
👉 Free 5-recipe PDF: https://sarahannmacklin.com/5_free_recipes
👉 The Compassionate Cure: https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/
Let's be friends!
📷 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahannmacklin/
📹 Subscribe: https://youtube.com/@livewellbewellsarah
🐦 Twitter: https://x.com/SarahAnnMacklin
📱 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@livewellbewellpodcast
💌 Newsletter: https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/
Chapters
00:00 Introduction
02:59 Arthur's personal journey and finding purpose
05:59 How grief can be a doorway to meaning
09:07 Why knowing everything doesn't make you happy
15:04 What Stoicism teaches us about happiness
20:57 The four idols — money, pleasure, power, fame
23:57 Why the four idols are a dangerous trap
33:00 Arthur's worst day and what it taught him
38:57 The arrival fallacy
42:03 The neuroscience of dopamine
48:00 The failure journal
54:07 The neuroscience of love — oxytocin, touch and eye contact
57:03 How to keep connection alive long term
65:58 Why the silent treatment is so damaging
72:02 How your emotions are made in the brain
78:00 Finding meaning beyond achievement
87:08 Where Sarah is two years on
93:00 What saved Viktor Frankl
98:28 Final thoughts on living well and being well

This week's Live Well Be Well Moment with Ruby Wax, comedian, author and mental health advocate.
We delve into two of the most extraordinary moments of Ruby's career, interviewing OJ Simpson and being humiliated by Bill Cosby on camera and what she would do completely differently today.
My book 'Healthy Shouldn't Be This Hard': https://www.amazon.co.uk/Healthy-Shouldnt-Be-This-Hard-ebook/dp/B0G1DHNRV5
This episode is sponsored by:
NOWATCH: The compassionate health tracker Connecting body and mind with unique stress recovery insights so you can live fully today. 👉 15% off with code LWBW15 at https://nowatch.com/
More from me: The Great British Veg Out How to support your gut by eating more, not less https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/p/t…
Reset Your Health If your body feels off after stress, travel, or burnout, this is where to start! https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/s/r...
Free 5-recipe PDF for busy weeks https://open.substack.com/pub/sarahma...
Join thousands reading The Compassionate Cure → https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/
Let's be friends!
📷 Instagram https://www.instagram.com/sarahannmacklin 📹 Subscribe https://youtube.com/@livewellbewellsarah?si=UbuuWvMjAcTkELPN 
📱 TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@livewellbewellpodcast?_r=1&_t=ZN-96iOW29jTRm

This week's Live Well Be Well Moment with Ruby Wax, comedian, author and mental health advocate.
We delve into what depression actually feels like from the inside, the machine guns, the intrusive thoughts, and how mindfulness taught Ruby to create distance from the thoughts that were trying to destroy her.
My book 'Healthy Shouldn't Be This Hard': https://www.amazon.co.uk/Healthy-Shouldnt-Be-This-Hard-ebook/dp/B0G1DHNRV5
This episode is sponsored by:
NOWATCH: The compassionate health tracker Connecting body and mind with unique stress recovery insights so you can live fully today. 👉 15% off with code LWBW15 at https://nowatch.com/
More from me: The Great British Veg Out How to support your gut by eating more, not less https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/p/t…
Reset Your Health If your body feels off after stress, travel, or burnout, this is where to start! https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/s/r...
Free 5-recipe PDF for busy weeks https://open.substack.com/pub/sarahma...
Join thousands reading The Compassionate Cure → https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/
Let's be friends!
📷 Instagram https://www.instagram.com/sarahannmacklin 📹 Subscribe https://youtube.com/@livewellbewellsarah?si=UbuuWvMjAcTkELPN 
📱 TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@livewellbewellpodcast?_r=1&_t=ZN-96iOW29jTRm

