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Make Life Work
These days it can feel like life is a never-ending to-do list, and it’s increasingly difficult to balance work and life. People everywhere are unhappy about their work-life balance, and we’re seeing growing numbers of people reporting burnout.
Comedian and ex-lawyer Alice Fraser has experienced the costs of work-life imbalance first-hand, so she teams up with neuroscientist Ash Ranpura to look for solutions to the demands of modern life.
They journey from the workplace, which is literally killing us, through to our smartphone, beds and even brains, to work out where we’re going wrong and find some science-based solutions.
Comedian and ex-lawyer Alice Fraser has experienced the costs of work-life imbalance first-hand, so she teams up with neuroscientist Ash Ranpura to look for solutions to the demands of modern life.
They journey from the workplace, which is literally killing us, through to our smartphone, beds and even brains, to work out where we’re going wrong and find some science-based solutions.
Audible Audio
Published September 1, 2020
5 people are currently reading
21 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
October 16, 2020
Make Life Work is a free Audible podcast series presented by an Australian comedienne who used to be a lawyer and an English neuroscientist, about achieving - or at least trying to improve - work-life balance. It’s a mixture of anecdotes, interviews and chat, and was certainly easy to listen to. I’m not really the target audience, since my WLB is now pretty good, but burnout is a subject I’m very interested in, having been there in my previous career. I listened to it on the treadmill and was interested enough that it kept me running longer than motivation alone would’ve so that’s something!
Broken up into six sections, each 15 to 30 minutes long, they begin by discussing burnout - how Alice’s personal experience of this as a young lawyer led to her career change and interest in the topic, and just how common it is, particularly in the caring professions. They then cover career success, time management, how to relax, parenthood, and - my favourite - how to say No.
I didn’t feel I learned very much as a lot of the advice is fairly obvious but there are some useful tips that it can’t hurt to be reminded of, such as using“I don’t” rather than “I Can’t” for anything you’re feeling pressured into.
The thing about work-life balance is it’s much easier to see what other people are doing wrong than to recognise it in ourselves. I find the people who tell you how busy they are are often the same ones who’re constantly on Facebook. Or they say they don’t have time to cook/exercise/see friends, but know exactly what happened on Masterchef... The best way to achieve it longterm is to choose cats over children, but ironically one of the things that led to my own burnout in my previous job was being expected to do other people’s work and cover all the holidays because I didn’t have kids.
While the presenters are chirpy and engaging, I got fed up with the banter between them, as well as with their interviewees, that felt like padding, making this longer than it needed to be. The personal anecdotes and revelation that neither of them was actually practising what they’re preaching made them human but definitely weakened the message. Nonetheless, if you’re time poor and don’t know where to start, and have Audible anyway, and can listen while you’re doing something you have to do anyway, and don’t mind the light-hearted tone, then you might learn something from listening to this.
Broken up into six sections, each 15 to 30 minutes long, they begin by discussing burnout - how Alice’s personal experience of this as a young lawyer led to her career change and interest in the topic, and just how common it is, particularly in the caring professions. They then cover career success, time management, how to relax, parenthood, and - my favourite - how to say No.
I didn’t feel I learned very much as a lot of the advice is fairly obvious but there are some useful tips that it can’t hurt to be reminded of, such as using“I don’t” rather than “I Can’t” for anything you’re feeling pressured into.
The thing about work-life balance is it’s much easier to see what other people are doing wrong than to recognise it in ourselves. I find the people who tell you how busy they are are often the same ones who’re constantly on Facebook. Or they say they don’t have time to cook/exercise/see friends, but know exactly what happened on Masterchef... The best way to achieve it longterm is to choose cats over children, but ironically one of the things that led to my own burnout in my previous job was being expected to do other people’s work and cover all the holidays because I didn’t have kids.
While the presenters are chirpy and engaging, I got fed up with the banter between them, as well as with their interviewees, that felt like padding, making this longer than it needed to be. The personal anecdotes and revelation that neither of them was actually practising what they’re preaching made them human but definitely weakened the message. Nonetheless, if you’re time poor and don’t know where to start, and have Audible anyway, and can listen while you’re doing something you have to do anyway, and don’t mind the light-hearted tone, then you might learn something from listening to this.
February 24, 2021
I always like the podcasts from these two but of all the ones I've listened to I probably like this the least. It was still entertaining, but I think perhaps it was the fact that none of the episodes seemed to dive very much into depth and the 'findings' were not all very unexpected. I thought the mention of karoshi not being limited to Japan, and Ash's comedy experiment were interesting but the rest was not dissimilar to observations I've read about in other sources. Anyway still fun, I think Ash and Alice have a great dynamic.
February 18, 2021
I experienced this one as an audio book (my first experience). I really liked the narration and the topics discussed were really relatable. In my opinion the solutions could have been discussed more in depth. The suggestions of Resumption Plan to overcome attention residue is my major take away. Over all a good short read!
July 16, 2021
Not impossible to follow.basic.thjngs you should get in your life. Not so good for Bosses but good for managers to understand from a team perspective and for self perspective.
October 21, 2020
I’m not sure if podcasts count as a book, but it’s on goodreads, so I’m including it.
This was a very interesting podcast, dealing with the work life balance, and how we approach it. It goes through what stress does to the body, the ways people will try and get as much time as they can, and the new approaches people are trying to bring new ideas to achieve a better relationship with work.
This was a very interesting podcast, dealing with the work life balance, and how we approach it. It goes through what stress does to the body, the ways people will try and get as much time as they can, and the new approaches people are trying to bring new ideas to achieve a better relationship with work.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews