Speaker 1: Hi, my boris, and this is straight talk.
Speaker 2: I could just hear the fire coming closer and closer.
Speaker 2: My hands and arms they were on fire. I got
Speaker 2: this huge rush of elation because I was still standing,
Speaker 2: still alive. Helicopter came and then I woke up a
Speaker 2: month later in a hospital in Sydney.
Speaker 1: Dory, Welcome to straight talk.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mark, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3: Just talking today, Tory, Like, what I'm getting from you
Speaker 3: is discipline, structure, self belief.
Speaker 1: A good support group is that what you want to
Speaker 1: leave people with.
Speaker 2: A Relationships are the most important thing. So maybe being
Speaker 2: a bit vulnerable and not being afraid to tell people
Speaker 2: how much they mean to you, because I know I
Speaker 2: was never good at that before this accident, and I've
Speaker 2: gotten so much better at letting people know how much
Speaker 2: they mean to me. I always struggled to explain how
Speaker 2: I did it, and I think it was every day
Speaker 2: I just got up and I just kept going.
Speaker 1: Dory bit, Welcome to straight talk.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mark, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Where am I? Where are you? Where are we talking
Speaker 1: to each other? From one riverside at.
Speaker 2: The moment, I'm in Aladullah, South Coast. I was going
Speaker 2: to say, God's caun't you? But then I thought, no,
Speaker 2: that's going to make me look like a bit of
Speaker 2: a bogain, So I won't say that, but.
Speaker 1: I said it. So I said it, so I looked
Speaker 1: like one exactly. Well. But by the way, happy birthday,
Speaker 1: I think for tomorrow. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2: Birthday, Yes, thirty seven.
Speaker 1: Happy birthday?
Speaker 2: Thank you? How old? How old are you?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 1: My god, don't ask me how old?
Speaker 2: I have?
Speaker 1: Sixty eight, sixty eight, sixty nine? Next birthday?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you've lived a lot of life, and I know
Speaker 2: you've got lots of lessons of people totally, including melding.
Speaker 3: I guess I'm nearly double your age. I'm nearly double
Speaker 3: your age. How's the world treating you for at thirty seven?
Speaker 1: Hey you? Hey, you going?
Speaker 2: You know what, It's been pretty good. It's been really
Speaker 2: good so living. My husband's a helicopter pilot. We've got
Speaker 2: these two beautiful little boys doing a bit of work.
Speaker 2: Like I know you do a bit of speaking, Mark,
Speaker 2: so do I my running program writing. So all of
Speaker 2: that keeps me really busy, as well as my kids.
Speaker 2: I think, to summon up, life's pretty good.
Speaker 1: So you've just come back from Indo.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I went to Indo and you commented on my
Speaker 2: surfing post, which I.
Speaker 3: Was really yeah, I did so, so I just look
Speaker 3: at my notes.
Speaker 1: I didn't realize this, but you're born in Tahiti before.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so my mom's tai Haitian, my dad's Australian. I
Speaker 2: was born in Tahiti and then I think I was
Speaker 2: I've got another brother, Genji, So I was around six months.
Speaker 2: They decided to move back to Australia, and I think
Speaker 2: they made that decision just for I think a better
Speaker 2: life for us kids. They thought they would have in Australia,
Speaker 2: Like you know, it's a bigger country, there's more opportunities.
Speaker 2: So yeah, we moved here when I was really little.
Speaker 2: But I've still got family all over there. And my
Speaker 2: mom has actually moved back to Tahiti. Now. She doesn't
Speaker 2: actually live in Tahiti. She lives on a different adult
Speaker 2: called Renguiaa. I went and visited her last year with
Speaker 2: the boys. She lives in a really remote spot. She's
Speaker 2: got no electricity, no water, living in a little hut,
Speaker 2: kind of like I suppose what people did back in
Speaker 2: the day, and she's so happy. I think it's the
Speaker 2: happiest I've ever seen her, which I think was a
Speaker 2: really good lesson for me because after a week there,
Speaker 2: I was so Boardmark. I was like, I want to go,
Speaker 2: Hime and get me out of Here's there's nothing to do.
Speaker 2: But I think it was a really good lesson because
Speaker 2: I think, particularly now in modern world, we're so busy,
Speaker 2: we're always going, we always want to keep achieving and
Speaker 2: doing and being productive, and it was a really good
Speaker 2: insight into you know, whether that stuff, whether all that
Speaker 2: achieving and all that producing, actually makes us fulfilled and happy,
Speaker 2: or if whether we get that sense of happiness and
Speaker 2: purpose by connecting to our land, connecting to our culture,
Speaker 2: connecting to our family, looking after others, that type of
Speaker 2: thing that's interesting.
Speaker 1: You should say that.
Speaker 3: So maybe you could explain to me, because I'm not
Speaker 3: that familiar with Tahiti or Tahitian culture, or for that matter,
Speaker 3: Tahitians as such. I mean, it's, to be honest, a
Speaker 3: bit of a mystery to me. So Taititian people are
Speaker 3: I guess are Polynesian. Is that top Polynesian in terms
Speaker 3: of genetics.
Speaker 2: So they're Polynesian, So they're part of the Polynesian Triangle,
Speaker 2: which is from Hawaii to which is New Zealand, and
Speaker 2: then Rapuanui, which is Easter Island. So Polynesian people colonize
Speaker 2: the whole Pacific Ocean. Thousands and thousands of years ago Europeans,
Speaker 2: you know, discovered Polynesia, and so Tahiti was colonized by
Speaker 2: the French. So everyone speaks French over there, but they
Speaker 2: also still speak their traditional language, which is Tahitian. But
Speaker 2: where my mom lives, it's I don't even know how
Speaker 2: to say it right, it's poor motu. Don't know if
Speaker 2: I've said that right. So it's a slight variant to Tahitian.
Speaker 3: So your mom sounds like she's like full full on
Speaker 3: as a Tahitian. Is she Is she like full blooded Tahitian,
Speaker 3: No person by genetically.
Speaker 2: No, she's not full blooded genetically. And I think as
Speaker 2: well Mark, you know, with colonization, I'm not sure if
Speaker 2: many people would say that they're full blooded. And I
Speaker 2: think for a lot of people that question can come
Speaker 2: across as being a bit a little bit denigrating. Maybe,
Speaker 2: So she's not full blooded. Her mom is Tahitian. Well,
Speaker 2: her mom is from Ranguia and her dad is French.
Speaker 2: So her dad was a soldier who went to Tahiti,
Speaker 2: I think in the around in the seventies. But my
Speaker 2: mom grew up she never knew her dad. She never
Speaker 2: knew him.
Speaker 3: Because I'm trying to work out, I'm trying to see,
Speaker 3: look at the influences on yourself. Obviously, her parents are
Speaker 3: and always big influences on all of us, particularly mums.
Speaker 3: I'm talking about it in my case at least, because
Speaker 3: I can only talk about her survey one. That's me
Speaker 3: and my I guess my owin kids. But if your
Speaker 3: mom's influences are her mother and culturally Tahitian, especially given
Speaker 3: what she's going to done now gone there to live there,
Speaker 3: and it sounds like like it's living off grid, how
Speaker 3: much of that is actually influenced you.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of it mark and growing up,
Speaker 2: you know, I would say that she was always so
Speaker 2: proud to be Tahitian. Her mom was a single mom,
Speaker 2: she raised four kids. She fought the French government for
Speaker 2: decades to get her traditional land back. So again in
Speaker 2: Australia may be a little bit like you know, land
Speaker 2: rights for our First Nations people. So my grandmother is
Speaker 2: incredibly strong and determined. My mom just as much. You know,
Speaker 2: she moved toward different countries, she didn't speak English. She
Speaker 2: ended up having four kids here. She wrote a best
Speaker 2: selling trilogy about life in Tahiti. She learned Tahitian as
Speaker 2: an adult because when my mom was growing up in Tahiti,
Speaker 2: no one spoke Tahitian. It was frowned upon, so everyone
Speaker 2: spoke French. And so as an older person, she's learned
Speaker 2: Tahiti and started reconnecting to her culture that way. So
Speaker 2: I think definitely there's a lot of influence on me.
Speaker 2: And even if you look at my kids' names, you know,
Speaker 2: hkaa Rahiti, both of those are Polynesian names. So it's
Speaker 2: something that I'm very, very proud of to be Polynesian.
Speaker 2: I don't speak Tahitian. I sound, you know, pretty Australian,
Speaker 2: my accents pretty strong, so I'm told. But I still
Speaker 2: think you can be connected to your culture even though
Speaker 2: you might not. You know, I never even lived in Tahiti.
Speaker 2: I moved here when I was six months old, but
Speaker 2: I still feel pretty connected to it.
Speaker 1: And then when you're this is about you, by the way,
Speaker 1: but I'm actually can tree about your mom. Now, your
Speaker 1: mum moved back to.
