Speaker 1: This episode was brought to you by Ozzie wool Comfort.
Speaker 2: Being in this icky, uncomfortable space is unnerving at times,
Speaker 2: and I think we're always defined by an experience, by
Speaker 2: the component of it, at least like our normal life,
Speaker 2: but also we all bring to an experience of what
Speaker 2: is our particular strengths and assets.
Speaker 3: What this trip taught me is that when I am myself,
Speaker 3: there will be people who who love that.
Speaker 4: And who will support me, and who I will give
Speaker 4: back to and that is enough.
Speaker 1: These are the yays of our lives. Busy and happy
Speaker 1: are not the same thing. We too rarely question what
Speaker 1: makes the heart seeing. We work, then we rest, but
Speaker 1: rarely we play and often don't realize there's more than
Speaker 1: one way. So this is a platform to hear and
Speaker 1: explore the stories of those who found lives. They adore
Speaker 1: the good, bad and ugly. The best and worst day
Speaker 1: will bear all the facets of seizing your Yeay. I'm
Speaker 1: Sarah Davidson or Spoonful of Sarah, a lawyer turned fu
Speaker 1: entrepreneur whos wapped the suits and heels to co found
Speaker 1: matcha Maiden and Macha. Milkbar Cza is a series of
Speaker 1: conversations on finding a life you love and exploring the
Speaker 1: self doubt, challenge, joy and fulfillment along the way. Hello,
Speaker 1: lovely neighborhood. So excited to finally have our yeas of
Speaker 1: our lives recap for you from our incredible trip to
Speaker 1: the Northern Territory a few weeks back. You'll hear all
Speaker 1: about it in the episode, although we could have spoken
Speaker 1: for many hours longer about the experience, but to quickly
Speaker 1: give you some background, eight amazing women and two fabulous
Speaker 1: men who were capturing photos and videos spent three days
Speaker 1: hiking fifty five kilometers with twenty two hundred meters of
Speaker 1: elevation across three of the twelve parts of the Larapinta Trail,
Speaker 1: led by Larapinta Culture, the only Aboriginal owned and operated
Speaker 1: touring company in the area. Jungla, the owner and an
Speaker 1: elder in the region, and his grandson Perula, along with
Speaker 1: Nick Fife, their mate, another legend who came to help
Speaker 1: us out, gave us the most eye opening, immersive few
Speaker 1: days camping in the red dirt, walking through the oldest
Speaker 1: land formations in the world. They're over seventy thousand years
Speaker 1: old and sleeping under the shooting stars I sat down
Speaker 1: with now three times Seize the a guest Samantha Gash,
Speaker 1: who organized this fabulous trip under the banner of her
Speaker 1: new trail running and adventure group for women, Her Trails,
Speaker 1: along with her dear friend Joe Nevin, who is now
Speaker 1: one of my dear friends after the drip. To give
Speaker 1: you a little insight into what it was like as
Speaker 1: avid trail runners, these two are also heading back to
Speaker 1: the Larabinter Trail in a few months to run all
Speaker 1: twelve sections covering two hundred and fifty k's in a
Speaker 1: row unassisted, so carrying everything they will need with them
Speaker 1: the whole way.
Speaker 2: Just to give you a.
Speaker 1: Little idea of the powerhouses you're about to hear from.
Speaker 1: They'll also chat about the return of relief run that
Speaker 1: they're both working away on furiously for our Neighborhood Watch section.
Speaker 1: You may remember that my husband Nick and Samantha pulled
Speaker 1: together a global virtual run last year to raise over
Speaker 1: a million dollars for bushfire relief, and it's back again
Speaker 1: this year to support the terrifying challenge faced by India
Speaker 1: at the moment under the pressures of COVID nineteen. Samantha
Speaker 1: just incidentally, as one of the many incredible things she's done,
Speaker 1: has crossed the whole of India on foot, giving it
Speaker 1: a very special place in her heart. And we've set
Speaker 1: up a Yeahborhood team which you can join from anywhere
Speaker 1: to run anytime between the eleventh and thirteenth of June.
Speaker 1: You'll hear more about it soon and why it is
Speaker 1: so important, and I'll pop links in the show notes.
Speaker 1: I'd be so proud to have some of you on
Speaker 1: board with us too. You hear more about that in
Speaker 1: the episode. Anyway, enjoy the cackles and reflections. I hope
Speaker 1: it brings some ya to your week. Hello you gorgeous humans.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for.
Speaker 4: Joining Ah, thanks for having us. This is fun.
Speaker 2: That's all right, Sarah. It's delightful to be back on
Speaker 2: the podcast.
Speaker 4: Guys.
Speaker 1: This is Sammy's third appearance on CZA. Our listeners probably
Speaker 1: know you quite well by now, Sammy, and if you don't,
Speaker 1: you can go back to episode forty seven, right back
Speaker 1: in the early days to hear Sammy's story. But Joe
Speaker 1: is new to the Yahborhood and I'm so so grateful
Speaker 1: to have met you on our recent trip to the
Speaker 1: Red Center. Which is what this episode is all about.
Speaker 1: But before we jump in, Jojo, tell us a bit
Speaker 1: about you.
Speaker 3: Ah, thanks for having me on, Sarah. I'm a what
Speaker 3: am I? I'm a mom of three. I'm a really
Speaker 3: passionate trial runner and ultra runner, which is how I
Speaker 3: met Sammy and eventually led to meeting.
Speaker 4: You as well.
Speaker 3: I also work full time in senior management in the
Speaker 3: not for profit sector, and I'm currently I guess the
Speaker 3: other big piece of my puzzlers, I'm currently studying my
Speaker 3: MBA and leadership, so.
Speaker 4: They're probably the big four things about me.
Speaker 1: Just a few things on the go, like yeah, a
Speaker 1: little easy. Well, as you guys know, the first section
Speaker 1: of Yeas of Our Lives is Quote of the Yave,
Speaker 1: where we discuss a quote that's been meaningful over the
Speaker 1: past week or week or so so, and I thought
Speaker 1: it would be apt to reflect on an Aboriginal proverb
Speaker 1: and one that meant a lot to me, particularly during
Speaker 1: our troop and in the few weeks that have followed
Speaker 1: since then. The proverb is may as well be here
Speaker 1: we are as where we are, And that's all about
Speaker 1: being present, just being where you are when you are,
Speaker 1: and not rushing to the next moment, which is something
Speaker 1: that we were very much forced into by the beautiful,
Speaker 1: beautiful indigenous elders who led us through our trip, who
Speaker 1: explained that there is no concept for time in Aboriginal culture,
Speaker 1: which I loved. So what did you guys think about
Speaker 1: that whole concept and surrendering to having no schedule.
Speaker 2: I kind of loved it, to be honest. I feel
Speaker 2: like I work phrenetically to have pockets of window where
Speaker 2: I can surrender. Unfortunately, sometimes the intensity wraps right up
Speaker 2: before I can surrender, and I often think, what if
Speaker 2: I just balanced out and then maybe it was just
Speaker 2: like at a slightly lower pulsating rate, tire of my time.
Speaker 2: But I actually like the differences between being like intensely
Speaker 2: on structured and strategically focused and thinking ahead to then
Speaker 2: having moments with the pendulum swings and I utterly get
Speaker 2: grounded to present, don't dwell and pass, don't fresh on
Speaker 2: wants to come, and just to accept what is the
Speaker 2: situation in front of me. So no, I loved it
Speaker 2: like I loved not wearing a watch. And I led
Speaker 2: the expedition, you know, so you'd think that I needed
Speaker 2: to know a few more things, But I was like, no,
Speaker 2: now we're here, We're just gonna be in the moment.
Speaker 1: We kept pestering Sammy for information, like in the weeks ahead,
Speaker 1: We're like, Okay, what's the schedule, what parts of the
Speaker 1: trailer we're doing on what day? And what do we need?
Speaker 1: And it was on until we got there and actually
Speaker 1: met flow erupinto Culture and the team that we were like, oh,
Speaker 1: you don't answer any questions really, Like I thought you
Speaker 1: were being annoying Sam But I was like, oh no,
Speaker 1: they're just not giving you any information.
Speaker 2: Oh you have no idea. I spend hours on the
Speaker 2: phone like lining up that trip, and we never talked
Speaker 2: about ructure or itinery. We just talked like. It was
Speaker 2: kind of nice even in those moments in the preliminary
Speaker 2: of that experience to surrender also and kind of go,
Speaker 2: this is going to be different and we need different.
Speaker 2: In fact, like the NT tourism campaign right now is
Speaker 2: sick different, and I thought that embodied what we were
Speaker 2: looking to experience as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, what did you think, Jojo?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I look, I'm a huge fan of trying to
Speaker 3: embed myself in the moment. You know, I'm a yoga teacher.
Speaker 3: I love being present. But how I opened earlier is
Speaker 3: really indicative of my life. I've got a lot of
Speaker 3: balls in the air, and I'm manning the managing schedules,
Speaker 3: but loads of people and I have to work two
Speaker 3: o'clock and I have to work to time. So when
Speaker 3: I take myself out of those situations and like Sammy said,
Speaker 3: can surrender, I experience things twofold, like being forced to
Speaker 3: be present in a moment because you literally don't know
Speaker 3: the time or know what's coming up. It turns the
Speaker 3: volume up on everything you're experiencing because your mind isn't
Speaker 3: flipping about to what's coming next or what just happened before,
Speaker 3: And it turns the volume down on anxiety because I
Speaker 3: think when you're running to a clock, that's such a
Speaker 3: mechanism for your brain to fast forward constantly and worry
Speaker 3: about what's next.
Speaker 4: On the clock.
Speaker 3: But you take the clock away and you really disable
Speaker 3: that mechanism of worry and thinking of what's coming up,
Speaker 3: and so what you're going through is just so much
Speaker 3: more colorful and taste and smell so much richer.
Speaker 4: And I think.
Speaker 3: That's why, Yeah, that experience is felt so deep, because
Speaker 3: you have no choice but to experience so much more
Speaker 3: fully when you're in it.
Speaker 1: That's such a beautiful way to describe it, that it
Speaker 1: turns the volume up on things, because I don't think
Speaker 1: you even realize that your senses are being dulled by
Speaker 1: white noise until you do kind of shut it all
Speaker 1: off and think, oh, I'm actually only half smelling and
Speaker 1: half hearing and half feeling most of the time because
Speaker 1: I'm doing it all at the same time. Soamie, what
Speaker 1: was your original plan out of the adventure? Is that
Speaker 1: what you wanted to create for our soul to get
Speaker 1: sort of eight women who usually don't make that kind
Speaker 1: of space together. How did you come up with the
Speaker 1: idea and what were your expectations versus how it actually unraveled.
Speaker 2: Well, I've been liaising with larak Into Culture, which is
Speaker 2: the guiding company that we worked with when we were
Speaker 2: on the Larapinto Trail. And for those who don't know
Speaker 2: the lark Into Trail, it's just out of Alic Springs
Speaker 2: in the Northern Territory. It's an incredible two hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty kilometer point eight to point B trail amongst the
Speaker 2: red dirt and like an incredible landscape in the heart
Speaker 2: of Australia. But this organization is the only Indigenous owned
Speaker 2: and operated guiding company that also incorporates cultural awareness programming
Speaker 2: into their guiding experiences. And so, I mean, I've been hiking,
Speaker 2: I've been try running for over a decade now, and
Speaker 2: I could have just gone and guided all of you
Speaker 2: out there, but it felt like that we defeat the
Speaker 2: type we could have want anywhere in the world, and
Speaker 2: that would have been we wouldn't connect to where we were.
Speaker 2: We would just be connecting to each other and we
Speaker 2: would be operating in the same frequency in which we
Speaker 2: always do. And so I wanted to really flip the
Speaker 2: switch on everything that was kind of the origins of it.
Speaker 2: But also like I wanted to support an indigenous organization,
Speaker 2: particularly one that had had a really tough go during
Speaker 2: COVID nineteen. I mean, we were the first tour that
Speaker 2: went out with them in eighteen months. I think they
Speaker 2: just renewed their insurances for our trip, and like I
Speaker 2: felt called to create that trip with them in partnership.
Speaker 2: And I'll never forget when I first called Jungler and
Speaker 2: we just had this like hour long conversation. We went
Speaker 2: to all these different directions the very very end of
Speaker 2: the trip is like where did you go to school?
Speaker 2: And I'm like, wow, I went to school in Ballerade
Speaker 2: at Ballarat and Claren College, and then I went to
Speaker 2: blah blah blah and he goes I went to baller
Speaker 2: and Claren College and I was like what from the
Speaker 2: n And then like I only realized in a couple
Speaker 2: of conversations afterwards, he's a part of the Stolen Generation
Speaker 2: and he was sent to Ballarat to live with another
Speaker 2: family and he went to Ballerine Cutting College. Anyway, long
Speaker 2: story short, I feel like we were collegiate buddies and
Speaker 2: we were meant to work together and it was just
Speaker 2: meant to be and we've formed this beautiful friendship out there.
Speaker 2: But if I think of also the group of women
Speaker 2: that I brought out, like all of you are my
Speaker 2: best mates, and a lot of you didn't know each other,
Speaker 2: and so I actually I just wanted to gift us
Speaker 2: and experience in time together and then I didn't have
Speaker 2: any expectations of what it would look like or what
Speaker 2: we would facilitate post. I just wanted to be in it.
Speaker 2: And now it's come out of it as like more people,
Speaker 2: more women need this.
Speaker 1: I think one of the really interesting things in the
Speaker 1: week leading up to it was how many ties people
Speaker 1: would be like, why are you going?
Speaker 3: Like what's it for?
Speaker 1: And I'd be like, I don't really know, Like we
Speaker 1: all just Sam just kind of had this idea and
Speaker 1: we're all so trusting of any experience that you create
Speaker 1: that we were just like, I mean, she just went
Speaker 1: fuck it, let's go, and we all went yeah.
Speaker 4: And yeah, Sam told us too. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's like, you don't realize that you need an experience
Speaker 1: like that until someone kind of facilitates it. And that's
Speaker 1: one of your greatest gifts, Sammy, is that you do
Speaker 1: create these incredible experiences for people and create an incredible
Speaker 1: group for us to experience it with. But yeah, it's
Speaker 1: funny to go into something when we are all as
Speaker 1: busy as we are, but to actually organize to not
Speaker 1: be contactable for that long for something that you don't
Speaker 1: know why you're there, it was actually amazing.
Speaker 2: That was part of my gift, though. My part of
Speaker 2: my gift that I know that I received is all
Speaker 2: of you just said yes and I didn't even tell
Speaker 2: you anything, like it was hartily because I didn't know,
Speaker 2: so I didn't want to give you incorrect information, and
Speaker 2: partially because I just didn't think it mattered. I mean,
Speaker 2: I also think, you know, obviously where we were made
Speaker 2: it so much more profound than what we realized. But
Speaker 2: I also thought we could have been anywhere and had
Speaker 2: a great experience. But it definitely was bigger than what
Speaker 2: I thought it was in terms of how it cellularly
Speaker 2: transformated our experience in that moment, and I think moving beyond,
Speaker 2: but consider can you please tell the story where like
Speaker 2: I was dodging your calls for a while, so.
Speaker 1: I was actually going to bring that up next. So
Speaker 1: basically Sam had this idea in what February, I think
Speaker 1: pretty much, and of course Joe, you'll probably feel the
Speaker 1: same now that you guys are going back to actually
Speaker 1: run the entire Larapinta trail. We only did like a
Speaker 1: small part of it. But when Sam suggests something, particularly
Speaker 1: if there are going to be other amazing women there,
Speaker 1: you just say yes and you figure it out later.
Speaker 1: The problem with me is that the beautiful part of
Speaker 1: our friendship is that usually what Sam suggests is like
Speaker 1: the opposite of what I enjoy and I am good at,
Speaker 1: and that I'm comfortable doing, which is why our friendship
Speaker 1: is so valuable, because you have extended my world so much.
Speaker 1: But that also means that from the moment I said yes,
Speaker 1: I was like fuck, fuck fuck fuck, fuck, Like, what
Speaker 1: is going to be a good enough excuse to get
Speaker 1: out of this? And she knows me so well that
Speaker 1: she just went into my calls. And it's usually the
Speaker 1: other way around, like Sam calls I text, so.
Speaker 2: I don't make it seem hard to get she just
Speaker 2: calls me all dialogue.
Speaker 1: But you, like, I think you knew that, especially in
Speaker 1: the two weeks leading up to it, when I realized
Speaker 1: it wasn't just going out into the Northern Territory, it
Speaker 1: was hiking and camping and no phone signal. I think
Speaker 1: you got the vibe that I was like, Oh, how
Speaker 1: do I.
Speaker 4: Get out of it?
Speaker 2: Even messaged me a couple of days. It was like
Speaker 2: almost like a light bulb switch had happened. And you're like, oh,
Speaker 2: I said yes to this.
Speaker 3: Do you know what it was?
Speaker 1: It was when you said, so, the first day is
Speaker 1: twenty seven kilometers of hiking, so you're gonna need hiking
Speaker 1: boots and gay and I was like, like, I looked
Speaker 1: at what gators were and I was like, where are
Speaker 1: we going that we're gonna need gators? Like I don't
Speaker 1: own those things.
Speaker 2: Everyone else who is a lot more versed with hiking
Speaker 2: and just being outdoors. The instructions that I gave to
Speaker 2: each of you were unique to who you are, and
Speaker 2: that's that beauty of knowing your friends. Joe, I'm like,
Speaker 2: she's good, Like she just needs to buy a hiking
Speaker 2: shirt because she's never had to wear a shirt because
Speaker 2: she just normally wears a similar type or a T shirt.
Speaker 2: But Sarah, Sarah either needs me to give her everything
Speaker 2: or she did which I did, or gave the boots
Speaker 2: and the moxies. And I said to know, like we'd
Speaker 2: organized an uber because we hadn't even seen each other,
Speaker 2: I know, for over a year. We live in the
Speaker 2: same city, although I live up on the hills, so
Speaker 2: I'm kind of had become even more hermitized.
Speaker 1: But the only things that I already owned were things
Speaker 1: from our last experience together in the Simpson and the
Speaker 1: one before that in India. Like that's the only reason
Speaker 1: I own camping gear.
Speaker 2: I know, it's because if you.
Speaker 1: But that's why it was so beautiful that you know,
Speaker 1: I did have that intense, like regret moment of like,
Speaker 1: what the fuck did I say yes too?
Speaker 2: What to get Joe at the airport? Can we touch
Speaker 2: into that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, that's what I was leading into, is that
Speaker 1: I think many of us had a bit of oh
Speaker 1: my God, like, you say yes and it sounds like
Speaker 1: a good idea, but then in the moment of actually
Speaker 1: having to create that space for yourself, particularly if it's uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: you suddenly get like, how can I get about out
Speaker 1: of it? But those are the best experiences, the ones
Speaker 1: that you do have that kind of semi regret before.
Speaker 3: I can relate so much to that that Yeah, see,
Speaker 3: I would run through the bush or hike through the
Speaker 3: bush for hours and days on end. Happily the opposite,
Speaker 3: but get me around a bunch of people that I
Speaker 3: don't know, and I was coming up with every excuse
Speaker 3: under the sun to bail out on that as well.
Speaker 3: I was like, Oh, I think I'm sick. I think
Speaker 3: work's really busy right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm going to be sick on Thursday, I think.
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, I think that moment Sam referring to is
Speaker 3: I was sitting at the gate at the airport knowing
Speaker 3: that all of you were about to arrive and we
Speaker 3: were all about to get on this plane together, and
Speaker 3: I was just looking at where I knew everyone would
Speaker 3: be walking from, and my heart was just racing. And
Speaker 3: Sam was the only person of the six women, seven
Speaker 3: women that would be walking towards me that I knew,
Speaker 3: and I was like, I can't do this. I'm absolutely
Speaker 3: terrified right now, Like am I going to fit in?
Speaker 3: Am I really different? Like this is my story, this
Speaker 3: is theirs. I'm not going to suit this group. And
Speaker 3: it was a disabling feeling and I just had to
Speaker 3: take a really deep breath and think of every self
Speaker 3: help book I've ever read, and I just like said
Speaker 3: to myself, like I am brave, Like I run through
Speaker 3: the bush, I do lots of badass things, and I
Speaker 3: just you know, I can sure as hell hug a
Speaker 3: bunch of women I don't know and throw myself into
Speaker 3: deep end here and honestly, like it was. It sounds
Speaker 3: a bit wanky, but it was transformative for me to
Speaker 3: do that, like as much as it was to travel
Speaker 3: over country. It was, Yeah, that was epic.
Speaker 1: You were amazing, Joe, and it was so interesting to
Speaker 1: go through that experience together coming into it with the
Speaker 1: opposite like discomfort at extreme levels, but for the opposite reasons,
Speaker 1: because being plunked in the middle of a room with
Speaker 1: strangers is like I thrive on that, But being pushed
Speaker 1: to a physical limit and being outside and sleeping under
Speaker 1: the stars and that stuff is like the opposite of
Speaker 1: my comfort zone. It was so interesting to watch us
Speaker 1: both push through that in different ways together and to
Speaker 1: come together at certain times and reflect on like how
Speaker 1: much you embrace and actually really enjoy when you have
Speaker 1: done it and mastered it and stop and think, yeah,
Speaker 1: like yeah, I'm doing it totally.
Speaker 3: And I think for me, like there was that element
Speaker 3: of I have to network for work, and I've been
Speaker 3: a coach myself, and I've been a presenter and run businesses,
Speaker 3: and there's that element of I can do that stuff,
Speaker 3: but I'd always show up with someone else, you know.
Speaker 3: I always mask who I am and I'm presenting. And
Speaker 3: I made this promise to myself that in this experience,
Speaker 3: I was going to show up at me and I
Speaker 3: was just going to be myself, which you all learnt
Speaker 3: really quick is like a filthy mouth, like slightly clogan.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: And I was like, they can just take me as
Speaker 3: I am, and if you know, let's see how that lands.
Speaker 3: And it was like this little self worth experiment for
Speaker 3: me to go, I'm going to own who I am
Speaker 3: this trip and I'm going to be uncomfortable and I
Speaker 3: don't know, like I felt so accepted by this amazing
Speaker 3: group of women for who I was, and I felt
Speaker 3: really seen, and I think that gave me just benefits
Speaker 3: on every level that you know you couldn't. You couldn't
Speaker 3: get that if you tried. There's no therapy session that
Speaker 3: can give you that other than just like getting uncomfortable,
Speaker 3: like Jack, throwing yourself in and owning who you are totally.
Speaker 2: But you know a lot of people in the discomfort
Speaker 2: will try and mask. As you've said before, it's very
Speaker 2: hard to mask I think six days. But by you
Speaker 2: showing up immediately as who you were from the get go,
Speaker 2: I feel definitely had a triggering effect on everyone up
Speaker 2: else to deliver that as well. It was this permissive
Speaker 2: license going, here's someone just being incredibly real. Let's just
Speaker 2: like I remember that all of our shit stinks, and
Speaker 2: being in this icky, uncomfortable space is unnerving at times,
Speaker 2: and I think we're always defined by an experience, by
Speaker 2: the component of it that's least like our normal life.
Speaker 2: But also we all bring to an experience of what
Speaker 2: is our particular strengths and assets, and we also want
Speaker 2: to magnify those in moments as well. So it's this
Speaker 2: beautiful balance of like, we've all got great things, we've
Speaker 2: all got this other baggage and stories about ourselves. What
Speaker 2: if we just show it both? Like what if we
Speaker 2: throw it all out onto the table right now? And
Speaker 2: I recently did a keynote of the Business Chicks event
Speaker 2: and I got off on the stage and someone's like,
Speaker 2: thank you for just being so real, And I was like,
Speaker 2: what an interesting piece of feedback to have, because I mean,
Speaker 2: isn't that just what we're meant to be? Shouldn't we
Speaker 2: just be that? And in fact, like when I am
Speaker 2: saying being real, I think people say that when you
Speaker 2: don't just show the glamorous sight, when you show like
Speaker 2: the in between, the mundane, like the challenge, the juggle,
Speaker 2: which I think makes up the majority of our time
Speaker 2: on this planet, and then like the gloss is like
Speaker 2: the two percent, but sometimes we could magnify to two percent.
Speaker 2: And I just my response to this lady was if
Speaker 2: you liked it by seeing it through me, there's a
Speaker 2: responsibility for you to now show that, to show that
Speaker 2: exact thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's amazing totally.
Speaker 1: I think another really beautiful thing about this trip and
Speaker 1: that we don't often allow ourselves to do, is because
Speaker 1: there was no purpose, Like we weren't actually there for work.
Speaker 1: It meant that the networking wasn't to get anything from
Speaker 1: each other or to like there was no objective even
Speaker 1: of learning, like we knew we would automatically learn things
Speaker 1: and have revelations. But because it wasn't like a retreat
Speaker 1: for relaxing, it wasn't a retreat for working, it wasn't
Speaker 1: a retreat for learning. I don't think you very often
Speaker 1: allow yourself to do stuff that doesn't have a purpose,
Speaker 1: because it's got to be worth your time. But it
Speaker 1: meant that we all just made relationships, not through what
Speaker 1: we could do for each other. And I think that's
Speaker 1: really interesting as well, because usually it's formed through that
Speaker 1: kind of connection. But we were all just there and
Speaker 1: you know, coming back to that quote like may as
Speaker 1: well be here, it was like, well, once we got there,
Speaker 1: we were like, let's just be where we are and
Speaker 1: you know you mentioned you know, all of our shit stinks,
Speaker 1: like you guys actually got to witness that mine does,
Speaker 1: Like oh my gosh.
Speaker 2: I mean you know, movement is an incredible lubrication movement. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And also like the brain connection is like no joke,
Speaker 2: The gastro intestinal tract is incredibly sensitive to strong and
Speaker 2: new emotions as well as movement. So like anxiety, fear, anger,
Speaker 2: nerds can all start to trigger responses in our stomachs. Now,
Speaker 2: I think by this point, Sarah like was copeing fine,
Speaker 2: she just needed to go and do a big old
Speaker 2: pooh Sarah. And initially she says, it's middle of the
Speaker 2: hike and we're on this little summit, and I'm like, mate, like,
Speaker 2: I don't think the spirits are going to appreciate you
Speaker 2: on this particular point you do if you.
Speaker 1: Do that, Sarah, such bad jojo. But I was like, guys,
Speaker 1: I mean, like, it's got like what do I do?
Speaker 1: Like I can't help the spirits will understand it's my
Speaker 1: moment of me.
Speaker 2: You can actually feel in the space when it's like no, no,
Speaker 2: like I've got a hold at this moment totally. But
Speaker 2: then all of a sudden, like it gets to be
Speaker 2: like an hour later, Sarah's like, I'm still holding somehow.
Speaker 2: She just like marches off ahead of everyone in this
Speaker 2: single file, incredibly exposed, no trees, and she just goes up.
Speaker 2: She likes to go up, like the mountain.
Speaker 3: At this point, Sarah, you don't know, but where on
Speaker 3: a hill watching growing go down, go down the hill,
Speaker 3: and you're like marching like you're going onto a display screen.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, And like I could hear the drone
Speaker 1: also going around. I was like, oh my god. But
Speaker 1: I think the most liberating thing about the whole environment
Speaker 1: is when you are living in such close quarters with
Speaker 1: people without your normal stuff, you just get like you
Speaker 1: cannot hide who you are and what your body's doing.
Speaker 1: And it's actually like I didn't even care by that moment,
Speaker 1: because I was like, eh, you know, we're all kind
Speaker 1: of humans. And I think that was just one of
Speaker 1: the coolest things of removing time, removing objectives, removing any
Speaker 1: kind of facade of work you or relationship you, and
Speaker 1: all just being ourselves while we ate together every day,
Speaker 1: and we together every day and like you know, we're
Speaker 1: at the campfire looking at the stars every day and
Speaker 1: reflecting every day. It was just so special.
Speaker 4: Watching the moon rise.
Speaker 3: It was I was like, yeah, I think that was
Speaker 3: the moment that I really let my.
Speaker 4: Watching Sam and who was Hailey.
Speaker 3: Hailey and Sarah. We're out outside our tents watching the
Speaker 3: moon rise and Sam heard me moving inside my tent, goes, Jojo,
Speaker 3: come out, come out and watch the moon rise. And
Speaker 3: I walked out and now standing in arm I put
Speaker 3: my arm around Sam. She put her arm around me, and.
Speaker 4: I went sh and she goes what and they poured.
Speaker 3: I was thinking that I was trying to steal this
Speaker 3: really like significant moment of peaceful time, and I just
Speaker 3: dropped the biggest part.
Speaker 1: I literally thought that I was getting in trouble for
Speaker 1: interrupting the moment, Like I thought you were like shut up.
Speaker 2: Like yeah, the spirits shh.
Speaker 3: And I was like, now I have arrived, like no,
Speaker 3: you know me, you know, like once I've broken the space.
Speaker 2: So it was like the way you were describing before, Sarah,
Speaker 2: like one were just kept coming into my mind and
Speaker 2: it's like primal, You're going back to the root of
Speaker 2: what humankind was kind of like here for besides the
Speaker 2: fact the way we're forunicating with each other. Beside that
Speaker 2: part everything else.
Speaker 1: I mean it was only five days though, I mean,
Speaker 1: if you left us to our own devices, we would
Speaker 1: have figured it out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know, there was lots of tooks of my brains.
Speaker 1: But you know what else was really lovely was that
Speaker 1: we were walking on land. It's like seventy thousand years old.
Speaker 1: It's some of the oldest formations being guided by representatives
Speaker 1: of the oldest culture of the world. And even like
Speaker 1: my body, you two are more used to it. My
Speaker 1: body is not used to walking that many k's a day,
Speaker 1: but just the sort of stillness of just repetitive motion.
Speaker 1: I've just walking. I can't even explain how much your
Speaker 1: brain goes through while you're doing that. We went through
Speaker 1: periods of intense revelation to just like laughter, to just
Speaker 1: dead silence, like a couple of times in the day.
Speaker 1: There were eight people, plus the two guys who were
Speaker 1: there who were awesome, who were videoing and taking photos,
Speaker 1: but also part of the group. None of us talked
Speaker 1: sometimes for hours at a time, and like you never
Speaker 1: get that stillness, but also while your body's moving, and
Speaker 1: I don't know, it was just amazing, Like I don't
Speaker 1: really have words that, like you said, Joe, don't sound
Speaker 1: lanky to describe it.
Speaker 3: But it's like meditation though, Like it's a really cool
Speaker 3: experience where you get to you start chasing thoughts, and
Speaker 3: that magic moment is then when you notice what you're
Speaker 3: doing and you become this kind of external viewer watching
Speaker 3: your brain bounce around filling this space that you so
Speaker 3: rarely have in day to day life, and you're just going, wow,
Speaker 3: this is hilarious or you know, and then or you
Speaker 3: might get onto a really good thought that would happen
Speaker 3: sometimes and it was like delicious and you'd just let
Speaker 3: yourself sink into that while you're hiking and yeah, just
Speaker 3: like munching down on this amazing you know dream you're
Speaker 3: having and you're or like for me, I'm just solving the.
Speaker 4: World's problems, like I'm saying, oh, I could do this
Speaker 4: or I could.
Speaker 3: Do that, you know, And it's like often you come
Speaker 3: up with some of your great ideas in those moments.
Speaker 3: And the opposite is when you hit the hard times
Speaker 3: And Sarah, I don't walk normally. I run a lot,
Speaker 3: so I actually found that physically challenging as well, having
Speaker 3: a head. I'm sure Saantic too, having a heavy pack
Speaker 3: and hiking. My legs were tired and I was ready
Speaker 3: to stop some days. And so then noticing my negative
Speaker 3: self talk and trying to work on that and trying
Speaker 3: to catch that and redirect it and reorient it and
Speaker 3: just neutralize it, you know, was really a great gift
Speaker 3: because that's what we bring back. That's an application we
Speaker 3: use in work and life and love as well. So I,
Speaker 3: you know, that's all stuff you get from silence.
Speaker 1: I was about to say, silence, like it doesn't really
Speaker 1: play a very big role in our day to day
Speaker 1: lives where it maybe should. Maybe one of the things
Speaker 1: that I took back was that obviously, being a podcaster
Speaker 1: and a host, like I talk all the time, and
Speaker 1: then because I like to actualize experiences through talking, that
Speaker 1: I'm talking in my personal life as well. But when
Speaker 1: you allow silence, beautiful things happen, and I think because
Speaker 1: we often feel like we need to fill those silences.
Speaker 1: The other thing that I really loved learning about Indigenous
Speaker 1: culture was that there's a really big concept of it's
Speaker 1: not your story to tell, which we kind of ended
Speaker 1: up laughing about a little bit at the end. But
Speaker 1: you know, if it's not your story. You don't have
Speaker 1: to always be explaining things, and you don't have to
Speaker 1: know everything about everything, and like, I'm sure we all
Speaker 1: got frustrated a few times when we were like, tell
Speaker 1: me about this land, and Perula, who was Jungla the
Speaker 1: elder's grandson, he'd say, I can't. This is not my
Speaker 1: family's land. I can't speak about this, and we're sort
Speaker 1: of like, well, we've come all the way out here
Speaker 1: and I want to know what this land is and
Speaker 1: I want to know the story, so tell me. But
Speaker 1: I like that the discretion of, like, you don't have
Speaker 1: to talk about everything and understand everything was kind of nice.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. I think the way Perula guided us
Speaker 2: was why we were silent. I think if we were
Speaker 2: left to our own devices, we would have gone into
Speaker 2: our default settings of chattering through thinking that's a way
Speaker 2: of connecting. And I think he kind of made us
Speaker 2: reflect on the fact that when all you're doing is talking,
Speaker 2: that's all you're hearing. And so that's why we went
Speaker 2: out with them. Like, I really feel like there were
Speaker 2: so many little life lessons that you may not incorporate
Speaker 2: every element into everyday life, but even recently I've been
Speaker 2: saying either that's that's not my story to tell, or
Speaker 2: if I do say it, I kind of definitely flag
Speaker 2: it by going, I'm going to share this part. I
Speaker 2: think in this context like I have permissioned to share it,
Speaker 2: because sometimes you do need to pass on bits of information,
Speaker 2: but to kind of be aware that the message is
Speaker 2: getting diluted every single time someone passes on a piece
Speaker 2: of that story and making sure that it never gets
Speaker 2: to a point where, like you telling someone else's story,
Speaker 2: is you getting involved in gossip and bitch or negative
Speaker 2: narrative for whatever reason. And I recently went through a
Speaker 2: thing a while ago, and I was like, sometimes people
Speaker 2: don't know the great things that other people do, so
Speaker 2: I might share it, so like, you know, this person
Speaker 2: said this, and I thought that that was really great
Speaker 2: because particularly when I did in the context of this
Speaker 2: person said a really beautiful thing about you the other day.
Speaker 2: They might not have told you, but they told me,
Speaker 2: and I can see how it would make the other
Speaker 2: person feel. And now I'm just in my day to
Speaker 2: day life, I'm like, Okay, so is that mover stepping
Speaker 2: a boundary? Yes? I had good intentions behind it, but
Speaker 2: was that maybe not mine to tell I like the
Speaker 2: thought of it now, Like that's what experiencing other cultures
Speaker 2: is all about. Like every time you go to a
Speaker 2: professional development conference, Like it's not like you're going to
Speaker 2: come out of carbon copy of that particular experience or
Speaker 2: that culture or that set of thinking. But you go, Okay, well,
Speaker 2: what in that works really well for my life? That
Speaker 2: allows me to create my own formula and my own
Speaker 2: set of guidelines, but how I want to live my
Speaker 2: life connected to my values and my integrity. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: so that's what I like. I like being shaken up
Speaker 2: to think differently. And it was so interesting when Perula
Speaker 2: first told us to shut the fuck up without using
Speaker 2: those words, but that's how my internals interpreted it, like
Speaker 2: I was being told off as a school kid. And
Speaker 2: he even did like the mirroring action. He like pointed
Speaker 2: to the eyes, pointed to the heart, and then did
Speaker 2: a zip of the lips, and I did. I gutturally
Speaker 2: felt like, oh I'm naughty. I shouldn't be talking now.
Speaker 2: My inner side felt like I want to defend. I
Speaker 2: need a just and then I was like, sit with
Speaker 2: that uncomfortableness, and that's okay, it's actually freaking okay. To
Speaker 2: be uncomfortable that maybe you said the wrong thing or
Speaker 2: and you can hold space for it. And I went
Speaker 2: on a hiking trip to Tasmania earlier this year and
Speaker 2: I actually do like to hike in silence, particularly when
Speaker 2: I'm in the hurt blocker, and I think a lot
Speaker 2: of people try and wipe away their pain through conversation,
Speaker 2: and whilst conversing is amazing, it's sometimes okay to be
Speaker 2: with it and to like sit with struggle, sit with
Speaker 2: challenging emotions and to not always wipe them away straight away,
Speaker 2: like we're quite capable and that's actually something that builds
Speaker 2: up our resilience to kind of deal with it. And
Speaker 2: so sometimes in that silent moment because we have Tom
Speaker 2: and I hiked, this is like, what do you love
Speaker 2: so much about hiking? And they're asking Aazilian questions and
Speaker 2: I was like, sometimes the silence.
Speaker 1: Just quickly interrupting today's episode to take you back to
Speaker 1: what you now know is my earliest hometown of Warrigal.
Speaker 1: You may have seen our recent years of our lives
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Speaker 3: Everything you're saying remind like it's so yogic, you know.
Speaker 3: The Dalai Lama talks about enlightenment not being sitting on
Speaker 3: a mountaintop completely free of thought with this completely empty mind.
Speaker 3: It's about being able to so constantly notice what your
Speaker 3: mind does and what you do. And when you're talking
Speaker 3: about that, and when you're talking about how you noticed
Speaker 3: that you were angry and you were you know, your
Speaker 3: ego is kind of getting challenged when you felt naughty
Speaker 3: and when you start to reflect in everyday life, Oh,
Speaker 3: was that my story to tell?
Speaker 4: Should I think about that?
Speaker 3: To me, we're just getting so much closer to becoming
Speaker 3: enlightened people, you know, to traveling the earth in an
Speaker 3: enlightened way, which is simply in other words, self awareness,
Speaker 3: you know. And the more we embed ourselves in these
Speaker 3: situations and allow ourselves to experience things in this surrendering way,
Speaker 3: the more enlightened we become, because the more we re
Speaker 3: enter life and just start going, Oh, that kind of
Speaker 3: ties to something I felt on that trip, you know, like,
Speaker 3: what does what does that Behave you do? Am I
Speaker 3: telling that story? Why am I feeling my ego challenged
Speaker 3: by this? And you know it helps us grow in
Speaker 3: so many ways totally.
Speaker 1: I think the quote that I used before, this quote
Speaker 1: of the A obviously was a mindstre by a new
Speaker 1: experience can never go back to its old dimensions. And
Speaker 1: I love that because you really feel your brain actually
Speaker 1: stretching as you see new ways of doing things and
Speaker 1: think about like there's that sort of confronting, discomfort, processing, acceptance,
Speaker 1: surrender process you could see us all going through each
Speaker 1: day at different points. Is there any way that you
Speaker 1: found your mind stretched from this particular experience that you
Speaker 1: will never be able to go back from. Like your
Speaker 1: biggest takeaway of like, wow, I won't be the same
Speaker 1: because of.
Speaker 3: That, mom would be to touch on that when I
Speaker 3: spoke about earlier of really having to sit in that
Speaker 3: uncomfortable place of deeply being myself around people I don't
Speaker 3: know and wanting to get away from that. And I
Speaker 3: have returned with a level of self assurance about owning
Speaker 3: who I am in my circles and trusting that that
Speaker 3: won't be for everybody, and you returning to that adage
Speaker 3: you know, that's not my people, not for them, They're
Speaker 3: not my people, and being okay with that, because what
Speaker 3: this trip taught me is that when I am myself,
Speaker 3: you know there will be people who who love that
Speaker 3: and who will support me and who I will give
Speaker 3: back to and that is enough. And I think I'm
Speaker 3: never going to go backwards on that. I'm going to
Speaker 3: keep challenging. It's not going to be easy for me
Speaker 3: because I've spent a lifetime of not doing that, but
Speaker 3: I think that I'm very committed to showing up in
Speaker 3: my leadership at work, you know, in every environment, when
Speaker 3: I'm presenting, when I'm teaching, when I'm raising my kids
Speaker 3: at PTA meetings, like, I'm going to show up with
Speaker 3: me And I think.
Speaker 1: Yeahs show that's so beautiful, You're so articulate.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Except when I'm dropping the F bomb constantly.
Speaker 3: Face You're welcome, Yeah, what about you, Sammy.
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of juicy stuff out of it.
Speaker 2: And I definitely I actually came out incredibly energized from
Speaker 2: an experience that sometimes people think that you might come
Speaker 2: back exhausted. I didn't feel that way, Like I if
Speaker 2: I hadn't have done that, I don't think i'd be
Speaker 2: working on the projects that I'm working on now. That
Speaker 2: I think because I created space for myself, I could
Speaker 2: start to see what was important, and so if I
Speaker 2: was to distill that into what would I take moving forward?
Speaker 2: Is the importance of crafting space. Yeah, crafting space with
Speaker 2: maybe not a clear objective, crafting space with important people
Speaker 2: on country, in environments and landscapes that make me feel
Speaker 2: something different than what I do in my normal life.
Speaker 2: The power of that, and also just the recognition of like,
Speaker 2: I have an incredible group of women in my life,
Speaker 2: and I think sometimes we silo our friendships to you know,
Speaker 2: like Sarah and I we've known each other for fourteen
Speaker 2: years and we went through university. So I'll preserve and
Speaker 2: protect and keep that relationship just to me. In Sad
Speaker 2: and Joe is my running friend, and Kemmy is my
Speaker 2: speaking friend, and Hailey I do female adventurers stuff with.
