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Today I’m chatting with Emma (you can find her substack here) about how social media affected our spending habits - as consumers and creators - and how our spending habits have changed over the years. This episode is also available as a YouTube video: This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit mikhila.substack.com This is a tale of two halves, partly about what happened, partly about how I’ve learned to forgive myself decades later.

This week I am desperately seeking some grace, ahead of what could be a very tricky topic to cover. Straight out of the gate, I think Ed Sheeran (whether we’re saying it’s his ‘team’ or him) handled this past week terribly. In not backing Macklemore, he made a statement, whether he wanted to or not, and in the days since, he seems to only be digging a deeper hole for himself. As a tiny influencer online, I have shared many political opinions over the years, and have suffered the wrath of the keyboard warriors who disagree with them. In recent years, I’ve been a little more careful. I’m aware I’m easy to find, my children spend time in the world without me.. there are a lot of weirdos out there. I pulled back on some of the hotter debates, out of fear more than anything. By nature, I have an opinion on just about everything, and putting the world to rights with someone who loves to debate is one of my favourite pastimes.. but that’s a small group activity. These people, even if they don’t know you well, can see you in front of them, they can question you, you can discuss points you disagree on. Taking a side in a public arena, addressing strangers who only know the caricature of you that sings songs.. that’s very different. I don’t think we can demand anyone share their personal belief system with us. You should be allowed to be an apolitical figure, if you so wish. Stepping out into that ring isn’t for everyone and if you know it’s not for you, fair! BUT.. in 2026, in the era of boycotting businesses and ultimate global awareness, that isn’t the safe choice it used to be. In choosing not to tell people how you feel about issues, they will either, a) decide for you, or b) decide that silence is as bad as being complicit. As the saying goes, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”. SO if, famously good guy, Ed Sheeran really wants to keep that status, it seems like he’s going to put on his big boy pants and make a real statement. What he said, reading from his teleprompter, at his first concert back, after every support act and his actual band left the tour, was weak. He’s still riding the fence. It’s giving, ‘good people on both sides’ and it’s not doing anything to fix his image. He’s obviously in a tough spot because he’s mid-tour and there are billionaires pressuring him to tow a certain line, but it’s not the billionaires who will be asked about this in every interview for the rest of their lives, it’s Ed. There’s an argument that Macklemore should never have used that moment to protest the conflict.. and, to a degree, I can see why people feel that way. Every contract I’ve ever signed has a clause to protect both me and the brand from being tarnished by any potential scandal. If I were to work with L’Oreal and then start posting #FREEPALESTINE across my socials.. they might see that as a problem. Not because they don’t agree, but because they want to maintain as much neutrality as possible, in order to reach the largest audience. It’s not personal, it’s just business. So when Macklemore did exactly that, there’s a world in which he broke his contractual agreement, and they were legally allowed to let him go. ..but I don’t think that’s what happened. If L’Oreal (I shouldn’t keep saying them.. let’s say LUSH, for ironic LOLS) ..if LUSH hired me and I was already posting #FREEPALESTINE all over my socials, they couldn’t very well terminate my contract when I did it again, could they? Macklemore was well known for his activism and, personally, I think Ed was absolutely cool with his set. I think most people were. But when it came to the money men throwing their weight around, a call had to be made, and they threw Macklemore under the bus. The thing is, that ‘just business’ excuse that used to make a lot of sense, and cover all manner of sins, doesn’t really fly anymore. Now, if you’re seen to be even slightly connected to someone a bit shady, that’s seen as your tacit endorsement of everything they stand for. Which reminds me, someone called me out for being a Zionist the other day for following Gwyneth Paltrow on Instagram.. and I didn’t even know I did. I don’t anymore, because the idea that that would give someone that impression was enough reason.. but I know people who HATE Donald Trump and follow him on Instagram.. it’s not a great indicator of politics. In case anyone wondered, or