Speaker 3: Tahitian, back to this remote, more and more remote place,
Speaker 3: and made a decision to sort of live this more
Speaker 3: natural life is probably better way, probably good way for
Speaker 3: me to describe it. What was her objective? I'm trying
Speaker 3: to achieve.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, and that's what all of us kids
Speaker 2: were doing, because no shit, when she first moved there,
Speaker 2: she was living in a tent like she wasn't it
Speaker 2: wasn't bougie, nothing about it was easier or nice. My
Speaker 2: mom is what like, maybe's close to sixty. Her mom
Speaker 2: is maybe eighty. So my grandma won her traditional land back,
Speaker 2: and my mom and my grandma went to the land
Speaker 2: set up tents and we're like, cool, we're here, this
Speaker 2: is our land, and we're going to turn it into something,
Speaker 2: you know, a little bit nicer or a little bit easier.
Speaker 2: So I think that might have been my mom's objective.
Speaker 2: I think she obviously wanted to reconnect to her culture.
Speaker 2: She really liked Australia. She always says it's given all
Speaker 2: of us kids such a great life, and that's that
Speaker 2: is true. But I think probably a part of her
Speaker 2: was always homesick when she was in Australia. So yeah, Mark,
Speaker 2: my mom is the most fascinating woman you would ever meet.
Speaker 2: She's so bad us and she's someone that decides she's
Speaker 2: going to do something and then she just goes and
Speaker 2: fucking does it. And I've always really admired that about
Speaker 2: my mom. And if you think about you know, when
Speaker 2: I was growing up, I had three brothers. My mom
Speaker 2: worked full time and every night she would write, she
Speaker 2: would work on these books that she was writing, and
Speaker 2: I just think the amount of self belief she had
Speaker 2: was amazing. I don't know if I've got that same
Speaker 2: amount of self belief.
Speaker 3: In no way, I want to ask more about your mom,
Speaker 3: because I actually think these things inform us, because these
Speaker 3: things inform us about ourselves. And I've been a big
Speaker 3: student of my own family, my own parents, and because
Speaker 3: everything I do, I have to be honest, like pretty
Speaker 3: much most things that I initiate in my life have somewhere,
Speaker 3: somehow found their way into my life as a result
Speaker 3: of something my.
Speaker 1: Parents have done. Which is I.
Speaker 3: Feel like sometimes I've never had an original idea, and
Speaker 3: I think maybe that probably applies to most people who
Speaker 3: have had a nice, good relationship with their family. Probably
Speaker 3: people had bad relationships to the family to some extent
Speaker 3: of formed ideas as a result of the bad relationship too.
Speaker 3: So if your mum right now she's living sort of
Speaker 3: on the land that her grandmother, sorry, your grandmother, her
Speaker 3: mother won back.
Speaker 1: How long a does your grandmother?
Speaker 3: How long did it take your grandmother to get this
Speaker 3: land back to her into her family.
Speaker 2: It took decades, Mark, it took decades and decades and decades,
Speaker 2: which is crazy. And I think the thing is, it's
Speaker 2: wine buggling to me that you have to, you know,
Speaker 2: you've got to prove that something that always belonged to
Speaker 2: you and your family was actually yours. So it was
Speaker 2: decades going through the French court system. Everyone in the
Speaker 2: family helped out with lawyers, fees. My grandma now says
Speaker 2: that that's what gave gave her breast cancer. Just this
Speaker 2: the stress, the stress, and that I guess the length
Speaker 2: of that fight. And so like, my grandma's happy, you know,
Speaker 2: she did it, she got a land back. She feels
Speaker 2: like she's done something really special for her kids, but
Speaker 2: also for you know, for for everyone in the family.
Speaker 2: And I really think, I really think she has and
Speaker 2: I think for for one person. It's kind of like
Speaker 2: that David and Goliath battle, right, you know, to go
Speaker 2: to go up against the court system, which I presume
Speaker 2: would be pretty intimidating. But she, yeah, she did. It
Speaker 2: took her decade though, it took her a really long time.
Speaker 3: So are we're talking about like something that's worth a
Speaker 3: shitload of money or is it not about the money,
Speaker 3: It's about the thing that defines somebody, you know, like
Speaker 3: if this is my land sort of thing you should
Speaker 3: never have taken on the back, or.
Speaker 1: Is it sort of something really really valuable?
Speaker 2: You know what I think, if I'm to be honest,
Speaker 2: I feel like if there was some economic benefit to
Speaker 2: the French for having that land, So for example, if
Speaker 2: there was you know, minerals underneath the land or all
Speaker 2: of that type of stuff that we see play out
Speaker 2: in Australia, I don't think it would have been as
Speaker 2: as easy for my grandma to to win her land back.
Speaker 2: But it wasn't you know, it wasn't agricultural land. There's
Speaker 2: nothing there, just like a few you know, a few
Speaker 2: palm trees and a few coconut trees and it's it's
Speaker 2: a limestone at all, Like nothing grows there. So it's
Speaker 2: pretty you know Barron in terms of it being not
Speaker 2: really producing anything. But I think for my grandmother it
Speaker 2: wasn't really about you know, winning this land back because
Speaker 2: it was going to be at a certain value that
Speaker 2: they could then sell and then split between the family.
Speaker 2: It was she wanted it back because she felt that's
Speaker 2: how she feels connected to her culture.
Speaker 1: And so it's a matter of principle too.
Speaker 3: So yeah, so how how does that if I was
Speaker 3: looking at by the ways, is your first name your
Speaker 3: maid not your maid name, your Christian name or whatever
Speaker 3: your first name is, I should say, is that a
Speaker 3: Polynesian word?
Speaker 2: Yeah? It is so Turia and it means goddess of
Speaker 2: the ocean. Oh wow, but most Assies can't pronounce it,
Speaker 2: so I just say Terria. That's fine, just to Rea.
Speaker 2: But yeah, well done.
Speaker 1: That's lovely, thank you, thank you very much.
Speaker 3: And so therefore principles, because I always say, is about
Speaker 3: my own kids, and I guess this applies to me too.
Speaker 3: Is growing up whatever I was told is not something
Speaker 3: that I really necessarily adopted or did. But generally speaking,
Speaker 3: what we see is what we end up doing. So
Speaker 3: what we see in our parents or our grandparents in
Speaker 3: your case, your parents and grandparents. And what I saw
Speaker 3: in my parents and grandparents for that matter, and what
Speaker 3: my kids have seen in their father, I think largely
Speaker 3: can represent how we.
Speaker 1: Live our lives.
Speaker 3: So you saw your your grandmother and to a largely
Speaker 3: sent to your mother too, never giving up on a principle.
Speaker 1: How much of that is parleyed back into your life?
Speaker 2: I think I think all of it.
Speaker 3: Mark.
Speaker 2: You know, you think about the journey that I've been on,
Speaker 2: and I always hate using that word journey because it
Speaker 2: feels so woo wo, But you know, the past, you know,
Speaker 2: the past decade I was so, particularly in those early
Speaker 2: years were really really fucking hard, and I I always
Speaker 2: struggled to explain how I did it, and I think
Speaker 2: it was every day I just got up and I
Speaker 2: just kept going. And I think that's what my grandmother did.
Speaker 2: And if I think about my mom, you know, having
Speaker 2: full four kids, running a household, putting food on the
Speaker 2: table every night, I had a dad as well, So
Speaker 2: I don't want to make out that my mom was sinking. Mom.
Speaker 2: I had a dad. But this was back in the
Speaker 2: nineties where you know, topics like the mental lid probably
Speaker 2: weren't discussed as as regularly. They weren't really part of
Speaker 2: our conversation. So Dad worked, Mum worked, but their mum
Speaker 2: also did cooking, the cleaning, the running of the house.
Speaker 2: So my mom did all of that, and then at night,
Speaker 2: when all of us kids were asleep, she would find
Speaker 2: this time to write on these books were inside of her.
Speaker 2: So again I saw my mom every day just doing
Speaker 2: those little steps, making those hard choices, not taking the
Speaker 2: easy way out, having this really high expectation of herself.
Speaker 2: And so I think all of those lessons and all
Speaker 2: of those things I saw growing up formed the person
Speaker 2: that I am today.
Speaker 3: So when you were if I go back to when
Speaker 3: you were a teenager, when did you sit in the
Speaker 3: sibling tree, like in terms of I've got Genji the youngest, youngest, oldest, Genji's.
Speaker 2: Eldest, then me, then Haimnu and then t Ricky, So.
Speaker 1: You're sort of the second eldest.
Speaker 2: Second eldest. Yeah, only girl.
Speaker 3: So when you were growing up in your teenager period,
Speaker 3: you were living so you're living down the South coast.
Speaker 2: Then living in Alida.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh the whole time.
Speaker 3: Okay, So just what we like as a student, like
Speaker 3: we're into it, or didn't give a shit about school
Speaker 3: or more interest in what was your deal?
Speaker 2: Mark? I was a complete nerd. I loved school. I
Speaker 2: loved the challenge. I loved applying myself. And I feel like, I,
Speaker 2: you know, and this is such a this is such
Speaker 2: a small memory. But you know when you're going for
Speaker 2: those careers sessions and you tell your careers advice or
Speaker 2: what subjects are you going to pick in your HSC?
Speaker 2: And so I said, you know, I'm thinking about doing
Speaker 2: physics and chemistry and maths. And he looked at me
Speaker 2: and he said, I just don't think you're smart enough.