Speaker 2: In fact, if all the women in your life come
Speaker 2: from vast different backgrounds walks of life, but they hold
Speaker 2: similar values, bring that shit together.
Speaker 4: Amen.
Speaker 1: Amen?
Speaker 2: Yeah, because now I'm just it's so nice that I
Speaker 2: have like eight of my girlfriends who I adore and love,
Speaker 2: and they all adore and love and call upon and
Speaker 2: love each other. And I think sometimes people can get
Speaker 2: really protective of their relationships, professional or personal, and I
Speaker 2: try not to do that. And this was an embodiment
Speaker 2: of me going like, you know, utilize it. You know,
Speaker 2: no one went in there with commercial objectives or personal
Speaker 2: objectives really, but you know, use Karen for pr like
Speaker 2: go and get training advice from Joe get on Sarah's
Speaker 2: podcast Abundance that Up.
Speaker 3: And I felt that gosh, I felt that I felt
Speaker 3: like I walked away with seven new friends, like I
Speaker 3: really I really did. Like it wasn't like, oh, we're
Speaker 3: on holidays together and you know, have a good life.
Speaker 3: I was like these and I felt that from you, Sammy.
Speaker 3: I felt that openness and it felt fresh, like it's
Speaker 3: like this is this is a thing we need to
Speaker 3: build on as a womanhood. You know this, You know
Speaker 3: there is abundance, There is lots of seats at the table,
Speaker 3: and yeah, I think it's you really got a ball rolling.
Speaker 1: And you can see that from like how many women
Speaker 1: reached out being like how can we do this?
Speaker 2: When can we come?
Speaker 1: And it's so exciting say that her trails is turning
Speaker 1: into something, which kind of leads into the next section
Speaker 1: of yighborhood. Watch really cool things that are happen happening
Speaker 1: out in the neighborhood, three of which are related to you, Sam,
Speaker 1: which is no great surprise really once anyone knows Sam
Speaker 1: that you usually all the cool things in the neighborhood
Speaker 1: are related to you somehow of it.
Speaker 4: So talk us.
Speaker 1: Through a how you know people in the future might
Speaker 1: be able to get involved in these kinds of experiences.
Speaker 1: Be what you two in particular are going back to
Speaker 1: do and see the third incredible thing that you have
Speaker 1: both been working on that we can all get involved
Speaker 1: in in the next couple of weeks.
Speaker 2: I definitely think one of my strengths is corrolling people
Speaker 2: in my life to move in a certain direction. But
Speaker 2: again it's all values driven. You know, like I think
Speaker 2: even a broader level, I think people want to have space,
Speaker 2: they want to have a solution to something, they want
Speaker 2: to have a way to be involved. They just don't
Speaker 2: not always know how to do it. So I guess,
Speaker 2: first one, are we going to be doing more of
Speaker 2: these experiences? Well, as I said, it wasn't like the
Speaker 2: intention to necessarily do that, But afterwards I was like, ah,
Speaker 2: we have got We've like, we've got the most incredible supplies,
Speaker 2: we know, the best accommodations. This has to be experienced
Speaker 2: again for people to create their own formula of how
Speaker 2: this looks, so, you know, like Joe and I do.
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, okay, we'll call the last Opportunity
Speaker 2: in the Sea and it would be August before it
Speaker 2: goes too hot in Laalara, Pintera. So yeah, we're hosting
Speaker 2: another retreat for her Trails, basically the exact same thing,
Speaker 2: you know, two nights at a place called Aramone Romina Homestead,
Speaker 2: which is a six hundred acre property thirty kilometers away
Speaker 2: from Alice, where we'll be sleeping in glamping tents and
Speaker 2: having incredible food and moving our bodies and you know,
Speaker 2: and then sunrise hikes and sunrise you know, sunset hikes
Speaker 2: as well, and then getting on country for three days
Speaker 2: with Larapina Culture and then finishing out the Hilton and
Speaker 2: doing a hot air ballooning. So that's in August. I
Speaker 2: think it's the seventeenth of August, is that right, Joe? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: Joe actually to take time off work because she's co
Speaker 2: facilitating with me.
Speaker 1: And unfortunately, guys, there are actually no places because we're
Speaker 1: all coming back to day.
Speaker 2: I want to preface it because you know, if there
Speaker 2: are people who reach out to her straight away, I
Speaker 2: want to say it's an aspirational trip because you know,
Speaker 2: the price of working with all these different operators there
Speaker 2: is a There is a price, and I definitely didn't
Speaker 2: want to discount working with an indigenous guiding group. And
Speaker 2: you know, our accommodation is beautiful and you're nourished celluarly
Speaker 2: with your food, with your rest, with the you know,
Speaker 2: the experiences that you have. The fee for the seven
Speaker 2: days is seven thousand dollars, and I want to say
Speaker 2: that upfront because I just want to put it out
Speaker 2: there and it is an investment in not just you,
Speaker 2: It's an investment in the connections that you're going to
Speaker 2: make the people that will come out in your lives
Speaker 2: and also just the opportunities that will flow from it.
Speaker 2: So it's like the MBA of adventure.
Speaker 4: Why didn't we put that on the flyer?
Speaker 2: I like, well, yeah, I mean I just made it
Speaker 2: up then, But I have because like this Her Trails,
Speaker 2: you organization that you know you've been speaking about Sarah,
Speaker 2: which this retreat is run out of. I really have
Speaker 2: been feeling that three tenants out of Her Trails is
Speaker 2: allowing women to feel opportunity where they can be self reliant,
Speaker 2: develop and harness their existing resilience and building from it,
Speaker 2: and then also finding the lightness, which is where like
Speaker 2: that joy is sreum where I feel like you've been
Speaker 2: so incredible in my life, are reminding like joy has
Speaker 2: to underpin every single thing that you do in order
Speaker 2: for us to not walk away at the end of
Speaker 2: our days on this planet and go. I just didn't
Speaker 2: allow myself to be happy, which is the fifth common
Speaker 2: regret that people have on their deathbed, written by a
Speaker 2: book of Bronnie Ware, the Five Common Regrets of the dying.
Speaker 2: Who wants her to speak the other day and I
Speaker 2: adore that woman and like the you know her story
Speaker 2: that she told through that book. But the first regret
Speaker 2: was I wish I didn't let other people basically determine
Speaker 2: how I would my life. And then the fifth one, yay,
Speaker 2: whish I let myself be happier. And so so often
Speaker 2: I'm like, all these things are based on choice, Like
Speaker 2: do I choose to have this experience? Do I choose
Speaker 2: to craft time for myself? Do I choose to see
Speaker 2: the lightness in this? It's your choice. Everything that we do,
Speaker 2: and particularly in the privileged lives that we live in here,
Speaker 2: we can definitely say that. So if anyone is interested
Speaker 2: in doing this treat, obviously short turn around time, but
Speaker 2: you will be nourished on every level. And we have
Speaker 2: probably the coolest swag that you're want to come out
Speaker 2: of this troop. But I don't even tell you that
Speaker 2: because it's a.
Speaker 1: Surprise, because you don't need to know everything in advance.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we've already had a bunch of women who've signed
Speaker 2: up for it. There's a maximum ten on it, so
Speaker 2: it's like it's small and it's intimate, very one on one.
Speaker 2: You know, we co create the experience in the moment
Speaker 2: as well, so the women on, like Erica Kramer from
Speaker 2: you know, the Confidence Queen Tina Towers. I just want
Speaker 2: to say her name twenty times, Tina Towers, Tina Towers her,
Speaker 2: He's amazing be a singer. Yeah, Oh my gosh, I
Speaker 2: just want to go Tinternitya Towers.
Speaker 4: Don't do that. I do that, Okay.
Speaker 2: I saw her face looking I'm like, oh, okay, this
Speaker 2: is one of those moments of being judge. But I'm
Speaker 2: going to keep rolling with it.
Speaker 4: That's true love.
Speaker 2: But you know, coming out of that, I was just
Speaker 2: you know, a bit of context to Joe's and my friendship,
Speaker 2: telling a part of her story to.
Speaker 4: Tell Sam stop, I'm giving it to you.
