We'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which this podcast was produced, the Galligall people of the orination. We pay our respects to Elda's past and present.
It's twenty twenty two and we're lakeside in remote Tasmania. Gina Chick is lying by the fire. She's just lit. She's one of ten contestants out here for the first Australian version of reality TV show Alone. The goal is to survive and stay out here as long as possible. This is no easy feat. The air is ice cold, the ground is soaking wet. Gina's been here for months and she could happily stay out here forever, but this
night is tough. It's her late daughter's birthday. Blaze was just three years old when she lost her battle with cancer. Gina breaks down, crying and calling out for her baby girl. It's a scene that will break the hearts of millions watching I'm at Middleton and this is Headgame today. What audiences didn't get to see and how Gina Chick is
scaling an endless wall of grief. Gina Chick, I am super excited to speak with you because talk about the epitome of free spirit of you know, psychological resilience, physical fortitude, you possess all of that. Take me back to your childhood and who Gina Chick is and how she grew up and because what fascinates me about your story is you've always been this free spirited individual that's sort of a you know, been super connected with mother Nature, been
super grounded with the planet and with yourself. But take me back to your childhood and your upbringing and what life was like as a child.
Well, first of all, thank you so much for that wonderful introduction. Yeah, and you're right, I have always been what you would call a free spirit. Although it's always the way when you're a kid, isn't it that you don't know any different. It's just like, well, that's just the way things are. And for me, I grew up in a family that really was quite unconventional. We spent
a lot of time outdoors. My parents are both teachers, and so that just meant we had all of our weekends and our school holidays together, and they didn't have much money, so we would go on epic hikes and bushwalks and camping and adventures with you know, my dad would get a daggy little boat with they could be go put put, but we just go out on adventures
in it. Or he'd make water skis that were so heavy you'd had to like drag them down to the beach and then try and pull us up on this crazy little boat.
Or you'd have to survive by trying not to drown.
Well, actually, yeah, I mean there kind of was a bit of that in my family. There was absolutely this attitude, I think because my father had three daughters and he just grew us up like boys. We never had this idea of boys can do this or girls can do that. We just had adventures pretty much NonStop, and some of them were a little hair raising, and some of them are quite dangerous. And the attitude that I ended up with is like, there's no bones broken, are there Nope?
And if ill out broken, are they sticking out? Okay? No, you can probably walk on that ben good to go. Yeah. And I think also I've always had this, I guess resilience when it comes to physical discomfort, and I think I got born with that. So whenever I would be cold or hungry or things would just go a bit pair shaped on an adventure. And I think that probably came also from my dad.
I know what you mean, because you sort of feel like that's where the journey starts. Well, that's where the challenge starts. Is like, well, I'm tired, I'm hungry, I'm suffering. Well, guess what I'm learning about myself. This is actually really exciting and I'm going to push myself even further.
Also, I think that you know, if you look back at your life, you don't really remember the bits where you're comfortable. You remember the things where you're uncomfortable, and at the time it's kind of miserable and horrible. But if you have one of those adventures with friends where you're all just gutting it through, you're kind of arguing, and somehow you get through, and then on the other side, you've made it because the story that is an actual
like a marker for your friendship, for your life. It becomes almost like a rite of passage.
Yeah, they're the memories, right, yeah, Yeah, And.
It's like that was the adventure. And humans don't grow when we're comfortable.
There's no growthing comfort. I always say, yeah, And.
To me, that comes from the wisdom in our hunt to gather at DNA because for hunter gatherers it's like you don't want to waste the calorie. So things are comfy, is you know, you sit back and go, okay, I'm cruising now. And it just means that we're actually designed not to grow when we're comfortable. We grow when we're uncomfortable. But we live in a culture that papologizes discomfort.
I knew I was going to get on with you, Gina. I knew I was going to get on with you. I love you already. I love you already. I want to jump down the screen and then sit by you and have this conversation, but unfortunately I can't. But it's amazing. It's amazing. So you went throughout your whole childhood like this, and your siblings did they go along this journey with you?