Speaker 2: And I felt really demoralized in that moment. I went
Speaker 2: home and I told I told my mom, and I
Speaker 2: told my dad and I told my brothers, and I said,
Speaker 2: oh no, no, the teachers don't think I'm smart enough.
Speaker 2: And I remember my dad being completely outraged and he
Speaker 2: was like, no, fuck him. He's he doesn't know who
Speaker 2: you are. Like if you if you want it, if
Speaker 2: you want to do those subjects, you can do them,
Speaker 2: but you've you're gonna have to work really really hard.
Speaker 2: And so I ended up coming first in physics and
Speaker 2: chemistry and maths. And maths extension. I won the math medal.
Speaker 1: Wow, And it.
Speaker 2: Was a real Yeah, it's a strong, it's a it's
Speaker 2: a formative memory for me because it was it was
Speaker 2: I guess, it was proof that no one else knows
Speaker 2: what you're capable of. You know, no one else has
Speaker 2: your has your wind, has your abilities, has your beliefs,
Speaker 2: and and and no one can tell you what what
Speaker 2: is possible or what is not possible. And in that,
Speaker 2: in that moment, I realized, well, even though people around
Speaker 2: me told me that I wouldn't be able to do
Speaker 2: those subjects, I fucking did them and I did really
Speaker 2: well in them. So that that you know that that
Speaker 2: was a little bit of proof for me in myself.
Speaker 3: That's this sort of theme of self belief seems to
Speaker 3: sort of be strong in and again, I don't want
Speaker 3: to diminish the effect of your father, but it seems
Speaker 3: to be a strong theme between the women in your
Speaker 3: family grandmother, mother, and yourself like self belief to the
Speaker 3: extent that you need to get a little bit of
Speaker 3: a pick up every now and then, a little bit
Speaker 3: of a lift.
Speaker 1: From your dad.
Speaker 3: Like as you said, he reacted strongly to the assertion
Speaker 3: of the vocational guidance person where we call them careers
Speaker 3: people telling you that you weren't good enough. But at
Speaker 3: the end of the day, it had to be your
Speaker 3: self belief. It had to be Toria's self belief in
Speaker 3: a self And I guess it probably gets influenced these
Speaker 3: things that at least get influenced by what you saw
Speaker 3: prior to that, everything you saw prior to that. And
Speaker 3: I presume we're talking about you about seventeen or eighteen
Speaker 3: at this time, but no, you know, when you had
Speaker 3: to go into your HC.
Speaker 1: Do you talk about the HRC now, aren't you?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I don't know what they call it these days, whatever.
Speaker 1: Called yeah your final year? Yeah, yeah, your final year though.
Speaker 3: And the that self belief thing is something that I
Speaker 3: think forms in us when we're like from a young
Speaker 3: age like you, right from you know, ten to twelve
Speaker 3: right through and it's obviously stuck with you because clearly
Speaker 3: you know when you had when you went through that
Speaker 3: tough period that in your life, you still have to
Speaker 3: have some self belief in yourself. That doesn't really matter.
Speaker 3: At the end of the day, you got you know,
Speaker 3: you're responsible for yourself. You've got to get up yourself.
Speaker 3: People might help sort of, you know, give you a
Speaker 3: bit of encouragement stuff like that, but you know it's
Speaker 3: up to you at the end of the day. It's
Speaker 3: just like when you did the year twelve or the
Speaker 3: last two years of school. It's your self belief to
Speaker 3: do extension masks and do physics and all those other
Speaker 3: sciences and all those other things that you did and
Speaker 3: you did well in. But because it's not enough to
Speaker 3: believe yourself that you've got to do something, You've got
Speaker 3: to actually drive yourself to do the work.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, you can have all of the self belief
Speaker 2: in the world that you're going to do extremely well
Speaker 2: in a math test, but if you don't look at
Speaker 2: the notes, if you don't do any study, if you
Speaker 2: don't do anything, and you just loaf around the whole year,
Speaker 2: I don't know if that self belief is going to
Speaker 2: translate into a very good result. So I think you
Speaker 2: know you need obviously you need self belief, You need
Speaker 2: that that that desire to do well, right, because if
Speaker 2: you don't want to do well in what you're doing,
Speaker 2: or if you you know, whether that's in your work
Speaker 2: or in your relationship or whatever it is, if you
Speaker 2: don't want to do well, you won't be able to right.
Speaker 2: So you need that. I think you need that desire
Speaker 2: to do well. But I also think you do need
Speaker 2: people around you. I think, I really think you need
Speaker 2: a support system because I could have had all of
Speaker 2: the self belief in the world, but in hospital, if
Speaker 2: no one came to visit me, if my mom didn't
Speaker 2: bring me meals, if my boyfriend at the time, Wiker,
Speaker 2: wasn't there every day. You know, if you don't have
Speaker 2: those people in your corner, I think that would be
Speaker 2: really difficult as well to do well or to exceed expectations.
Speaker 1: Because it's interesting, You're right.
Speaker 3: Self belief it's an important greeting, it's a necessary ingrediing,
Speaker 3: but it's not sufficient to succeed at whatever is you're
Speaker 3: trying to achieve.
Speaker 1: And then I even.
Speaker 3: If I just look at your year twelve period, it's
Speaker 3: not enough to be someone who believes in the self
Speaker 3: and the outcomes that you want to. But you have
Speaker 3: to have a sort of a structured life. I mean,
Speaker 3: you have to get up at a certain time. You
Speaker 3: have to you know, if you're doing extension maths, you
Speaker 3: have to go to extra classes which probably started at
Speaker 3: seven in the morning or seven thirty in the morning.
Speaker 3: Some people may have tutors, but at least the schools
Speaker 3: most of them put in an extra class for those
Speaker 3: extension maths kids and etc. And you have to be
Speaker 3: the sort of kid who can get up and get
Speaker 3: dressed and have breakfast and go to do the thing,
Speaker 3: and you have to do the homework around it.
Speaker 1: So where did this structured bit come from?
Speaker 3: That let's call it discipline structure in your life, because
Speaker 3: you know, it's all very well to be motivated, but
Speaker 3: at the end of the day, it's discipline.
Speaker 1: That succeeds, you know.
Speaker 2: And you.
Speaker 1: We'll just talk a little bit later. I'd like to
Speaker 1: park the.
Speaker 3: Support system that we all need to have to I think,
Speaker 3: because unfortunately some people do not ever get a support system.
Speaker 1: But I want to talk about that in a minute.
Speaker 1: I'll park that for a moment.
Speaker 3: But this structured process, this process of being able to
Speaker 3: structure yourself and discipline yourself to actually execute on that structure,
Speaker 3: where that come from?
Speaker 2: I don't know, Mark, I don't actually know. I'm a
Speaker 2: very logical person, you know, I eventually became an engineer,
Speaker 2: So I think I just I just I just really
Speaker 2: liked it. I liked having a structure. I liked having
Speaker 2: I liked being able to show up. I liked being
Speaker 2: at my class, you know, prepared, being able to put
Speaker 2: my best foot forward. I liked having the right pencils.
Speaker 2: You know, some kids would walk in and they'd have
Speaker 2: a you know, kaok, they'd have a purple pencil or
Speaker 2: are I like to have the right pencil for the
Speaker 2: class that I was in, Because I think if you
Speaker 2: or all of those little things right, it's just like
Speaker 2: they're so easy. It's easy to do. Like it's easy
Speaker 2: to have the right materials for the class. Like, that's
Speaker 2: not hard. You don't need anything special to be able
Speaker 2: to do that. You don't need to be smart. You
Speaker 2: just need to make sure you have the right pencils
Speaker 2: for the class, have your notes that are for that class. Again,
Speaker 2: that's easy to do. You pack them in your bag.
Speaker 2: And I keep saying it it's easy to do, and
Speaker 2: maybe it was just easy for me to do. And
Speaker 2: I also want to say, you know, I didn't. I
Speaker 2: was liking that how my brain works, the structure that
Speaker 2: schools are and my brain work really well together, or
Speaker 2: at least they did when I went through school, and
Speaker 2: I know, if you're neurodivergent or you know, even if
Speaker 2: you're a kid, if you're a kid and you don't
Speaker 2: have a safe place to sleep at night, and you're
Speaker 2: waking up in the morning and there's no food for breakfast,
Speaker 2: it's it's going to be really hard for you to
Speaker 2: have all your stuff squared away, isn't it for the
Speaker 2: maths class that you're doing later that day? Like that's
Speaker 2: that's not even on your priorities list. So I think
Speaker 2: just want to call out that I was. I was
Speaker 2: able to put my best foot forward because I had
Speaker 2: all of that stuff. I had a safe space to sleep,
Speaker 2: I had a you know, a relatively straightforward relationship with
Speaker 2: my family. There was food on the table, We had electricity, like,
Speaker 2: we had all of those basic things which made it
Speaker 2: easier for me to be able to go, yep, I'm
Speaker 2: going to have the right pencils for this class.
Speaker 1: It's very interesting.
