Happy New Year! The Spill is back

Have you ever had one of those days that screamed for a wine and chats sesh with your girlfriends? Enter Image.ie’s podcast, The Spill. The Spill is hosted by our very own self-proclaimed agony aunts Sophie White and Rhona McAuliffe. With a mix of discussion on current affairs, arts and culture and some healthy advice to our listeners, it’s the best place to unwind and deliberate the issues affecting Irish women today.

It’s a new year on The Spill but don’t worry — Sophie and Rhona are the same hosts we know and love. For their very first episode of 2019, the theme is resolutions — or regrets, depending on where your head is at. Should we all be self-improving, or is it all just overrated? The “new-year-new-me bullsh*t brigade” as Sophie calls it,  seems to be slightly fading, in favour of more “you’re perfect as you are” approach. Our hosts argue that the end of a year and the beginning of a new one is a natural time to reflect, and so, resolutions are an expected result of everyone taking stock of how their year has been. Are resolutions a good idea, or should everyone relax the pressure to self-improve?

Our hosts are also chatting with activist Sarah Tyrell this week, on how to approach new year’s resolutions (if you want to make them) while still being conscious and body-positive. Fitness and health are some of the biggest areas of focus for the “new-year-new-me” time of year, but it can be very damaging to those struggling with their body image. Sarah herself is a big fan of resolutions as a way to start off with a clean, fresh slate, but not when those goals are motivated by external validation about your weight and image. As Sarah says: “If nobody else in the world knew that you had achieved your resolution, would it still make you happy?” is a good benchmark for whether a goal is coming from a good place. Do you feel pressured to lose weight and appear healthier in the weeks after New Year’s? Do you think body positivity should play more of a part?

And finally, on Hit Me Up this week, Rhona advises a girl whose friends are causing rifts in her new relationship. According to Skeletons in the Closet from Dublin, she had a wild side when she was in college, and frequently let her down and saw plenty of different men from different backgrounds, all with a good laugh with her friends afterwards. Since meeting her new boyfriend a year ago, she’d rather keep that side of her past more quiet, but her friends think it’s funny enough to tell the tale every time they see him. How can she get them to stop embarrassing her without losing that part of their friendship?

This week’s new episode, and all the others you might have missed, are available here: