From the memoirs of Billie Harper, looking back on her learning journey.
"Nourishment isn’t just food. It’s morning sun on your face, laughter in the kitchen, bare feet on the earth. It’s whatever reminds you that you’re alive—and worthy of care."
Back then, nourishment was often mistaken for food alone—calories, macros, supplements in shiny packets. But true nourishment? It reaches deeper.
I’ve come to understand nourishment as a kind of remembering. A return to what fills—not just the body, but the heart, the mind, the spirit. Our ancestral journals talk about communities gathering for slow meals, singing while grinding native grains, storytelling around fire-pits. They wrote of how healing began—not in grand gestures, but in the small, steady rituals of care.
In our time, we still honour those ways. A handful of quandong, rainwater warmed by sunstone, quiet morning stretches beneath paperbark trees. Nourishment doesn’t rush. It invites us to notice.
To nourish the whole of you is to listen inward. To ask: What do I need—not to perform, or please, or produce—but to feel full, in the truest sense?
Some days, it’s a bowl of broth shared in silence. Others, it’s solitude. Or a walk along the Bilya trails, barefoot and breathing. These are the things that keep us strong.
Nourishment isn’t a luxury. It’s the ground we grow from. The pause that sustains the purpose. In nourishing ourselves, gently and often, we remember we’re worthy of the care we so freely give.