Speaker 2: But that's not true. But years ago, Joe created an
Speaker 2: organization called Summit Sisters, and I was close friend to
Speaker 2: Joe back in the day when she did that, but
Speaker 2: it closed down for whatever reason and Joe never spoke
Speaker 2: about it again, and so I when I was creating
Speaker 2: her trails, I kind of totally forgot that so much
Speaker 2: sisters that had ever been in existence until as I'm
Speaker 2: like crafting the project and she goes, I've got all
Speaker 2: this material, and I'm like, why do you have all
Speaker 2: this material, like why have you written documents and documents
Speaker 2: and documents you know, summut sisters, And I'm like, oh
Speaker 2: my gosh, there are people in your close community that
Speaker 2: offer so much more depth of resource and wisdom. You
Speaker 2: don't have to reinvent the wheel. Like we can stand
Speaker 2: on the shoulders of giants, and our giants are our
Speaker 2: friends and our people that we choose to be aligned with. Uh,
Speaker 2: and we cut time dramatically and like get shit done.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, which both of you have been doing as well
Speaker 1: with the experience at kind of the other end of
Speaker 1: the spectrum. So one is quite intimate and curated, and
Speaker 1: the next one is like as many people around the
Speaker 1: world as we can get on board, talk us through that.
Speaker 2: Hit it, Joe, you know what we're talking about.
Speaker 3: Okay, so this is really I feel like Sam should
Speaker 3: be talking to this.
Speaker 4: So I'll briefly introduce Sam, but let me introduce Sam,
Speaker 4: like she needs that.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So late last year, if anyone was under a rock,
Speaker 3: Sam and Nick Davidson, who I think you know, Sarah,
Speaker 3: I might.
Speaker 1: Have met him before.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they founded the relief run Like in it felt
Speaker 3: like thirty seconds to rush to the aid of the
Speaker 3: Australian bushfire victims who were really struggling and raised one
Speaker 3: point one something million dollars to the astrone Red Cross
Speaker 3: bush Fire Appeal. And then obviously Sam has huge ties
Speaker 3: in year after her run India project and has always
Speaker 3: had her heart there ever since. I think you've been
Speaker 3: there like six times, Sammy, and so we're all watching
Speaker 3: India really suffer at the moment, like in a way
Speaker 3: that is quite I don't have language for it. All
Speaker 3: I do is cry when I see it, and it's
Speaker 3: and I know Sam and I have been in tears
Speaker 3: looking at stuff together recently. It's genuinely heartbreaking. And so
Speaker 3: Sam's just called it and gone, we're bringing back the
Speaker 3: relief runt. And she called me and said I want
Speaker 3: to do this.
Speaker 4: I need help.
Speaker 3: And so I called my people and said, Sam wants
Speaker 3: to do this, she needs help. And we've pulled together
Speaker 3: a cracking little team and yeah, I'll hand over to you, Sammy.
Speaker 2: Oh. I mean, this is why we're in partnership, and
Speaker 2: this is where an example of like together we can
Speaker 2: tell the story because we all have different elements that
Speaker 2: bring it together. And I think India is in the
Speaker 2: groups of just a crisis that they can't overcome on
Speaker 2: its own. And that's not kind of being this white
Speaker 2: savior complex. It's actually like a community is going through
Speaker 2: significant suffering right now, and Australia and particularly a lot
Speaker 2: of other countries in the world are not in that
Speaker 2: depth of crisis, and we can all them support to
Speaker 2: each other, you know what we're seeing on the media,
Speaker 2: Like I feel like, if you're not paying attention, you
Speaker 2: won't even know. And probably all you're hearing about is
Speaker 2: the you know, Australian who are in India and need
Speaker 2: to get home, which obviously is an issue, but what
Speaker 2: about the people who can't get out, who are caught
Speaker 2: in that situation day in, day out, And so like
Speaker 2: for anyone who's kind of like data oriented. They have
Speaker 2: officially listed that over twenty six million cases of COVID
Speaker 2: i've been recorded in India, which is the more than
Speaker 2: the population of Australia, and four thousand people minimum have
Speaker 2: died every single day over the past three weeks. And
Speaker 2: it's said to be a gross underestimate. And there's a
Speaker 2: whole lot of reasons why that's a gross underestimate, from
Speaker 2: the fact that they don't have COVID testing. In the
Speaker 2: rural communities, they don't have hospitals, they don't have facilities,
Speaker 2: people are on the census. There's so many reasons why
Speaker 2: that's not right. We're also going to have a whole
Speaker 2: generation of children that are orphaned, and it's not just
Speaker 2: the elderly like it was in Australia. You know, I
Speaker 2: expect to a friend today who's in an Australian Indian.
Speaker 2: She was born in India and she said, in the
Speaker 2: last month four of her family members have died in
Speaker 2: India and two of them are in their fifties. When
Speaker 2: the resources medically are already stretched across the border in India,
Speaker 2: but even far more stretched in rural communities when something
Speaker 2: like this happens, like they just can't cope. It hurts
Speaker 2: my heart that we're not seeing this more. Because when
Speaker 2: Australia was going through a crisis, and it was of
Speaker 2: course the Bushbye crisis was huge, and not to compare
Speaker 2: the two, but it was all over the news, not
Speaker 2: just in Australia but everywhere. Like we had so many
Speaker 2: Americans who came on board to the relief front because
Speaker 2: their New Cycle twenty four seven was the Australian bushfire crisis.
Speaker 2: We're not seeing that here. And like my question too,
Speaker 2: and anyone in media is listening to this, why is that?
Speaker 2: Why can one community have sorry, I'm getting my soapbox
Speaker 2: like in one community, like we hear I'm take it
Speaker 2: a bit lighters the age, No, but like, why is that?
Speaker 2: Are we to sensitized because we need to to be
Speaker 2: able to cope with the fact that it's so unfair
Speaker 2: what's happening? Or did we see so many like poverty
Speaker 2: stricken photos of Indian children when we were younger through
Speaker 2: a lot of you know, child sponsorship campaigns that to
Speaker 2: cope with those images, we just kind of say, oh,
Speaker 2: that's what happens in India and it's too big a
Speaker 2: problem and it's not my problem. But I'll put it
Speaker 2: forward to people that India accounts for one six of
Speaker 2: the world's population. And if you're not getting some invoices
Speaker 2: paid right now, I'll tell you probably because the teams
Speaker 2: are in India. We are so inextricably linked to India,
Speaker 2: if not professionally, definitely personally. And so whether you jump
Speaker 2: on board with a relief front, I just which I
Speaker 2: would love you to do think in your life who
Speaker 2: may be connected to India, and if they're based in India,
Speaker 2: reach out to them, because there's nothing worse when you
Speaker 2: feel like you're going through crisis and overwhelmed both personally
Speaker 2: and medically economically, to feel alone.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 3: I don't know a more apt way of saying, but
Speaker 3: for the grace of God, go I in this. You know,
Speaker 3: we are so fortunate to be where we are and
Speaker 3: to be born into the place that we are born into.
Speaker 3: These people did nothing to deserve what they're going through,
Speaker 3: and there's nothing about us that's better than them, you know,
Speaker 3: like that could be them, and if we were, then
Speaker 3: we would expect and pray and hope that someone would
Speaker 3: come to our aid. And I really think COVID's taught
Speaker 3: us one thing. It's that, you know, we are really
Speaker 3: one global family. We've got all these ridiculous borders that
Speaker 3: we put up in our world and say here's the line,
Speaker 3: this is ours, this is yours, But we are one
Speaker 3: human kind. And I know it sounds cliche, but I
Speaker 3: think COVID's taught us that more than anything. And we
Speaker 3: really do need to stop turning to the media for
Speaker 3: what matters most, and I feel like we've got a
Speaker 3: responsibility to educate ourselves on that. And we all put
Speaker 3: blinkers on, and I'm so guilty of this as well,
Speaker 3: of just looking at what's directly in front of us
Speaker 3: as we all over schedule and put one foot in
Speaker 3: front of the other. And so a big ask here
Speaker 3: is just to take the blinkers off, look at this
Speaker 3: Like it's hard to look at but it's the least
Speaker 3: we can do is to look at it and then
Speaker 3: think like, how can I help this in one way?
Speaker 3: Because it is those microactions for mass change, and this
Speaker 3: is going to be the only way this gets done.
Speaker 1: And I think that is so important, the microactions thing,
Speaker 1: because what it can be, really what can be a
Speaker 1: big obstacle to people actually doing something. I think Relief
Speaker 1: Run last year showed all of us how willing people
Speaker 1: are to do something to help. It's just that often
Speaker 1: they're so overwhelmed about which vehicle is going to be
Speaker 1: the right way to do it. It either is like
Speaker 1: if my donation isn't massive, it's not going to have
Speaker 1: an impact, or who do donate to or whe's it
Speaker 1: going to go and all those kinds of things, And
Speaker 1: I think Relief Run made it really simple. It makes
Speaker 1: it really simple to jump on board and do what
Speaker 1: you can with what you have. Where you are, anywhere
Speaker 1: in the world. You can go for a run, you
Speaker 1: can go for a walk like it's just it really
Speaker 1: simplifies something that's really overwhelming. But the willingness I think
Speaker 1: is there much more than you would expect. It's just
Speaker 1: giving people a way to show that. And so my
Speaker 1: recommendation for this week is sign up, sign up. The
Speaker 1: website is live. It's the longer weeken so the eleventh
Speaker 1: to the thirteenth of June, so a couple of weeks away,
Speaker 1: and there is really no excuse not to because you
Speaker 1: don't have to be in a particular place, like explain
Speaker 1: the actual logistics of it, Sammy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this time we've added a few more flavors to
Speaker 2: the offering. We have a three K kids run, we
Speaker 2: have a five K, ten K and twenty one point
Speaker 2: one kilometer, and then you can also be about ass
Speaker 2: and do what we call the trifecta, which is Joe's Inclusion.
