Mental Makeover

This is something I never thought I'd be talking about because I never thought I'd be doing it in the first place. For me, therapy always seemed like something you'd only seek out if you were dealing with a lot of physical or emotional trauma, depression or anxiety. I didn't think I had any justifiable reason to go. I was comparing my pain with the pain of others, and mine never seemed significant enough against theirs. In today's episode I talk you through my entire process - from my assumptions about therapy; what led me to start considering it as a valid option; making my first appointment; what the experience was like and best of all, some of the amazing life-changing lessons I've learnt so far. This is a big one for me to share, so if you did enjoy, I would be super grateful if you could leave a rating or a review - thank you so much :) x

Your perspective governs your entire life, whether you realise it or not. Your beliefs, values and morals justify your perspectives on your friendships, relationships, work, your decisions, your actions and your thoughts. They also justify your judgements about other people, and their beliefs, values, actions, decisions, work and relationships. Our perspective is mainly subjective, and very rarely objective. It usually isn't based off hard facts, it's actually heavily influenced by our personal feelings about whatever we're observing, learning or experiencing, and whether they align with our values and beliefs. Today's episode discusses what perspective is, how to fine tune it so that you're making level-headed, informed decisions, and how doing so can truly change your life for the better. If you enjoyed, please don't forget to subscribe, rate and review! :D

Let's be real: we've all indulged in gossip before. Someone you know (or maybe even don't know) has done something to upset you or someone close to you, and so you talk about it. Maybe with one person, maybe with 10, maybe with more. You feel justified in doing so, because they did something wrong, right? You want that person to be held accountable, so you seek justice in the form of forming a group of people together who know how bad that person is and doesn't want to be friends with them anymore. You've won, because you've proven that you're innocent and they're guilty. Most of the time though, these things blow over. Everyone moves on and becomes friends again. Some feelings might have been hurt, but that's about it. Now, let's consider what happens when a YouTuber has a scandal. Tens of thousands (if not millions) of people join together to actively ruin someone's career. They want them to lose their jobs, their income, their stability, their friends, their support, their sanity and sometimes, when it gets bad enough, their lives. All for what? A bad makeup launch, a misconstrued tweet, befriending the wrong person or a mistake they made when they were a teenager, over 10 years ago? Internet culture has taken a turn for the worse, and someone needs to speak up about it. Let's chat...

If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave a rating and a review and subscribe if you haven't already :) You can also follow my Instagram page here! x

My sleepwear business Lauren Curtis Lounge has been up and running since September 2018. It's my first business outside of YouTube, and while I knew it would be a challenging endeavour, I didn't realise just HOW challenging. Reece (my boyfriend and co-founder) and I have learnt SO. MANY. LESSONS. in the past year and a half (most of them the hard - and expensive - way), and so I wanted to share our experiences with you guys. Who knows, maybe you're thinking of starting a small business or perhaps you've already started and you just feel like you're in your head about where it's at and where you think it should be. Or, maybe it will make you feel better about mistakes that you've made that you're still beating yourself up about. Whatever the reason, I hope it helps you to realise that although I'm calling them mistakes for the sake of the podcast, I really don't consider them mistakes because we both learnt from them. That's what business is - trying something, seeing if it fails or succeeds, then learning from the failure or trying to prolong the success. Lauren Curtis Lounge is currently holding an up to 60% off Valentine's Day sale too, so if you'd like to try our brand now's the time! You can find our website here. If you enjoyed today's episode, please don't forget to subscribe, rate and review! Thank you so much :) x

What's your relationship with money like? Do you struggle to save, wish you knew how to budget, or can't get yourself out of debt? Do you feel pressured to buy a house and stop renting? Do you regularly use Afterpay and UberEats? Do you understand what shares are, and the impact of smart investments? Or, do you just have limiting money beliefs that you want to conquer? If you answered 'yes' to any of these questions, this episode is for you. Victoria Devine from She's on the Money (listen here) sheds invaluable light on all of these topics and more, and some of her answers will shock you! If you enjoyed today's episode, please don't forget to subscribe, rate and review! It means so much :) xxx

As many of you will know, I have been seeing Carmen McNamara aka The Skin Fairy for at least 4 or 5 years now. She's helped me tremendously throughout the years, but more so now since going off the contraceptive pill and experiencing hormonal breakouts. I have received so many messages asking if I could interview her and pick her brains, so that's exactly what I'm doing in this episode! I asked you guys what questions you'd like for her to answer, and then I picked the most commonly asked or interesting ones. I hope you enjoy! You can find Carmen on Instagram at @theskinfairy_, @skinfairyclinic and www.skinfairyclinic.com.au.

This episode is... mind blowing! I got goosebumps so many times and had to edit out my hundreds of "WOW" remarks (I couldn't help myself!). I really struggled to pick a title because nothing could succinctly summarise how interesting, engaging, informative, inspirational and truly unbelievable her story is. You've probably heard of The Quick Flick by now (winged eyeliner stamp for those who haven't), and maybe even her new venture Beauty Fridge. Iris Smit is only 24 and has managed to build a $15 million dollar empire in 2 years. From the outside, everything seemed perfect. Booming business; long term relationship; dream car; dream life, right? Despite every box being ticked, Iris was unhappier than she'd ever been. After experiencing horrific trauma as a child, she had no identity, no control, nothing to call her own and subsequently felt completely numb. It's the story of what came next that truly blew my mind in more ways than one. I won't spoil it because it deserves to be heard in context and in its entirety. Thank you so much to Iris (@irisjade, @thequickflick, @beautyfridge) for joining me on the podcast, I think this will remain one of my favourite episodes for a very long time x

Hellooo! By now, most of you will probably be familiar with my boyfriend of almost 5 years, Reece. He's the love of my life, my best friend and my soul mate. He's also super shy so it takes a bit of coercing to get him to agree to film a video or record a podcast hehehe but this particular Q&A (Q's asked by you guys) he really enjoyed and gave sooo many personal, insightful and helpful answers. It became quite an intimate discussion about almost everything in our lives (whether it be as a couple or individually), so I really hope you get something out of it :) You can find Reece on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/reeceddaniel/ or on his business page https://bonhommewatches.com/ x

Karissa Pukas and I have an interesting past. We first connected online back in 2011, and met in person in 2013. We filmed two videos together, one at my house in Perth and another in Sydney with Shannon, Chloe and myself (who remembers?!). All was well until it... wasn't. Something happened (tune in to find out what) and that was the end of our friendship. I blocked Karissa from everything and she unfollowed me right back. I'm a grudge holder, so I genuinely thought that was the end of that chapter for good. It wasn't until I heard from Karissa years later that we were able to reconnect and go over what happened between us; this time with a bit more maturity at our disposal. This episode goes into all of the nitty gritty details about why Karissa was mad at me, why I was mad at her and how we came to a resolution years later. We've both learnt so much over the years and came to discover that we actually have way more in common now, then we ever did before. It's a great story full of lots of life lessons, so we hope you enjoy. You can find Karissa at: http://youtube.com/karissapukas and https://www.instagram.com/karissapukas/ :)

From the moment I started my YouTube channel, the most common insults I would receive were to do with my appearance. People would call me fake any chance they could get. While the taboos surrounding plastic surgery and injectables have lessened slightly, the judgement people face whenever they're honest about getting work done, or even if they've never discussed it and people just think they've had something done, is immense. It's almost as if they feel superior to you, and they want to let you know that you should be ashamed of yourself, simply because they don't approve of your choices. Well... I've got a lot to say about that! Keep your mind open while you listen to this podcast, and let me know if you had a change of heart/opinion once you reach the end :)