Welcome to the You Can Heal Your Life podcast. I'm Helen Rochester, Editorial Director

at Hayhouse UK. Today I'm delighted to welcome my guest, Human Connection Specialist Simone

Heng. Please join us as we discuss Simone's brand new book, let's talk about loneliness

the search for connection in a lonely world. Simone explores the topic of loneliness and

disconnection. Drawing from her personal experiences and extensive research she delves into the

impact of technology on connection, the importance of authentic relationships and provides insights

on how to cultivate meaningful connections in a digital age. You can listen to the Let's Talk

about loneliness audiobook for free with a trial of the Empower You Unlimited Audio app.

To download the app today visit hayhouse.com, board slash Empower You. I hope you enjoy our conversation.

So Simone, for anyone who's not familiar with you, who are you and how did you come to write this book?

Okay, so I am what is termed a human connection specialist. I guess it's just a very proper way

of saying that I'm obsessed with this topic and with this area and I spend a lot of time speaking

on it, reading on it, researching it, creating content online about it, and it came into my life

for multiple reasons that all conspired at the same time. So my my mum was very ill and has a

form of dementia where she couldn't connect with herself and with me and then at the same time

as working in a really toxic workplace where there is a lot of lack of belonging and exclusion happening

and so everywhere I looked, this idea of loneliness and disconnection became just a topic that

was a thread that went out, went through my entire life. I think at first I thought what a way to

really like stratify my thoughts about this topic because people have written about it before

but I hadn't really read anything that made me feel less alone. Like there were textbooks on

the science of connection but I wanted to put something in the world that really made the reader feel

that loneliness comes in many forms. It doesn't look like it used to look and I wanted people to feel

...