Speaker 3: Which is just for Joe, just for Joe.
Speaker 2: You can do the five, ten and twenty one kilometer
Speaker 2: over the entire week nd, and that's the trifecta, and
Speaker 2: that's a pretty amazing challenge to kind of get that
Speaker 2: all in over the weekend. But as Sarah said, anywhere, anytime,
Speaker 2: and what made this so big last time is that
Speaker 2: a lot of group runs happened, and so like people said, Okay,
Speaker 2: how I'm going to meet you at Saturday AM at
Speaker 2: Albert Park ten am. Let's go and do a half
Speaker 2: marathon or a ten k, and then they shed it
Speaker 2: with their communities and more and more, and we had
Speaker 2: community events all over the world and we've definitely had
Speaker 2: a lot of teams set up and we do that
Speaker 2: through the back end and then people can align their
Speaker 2: individual registration to that team in a drop down menu
Speaker 2: and it allows you then once you get the results,
Speaker 2: to kind of go, okay, well where's the CZA team
Speaker 2: And you can actually go the c'sa community collectively did
Speaker 2: X amount of kilometers and we raise X amount of dollars,
Speaker 2: like that's what our communities like impact was, And then
Speaker 2: we can also give you the data of like, so
Speaker 2: x amount of dollars, that's how far it goes into
Speaker 2: this circumstance, so it's fifty dollars. He pays a registration
Speaker 2: fee and then the relief front gives it as all
Speaker 2: of it, all of it to a donation to World
Speaker 2: Visioned Australia's India COVID nineteen a PL. And because I
Speaker 2: have run across India and worked in partnership with World Vision,
Speaker 2: I think I'm in a position to say, hand on
Speaker 2: hard that money goes to the people on the ground.
Speaker 2: You know, world Vision have had one of the longest
Speaker 2: standing imprints within India and working with the community. In fact,
Speaker 2: when they fund a community, they stay there typically twenty years,
Speaker 2: and at the beginning, like they're heavily involved and they
Speaker 2: hire staff members from their area, they train them, they
Speaker 2: skill them. By the end of the twenty year cycle,
Speaker 2: like the community is completely running it, calling all the shots,
Speaker 2: and it might just be like they get, you know,
Speaker 2: the financial contribution and a little bit of guidance or
Speaker 2: expertise where they need it, and then they run it
Speaker 2: on their own, so they're there for the long haul,
Speaker 2: not just in these moments of crisis. I've spoken to
Speaker 2: a lot of my friends who work for World Vision
Speaker 2: India on the ground, and that's what's also like I'm
Speaker 2: holding onto too because they're sick or their family members
Speaker 2: are sick, and they're still working, like trying to do
Speaker 2: something for their broader community. You know, it's a lot,
Speaker 2: but I can also say, like fifty dollars goes such
Speaker 2: a long way in these communities. If anyone has a
Speaker 2: corporate organization that wants to get on board, because we're
Speaker 2: a nimble, small team, we can facilitate for you to
Speaker 2: make it a tax seductible donation. We'll set up a
Speaker 2: promo code in the back end that allows you to
Speaker 2: then register your individual participants. It might work for the
Speaker 2: corporate group. So you know, quantas smart wanting know a
Speaker 2: in Z you know George Bank.
Speaker 1: I don't want to name names, but I'm going to.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm to name names, and I think we should
Speaker 2: applaud businesses that move really quickly because often bureaucracy gets
Speaker 2: in the way of swift movement. AI Australia has like
Speaker 2: totally just dominated this they I sent the CEO, Damon Damien,
Speaker 2: a text message at seven or eight pm on a
Speaker 2: Friday night, going, hey, I'm going to create the relief run.
Speaker 2: I know you've got team members in India, no pressure,
Speaker 2: but let me know if you want any affiliation. I
Speaker 2: got a text message at seven am on Saturday morning
Speaker 2: and he's like, we're in let's chat, and so off
Speaker 2: the weekend. We chatted on the Monday morning. He's like,
Speaker 2: I've just got got you to have a meeting with
Speaker 2: a few people, and I'm eating my bolonnaise over like
Speaker 2: a zoom session. All of sudden realized it's like the
Speaker 2: heads of all like the countries. I'm like, hey, Bolinnai
Speaker 2: Bolonne is sitting away and they were just like, okay,
Speaker 2: what can we do? Like I think careers gone on
Speaker 2: board Samsung. I think like they might have got their
Speaker 2: global ambassador on board, mister Beckham. But we'll see. Mic
Speaker 2: Drop may have been writing some cooking notes to him
Speaker 2: the other night, wasn't.
Speaker 4: It's not my story to tell, So it's.
Speaker 2: It's total by the long story short, like we all
Speaker 2: can play a little part, and it's also really fun
Speaker 2: to move together. It's actually you'll benefit from going out
Speaker 2: for a five k run on a Saturday knowing that
Speaker 2: it's going to a good place and you're a part
Speaker 2: of something that's bigger than yourself. So get on board
Speaker 2: and listen.
Speaker 1: You've become a singer this episode.
Speaker 2: I know, I just wouldn't to tell me up again.
Speaker 2: It kind of feels nice.
Speaker 4: Can't be good at everything?
Speaker 1: Girl?
Speaker 2: Do you know that I was the leader of the
Speaker 2: sopranos and I was at high school. It wasn't a
Speaker 2: year level of forty nine, so they might have been
Speaker 2: like scraping at the barrel.
Speaker 1: Oh well, you guys are absolutely amazing. Thank you so
Speaker 1: so much for joining and sharing so much wisdom and
Speaker 1: laughter and joy and everyone in the neighborhood. It would
Speaker 1: just be so wonderful if you could rally around relief
Speaker 1: run and show your support and also have an amazing
Speaker 1: time like who you meet such great people. Last year
Speaker 1: we had so so many new friends come and join
Speaker 1: at the Lake. And we'll include details across our socials
Speaker 1: of how you can get involved in some of the
Speaker 1: community runs that you can maybe tack onto as well.
Speaker 2: I can already tell you one because even though I
Speaker 2: didn't ask for permission, I credit SEZ THEA as a
Speaker 2: group that you can find up hearing this through the podcast.
Speaker 2: Feel free to sign up through to SEEZ the A.
Speaker 4: Yeah you're right, I did it. You're a group.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, thing. You just do what we can and
Speaker 2: have a lot of fun, like it's just such a
Speaker 2: nice excuse to see people amazing.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, my loves, we'll chat soon.
Speaker 4: Thanks for having us.
Speaker 1: I'm actually quite surprised that we fitted that into an hour,
Speaker 1: even though it was meant to be half an hour.
Speaker 1: We could have gone for days if we've been able to.
Speaker 1: Maybe lucky for you guys that we didn't. Such incredible women.
Speaker 1: I feel so lucky to call them friends. And I'm
Speaker 1: sure you can imagine how amazing the other five women
Speaker 1: on our trip were. I mean, we barely touched on
Speaker 1: them for all our guest bagging. But you'll actually hear
Speaker 1: from a few of them as well in the coming
Speaker 1: One of them you've already heard from Keminik Fapil, who's
Speaker 1: also been a guest before. Please do consider registering for
Speaker 1: Relief Run. You can walk, run, or even do nothing
Speaker 1: at all with us on the weekend of the eleventh
Speaker 1: to thirteenth of June, but your registration alone can make
Speaker 1: such a huge impact, and I've popped some practical information
Speaker 1: breaking down what that fifty dollars can do in the
Speaker 1: show notes along with the registration link. We'll be doing
Speaker 1: a community run in person in Melbourne again like we
Speaker 1: did last year, that I would love to see some
Speaker 1: of you at and we'll share in the Facebook group
Speaker 1: when details are finalized. In the meantime, I hope you're
Speaker 1: having a wonderful week and are seizing your Yay