What happens when one of Australia’s most recognisable wellness voices stops talking about sugar… and starts talking about the collapse of civilisation?
This week on marie claire‘s podcast You’re Gonna Want To Hear This, philosopher, journalist, author and activist Sarah Wilson joins editor Georgie McCourt for what might be the most confronting – and unexpectedly hopeful – conversation the series has aired to date. And it couldn’t come at a more timely moment.
The episode lands as Wilson launches her powerful new book, I Eat the Stars, out this week – a deeply researched exploration of climate collapse, artificial intelligence, modern capitalism, and what it actually means to live fully when the future feels increasingly uncertain.
You may know Wilson as the woman behind the global phenomenon I Quit Sugar, but this latest chapter is worlds away from wellness hacks and clean eating. Instead, Wilson has spent more than a decade researching what she calls “collapse” – the unraveling of the systems we’ve built around endless growth, consumerism and convenience – and why humanity may be standing at a critical fork in the road.
Listen To You’re Gonna Want To Hear This
“I’ve Broken Up With Hope”
“I’ve broken up with hope,” Wilson tells McCourt in one of the episode’s most arresting moments. “Hope keeps us in this addictive cycle of thinking somebody else will fix it.”
It’s a line that stops you in your tracks – but as Wilson explains, letting go of traditional notions of hope hasn’t left her despairing. Quite the opposite.
“There’s immense relief in truth,” she says, arguing that facing the realities of climate change, economic instability and technological disruption could actually open the door to a simpler, more human way of living.
Paris, Hiking And How Turning 50 Changed Everything
Across the deeply personal, often wildly funny hour-long conversation, Wilson opens up about everything from leaving Australia just before turning 50 and moving to Paris on an artist visa, to dating French men (“The clichés are pretty true”), hiking compulsively to regulate her nervous system, and why – despite not having children – she says she’s “the happiest I’ve ever been.”
AI, Fear And What Makes Us Human
The conversation also dives headfirst into one of the biggest anxieties facing women right now: AI.
While panic about artificial intelligence dominates headlines, Wilson offers a surprisingly grounded perspective, arguing that energy shortages, climate realities and economic instability may force society to simplify long before “the robots take over.” Instead, she believes the real question isn’t what AI can do – but what it never will.
“If you want to stick it to the system,” Wilson says, “do the things that make us uniquely human. Have children. Create art.”
I Eat The Stars Is Not A Doomsday Book
It’s this tension – between fear and possibility, collapse and reinvention – that makes I Eat the Stars feel less like a doomsday manifesto and more like a call to wake up.
The book’s title itself comes from a poem by Rebecca Elson: “As an antidote to fear of death, I eat the stars.” For Wilson, it became the emotional and philosophical spine of the project.
“What Comes Next Could Be More Beautiful Than We Imagine”
And while the subject matter may sound heavy, Wilson leaves listeners with a message that feels strangely comforting.
“What comes next,” she says, “could be more wonderful and beautiful and more human than we can possibly imagine.”
If there’s one podcast episode that will challenge the way you think about modern life, motherhood, ambition, AI, anxiety and what really matters – this is it.
Sarah Wilson’s new book I Eat the Stars is out now. Listen to her full conversation on You’re Gonna Want To Hear This wherever you get your podcasts.
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