Speaker 3: So you mentioned earlier on right at the very beginning,
Speaker 3: you said you were a new I'm always curious when
Speaker 3: someone says that, because I was a bit of a
Speaker 3: nerd at school too. But being a nerd doesn't mean
Speaker 3: I didn't get up to mischief because I did. But
Speaker 3: at the same time, when it comes to my school work,
Speaker 3: I was nerdy, and what I mean by nerdy and
Speaker 3: I'd like to know what you mean by nerdy?
Speaker 1: It just doesn't matter what I mean by nerdy. I
Speaker 1: don't you know what you mean by nerdy?
Speaker 3: Do you mean that you were actually very curious about
Speaker 3: the topics that you were studying and actually loved it,
Speaker 3: loved maths, loved physics, or you were nerdy in the
Speaker 3: extent that you just did anything you had to do,
Speaker 3: no curiosity.
Speaker 2: And I genuinely loved it. I genuinely loved it. So again,
Speaker 2: I think that's part of that, that desire to learn
Speaker 2: about the subject, Right, I was invested in it. I
Speaker 2: wanted to learn about it. I was curious about it.
Speaker 2: I probably drive some of my teachers up the wall
Speaker 2: with my incessant questioning about things. So I genuinely loved it,
Speaker 2: even like I found an afternoon doing calculus, I found
Speaker 2: it relaxing. I found it so I found it a
Speaker 2: great a great way to spend my time. So that
Speaker 2: I think that obviously helps. Right, if you're if you're
Speaker 2: liking what you're doing, or you're interested in it, or
Speaker 2: you're curious about it, it's going to be easier to
Speaker 2: develop that discipline to do it right. Whereas if it's
Speaker 2: something that you're knowledgested about, couldn't give a shit about,
Speaker 2: I don't want to know about. To strap yourself to
Speaker 2: your desk for a couple of hours and learn about it.
Speaker 2: I think that's going to be really really hard for
Speaker 2: you to do.
Speaker 3: You're a bright person of me, and so I don't
Speaker 3: want to look like I'm getting too deep into the
Speaker 3: weeds here. But if I might just put this to you,
Speaker 3: because you're making me think about my own school journey
Speaker 3: as well.
Speaker 1: Was it the chemical do you think it was in hindsight?
Speaker 1: Do you think it was the.
Speaker 3: Reward of or was the brain rewarding with a release
Speaker 3: of chemicals for you getting things right? That actually was
Speaker 3: a thing that makes you become really let's call it
Speaker 3: like addicted in a good way, addicted to hard work
Speaker 3: and curiosity, because for me it was always like I
Speaker 3: used to get an adrenaline rush or a rush when
Speaker 3: I calculated something correctly, and particularly if it was difficult,
Speaker 3: and particularly if other kids my peers might have been
Speaker 3: having some difficulty with it, just getting the outcome correct
Speaker 3: or doing well in an exam, et cetera. I used
Speaker 3: to get a bit of a bit of a hit,
Speaker 3: a bit of a rush from that, and then over
Speaker 3: time I didn't realize it any time, but yeah, it
Speaker 3: was good. Yeah, I am dopamin and serotonin hits, Like
Speaker 3: it's just hormonal releases that your brain is giving you
Speaker 3: as a reward for achieving an outcome. So achievement was
Speaker 3: a driver for me, and I didn't positively think about that.
Speaker 3: So was that something for you?
Speaker 1: Was that or was.
Speaker 3: It is just your academic nerdness? If there's such a
Speaker 3: word that was driving you?
Speaker 1: What was really driving you? Deep down? What do you
Speaker 1: think it really was?
Speaker 2: What was driving me? I wanted to I wanted to
Speaker 2: prove to people that I was, that I was smart.
Speaker 2: I wanted I obviously my brain obviously liked those little
Speaker 2: hits of dopamine and serotonin. So I liked that. You know,
Speaker 2: when you work out a difficult maths problem, that that
Speaker 2: that smug sense of satisfaction you get, like that's pretty
Speaker 2: fucking good. Not there's not many things that that. Well,
Speaker 2: Probably much I've done, really big, you've done lots of
Speaker 2: big deals, so you're probably thinking, yeah, there's heaps of
Speaker 2: stuff that beats out, but you know that that is
Speaker 2: an amazing feeling when you work out something that's really difficult,
Speaker 2: and probably that you know that that academic nerdness, as
Speaker 2: you so eloquently put it before. I think maybe all
Speaker 2: of the above.
Speaker 3: How about because one of the big drivers for me
Speaker 3: too was I used to like to please my parents.
Speaker 3: I used to like coming home with, you know, a
Speaker 3: good report card. That was a big deal for me.
Speaker 1: I don't know why.
Speaker 3: I wasn't a goodie two shoes by no stretch of imagination,
Speaker 3: especially when I went to school. Yeah, I mean, was
Speaker 3: that sense of people big?
Speaker 2: Probably Mark, And I think maybe it was a bit,
Speaker 2: a little bit to my detriment because my brother was
Speaker 2: a really, really good surfer growing up, so he had
Speaker 2: lots of my parents' time and attention, which I didn't
Speaker 2: articulate at the time, but resented him because you know,
Speaker 2: all of our spare money would go into his his
Speaker 2: his surfing career. And I realized that through achievements in academia,
Speaker 2: I also got some time and attention from my parents.
Speaker 2: And when I say my parents I'm mainly meeting my dad,
Speaker 2: but also my dad had really high expectations of me.
Speaker 2: So I remember once I got, you know, ninety seven
Speaker 2: percent on a math's extension exam, and my dad, instead
Speaker 2: of being happy, he said, well, he said, well, why
Speaker 2: wasn't it. Why wasn't it a hundred? You know? And
Speaker 2: I think the next time I did get one hundred percent.
Speaker 2: So it's kind of hard for me to talk about.
Speaker 2: And you know, I'm not trying not to denigrate my dad,
Speaker 2: because of course I love him, but it was, you know,
Speaker 2: he had really high expectations for me. I don't know
Speaker 2: if that was just what, you know, the style of
Speaker 2: parenting that he learned from his parents as well.
Speaker 3: But do you think that to some extent was maybe
Speaker 3: a good thing in any event, because it gave you
Speaker 3: a high barble chief, I mean, may perhaps if it
Speaker 3: wasn't there, you might not have actually pushed that hard.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's what I don't That's what I get
Speaker 2: confused about myself. But I don't know if it made
Speaker 2: If I reflect on that last year of school, all
Speaker 2: of that achievement, all of that hustling, all of that grinding,
Speaker 2: all of those late nights. I can't say I was
Speaker 2: very happy. You know, it wasn't a fulfilling year for me.
Speaker 2: But I also think when you're working really hard on
Speaker 2: a goal, you're not going to be happy all of
Speaker 2: the time, right, You're going to be stressed, annoyed, tired, cranky,
Speaker 2: pissed off because stuff's not going your way sometimes. So
Speaker 2: I don't I don't. I don't know if happiness is
Speaker 2: the end goal. And I don't know if you can,
Speaker 2: at least for me, I don't know if you can
Speaker 2: be you know, happy with what you've got, grateful for
Speaker 2: your life, in that sort of reflective mode, and simultaneously
Speaker 2: really working hard towards something. I don't know that.
Speaker 1: It's very insightful. That's very insightful.
Speaker 3: Like it's funny, you should say, because and i'd like
Speaker 3: to know what you think about this. But I have
Speaker 3: a concept in my life which you know, take me
Speaker 3: sixty eight years to develop it, but it's called It's
Speaker 3: not happiness as such. It's about peacefulness is probably the
Speaker 3: most important thing. But on that happy, on that, on
Speaker 3: on the h level, it's about happy enough. And I
Speaker 3: think that you need to just need to be in
Speaker 3: like to know what you think about it. So, I
Speaker 3: just like to be happy enough in the in the
Speaker 3: pursuit of what I'm doing at any one particular time,
Speaker 3: knowing well that quite well that there's going to during
Speaker 3: that pursuit there's going to be periods where I'm not
Speaker 3: going to be feeling great. I mean, you know, then
Speaker 3: the world of an entrepreneur, the world of a startup,
Speaker 3: et cetera. That's that's your world. It's it's a shitty world.
Speaker 3: But you have moments of highs, and you have lots more,
Speaker 3: many more moments of lows. But if you can manage
Speaker 3: to have an attitude of I'm happy enough, then you
Speaker 3: can get through it. Now, what do you think about
Speaker 3: that as a concept, Because you've obviously been challenged a
Speaker 3: lot in your life.
Speaker 1: So is happy enough probably where you need to be?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I think so. And I think there's so much
Speaker 2: focus on being happy all of the time. And I
Speaker 2: think that's part of our you know, I think our
Speaker 2: culture these days, it's it's a bit of a culture
Speaker 2: of this fake positivity, right this, you know, like everything's
Speaker 2: all rainbows and butterflies or you're almost it's almost like
Speaker 2: you're not allowed to articulate that you're stressed, are you sad,
Speaker 2: or you're going through something tough, are feeling anxious? And
Speaker 2: I think most of us we want to feel all
Speaker 2: those good positive emotions, right like being happy, excited, enthusiastic.
Speaker 2: But I don't think that's reflective of normal life. And
Speaker 2: I think just as we feel, you know, happy and
Speaker 2: excited and energetic and motivated, it's going to swing the
Speaker 2: other way at some points and we're going to wake
Speaker 2: up irritated, stressed, annoyed at our partner, you know, cranky.