Absolutely? We were and are a very tight family unit. And that meant because again, we didn't really have much choice. It was like, all right, well we're going out this weekend. There wasn't really the option of like, actually I'm going to stay at home. No, everybody, we're all going out together and so and because we would do things like you remember those old tents, the a frame tents before we have the new be bloody Yeah, absolutely, idea old
a frame. You put the poles in and then the first wind that comes along it's proper bends all the poles and you end up with the tent landing on top of you.
That was, Oh, you've got the poles mixed up. They're in the wrong in the wrong side of the tent. The tent sort of looks like a tent and that's good enough. Where made do Let's let's nail it down so it doesn't move. Then all of a sudden it's gone.
Yeah, and then it's off. So yeah. So my sisters and I we all went through it all together and that was just a part of life for us. So I felt at the time, like I said, you don't know any different. So for me, that was just normal. It was only when I got older that I realized that I had been extraordinary childhood.
Yeah, it's fascinating when you say that, because it's so true. You know, you are a product of your environment and the people around you. And when did you start realizing that, you know that this wasn't actually classed as the norm, and when did you start to realize all, wow, actually I'm probably a small percentage here that's been through this.
Basically at school, I mean, school is a great leveler, and I went to, you know, a very standard public school. It wasn't any you know, there was no posh in my world. It was very much a coastal, little ossy seaside town and there was basically surfers and bogans and that's about as posha as it got. So it was real melting pot. And I learned pretty quickly at school
that everyone didn't have the child that I had. But every day I would come home to this part advice and I would come home to this incredible sort of family of adventures. It meant that I really had the school life and then I had the home life. And I think that that home life really did plant the seeds of adventure. And I don't think there was ever going to be an option where I wasn't out pushing the boundaries of things, because I think it's actually in my makeup.
Yeah, it was this. It was the moment you left it, left the room you were, you were there, thrown into this life of an adventure. I love that pretty much. And so what did you want to do?
You know?
When we saw of get to that stage of people asking the question what do you want to do? You know, who do you want to become? And it's sort of forced upon us to make a decision, you know there and then how did that work out for you?
I guess there were a few options, and most of the things that I wanted to do were either to do with being outside or there were to do with writing. I've been writing since I remember, and it was only much later, I think, in my very early twenties, that I discovered that my grandmother was an incredible Australian author and writer, and that writing is actually in my and I didn't know that when I was a kid. But I have been writing the whole time, and I definitely
wanted to be a writer. That was that was always part of the plan, but also the plan. You know what, You're like me, you're a kid, You're like, well, I'm going to be this, and then I'm going to be that, and I'm going to be that, and then I'm going to do all of that at all, and then I'm going to sail around the world and I'm going to new lands that haven't been found yet, and I'm going to name animals that haven't been discovered yet and all of that. I was devastated actually to find out that
everything already had been named on the map. So I remember there was a moment of going, what do you mean I can't go and discover the lost world?
Yeah, find a new island? Or do you know what I think you're think it's out there? Gena, I don't think that we have I think if you go, we should go. We should go on a on a on a dual search. I'm sure we're fine.
Something I reckon, So I think I thought it big.
I love what you say about you know, writing is in our DNA, because we we're constantly writing our own story just by going on these adventures. You know, we're not physically they're writing them down, but we're writing them in our head. We're writing them in our memories, we're writing them in our you know, in our DNA, and all it takes for them is just to transfer that
onto a pen and paper. But you you've had this super sort of adventures as a child into your teen years and then then you you meet a fine gentleman along the way and you you you you feel pregnant. Is that correct.
So I met Lee at a primitive skills in New Jersey called Tom Brown Junior's Track of School, like that was just the biggest adventure ever. And met this kind of cockney cocky cockney lad who followed me home. So I kept it.
There you go, You're like, I'm having you. Thanks you very much. Listen, my tracking skills and my and my survival skills have come in handy your mine. I've caught you.