cared, I am the most left of the left.. but I am far too sensitive to face a lot of world news these days and, although I will happily tell you here that I think Israel are the bad guys in this movie, the last time I posted something in support of Palestine, I received not one but two death threats.. and I realise it’s a privilege to choose to remove myself from that conversation, but I did. I don’t think that thinking Israel are committing genocide is antisemitic, but I do think that a large number of people struggle to reconcile their (conscious or otherwise) Islamophobia with the issue in Gaza. You cannot convince me that, if Palestinians were white, they would have the support of more people. But that’s by the by, from my tiny experience, I can understand celebrities who sit on the fence, I really can. The fact Ed hadn’t said anything up to now was a non-issue.. but once you’re thrown into the fray, you have to pick a side. You just do. And, it shouldn’t be that hard. I actually think I’d have more respect for him if he’d doubled down and said he didn’t agree with what Macklemore said.. but you can’t have it all ways, you can’t say, ‘on the one side apples but on the other oranges’ and think you’ve made a statement. Because I think he knew what the set was going to be ahead of time, I really don’t have any sympathy for him. If he’d been truly blindsided and then put in this situation, I could find a little, but even then.. it feels like the only reason not to come out in agreement with his friend is money. Money that he would have to pay venues, money he might lose in future deals.. and that’s not a great look. As with so much, you’re entitled to live your life and share your views in any way you want, but there are consequences.. it’s a trade-off. People will decide who you are based on how you engage with what’s important to them and, in this case, I’m reminded of the immortal words of Ronan Keating, ‘You say it best, when you say nothing at all’. What do you think? Should he have been allowed to stay mum? Or do you think he should have taken a harder line? It’s an ethical dilemma.. one we each need to answer for ourselves.. unless we’re a global pop star and everyone will answer it for you. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit mikhila.substack.com I promised my arrest story on Monday but something has been percolating in my brain and I can’t wait until next week to get it out. Yesterday, my husband said something to me. It was a joke, I’m fairly sure, but it’s been hovering ever since and I couldn’t help but wonder (forgive me) if it was true. We were talking about my w…

Today is the first day of the rest of my life. 21 years and 6 days ago, I had a baby. I was 19, I still lived at home, I’d had a full time job since I left school at 16 but I’d been nowhere, I’d done nothing. I hadn’t lived. I talk about the impact that having children so young had on me often. I sometimes think it’s a little much, but there’s nothing else that has shaped me in the same way. While I’ve never identified as a ‘mother’ - we’ll get to that later - I have always known that I can’t know who I’d have been had I not been one. Responsibilities of children change as they grow and as your own life changes. Jobs, schools, friends, each child is different and you are different with each child. The mother Ella had was practically a child herself, winging it in a totally different way to Milo’s. She barely knew how to take care of herself. She wanted to be good but she also, deeply, wanted to maintain her sense of self. By the time Milo came along, I was ready. I was excited. He was planned. I knew who I was and I wanted to be a mother as well. Some people could hear that and immediately judge me, and that’s fine. We all live differently, with different priorities. I just always felt that I had to retain the core part of myself in any relationship (including the one with my kids) in order to avoid any resentment down the line. I give pieces of myself to other people and I lend others, but I need to hold on to the woman who can exist alone. We’ve talked about this before, I know, and there’s a good chance that’s rooted in fear. I want to always be okay alone.. is that because I’m afraid of being abandoned? Never get too attached and you wont get hurt? Oof.. that’s a bit much for today, but I mention it to make very clear, this is not me saying I know best or I have it sussed, it’s the way I’ve always been and the why I’ve recognised in later life. Last week my eldest and only daughter turned 21 and my son started taking the bus home from school. This week, my husband decided he’s going to take him to school on a Monday morning. These are all inconsequential happenings on their own, but together? I realised that today is the first time since I was 19 that I have nobody to answer to and absolute no