Speaker 2: You know, if in your case market you're working with
Speaker 2: startups and things like that, there's going to be shit
Speaker 2: that happens which really really annoys you, really gets to you.
Speaker 2: So I do really like your how you look at
Speaker 2: it as being happy enough.
Speaker 3: I guess post your year twelve, the next the next
Speaker 3: stage of life is as a university student, you did engineering?
Speaker 1: Which which engineering you do? Which? Which facet of engineering
Speaker 1: did you do?
Speaker 2: Did mining engineering?
Speaker 1: Why? Mining engineering? Why did you choose that?
Speaker 2: Why did I choose mining? I looked up some mining
Speaker 2: blasts on the internet on YouTube, and I thought, wow,
Speaker 2: that looks really that looks really cool. That looks that
Speaker 2: looks that looks awesome.
Speaker 1: As in like you just went on YouTube and you
Speaker 1: looked up.
Speaker 2: Like so when they're like when they're mining coal, for example,
Speaker 2: they'll blast that top layer they call it the overburden.
Speaker 2: They blast that so they can remove it away with
Speaker 2: with diggers and trucks and what's left behind is like
Speaker 2: the scene of coals.
Speaker 1: To do mining engineering, I just thought it was cool.
Speaker 2: I was also like, it's been a little bit flexible
Speaker 2: right those first couple of years. I thought I could
Speaker 2: do mining, but if it doesn't work out, I could
Speaker 2: do something else.
Speaker 1: So you graduated as a mining engineer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so engineering is a very male dominated industry. So
Speaker 2: I think when I graduated as a mining engineer, there
Speaker 2: was like five girls in my class and about you know,
Speaker 2: fifty boys.
Speaker 1: And did you manage to get a job in mining?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I got a really really great you know, when
Speaker 2: you finish Uni, there's all of these graduate positions that
Speaker 2: go out and I got a really one one that
Speaker 2: was held in high regard because I was, you know,
Speaker 2: I was still a nerd at university as well. So
Speaker 2: I got this job in Karanara, in the Kimberly region
Speaker 2: of Australia at the Agile Diamond Wine, which was I
Speaker 2: don't know if it still is, but it was operated
Speaker 2: by Rio Tinto.
Speaker 3: Yeah that's where the pink diamonds.
Speaker 2: The pink diamonds. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1: And how long did you work in mining for?
Speaker 2: You know, I only got to work in mining for
Speaker 2: nine months. Then I entered that Ultra marathon, which you know,
Speaker 2: drastically changed the course of my life.
Speaker 3: Can you tell me about the ultramarathon. Why you've decided
Speaker 3: to enter my ultra marathon? What?
Speaker 1: What was the deal?
Speaker 2: I think it's just I like, you know, maybe it's
Speaker 2: evident from my life so far, but I like challenges.
Speaker 2: You know. I did winning engineering, which was quite maldominated.
Speaker 2: I loved running. When I was in Kananara, I was
Speaker 2: away from the surf, so I just, you know, kept
Speaker 2: kept running and kept running a little bit more. There
Speaker 2: was like a local half marathon which I won, and
Speaker 2: then I did this Ultra Ultra marathon and I emailed
Speaker 2: them about it, and then they came back with the
Speaker 2: registration fee and I thought, no, that's a rip off,
Speaker 2: that's too expensive. You know, I'll look at something later.
Speaker 2: And they emailed me, you know, I think maybe twelve
Speaker 2: twelve days before the race, and they said, oh, we've
Speaker 2: got a couple of free entry spots, would you like one?
Speaker 2: So I thought, yeah, cool, that sounds good. No worries.
Speaker 2: Entered the ultra marathon really excited at the start of
Speaker 2: the race, you know, feeling excited, feeling nervous, feeling a
Speaker 2: little bit anxious. And I only got a So this
Speaker 2: ultra marathon was one hundred kilometers. I got about twenty
Speaker 2: five kilometers into the race and I just passed another checkpoint.
Speaker 2: So when you do an ultra marathon, they have things
Speaker 2: called checkpoints at you know, maybe ten or fifteen k's
Speaker 2: through the race for everyone to check in and make
Speaker 2: sure everyone's going okay. So we'd all passed the second checkpoint,
Speaker 2: and I say we because there was there was five
Speaker 2: I think five other people who were with me on
Speaker 2: that day. We were at the bottom of a gorge
Speaker 2: and we could see fire fastly approaching. Now we had
Speaker 2: two choices marked, so we could go back the way
Speaker 2: that we'd come, but there was really dry spin effects
Speaker 2: up to about my shoulder, so you know, perfect fuel
Speaker 2: for the fire. Our other choice was to run up
Speaker 2: the side of the gorge, which had less vegetation, so
Speaker 2: less feel for the fire, but fire goes faster going uphill,
Speaker 2: So those were our options in that moment. At that time,
Speaker 2: we all decided to run up the side of the hill,
Speaker 2: tried to cover ourselves, you know, in amongst the rocks.
Speaker 2: I could just hear the fire coming closer and closer
Speaker 2: and closer. It was, of course extremely hot for me,
Speaker 2: and I just remember like looking down at my hands
Speaker 2: and arms and they were aflame, they were on fire.
Speaker 2: And in that moment I thought about one person. I
Speaker 2: thought about my boyfriend, my boyfriend at the time, Michael.
Speaker 2: I think we'd only been together for like a year
Speaker 2: and a half at that stage, and I thought about,
Speaker 2: you know, when you're a young person and you fall
Speaker 2: in love, you have all of these hopes and dreams
Speaker 2: with this person that you've fallen in love with. I
Speaker 2: just remember thinking how how unfair it was that Michael
Speaker 2: and I wouldn't be able to, you know, lived this life,
Speaker 2: live this life of adventure that we that we talked
Speaker 2: about and that we'd planned. Now the fire passed side.
Speaker 2: I don't actually know how long it was around for
Speaker 2: how long I was burning for might have been five seconds,
Speaker 2: might have been a minute, I don't know, but it
Speaker 2: moved through us, and I remember I got this huge
Speaker 2: rush of elation because I was still standing, still alive,
Speaker 2: and I thought, fuck, I've done it, Like I've survived.
Speaker 2: This is amazing. Now. He ended up having to wait
Speaker 2: four hours on that hillside, on that side of the
Speaker 2: gorge for help, yeah to arrive. I wasn't very lucid
Speaker 2: at the time, didn't know what was going on. Helicopter
Speaker 2: came and picked us up, took us to the local
Speaker 2: hospital and kind of I I remember saying to the nurses,
Speaker 2: can someone just please call my boyfriend because he's going
Speaker 2: to be worried about me? And then I woke up
Speaker 2: a month later in a hospital in Sydney, and I
Speaker 2: always get asked, like, you know it was it was
Speaker 2: the fire? Painful? Was it scary? And like, yes, it
Speaker 2: was painful, Yes it was scary. But at the same time,
Speaker 2: I think your your body's protective mechanisms kick into play.
Speaker 2: So I had all of this, you know, adrenaline surging,
Speaker 2: and for me, I had no concept of time on
Speaker 2: that day, didn't really know what was going on, and
Speaker 2: so I always say like yes, it was painful, Yes
Speaker 2: it was scary. But for me, the real work the
Speaker 2: biggest challenge of my life so far, and I really
Speaker 2: hope it is it is the biggest challenge of my
Speaker 2: life because it was it was really bloody. Big was
Speaker 2: when I woke up in hospital and I had to
Speaker 2: go through that process of rehabilitating my life, rehabilitating myself
Speaker 2: and my body.
Speaker 3: That's pretty crazy sort of.
Speaker 1: The rehabilitation process, which we'll talk to you about it.
Speaker 3: But is it because you're in a coma for that
Speaker 3: period or is it in duced come or did your
Speaker 3: body just go and or coma?
Speaker 2: So they put you into an induced coma so they
Speaker 2: you know, they're doing operations on you while you're asleep,
Speaker 2: doing skin grafts and all types. I was burnt to
Speaker 2: sixty five percent of my body, so that's a pretty
Speaker 2: large surface area. So they put you in an induced coma,
Speaker 2: I think, so you're not in an excruciating amount of pain,
Speaker 2: I suppose, and so that they can carry on and
Speaker 2: do the work that they that they the doctors and
Speaker 2: the surgeons and all of you know, the medical stuff,
Speaker 2: do all of the work that they need to do
Speaker 2: to be able to save say, of your life. And
Speaker 2: then I think when everything's looking a little bit, the
Speaker 2: outcome is looking a little bit better, and that you know,
Speaker 2: you're alive, and they think they've saved your life, and
Speaker 2: you're you're good, you're good to go for one of
Speaker 2: a better phrase. They pull you out of the induced.
Speaker 3: Coma, and what was the first thing you remember when
Speaker 3: you I mean, I don't know how this works, but
Speaker 3: do you actually just wake up in the hospital somewhere
Speaker 3: in Sydney or something, and then you look around and
Speaker 3: is there someone there in front of you?
Speaker 1: And what was the first thing you saw?