Yeah, well I think we caught each other actually, And then but then yes, then I I got pregnant and four days after I found out I was pregnant, I found out I had breast cancer, which was a bit of a shock.
And I went on this huge journey of healing and slobby and ended up having my daughter.
So when you when you fell pregnant four days later you got diagnosed with breast cancer, God, that must have been not only a shock to you, to yourself, but all so really detrimental to your daughter. You know, did you did you go through treatment? Were you was there moments that you were told that you couldn't have have the baby? You know? Just just take me back to to that period if you can.
I was advised because it was a cancer that set on hormones, and pregnancy has lots of those, and I was told that I basically had to terminate the pregnancy or I would die. And I threaded a needle with a very small hole, with a very fine piece of thread.
I found that, you know, I managed to stitch myself through that whole experience and brought together tools that I'd assembled my whole life to be able to go through that experience, and I guess not be broken by it, you know, constantly saying well, what is the what is the thing that I can do right now? I can't think about tomorrow, next week, or next year or any of that, but right now is where I can take responsibility.
This is the information that I have. And as a as I was completely present in that so that in every moment I could make that choice, just that choice, just that choice. So I managed to, yeah, find my way through and.
Small commitments at a time, right like with anything in life, Like you said, you know that time, that time is just adding all of those up. And it must have been incredibly sort of difficult to ignore such sort of you know, medical advice. But what was it like, you know, knowing this information and then giving birth to Blaze.
Well, I mean birth, birth is a doorway, and birth is a death, and anyone who has birth knows this. The person that we are before we birth is they die in the process of birth. You know. It's like a new creature come into the world and we leave ourselves behind in the process, and a you us has to come in to touch that creature. And so for me, I was so pressent through that whole journey because every decision I made was life or death. That came to
the birth. It was actually amazing and freeing to be able to go, oh my god, I'm just I can just birth like a normal woman who's just pregnant. And birth is one of the most incredible experiences I've ever been through in my life. And I'm so so grateful that that my body knows this. So many women who don't get to experience that and then get to be mothers in very different ways and our mothers just as much.
But the actual experience of birth in myself has definitely helped sort of create me as a person.
Yeah, I suppose it's the most natural, purest form of life, isn't it. It's that whole circle of life. So it's so so cool.
Yeah, it really is. And for me, there was something about like this little creature and this little creature, where did she come from? Her eyes were open and I'm like, she's not like what's looking through those eyes? Is this like mystery that's wrapped in skin? And oh my god, that somehow grew in my body? But she is her own person.
All of that like fireworks, fireworks insane. It is because I've got five children myself and I'm not I remember holding them, you know, soon it's seen as soon as they came out onto mum once once mum was it then just and looking at the eyes, you know, thinking they can't even see me, you know, they can just probably see shadows. What's the little mind going through? How is that little heart pumping? And you know I've got I've got something that's completely reliant on myself and my
wife to you know, to survive. You know, talk about responsibility. It's like and that made me excited that that that gave me the the buzz to to to really want to not only better myself, but you know, to to to better people around me. So I sort of understand it on a on a on a on a fatherhood scale. But you know, like you say to that, when that when that baby is growing inside of you, you know, Car and you say that, you leave a part of
you behind, of who you were. I can sort of understand that in a way, but Car, to go through that not sort of envious, but I'm like, wow, that must be some you know, talk about the purest form of life, some experience to be able to do that is especially with the way that you think, Gina, you know, the way that you're connected, the way that you're you're grounded with with the planet. It's a I can only imagine the fascination going through your head.
I think that humans are designed to search for ways to be in service to something greater than selves. And when that happens, when we find a purpose greater themselves, whatever it is, there is past that feels at home. It's like, Okay, now I get to bring my gifts, Now I get to bring my wisdom. Now I am
not the most important thing in my universe. We go from the selfishness of a child, it's like I'm the only thing that exists, and then you know, the entitlement of a teenager is like I deserve, and then we get broken in our twenties into their like the universe doesn't actually give a shit, and you know if you if you don't find a way to fit into the greater context of life, then then life is going to slap your hard until you get it. And by the time we have a child, then there's this oh.