responsibilities. No work, no school run, no football training, no making sure I’m available. Nobody needs me today. Nobody will need me on Mondays for the foreseeable future. This is the first day of the rest of my life. When I started this podcast, it was probably the 6th or 7th I’d tried. Others failed for multiple reasons, most of which involved the needing of other people to record with. The secondary reason was always my desire to start over once something changes. Today’s episode is number EIGHTY and nobody is more shocked than me, but I’ve had this little niggle over the past few weeks. I’ve been inconsistent and generally rubbish online this summer. I’ve spread myself too thin, I’ve had too many ideas, started too many other projects, totally lost all focus and routine. I know we’ve discussed this, the medication, all of the reasons this may have come to be, but none of that helps that feeling I have that I should scrap it all and start over. I’ve lost my way, what is even the point of this show? Why would anyone listen? And some people PAY to hear the bonus episodes, THAT is utter madness. This has no value, but I could make it better.. let’s just start over. It will be better next time. I’ve had this feeling countless times about YouTube over the years. I think at my last count I had 5 (maybe 6?) channels I still upload to, as well as historic ones that are no longer public. I did the same thing with blogs, I just want a fresh start. Everything will be solved when I start the new ..but it never is. If you’re struggling, packing in and starting over is rarely the solution. Taking what you’ve earned and locking in to improve what you already have is almost always better.. it’s just messy isn’t it? And people can see where you’ve been. Isn’t it nicer when you have a clean slate and people only get to see the polished version? That’s how it feels in my head, but as a consumer of content and an experiencer of people, no. I want to see your scars, I want to hear your struggles. Perfect is BORING. How does this have anything to do with my first responsibility free day? you ask. Well, I had SUCH high hopes for it. I went to bed last night thinking of all of the ways in which Monday’s would be great. I will have an amazing routine and finally get back on track. I’ll have time to learn new things and focus for longer stretches. There was nothing I wouldn’t be able to achieve now I had these new ‘freedom Monday’s’ to with as I wished. First of all, I slept in til 9.30, I’d barely slept over the weekend and it was just too tempting to snooze, snooze and snooze again when there was no real reason not to. Then I decided to pick up where I left yesterday, trying to fix and set up my Grandma’s old sewing machine. Great, right? Exactly what freedom Monday’s were made for. By 2pm I was frustrated, hungry, had a headache and had accomplished nothing. Not only had I wasted the majority of this special day, but it was the FIRST one. It’s like making a mess of the first page of a new diary. I wanted to throw it our and start again. I wanted the alarm to go off at 6.50 and to spring out of bed. I wanted a do-over. I can’t get today back. It’s THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF MY LIFE! There wont be another one. This was supposed to be monumental and I ruined it on a totally unnecessary hyper-fixation that, not only didn’t pay off, left me with an even bigger pile of to do’s for tomorrow and now I feel terrible. May as well throw the diary out because that first page will bother me forever. I sat down, ready to ruminate over the various things I should have done with the day, when I remembered I had promised to get back in to the Monday/Wednesday routine over here. I pulled out my laptop, trying to think of something to write when it occurred to me.. this podcast has been my, ‘don’t start over’ exposure therapy. It’s been a few different things since it’s conception, but I’m still here, talking about whatever I feel like and I have pushed down every urge to scrap it and start again. It’s been renamed, it’s had new logos, I’m doing away with the weekly art work changes (they’re just too time consuming) and every cell in my body says, ‘start again!! it’s a mess! Decide on a format and DO IT BETTER THIS TIME’ but I haven’t. The episodes are all still live. You can go back and listen to the evolution of the show and, maybe it’s embarrassing, but that’s what happened. It was something else and now it’s this.. just like me. I was something else and now I’m me.. I can’t erase my past and my experiences and I wouldn’t want to. LIFE isn’t polished. It’s messy, and I think we all enjoy that, don’t we? My life has been nothing like I’d have written, could I have planned it out ahead of time. I wouldn’t have chosen teen pregnancy, I wouldn’t have chosen divorce - but I did when they each presented themselves