Speaker 2: Yeah? You know what. The first memory I have is
Speaker 2: of my my boyfriend Michael. You know, he's looking at
Speaker 2: me in my eyes and he's like, terree, my darling,
Speaker 2: you're alive. Like so, you know, I could see in
Speaker 2: his face he was overjoyed that I was still on
Speaker 2: this planet, you know he was he was so so
Speaker 2: happy that I was still there. And I was in
Speaker 2: so much pain. I was in so much like physical
Speaker 2: physical pain that I was like, no, I'm actually not
Speaker 2: happy to be you know. I couldn't talk at the time,
Speaker 2: but that's what I was thinking, like, I'm not actually
Speaker 2: happy to be alive. I don't want to be here,
Speaker 2: and I didn't realize the extent of my injuries at
Speaker 2: the time. It was just because you know, if you
Speaker 2: talk to any burns patient, pain and you know, maybe
Speaker 2: this isn't just reserved for people in the burns unit,
Speaker 2: but for a burns patient, pain is an essential element
Speaker 2: of your day to day for you know, if you've
Speaker 2: got a big burn like me for months.
Speaker 3: So it's very hard for me to understand for obvious
Speaker 3: reasons because I haven't experienced it. But I'm just going
Speaker 3: what you're saying, but I'm trying to imagine it, which
Speaker 3: is virtually impossible to do. I think I might can
Speaker 3: empathize with it, but that's sort.
Speaker 1: Of not real.
Speaker 3: When you say the pain for the that you were
Speaker 3: feeling when you first woke up and you're saying to
Speaker 3: yourself like, I'm not really.
Speaker 1: Happy to not that happy to be here.
Speaker 3: Is that as a result of you thinking yourself, I'd
Speaker 3: rather not put up with this pain, therefore not exist anymore.
Speaker 1: Is that actually a full process?
Speaker 2: I don't know, and I don't know, like, have you
Speaker 2: ever been so sick, mark or like so physically unwell
Speaker 2: that that sounds of bit grim, but like you almost
Speaker 2: wish you were dead, Like if you're like violently ill,
Speaker 2: has that ever happened to you? Or you know, it
Speaker 2: doesn't happen to people.
Speaker 3: Like Mark thankfully no, thankfully no, Or if it has happened,
Speaker 3: maybe my brain is eliminated out of my.
Speaker 1: Head over the years.
Speaker 3: I mean, I've had some terrible accidents in my life,
Speaker 3: but you know, I don't think I've ever thought that,
Speaker 3: so therefore I haven't been at that chronic point.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So is even just like even even breathing with
Speaker 2: the ventilator, you know, my ribs expanding and contracting, that
Speaker 2: was painful, like the process of just breathing. So it
Speaker 2: was just I was in my whole my whole world
Speaker 2: was just blinding pain.
Speaker 3: How long did you experience this extraordinary painful Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, because it was there a point in which it
Speaker 1: started going I should have feel a bit better.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it does. It does go like that, you
Speaker 2: do start to feel you know. So that was obviously
Speaker 2: in the earlier days, and as the months progressed, I
Speaker 2: started to feel less pain and then they you know,
Speaker 2: they they wean you off the pain meds. So there's
Speaker 2: that kind of balance to consider as well. But the
Speaker 2: you know, because I've got such a big burn, one
Speaker 2: of the you know, but one of the things I
Speaker 2: have to do every day is I have to change
Speaker 2: ad bandages. Right So, because I had such a big
Speaker 2: burn sixty five percent of my body, this process of
Speaker 2: changing my bandages would go like no ship for hours
Speaker 2: and hours and hours, and I would get so anxious.
Speaker 2: I'd been such turmoil thinking about this excruciating bandage change
Speaker 2: that I would have to have the next morning. I
Speaker 2: would lie awake at night, I'd be I would be,
Speaker 2: I would be, you know, sweating thinking about this this
Speaker 2: pain that I was going to have to endure the
Speaker 2: next day. And I got really lucky in hospital that
Speaker 2: you know, I had an amazing medical team and one
Speaker 2: of the nurses, you know, I came into my room
Speaker 2: one day she said, look, we've got to watch a
Speaker 2: Ted talk. I waited to watch this Ted talk by
Speaker 2: this guy called Dan Ariali. He's a I think he's
Speaker 2: a psychologist, but he's also a burned survivor. So we
Speaker 2: watched this Ted talk. I learn a little bit about
Speaker 2: his you know, he did some studies on pain. Basically,
Speaker 2: what I got out of it is that if you
Speaker 2: start with the most painful area first, and you progress
Speaker 2: through the dressing to the areas that are less painful,
Speaker 2: it's going to make your experience, or your perception of
Speaker 2: that dressing change, of that bandage change feel less painful.
Speaker 2: So what I decided to do was I volunteered to
Speaker 2: be the first burns patient to get their bandages changed.
Speaker 2: And it was I think that was part of, you know,
Speaker 2: developing That was a start of me developing that little
Speaker 2: bit of discipline, you know, doing eating the frog, doing
Speaker 2: the worst first. So I asked ask the nurses to start,
Speaker 2: you'd be the first patient to get their dressings changed.
Speaker 2: And then I also asked the nurses to start with
Speaker 2: the most painful areas of my body first as well,
Speaker 2: because then for me, like like I learned that Ted talk,
Speaker 2: and probably like I'd learned throughout my life, you know,
Speaker 2: when the worst is done, it when you've got the
Speaker 2: hardest stuff of the way, the rest of your day,
Speaker 2: in comparison, feels a little bit easier or a little
Speaker 2: bit lighter.
Speaker 3: It's interesting you even started structuring your thinking process at
Speaker 3: that point. You know, you're actually not too dissimilar to
Speaker 3: what you do in the year twelve. It's about structured thinking,
Speaker 3: which is very much an engineer an engineer's process. But
Speaker 3: you know, like perhaps all that period of study and
Speaker 3: work and also you developing your own brain allows you
Speaker 3: to sort of build better understanding of perception, because pains
Speaker 3: about perception, and you know, it's your brain telling you
Speaker 3: something that you perceive it perceives, and it sounds like
Speaker 3: that you were sort of not manipulating but sort of
Speaker 3: train your own brain around what you wanted it to do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, if you think about your perception of pain
Speaker 2: and anticipating the pain, that makes it so much worse. Right,
Speaker 2: so far, was lying bed the night before the bandage
Speaker 2: change was going to be done, and I was already
Speaker 2: stressed about it. And then in the morning, when I
Speaker 2: could hear the nurses in the hallway pull it, you know,
Speaker 2: pushing their little trolleys, that would make me even more
Speaker 2: anxious about it. And then when I would hear, you know,
Speaker 2: a burns patient next door screaming about their bandage change,
Speaker 2: I would, you know, my heart would my heart would
Speaker 2: already be racing. And there was no one in the room.
Speaker 2: There was no nurses in the room, no one was
Speaker 2: trying to change my bandages, but I was already in
Speaker 2: this state of being worked up and anxious and stressed
Speaker 2: and worrying about all of this pain that I was
Speaker 2: about to endure. So I don't know if at the
Speaker 2: time I could have said, you know, I'm doing this
Speaker 2: because I want to be more discipplined and I want
Speaker 2: to have some structure to my day. I just watched
Speaker 2: that Ted talk. I chatted about it with the nurse,
Speaker 2: and you know, we decided, or maybe she even suggested
Speaker 2: to me that going first might be a really good
Speaker 2: way for me to manage my pain. But it was
Speaker 2: really a really good lesson for me at that time
Speaker 2: because it reminded me that I still had agency. See,
Speaker 2: when you're a patient in a hospital in you're a
Speaker 2: patient in a hospital for months, and every day you've
Speaker 2: got people coming into your room, you know they want
Speaker 2: to they want to poke you and prod you, and
Speaker 2: totally get that they're that they're just doing their job,
Speaker 2: and they do a really bloody good job as well.
Speaker 2: But you I think I became a little bit passive
Speaker 2: in that I didn't and then I didn't realize or
Speaker 2: I didn't I didn't recognize that it was still in
Speaker 2: my body. I still had agency, I still had control
Speaker 2: over it. So I think it was a good lesson
Speaker 2: and reminded me of that. But it also reminded me
Speaker 2: that how I thought about things, or how I how
Speaker 2: I executed things had a big impact onto how I
Speaker 2: to how I felt about them, if that makes sense, said,
Speaker 2: I think that was the start of me realize.
Speaker 1: It's very interesting.
Speaker 3: It's funny because today, I mean, we hear it on
Speaker 3: social media light about people getting triggered by something or other,
Speaker 3: and off the back of that, I mean, especially younger
Speaker 3: people talking about it, and off the back of that,
Speaker 3: we have you know, a lot of people will say
Speaker 3: how they experience some anxiety off the back of the trigger.
Speaker 3: In your case, it might have been hearing the trolley
Speaker 3: coming along, or without actually them actually removing the bandages,
Speaker 3: you actually experience anxiety. To me, you're actually someone who
Speaker 3: probably a black belt in anxiety in terms of experience,
Speaker 3: in terms of you know, like a tenth damn black
Speaker 3: belt in terms of experiencing anxiety.
Speaker 1: What would you say?