Wow, now it makes sense.
I will yeah, I will never again be the most important thing in my life. As long as this child is breathing, then I am in service to them in some way. And then of course there's the parts of as like.
Oh my god, I've ruined my life and your little bugger and why can't I just go back to my care free life.
I was so great before. But then there is that deeper like you can't help it. You just get cracked open over and over.
Beautiful Blaze was born.
And then.
I suppose every parent's worst nightmare, I know it would certainly be mine. Three years later, you find a lump in Blaze's belly. Can you just take me back to when you when you identified that and how you identified it? Were you playing with Blaze? And how old of a suddenly did you come across the lump that was on her belly.
Ah, if you've ever had a toddler, you know they've got a big tummy, you know, they just get this big belly and then they grow out of it. And I just had a moment of seeing her going, yeah, tommy's too big. Y's that's too big, and you know, just one of those little instinctive moments and then come here, let me feel it. And so it was big. I felt. It's like if anyone who's ever had cancer, you know how it feels. It's hard. It's like a rock. It's like a stone, you know, and it's it's it's like
running into a wall, feeling a tumor lump. And so I felt that inside her and I immediately.
Knew how big.
To me, it felt like a fist, like that's in her. It was like it was big. It's all a blurn. Now I can't tell you exactly how big it was because it's you know, so much more happened, but it was definitely. The cancer that I had was quite small, it was like one or two centimeters, but on that she had definitely like I was like, whoa, there's a that's not just a lump that's a rock and yeah, and then I knew. I knew that because I've felt Yeah,
because I'd felt it in my own breast. I felt I've felt that, you know, thousands of times in my own breast. What's that? It is there? It is there? It is there. It is you know when you're like you get a hole in you, like you when you pulled out a tooth or something, is it getting you stick your tongue in it and you're worry at it or it's the same thing. It's that that, Well, there's something there. I'll just poke at it and feel it.
So you knew, you knew before you even took her to the to the doctors took her to you knew. So when when Blaze was diagnosed with cancer, were you already you know, preparing for the worst. I expect, you know, you actually knowing in your head or what was going through your head once once the doctor sort of confirmed what you already knew.
M I think, I mean I did know, But then again, having been through it all myself, I know, and I knew that there's all of the tests, what kind is it, what does it do? Has it gone? And outside? Is it in the lymph nodes as have gone through the body. Is it malignant? Is it this? Is it that? So so again, there are probably a lot of people who are listening to this who have been through cancer, and when you have been through cancer, it becomes a hurry
up and wait situation. There's okay, there's a diagnosis, but now we need to know, we need pathology. So then you've got a test and you've got to sit there and you've got to go to do and wait for that to come back. And then when it comes back, then you've got to wait for doctors to tell you what it means. And then they give you some options and then it's like well you can do this or this or this or this or this and then make a decision, and then you've got to wait to be
able to let that start. So there's these kind of like this stutter stops like yes, no, it's like having someone driving a cab and you're in the cab and that you know those people and they put on the accelereta and then they put on the brake and you're like you're like this, like just decide, dude, just like go one way or the other. So I think there wasn't really a lot of room in that moment for
really even projecting. It was it was what information is coming in, and I make decisions based on my logic. I will absolutely assemb all of the data that I can, but my ultimate decision comes from my belly, from my instincts. So I'll have my emotions and I'll hold them gently, and I'll have logic and I'll hold that gently. But then the intuitive leap that gets to move through those
two things, that's actually how I decide things. So when I was told, you know, you must terminate this pregnancy or you'll die, it's like all the information, all the logic was yes, you'll die, and my heart is like, oh my god, no, But my inisted that is a way. And if I stay clear and scentered and come, I know I can find it. But I need to stay clear and centered and calme. So anything that knocks me off center I need to be able to deal with. So it became a meditation, and it was then there
was the same thing. Once Blaze was diagnosed, it was pretty much the same thing. There's a whole bunch of information and then there's a whole bunch of emotional process. But then there was this you know, instinctive voice. I trust my gut absolutely implicitly. Whatever it tells me, That's where I go, no matter what what noise is going on, My gut is my guide.