as the right things in the moment, and I wouldn’t go back and change anything. At 40, the idea of eradicating every mention of me from the internet and starting over sounds idyllic. A lot of people out there see me as erratic and odd because they’ve seen 16 years of my life online, but a lot of others have been with me on the journey and I feel like I know you. Part of the ride is the mistakes and what we learn. So, today wasn’t what I wanted it to be. I can’t change that, I might not even learn from it, but I can definitely control how much I let it bother me. I encourage you to open a new notebook and scribble on the first page. Keep it there as a reminder that it has absolutely no impact on the pages ahead of you. I’m going to spend the rest of my day working on things I didn’t get to earlier and making a plan for tomorrow. Maybe I’ll even get back to the sewing machine I’m convinced I’ll never conquer.. but they are all options I have because my life is changing, the freedom I was promised I’d have in my 40s is finally here and while that makes me a little bit (and unexpectedly) emotional, it really means I only have more of these days for myself to come.. Thanks for reading, I promise I’m back on form now.. I’ll speak to my paid substack members on Wednesday and the rest of you, I’ll be back next Monday.. because now that day is mine. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit mikhila.substack.com Today’s episode is brought to you by my instagram feed constantly serving me content that evokes a strong response.. I’m sure there’d a word for that. In other news, IT’S SEPTEMBER!! YAY! My routine will soon return to normal and the 2 episodes a week will be BACK.. just in time for my to go n holiday and lose it again.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit mikhila.substack.com This was originally on the docket as a chatty, entirely-unscripted, vlog. During my tenure as a chronic over-sharer with a camera and a YouTube account, I’ve pegged myself as a verbal processor. Where many may see someone giving strangers way too much personal information, I see a free therapy session. Of course there’s always a price with sharing onlin…

When Chat GPT first popped in to my world I thought it was magic. I’m a creative person with a million ideas but I’m often bogged down in the admin of running creative businesses and find myself with less and less time to actually create. This was a tool that allowed me to outsource the boring stuff. I could feed it masses of data and ask it to summarise what would take me hours of research and learning, in seconds. The answer to my prayers. I fed it information about my candle business, my youtube channels, I let it help me with SEO, titles, even (shamefully) copy for our online shop. The minutia of running e-commerce and the never-ending algorithmic changes of social media could be given to this robot and I could get on with the projects gathering dust at the bottom of my to-do list. We’d all been living in fear of this ‘AI’ future but, if this was it, it seemed pretty great to me! Then came the posters. I’m not sure when it happened, but didn’t it feel like overnight? One day I opened instagram to a sea of AI generated graphics. I wrote it off as a trend, like the snapchat filters. They all looked the same so it wouldn’t be long before people got bored. Not only did they not go away, they became videos. Then came the data centres. I say that as if they hadn’t been there all along, but we didn’t know. The average consumer did not know. Suddenly there were people posting videos of looming warehouses on the edge of residential streets, there were statistics about water consumption and the impact on the environment. This was spun in to, ‘don’t say please and thank you to Chat GPT’. It seemed other-worldly.. unreal. Not real, in fact. This is where I draw a parallel with smoking and sun beds - stick with me - Warning the public about health risks isn’t enough to stop them from participating in something they enjoy. A photo of diseased lungs on a cigarette packet never stopped a smoker lighting up. A sign outside a tanning shop, warning about the dangers of skin cancer, isn’t enough to stop them walking through the door. Threats to the environment have never been enough to trigger change in the average consumer. We’re a vain species. I’ve always said, the photos on the cigarette packet should be cosmetic. ‘You will age X times faster if you Y’ would be far more effective that, ‘this could kill you.’ I’m not defending it, but that’s who we are. Humans care about how we are seen. This is why the biggest shift in AI consumption will be led by SHAME. Don’t get me wrong, AI is booming. The number of people using it in their daily lives, let alone for work, is growing all the time. It’s far from dying a death.. but admitting you’re using AI is losing its appeal rapidly. As with everything these days, you must be either for or against. There’s no room for grey. You’re team blue or team red and team blue must never befriend team red, lest you be ousted from your gang forever. As is also true, of this all or nothing modern mentality, this isn’t a reasonable stance. You cannot put the genie back in the bottle and so much of what we’ve used for years, is powered by some kind of AI. As someone who enjoys learning new skills and is a creator at her core, a little bit of me dies every time I see AI ‘art’ being proudly displayed by a business. ‘Surely it’s not that hard to learn basic Canva’, I think to myself. But who am I to judge, when I did exactly the same thing with data analysis, anything relating to numbers, and even work (like copy) that I was entirely capable of doing myself. Because I wasn’t using generative AI, I convinced myself that I was above it, but I’m not. It just so happens that my strengths lie in the visual, so I was never tempted to ask it to make me an image I knew I could make for myself. Someone with no creative spark is using this tool in the same way I was, to supplement natural talent and interest and streamline something that would have taken them a long time to produce. I recently started a new business, yet to launch, and the fresh instagram feed I have over there has been eye opening. I have access to multiple accounts with different themes and I’ve interacted with different posts on each, intentionally curating the spaces. The accounts with business/creative themes are attracting SO many anti-AI posts. It feels like more than 50% of the feed is ‘if your event poster is AI, I’m not coming’ and artists showing literal cut and paste, mixed media signage, to combat the trend for computer generated everything. On some accounts I see nothing about AI. My husband shows me a video at least once a day that he doesn’t know is AI. I have friends who use AI for everything and friends who wouldn’t know what Chat GPT was if you put it in front of them. In your own bubble, things feel very loud and you assume that everyone is hearing this same noise, but we’re living in totally different online worlds. For me, the masses of, ‘I think less of you if you use AI’ had an immediate impact. Even as an individual, perception is important to me, but as a business? It’s everything. If your visuals flag as AI to customers who live in that same bubble, it’s over before it began. You may be safe with your regulars who don’t care much or aren’t chronically online, but you could be deterring a whole new audience with that first impression, in exchange for the time it would have taken to make your own image. Once the public shaming is a mainstream message, I truly believe that that will be the downfall of generative AI. I have never known something turn so quickly on its heels as this. From, ‘everyone use AI, it’s fantastic.’ to ‘I was wrong, don’t use AI’ from the same creators. And, for the most part, it was because they didn’t want to be seen as people who used something that is being criticised en mass. It’s not altruistic, it’s not because they want to save the earth, it’s because they want to save themselves. Once the visual trends started, I started to see the patterns in captions too. These posters all looked the same.. but then so did every infographic, every YouTube title, every listicle. There was a specific Chat GPT tone that was hard to ignore. I realised that every question I asked, it told me I was a genius. Nobody had every had such an amazing idea, I was sure to be a runaway success. It’s like a ever-positive magic 8 ball. You shout in to the void, ‘am I wrong’ and a voice bounces back, ‘NEVER’. It’s not a helpful resource, it’s a useless sounding board that will always tell you what you want to hear. It’s an algorithm, just like every other platform, designed to keep you coming back, feeding it, helping it to learn from your every waking thought and question. The more we ask, the more it understands.. the scarier it becomes. I’m not going to lie to you and pretend that one day I closed Chat GPT forever and never looked back. I didn’t. I still use it. It’s not going away and the use-case for data analysis just can’t be argued against. I can give it 10 years of data and it can instantly pick out what I need to know. Does that put me in team red or team blue? I don’t think either would claim me. I don’t like AI generated images. They are stealing work from real, human artists and they’re duping people who don’t know better. AI creative writing is equally terrible in every possible way, but grammar tools? graphic design software that helps smooth and polish human creations? There’s a lot of grey. Here’s something that fills me with hope, in a world that feels like it’s being taken over by robots. I am contacted multiple times a week by companies