Speaker 3: You obviously talk about these things on your talks. I mean,
Speaker 3: you do a lot of talk and a lot of
Speaker 3: circuits around, around your experience, et cetera. What would you
Speaker 3: say to people today, particularly younger people, who are troubled
Speaker 3: by things that they hear or their sensory perception of
Speaker 3: what's going on around them that might be actually trigger
Speaker 3: triggering or creating a lot of anxiety in them about
Speaker 3: something that could be about to happen. What do you
Speaker 3: say to these people? I mean, and obviously that's part
Speaker 3: of your job these days, but what do you say
Speaker 3: to them?
Speaker 2: I don't actually speak to that many young people these days,
Speaker 2: not because I don't want it, but just because life
Speaker 2: with the kids and the family is a bit busy.
Speaker 2: I do wonder if we're if we are maybe coddling
Speaker 2: younger people. And so, for example, if you go on
Speaker 2: social media, if you jump on Instagram and you find
Speaker 2: yourself triggered by what you see, For sure, that might
Speaker 2: be because of the algorithm, but I think also you
Speaker 2: do have some agency, right You could remove Instagram from
Speaker 2: your phone, you could follow different people, you could you know,
Speaker 2: you could leave your phone at home, so you can
Speaker 2: take all of those actions to to make that that
Speaker 2: you know, that triggering or that anxiety that you feel
Speaker 2: about what you're seeing a little less. That's not to
Speaker 2: say that everyone who says that they feel triggered by
Speaker 2: saying something on social media is just, you know, it's
Speaker 2: all in their head, because you know, we don't know
Speaker 2: what's what's gone on in someone else's life, how they've
Speaker 2: been brought up, what their family life is like. We
Speaker 2: don't know any of that. But I do think that
Speaker 2: there's a little bit of a balance. I think we
Speaker 2: there may be a bit of danger that where that
Speaker 2: we might be cuddling people as opposed to encouraging them
Speaker 2: to take some responsibility.
Speaker 3: That's a very good point, and especially coming from someone
Speaker 3: like you, as opposed to say, someone like myself, et cetera.
Speaker 3: Coming from someone like you who's actually really experienced deep,
Speaker 3: deep trauma, physical trauma and probably the mental trauma as
Speaker 3: well that went with it.
Speaker 1: You know, that's a to me. I find that to
Speaker 1: be a deeply.
Speaker 3: Not any insightful, but deeply interesting to me, deeply interesting
Speaker 3: commentary from you.
Speaker 1: Could you do you think.
Speaker 3: In an advisory way that for any of us, probably
Speaker 3: not so much more.
Speaker 1: It could happen to me. It doesn't matter how old I.
Speaker 3: Am, but for any of us should make sure that
Speaker 3: we do not undervalue the importance of.
Speaker 1: Support structures around us. And I said I was going
Speaker 1: to park that earlier.
Speaker 3: On I'm now unparking or driving this into the driveway.
Speaker 3: Do you think that making sure that we build good
Speaker 3: support around us family friends, in your case, your family friends,
Speaker 3: but also your boyfriend to become your husband? How important
Speaker 3: is that as a a prospective process that we should
Speaker 3: get undertake, whether or not we whether or not we
Speaker 3: end up experiencing the source of trauma that you experienced.
Speaker 1: Anyway, but how important is that? And how important was
Speaker 1: it for you?
Speaker 3: Because obviously you pre you pre did all this, Touria,
Speaker 3: you did this earlier without knowing that what was going
Speaker 3: to happen to you.
Speaker 1: How important was it?
Speaker 2: But I think I think the most it is the
Speaker 2: most important thing. Relationships that are the most important thing.
Speaker 2: And I think that's your relationship with your spouse, your
Speaker 2: relationship with your family, your relationship with your friends, your
Speaker 2: relationship if you know, if you're lucky enough to have
Speaker 2: a mentor whatever it is. I think it is the
Speaker 2: most important thing. And it's not you know, it's not
Speaker 2: surrounding yourself with people who blow smoke up your ass
Speaker 2: and tell you how amazing you are and how good
Speaker 2: you are. And cheerleaders, yeah, and I like cheerleaders are
Speaker 2: great as well, because sometimes you feel fragile. You just
Speaker 2: want someone to say you're doing a good job. Right,
Speaker 2: you do need cheerleaders. But if I think about, you know,
Speaker 2: the constructive feedback, I've got. The person who will always
Speaker 2: give it to me straight is my husband, Michael. He'll
Speaker 2: always tell me if something is shit, if something's not good,
Speaker 2: if I haven't done a good enough job. My dad
Speaker 2: will tell me as well. I remember the first the
Speaker 2: first time I did a motivational speech, my dad came
Speaker 2: with me and afterwards, I said, oh, Dad, how do
Speaker 2: you think I went? And he said, Terria, that was shitouse.
Speaker 2: You should be embarrassed. You should be embarrassed that you
Speaker 2: are charging people money for that, because he said that
Speaker 2: was terrible. And he said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry to
Speaker 2: tell you. I'm sorry to be so blunt. But he
Speaker 2: said basically like, if it's something that you want to pursue,
Speaker 2: you're gonna have to get better at it. You're gonna
Speaker 2: have to go see other people how they do it.
Speaker 2: You're gonna have to get some training because that performance
Speaker 2: was like terrible, absolutely terrible, absolutely shit out. But I
Speaker 2: think I think you need and I think that's the
Speaker 2: other thing too. We've you know, and maybe even myself,
Speaker 2: you become your ego become so fragile that you don't
Speaker 2: like it if someone says, well, that wasn't good or
Speaker 2: that wasn't a good enough job, or you need to
Speaker 2: do better, or have you thought about doing it this way?
Speaker 2: And I know, you know, if Michael, my husband, says
Speaker 2: stuff that like that to me, it really hurts my
Speaker 2: ego because I'll be like, well, no, everyone everyone else
Speaker 2: likes it, so why don't you? Why don't you? But
Speaker 2: I think as well, sometimes you need that that close
Speaker 2: relationship with someone, that trust with someone for them to
Speaker 2: be able to tell it straight to you. And you're
Speaker 2: not always going to like what they have to say.
Speaker 2: But I think it's no, I'm not good at this either,
Speaker 2: but I think it's really good to try and be
Speaker 2: open winded, try and take what they've told you on board.
Speaker 2: So cheerleaders are great, but I think you also need
Speaker 2: people who are gonna who are going to be able
Speaker 2: to give you that be able to tell you the
Speaker 2: stuff that you don't want to.
Speaker 1: Hear, well, that's a I mean I often get criticized.
Speaker 1: I have been often criticized in my life.
Speaker 3: For being a bit direct, especially I'm probably more direct
Speaker 3: to those people and close to.
Speaker 1: Is there a way that someone like me, who probably
Speaker 1: a bit like your dad's I just say it as
Speaker 1: it is?
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't really have many filters in my system.
Speaker 3: Is there a better way to do it? Or is
Speaker 3: it just just say it as it is? And I
Speaker 3: know you might I might crush someone's ego similar to
Speaker 3: what your dad did with you on your first motivational talk.
Speaker 1: Is that okay?
Speaker 3: Or is it maybe you know Dad and I we
Speaker 3: need to change the way. Is there a midway point
Speaker 3: where we maybe need to change our way of talking
Speaker 3: to people?
Speaker 1: Are you?
Speaker 3: Because you know, at the same time, we don't want
Speaker 3: to crush you. You know, I wouldn't want to crush
Speaker 3: my kids or my partner or whatever. I don't want
Speaker 3: to crush people. Is advisory advise me?
Speaker 2: I think? I think And this might not be right either, Mark,
Speaker 2: but maybe giving them some a bit of direction. So
Speaker 2: if you just say that was shit, you're awful, get out,
Speaker 2: that's probably going to crush someone. But if you say
Speaker 2: I didn't like that because of X, Y and Z,
Speaker 2: here's where I or you know, you could say what,
Speaker 2: you know, what do you think you could have done
Speaker 2: to do it a little bit better? You could put
Speaker 2: it on them to ask, because I think as well,
Speaker 2: sometimes sometimes we might lie to ourselves. We might like
Speaker 2: to think something's good, but I think deep down, you know,
Speaker 2: you do always know if you haven't done a good
Speaker 2: job or if it's not up to scratch as well.
Speaker 2: But you know, just giving people some directions mark of
Speaker 2: what they could try differently or where they could go to.
Speaker 2: Like my dad did after my speech, right, he said,
Speaker 2: go see some other speakers in action, go and get
Speaker 2: some training. You know you've got it. This has got
Speaker 2: to be a lot more polished.
Speaker 3: And I guess to some extent too in your case,
Speaker 3: especially substance over form would be really important because you're know,
Speaker 3: you don't really want to play the pity card, so
Speaker 3: to speak. You know, people clap because you know, we
Speaker 3: feel sorry for career, like you'd rather. You're an intelligent
Speaker 3: person and a trained person, and not only that, persons,
Speaker 3: you've actually you have experienced the trauma, so you actually
Speaker 3: went through the trauma yourself, So you would rather be
Speaker 3: applauded for your substance and content over and above the form.