When Blaze was born, was there was there checks, you know, where they thought like, you've you've you've had cancer's let's check this baby thoroughly, or was it a case of notes She's clear, and all of a sudden, three years later you find this lump.
The interesting thing about cancer is there are many pathways that cancer can take to express in a body. You know, some of it is environmental, some of it may be genetic, you know, some of it can be diet, some of can be emotional. The cancer that I had, I had every test for genetic markers and there was nothing. There was no family history, there was there was just like it was. It was a unicorn. It was a lightning strike.
The doctors were like, we have no idea. You're healthy, you're fit, there's nothing in your genes, and yet here you are with stage three, grade three malignant breast cancer, pretty much your toast and we don't know why. But because there were no genetic markers, there was no there was actually no question about Blaze having cancer. It wasn't that thing of like because I have cancer, then she will grow it. It doesn't work that way. And it was then when she ended up with cancer. It's for me.
It was an absolute wildcard and for them as well, and the doctors they said that we don't we have no idea, We have no idea why she has it either related to yours. It's not related to anything you did. It's just that's just the roll of the dice.
Yeah. Yeah, you say that, the vault of the dice. How long from her diagnosis to when when she passed?
How long was that that would have been all up? No more than about six months?
Oh wow, So it took hold and just yeah, yeah.
No, it was really it was really quick. It was really quick.
What was going through your head during that six months? And was there any hope that that that you know, this they could get rid of this cancer? There was, right?
Yeah, yeah, so we thought we thought we had got rid of it. Oh wow, we thought we thought it was done. And then it was just like she was here and then she wasn't, Like she was fine until she wasn't. There wasn't it wasn't like there was this huge, long drawn out process. She was fine and then then she was gone. It was really it was actually really beautiful because there wasn't this long process. We just got to have our daughter and then very quickly she just
wasn't here anymore. And I'm glad. I'm glad it was like that. Actually, that's that's better than watching a wild thing be caged.
How was your grieving process and how did you get through it?
Grief demands to be felt, and we live in a culture that I think doesn't have healthy ceremonies and rituals and language about grief. You know, stiff upper lip and emotions are suspect and well it's very inconvenient, incredibly uncomfortable. So we're just going to make that girlway, shall we. And I don't hold to that at all, like I would rather let the ocean of emotion roll through me.
For me, emotions are like weather. They come and they go, and a storm doesn't stay storming on you for months. A storm comes and then it goes, and then there's another storm, but then there's some sunshine in between, and sudden, you know, the ocean is beautiful and calm and clear and like dazzling light one day and the next day it's like these pounding waves that are like you know, churning up the beach. That for me is the experience
of being in a body and having emotions. And so I just asked every day of grief, what do you need from me? What is grief asking of me to know? Some days it was asking me to wail and have tantrums, and other days it was asking me to laugh with my friends, and other days it was asking me to make love, and other days it was asking me to
watch really bad TV. And other days it was asking me to just look at the leaves in the trees and not move for three hours and not even know what I was doing, just be like just looking at nothing, looking at looking at the waves, or looking at the sun. And again, for me, it's always about what is right right now? What is this moment asking of me? That's how I got through That's how I got through pregnant with cancer, That's how I got through all of the
situation with her, That's how I got through grief. It's like what is right right now? And then some days it's like I don't want to feel this right now. So right now, I'm going to eat all of the ice cream and eat all of the chocolate and just you know, eat my feelings and make it all go away. And then there's other times I'm like, no, now, I can absolutely dive to the bottom of myself and I can feel every single sceric of this feeling and I wail to the heavens, and then on the other side
of that, i'd feel clean and clear. I'm very blessed, I think to have had a life where I've learned how to process my feelings and to trust my body. I trust my body and I trust the movement of my feelings through my body. So grieving has been huge because it is. But the other thing for me is that grief is the flip side of the coin of love. And however much we love, that's how much we grieve love that for that which is been lost. And so
the bigger our love, the more the grief hurts. But the grief is that that says that I feel and I'm alive, and I breathe and I love.