who have started AI apps that help you run a business. They’re looking for creators to promote these services. In the same way every sponsorship goes, they offer money for me to endorse something, lending my social capital for a moment, to convince you that this thing is worth your time and money. AI cannot sell you something. People buy from people. If AI was all powerful, why do they need me to convince you to use it? I have noticed people arguing with AI creators in instagram comments recently, which is kind of hilarious. They’re marked as an ‘AI creator’ ,right next to their name, but I don’t think everyone spots that. These accounts are a little terrifying because they’re obviously trying to create something that does replace their need for us.. but they can’t. There’s an uncanny valley element to anything computer generated that looks so close to human but isn’t. People will become more savvy, spot them more quickly and, as if influencer trust wasn’t already at an all time low, they will just cease to believe anything they see online, let alone be sold to. The perception of AI is mostly negative, but the tools they offer are intoxicating. People look past the photo of the diseased lungs, to take out the cigarette, because it’s just too tempting. They know they shouldn’t but they put in the prompt and ask for the image because it’s just too easy. The only thing that will get in the way of that temptation is knowing that opening that box will make you uglier. People will see you differently, your image will be tarnished and all you have to do to rehabilitate it is STOP USING GENERATIVE AI. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit mikhila.substack.com Today’s episode is another ‘Couples Therapy’ with Lee. Today we’re talking about why some couples grow apart and others grow together over time. I saw a clip from ‘relationship experts, Julie Schwartz Gottman and John Gottman that really made me think.. because I am guilty of turning away recently, and I wanted to share this idea because you may need to…

I filmed this for YouTube last week and thought it lent itself well to a podcast episode too. The response I received made me feel like I wasn’t totally alone in feeling I will never be free of the impulses I’m trying to control, but I can do what I can to mitigate triggers. Ultimately, it’s a daily exercise in making better choices for the life I want, rather than succumbing to those inner urges. If you’d rather watch than listen, here’s the video version: This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe

Apologies for those who missed the podcast this week! I’ve been off work and thought I’d have SO much time. When will I learn that when everyone is home, I get nothing done? I roped Lee in to a chat about his obsession with all things Disney, since we were sitting in the car to charge anyway, and we went LONG, so hopefully this makes up for the delay in posting. I was always a ‘Disney person’, but Lee really didn’t connect with it on our first trip and he didn’t grow up with it at home, so I find it fascinating that he’s now such a hardcore fan. It’s as if a spell was cast and now he’s IN. Since the kids are older, and we’re looking ahead to our empty-nest years, we’ve been working on a little parks-inspired venture, and (nobody could have convinced me he’d have wanted to do this) a Disney Vlog Channel on YouTube. Projects we can work on together that align with how we want to spend our next decade or so. If you’re interested in more Disney podcast episodes, let me know cause Lee could talk about this ALL DAY LONG. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe

You can watch this episode on YouTube or listen on your chosen podcast player. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit mikhila.substack.com Today’s episode is a BUMPER LENGTH - possibly record breaking - chat with my friend Charl (@gingergirlsays) about social media icks, over analysing how we’re perceived and a little prequel to dating. I am absolutely going to wrangle her in to a follow up, so stay tuned for some calls for questions on insta! This was the comedy sketch Charl referenced fro…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit mikhila.substack.com If you haven’t already taken the quiz, I really recommend it, and if you can get other people in your life to take part, all the better! https://love-language.co/ and, for anyone who hasn’t seen it, this is the Key and Peele Sketch I was referencing

In today’s episode I will mostly be MELTING in a hot car while covering an even HOTTER topic - influencer businesses. Having run a (somewhat successful) candle shop for 3 years, I’m embarking on a new venture and I’m having all of the same wobbles I did the first time around. Let’s talk about it. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit mikhila.substack.com/subscribe