Speaker 3: And that's a pretty important thing. That would be an
Speaker 3: important message to give to somebody.
Speaker 2: I think, I think so. But I think I think
Speaker 2: if I was, you know, if I was just relying
Speaker 2: on pity, that that probably would have all dried up
Speaker 2: years and years and years ago. Yes, right, because there's
Speaker 2: only short term pity someone for a short term. But
Speaker 2: I think you've got to be able to go beyond that.
Speaker 2: So I think, yes, substance is good. I can't remember
Speaker 2: the other word you used, Mark, You said substances.
Speaker 3: Content, content and substance over form. You know, it's not
Speaker 3: it's not about you know, you know what I feel.
Speaker 1: What it's about?
Speaker 3: What do you leave me with? What do I get
Speaker 3: out of what you just told me, the story you
Speaker 3: told me? What am I getting from it? Like I'm
Speaker 3: like just talking today to get what I'm getting from you?
Speaker 3: Is you know, discipline, structure, beliefs of belief good. You know,
Speaker 3: I'm getting a lot important stuff like a good a
Speaker 3: good support group, but probably beyond that, having people who
Speaker 3: talk to me straight. And I think that that's probably
Speaker 3: all of those things are quite motivational in that they
Speaker 3: sort of give me a direction.
Speaker 1: I mean, and I'm not me.
Speaker 3: I'm talking about me the listener, and I'm one of
Speaker 3: your listeners right now, but me the listener to you.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, I go, I can't sit around
Speaker 3: feeling sorry for myself. I'm going to do something about it.
Speaker 3: And that's what I'm getting from the conversation. And that's
Speaker 3: what i mean by content and substance. Is that what
Speaker 3: you is that what you want to leave people with.
Speaker 2: I hope. So I hope if after you know, listening
Speaker 2: to this chat, Mark, people feel, you know, they feel
Speaker 2: like maybe they can take on that extra project, or
Speaker 2: maybe they can go back to UNI and do extra study.
Speaker 2: I think that's great. I also think if someone listens
Speaker 2: to this conversation and thinks, you know what, there's some
Speaker 2: one in my life that I really love and I
Speaker 2: haven't told them enough, and they pick up their phone
Speaker 2: and they call that person and they let them know
Speaker 2: because I think, you know, I said it a little
Speaker 2: bit earlier, but it's our it's our relationships, our relationships
Speaker 2: with each other, with our spouse, with our friends, with
Speaker 2: our family. I really think that's that is that is
Speaker 2: the most important thing in our life, because if you
Speaker 2: if you take away all of those personal relationships that
Speaker 2: you've got with people, or that you know, that that
Speaker 2: that network of people that you've got, if you take
Speaker 2: all of that away, you're not really left with a
Speaker 2: whole bunch, are you. So I think, you know, maybe
Speaker 2: being a bit vulnerable and not being afraid to tell
Speaker 2: people how much they mean to you or how much
Speaker 2: they love them, because I know, for me, I was
Speaker 2: never good at that before this accident, and I've gotten
Speaker 2: you know, I've gotten so much, so much better at
Speaker 2: letting people know how much they mean to me.
Speaker 3: It's funny like if I sometimes I'd like to sort
Speaker 3: of this sounds like I'm putting things into categories, but
Speaker 3: if I was to the words come to my mind
Speaker 3: when I'm doing interviews like this one, or just generally words.
Speaker 3: The very first word that came into my mind when
Speaker 3: we're first talking about your early years was curiosity and structure.
Speaker 3: But curiosity was a big thing in terms of you know,
Speaker 3: the nerd, the nerd part of all the discussion. But
Speaker 3: what I'm getting out of it now in terms of
Speaker 3: one word is gratefulness versus bitterness, and gratefulness seems like
Speaker 3: to be an overarching thing that's coming out of the discussion,
Speaker 3: even though you haven't used that word yet, But I'm
Speaker 3: getting a sense of gratefulness from you.
Speaker 2: You know what, Mark, if I had had these injuries
Speaker 2: in a developing country, I'd be dead, no question about it.
Speaker 2: And I think I've got all of these, you know,
Speaker 2: all of these great things in my corner. I've got
Speaker 2: this amazing spunking man. I've got these two beautiful children.
Speaker 2: I get to do work every day that I enjoy doing,
Speaker 2: that I find meaningful, that gives my life structure and purpose.
Speaker 2: I can go surfing when I want, you know, I
Speaker 2: can spend time with my friends and family. I am
Speaker 2: genuinely grateful for this life that I live, and I
Speaker 2: think you know I feel I even I feel really
Speaker 2: grateful to the Australian public right because you know, that's
Speaker 2: why you've asked me to be on this interview today, Mark,
Speaker 2: Because people know about me, people know about my story.
Speaker 2: People in Australia have supported me and my journey from
Speaker 2: even though all of those years ago doing my first
Speaker 2: sixty minute segment. You know, I've had nothing but love
Speaker 2: and support from the Australian people, and so I don't
Speaker 2: want to be better because I think, well, what have
Speaker 2: I got to be bitter about? Because you've got all
Speaker 2: of these amazing things, all of these amazing things, but
Speaker 2: all of these things that are working for you and
Speaker 2: not against you.
Speaker 3: Well, what you're doing is you're giving me, as part
Speaker 3: of your audience right now, a great deal of perspective.
Speaker 3: I mean, and I find that every now and then
Speaker 3: we all need a good uppercut. And I can wake
Speaker 3: up this morning feeling like a bit shit because I
Speaker 3: might have something bothering me, and then you're just giving
Speaker 3: me perspective, which is basically me giving myself an uppercut.
Speaker 3: And I think that's important. I think we all need
Speaker 3: to have that. I mean, I really do. I just
Speaker 3: think we just need to get a copper sort of
Speaker 3: a clip every now and then and just think it's
Speaker 3: just sit back for a second, mark. And I think
Speaker 3: our audens needs to do the same thing. So what's
Speaker 3: the future, Toria? What's ahead of you?
Speaker 1: Now? What's ahead of it from being a mom and
Speaker 1: all that other stuff.
Speaker 2: I am on deadline for my next book, which is
Speaker 2: a little bit about the mental lie, a little bit
Speaker 2: of about motherhood. So it's going to be really interesting
Speaker 2: to see how that all turns out. That's due in
Speaker 2: a couple of months, so that's pretty much what I'm
Speaker 2: working on at the moment. And then I've got my
Speaker 2: running program. I've got a group of runners who are
Speaker 2: taking on Queenstown Marathon at the end of the year,
Speaker 2: so i really want to make sure that I'm giving
Speaker 2: them the you know, the support, the being a cheerleader
Speaker 2: for them, but also giving them a bit of a
Speaker 2: stern talking to when I think they need it.
Speaker 3: And your your book. It'll be by sounds of it's
Speaker 3: going to be ready for Christmas? Is that about right?
Speaker 2: No to do this year? Won't It won't come out
Speaker 2: till next year, won't come out till next year.
Speaker 3: It won't come out to next year. So maybe a
Speaker 3: good Mother's Day present or a good present. It's sort
Speaker 3: of in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: I think it's an excellent present in twenty twenty five
Speaker 2: for the women, but also for the men if they
Speaker 2: want to, if they want to read my take on
Speaker 2: it as well, I'll send you a copy. Mark I'm
Speaker 2: to worry about it.
Speaker 3: I was going to ask you if you wouldn't and
Speaker 3: please sign it. Will you say something on the inside
Speaker 3: of the book, because that makes it really valuable if
Speaker 3: it comes from you personally.
Speaker 1: I'd love to I'd love to have something like that Tooria.
Speaker 3: Like I, I've never met you before, I obviously know
Speaker 3: about your story. Not obviously, but I know about your story,
Speaker 3: and I pay attention to these things.
Speaker 1: But I think as an.
Speaker 3: Australian to me, you epitomize in a lot of ways anyway,
Speaker 3: what lots of a sort of dream about a strong woman,
Speaker 3: a strong mother, a great partner, but a person who
Speaker 3: actually sort of doesn't mind openly talking about the virtues
Speaker 3: that sort of keep her going. And as I said earlier,
Speaker 3: things like gratefulness, et cetera. They're things, and most of
Speaker 3: those virtues they're old fashioned, but when we rarely ever talk.
Speaker 1: About them, I really talk about them.
Speaker 3: And I want to thank you for reminding me, and
Speaker 3: I guess probably the balance of our institute and all
Speaker 3: those people who know to reappear reminding us of those
Speaker 3: important things in life outside of Instagram, outside of social media,
Speaker 3: outside of you know, all our anxieties and worries and concerns,
Speaker 3: but reminding us of those important virtues that basically drive
Speaker 3: us in our life. And I've had this whole discussion
Speaker 3: has been motivational and inspirationial to me. I'm so appreciative
Speaker 3: of being able to do podcasts to meet people like yourself,
Speaker 3: like it's a big deal for me, and even at
Speaker 3: sixty eight years of age, it's just the start of
Speaker 3: my life.
Speaker 1: And I thanks for being part of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks so much for having me Mark, I really
Speaker 2: appreciate it.
Speaker 1: So cool, great, a great chat. I loved it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was good. I enjoyed it. Took