Yeah, that's a positive, right, that's a positive.
Grief is a tribute. Yeah, it's like, oh wow, this is really hurting. Because that's how big my heart is right now. And to be able to map my heart and see whoa like, my heart is so big, it goes to that horizon, and my heart is so big, it goes to those stars because that's how big my grief is. But that is how big my heart is. It stopped being for me a negative and just starts being a part of being alive. Wow, and what a gift.
I think a lot of people who've lost will tell you that part of the gift of losing someone is the recognition that every breath is a gift. Every breath that I have means that I'm alive, and that is part of the gift of losing her. I'm just like, well, there's a other one. I'm still alive.
The first Australian version of the reality show Alone pops up. When that popped onto the scene, what was going through your head and you were one of the ten contestants on there? How did you go through that process to become a contestant?
It was really interesting because I was very judgmental about survival shows. I was like, they're all fake. I'm not interested in reality shows. The people have been telling me for like eight years to watch alone. No, no, this is different. I'm like, yeah, yeah, no it's not. It's all reality. Yeah right. And it wasn't long after the pandemic, I think, and I was just kind of doom scrolling on Netflix, going oh, there's that alone thing. I guess
someone had just said something. Oh yeah, I'll have a look, And so I had a look book and very quickly went all, oh, this is real. There is no film crew and it is real. It's obviously real. This is not scripted. There are no producers. I get it. And so I started binging and shouting at the TV and giving advice and doing all the things that everyone does when they watch alone. And then I started to have the thought of what would I do if that was me?
Because it was in the Northern hemisphere. I was like, well, you've got to be an American citizen and I'm not. And it's all thems because the thing is, it takes about I would say it takes two years to learn an ecosystem well enough to even be able to begin to spit properly. And the North American ecosystem I didn't. I mean, I've never survived in that. So for me, the point was moove. And then about two weeks after I really started binging, mine box blew up with people saying, Gina,
it's alone, It's like loans Fred. And because it had already just taken rooting me and I was putting myself always like asking these questions what would I do? As soon as turned up in my inbox, I was like, oh, well, I have to do it. It was it wasn't even a question. I will say that it was choiceless. There was no choice. It was that instinctive. This is the thing, it is the only thing, It is the everything, and nothing else will exist until I am there, And and
it was it was like that. I think I drove my friends in same Actually, I think I drove my friends enough because I was planning shelters and I was talking about fishing, and I started preparing before I applied. I gave myself a whole three month plan of preparation before i'd even applied, and I started it.
I was like, yep, yeah, and you started, Gina, and you obviously come out on top and you win this. But did that process of being out, you know, by yourself, with your own thought process connected to mother nature grounded to the planet, you know, walking around without no shoes, which I know that you still do nowadays. You know, did those sixty seven days of you being completed, did that help you process your grief? And did you really use that as a platform to do that.
It's a great question. So those seven days were a quest and a rage every First Nations culture, every indigenous culture, every how to gather a culture ceremonies of transformation where people go out into the wilderness on their own as fast and talk to nature. It's part of our birthright. And I have myself out on quite a few rites of passage that are you know, that are based in this kind of a process, in kind of this kind
of a ceremony. But to go out for sixty seven days is a quest unlike anything else that I had ever done. And I went out there and I made a vow of veracity. I made a vow to tell the truth no matter what. The whole cameras, you know, having cameras and filming myself that this would just be like a little portal. But I wasn't going to second guess. I wasn't going to filter. I was going to have
the experience as if the cameras weren't there. And what that meant was that every day I would get up and I would ask three questions, ask what are my needs? What resources do I have to meet those needs? And how much energy do I have left over to make art? And that was it. That was that was pretty much in that moment. And again, like I have done my whole life, what's this moment asking of me? And because I was starving and I was freezing.