This week I'm joined by Ruby Wax, comedian, author and mental health advocate, and someone who has spent her life turning the most painful human experiences into something that makes us feel less alone.
We explore depression, mindfulness and what it really means to understand your own mind, not just survive it, but actually work with it.
Ruby Wax is an Emmy Award-winning writer and performer who studied neuroscience at Oxford University and went on to write the bestselling books Sane New World and A Mindfulness Guide for the Frazzled. Ruby founded Frazzled Café, a peer support community for people who feel overwhelmed by modern life, and has performed sell-out shows across the world on mental health. She knows what depression looks like from the inside and she has the Oxford degree to explain why
What we explore together:
*Why depression isn't about sadness and what it actually feels like from the inside
*What mindfulness does to your brain, and why Ruby had to go to Oxford before she believed it
*Why your thoughts are not you and how to create distance from the ones trying to destroy you
*What happens when you stop fighting depression and let it pass instead
*Why self compassion isn't weak or gushy — it's biological necessity
*The moment Bill Cosby humiliated Ruby on camera, and what she would do differently now
*Why Ruby feels safest in a mental institution and what that tells us about belonging
Love, Sarah Ann 💛
My book 'Healthy Shouldn't Be This Hard': https://www.amazon.co.uk/Healthy-Shouldnt-Be-This-Hard-ebook/dp/B0G1DHNRV5
This episode is sponsored by:
NOWATCH: The compassionate health tracker Connecting body and mind with unique stress recovery insights so you can live fully today
👉 15% off with code LWBW15 at https://nowatch.com/
The Great British Veg Out
How to support your gut, energy, and hormones by eating more — not less.
👉 https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/p/t…
Reset Your Health
If your body feels off after stress, travel, or burnout — this is where to start.
👉 https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/s/r...
👉 Practical beats perfect. Here's a free 5-recipe PDF I use to support energy and stress during busy weeks.
https://sarahannmacklin.com/5_free_recipes
👉 If this resonates, you can join the thousands who read The Compassionate Cure each week.
https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/
Let's be friends!
📷 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahannmacklin/
📹 Subscribe: https://youtube.com/@livewellbewellsarah
🐦 Twitter: https://x.com/SarahAnnMacklin
📱 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@livewellbewellpodcast
💌 Newsletter: https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/
Chapters
00:01 — Introduction
03:05 — Ruby's childhood and what shaped her
05:54 — How Ruby found her voice through comedy
08:49 — Being outed by Comic Relief
11:49 — What depression actually feels like from the inside
14:59 — The neuroscience behind mental illness
17:57 — How Ruby used her illness publicly to help others
21:08 — The machine guns — living with intrusive thoughts
24:04 — How mindfulness creates distance from your thoughts
26:49 — What happens when depression takes over completely
29:52 — Why Ruby checks into a hotel instead of fighting it
32:59 — Performing in mental institutions for two years
35:55 — What mindfulness does to your brain — the science
39:04 — How to actually practise mindfulness anywhere
42:00 — Jon Kabat-Zinn and the origins of mindfulness
44:58 — Ruby's modelling career and finding what she was good at
47:58 — Why self compassion feels cringeworthy — and why it shouldn't
50:51 — The difference between mindfulness and meditation
54:01 — Ruby on relationships and what she looks for
57:01 — The OJ Simpson interview
60:04 — What it means to feel truly safe
62:59 — How Ruby met her husband
66:02 — Family history and what gets passed down
69:01 — Why Ruby feels at home in a mental institution
72:00 — How to observe your thoughts like clouds
75:02 — Ruby's upcoming tour
78:00 — The mania perfume idea
80:55 — Final thoughts on living well

This week's Live Well Be Well Moment with Cindy Gallop, advertising icon and entrepreneur.
We delve into whether men can handle female confidence, what real love actually looks like and why so many of us are surrounded by more love than we realise.
My book 'Healthy Shouldn't Be This Hard': https://www.amazon.co.uk/Healthy-Shouldnt-Be-This-Hard-ebook/dp/B0G1DHNRV5

This episode is sponsored by:
NOWATCH: The compassionate health tracker Connecting body and mind with unique stress recovery insights so you can live fully today.
👉 15% off with code LWBW15 at https://nowatch.com/
More from me: The Great British Veg Out How to support your gut by eating more, not less https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/p/t…

Reset Your Health If your body feels off after stress, travel, or burnout, this is where to start! https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/s/r...

Free 5-recipe PDF for busy weeks https://open.substack.com/pub/sarahma...

Join thousands reading The Compassionate Cure → https://sarahmacklin.substack.com/
Let's be friends!
📷 Instagram https://www.instagram.com/sarahannmacklin 📹 Subscribe https://youtube.com/@livewellbewellsarah?si=UbuuWvMjAcTkELPN 
📱 TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@livewellbewellpodcast?_r=1&_t=ZN-96iOW29jTRm