How To Fail With Elizabeth Day

Elizabeth Day asks every guest the same brilliantly simple question: tell me about three times you failed. The answers — from actors, athletes, writers, politicians, and ordinary people — consistently produce some of the most honest, uncomfortable, and ultimately reassuring conversations in podcasting. With 462 episodes and a 4.7-star rating, How To Fail has built a loyal following by normalizing something universities often don't: the reality that setbacks are not just inevitable but formative. Recent guests have opened up about eating disorders, living with parents as adults, navigating singlehood, the emotional cost of early fame, and professional rejection caused by dyslexia. Day is a skilled interviewer with a warm, curious style. She doesn't push guests into trauma performance or manufactured vulnerability. Instead, she creates space for genuine reflection, and the conversations feel like sitting in on an honest late-night talk with someone you respect. Episodes run about 50 to 57 minutes for full interviews, with shorter bonus episodes for subscribers. For university students, this show hits a nerve that few others reach. The pressure to appear successful, to have your path figured out, to never stumble — it's relentless on campus. Hearing accomplished people describe their failures with specificity and humor is a genuine antidote to that pressure. You'll finish episodes thinking differently about your own setbacks, and that shift in perspective might be more valuable than anything you learn in a lecture hall this semester.