And I was surviving, there wasn't a lot of energy available and I had to make sure my shelter was warm enough so I could live calories so I didn't have to go out and find calories.
I had to conserve heat. What are my needs? You know? There were all these very very powerful and poignant tasks, but they were also incredibly simple. I didn't have to
think about what anybody else thought of me. I didn't like so many of the hamsters that go around and around in our minds as modern humans, are about externals impacting on us, or ways that our power is outsourced, and yeah, and our authority is outsourced, and we live in a culture that tells us that everything that we do is wrong, that we're not enough that we should be doing something differently. Out there, all that's gone gone
just doesn't even exist. And so then this purity of human experience got to rise up, and I got to interrupt in this very simple way with nature and with myself. So when it came to grief, grief would come, and then grief would go.
There's a moment that went viral, and I've seen the clip and car talk about are powerful. And I use the word powerful because you know, some people can use heartbreaking, some people can use but it was such a powerful clip. It almost felt that you were in your element. I know it must have been such a hard thing to do, But for me, when I looked at it, I thought, she's in her she's present, She's in her element now
right now. You know a lot of people might go, ah, she's suffering, and I saw the flip side to it. I was like, she is the all power and all She's just being herself and that must be really really powerful. And I don't know if I've got that wrong. I've got that right, but I see a lot of people see the opposite side to it. I didn't see that. I was just like that gave me inspiration.
Oh thank you. That's really that's really lovely to hear. And it's spot on because I have been grieving very consciously for so long. For me, it's not suffering. It's a storm.
It's the purest form of yourself. Then I saw the purest form of you.
Yes. Yeah, it is a storm of emotion and it comes and it goes. And if I fight it, and if I hold it away, then that tension that's suffering. Because the thing is, I think I've done it so much now I know it's going to end. I think that what happens with people is stuff comes and we go, Oh my god. If I go into this, I'm never going to come out. If I start crying now, I'm never going to stop. If I start raging now, I
am going to burn the world. Whereas my experience is that that emotions come in waves, and so it will start and it will build. And if I catch that wave, if I you know, if I fight a wave, then it's got to smashed me and it's going to break me. But if I surf that wave, if I if I let myself be fluid and pliable in that wave, then you know, I might still get dumped, but that's okay. I just hold my breath and get tumbled and then come for the surface. And that grief storm was it
was her birthday. It was her birthday, and I, you know, I made a fire and I didn't know that that grief storm was going to come until it did. And there was one moment when I had the cameras, I'm like, am I going to leave this on? And it wasn't even a question, that's like, of course I'm going to leave this on. Of course, I said, vow of veracity, I'm going to tell the truth. And this is a human truth. This is a poignant and powerful and archetypal human truth. This is grief.
It was such a such a powerful moment. And once you rode that emotional wave, will like you say, did it make you feel better? Did it?
Did it?
Did it then allow you just to to move on to the next emotional wave? How did that make you feel in that moment?
Yes? Well, the thing that I think, I'm really grateful that SBS and ITV allowed the edit that they did in that moment because the rawness of this woman keening beside a fire for her lost child. I you know, It would be very easy to make that clickbait. It would be very easy to just turn up the volume on that and just leave it in the tragedy and leave it in what looks like suffering. But I'm so grateful because what they did was then they showed me the next day when I was leaning against a log
and I was in gratitude. I was so so peaceful and grateful, and it wasn't fake. You could see it. You could see that this is what it's like. You know, when there's a storm, and then afterwards, the sun comes out and you go outside and the bush smells amazing, and the beach is washing and the birds are all singing, and you needed that storm to clean out everything, and now everything feels brand new. That's the next day, and
you see it. And I'm so glad that they showed that, because to me, there is an intelligence in allowing emotions to move, but you've never seen it. It can be
like I can't do that. But I have people who stopped me all the time in the street and say thank you so much for showing your grief, And it's helped me to be able to understand and process and not be afraid of my own, which for me, it's that purpose beyond self Like I went out there on a lone Australia too, you know, for a million different reasons. But ultimately, ultimately it wasn't about me. I was a placeholder,
you know. I got to tell a story that I think needs to be told about nature, connection, about being a part of nature rather than apart from nature. But ultimately that story is not about me. It's just I happened to be a vehicle for that story to be told. And I think a part of that was the being able to show, well, this is how it can actually even though it's the hardest thing, it can also be poetry. And to have people come up and tell me that means that there's a part of that kind of does
okay good. I kind of did my job what I needed to do and set it free into the world.
