"Because giving birth is such a real thing, it takes you back to a rawness and a realness about your essential nature as a human being that is. Completely different from the sort of the mad culture that we're all immersed in. There's something older and deeper and more real than the cultural sort of millieu that we might be in".
Julie Bell is a nurse, missionary, doula, birth passionista, herbalist and owner of Blissful Herbs.
She was born in Australia but grew up in New Zealand so has experienced life on both sides of the Tasman. She claims allegiance to whichever nation is winning the cricket.
After completing her training as a Registered Comprehensive Nurse, she decided the best way to kill herself was to go on the Outward Bound outdoor adventure course.
For 24 days she scaled cliffs, threw herself overboard into frothy seas and kayaked backwards down waterfalls in the wilds of the South Island (yes, where The Lord of the Rings was filmed).
To the amazement of herself and particularly of her instructors, she survived and then proceeded to spend the two decades of her life in South East Asia as a volunteer humanitarian worker.
She can mark her experiences in terms of the bizarre delicacies she has ingested along the way. Frogs, snakes, birds, bird’s nests, sharks, shark fins, thousand year old eggs - some containing embryos - spiders, bats, dogs, cats …. And every possible anatomical appendage or innard a beast can grow: pickled, fermented, broiled, dried, roasted, buried underground, raw, or smothered in chilli enough to sear every internal lining from lips to squat pot.
She can also give the movie ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles’ a run for its money. Julie’s version would be, ‘Jeeps, Junks, and Tuk Tuks’.
She has been married for a cool quarter of a century and together they have welcomed four babies, all born at home. Now aged from 11 to 24 years, they like to do mad things like free-climbing tall cliffs - and buildings - running marathons, riding unicycles and getting brought home by Police at 4 a.m.
It is the passion of Julie’s life to support women in realizing their personal power and learning to wield it unapologetically. It is the joy of Julie’s life to be allied with a remarkable cohort of creative and inspiring women who are a force of love and change in the world. Julie is the eternal student and constant journeywoman, always seeking, learning, discovering and expecting.
Into her 50s and beyond, Julie intends to continue to live radically, wage peace and make revolution. She has no plans to go quietly.
https://www.blissfulherbs.com.au/