Do you know what, along with millions of other people. I'm so glad that you did. So since the show you're running programs now, could just talk to me about the programs that you're doing, and also just quickly about about your life off grid. You know, how interesting is it and how nourishing is it, and how live eating is it.
Living off grid is amazing. But at the moment, since alone, I have had my life turn so completely upside down that I'm not in the shack at the moment. I have a seven meter bus that is my home and that I kind of go up and down the coast in. But I've ended up writing a book, and I've written a memoir and it comes out on October two in Australia. And as a result of that, I am involved in
all of this modern stuff. I'm involved in publishing, I'm involved in designing covers, I'm involved in you know, there's a book tour coming up.
What's the name of your book.
It's called We Are the Stars, and it's a memoir and it's an absolute magic carpet ride. It's a roller coaster. It's like, you know, basically, you've taken me through the elements of so much of my life, and it's got all of that. It's got the grittiest and the realist and the raw is the most silly, the most embarrassing, the most hum It's got all the possible flavors of a human.
I want to sign copy.
I will send you assigned copy. I would love to send you assigned. Yes, best, Yeah.
And your programs. Talk to me about your programs as well.
Okay, so the programs there, it's rewilding, and a lot of people like what's rewilding. Well, rewilding is basically just learning how to exist in relationship with nature using ancestral living skills, like the skills that are that are encoded in all of our DNA. You know, it doesn't matter what your heritage. Three hundred and fifty thousand years we've been Homo sapiens, and three hundred and forty thousand of
those years we were how to gatherers. It's all of us, and we only lived and existed by being in connection with nature and with each other and by being able to live in harmony. Without that, we wouldn't have made it as a species.
I love that encoded in our DNA.
And what we see is that our modernity is like this barrier that we think is really like hard, but it's very permeable and it doesn't take much to scratch it off. And so if you take people and put them into nature connection situations very very very quickly, they start to remember how to be at home in the wild, like it doesn't take much. It's like there's a part of all of us inside that is going, come on,
let me out, let me out. And so, you know, it starts with maybe just taking off your shoes and walking in the grass, or leaning against a tree, or turning off your phone, or looking at a horizon and seeing that infinite edge, or letting your eyes go soft
and listening to the birds. All of these things start to quieten it so that we start to get a sense of ourselves as part of the interconnected web of life, and rewilding is how we learn and dive into those skills that are going to help us survive and thrive and love and live and understand the song of the bush, the song of nature.
Wow, do you know what that is? Amazing? It's almost it's almost a program of the purest form of life. It's been amazing chatting to you. Honestly, the energy that I've got from this talk, the knowledge, the just the freedom of just being able to, you know, connect with myself, connect with my emotions and go with the flow is certainly something that I have to remind myself to do every now and then, because life, you know, sort of takes you away in a certain direction. But I'm very
much connected in that way as well. But I think we all need to do it a little bit more. But Gina, thank you ever so much for coming on my podcast, head Game. I love you millions, and listen, we are definitely hooking up when I come to OZ and don't forget that signbook for me.
I want to get that sign book. And I'm giving you the biggest squeeze through this screen right now. I'm giving you a proper, proper, proper, proper squeeze from my bones in my heart.
I'm taking it. I'm taking it.
Okay, Bye, Love Gina.
Chicks memoir We Are the Stars is out now. I'll lead the details in the show notes. Thank you so much for joining me on Headgame. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure you're subscribed so you don't miss any of our incredible stories and leave me a review wherever you're listening. I'm Matt Middleton. Catch you again next time.