Offline, With Alison Rice

Dearest you.

In this honest conversation, Natalie Fornasier opens up about living with stage four melanoma and what she’s learnt actually matters in life.

Natalie is a talented young writer and self-described skinfluencer (the sun safety kind) who is using her growing social footprint to advocate for those experiencing chronic and terminal illness. 

This honest conversation focuses on the present. On surviving. On what it means to accept your own mortality. Nat opens up about her relationship with death, the spectrum of diversity through the eyes of the chronically ill, navigating friendships that aren’t equipped to hold space for her experience, how she, in turn, thinks about holding space for her partner’s experience both within her illness and also separate to it, what it’s really like trying to establish a career when you have cancer and what she’s learnt actually matters in life. 

Every episode of Offline seeks to educate and inform, but I hope this one also offers perspective. When we really get down to it, what else matters but our health and the health of the people we love? 

We know we can prevent skin cancer. Melanoma is the third most common cancer in women. Please wear sunscreen and keep your precious skin out of the sun. 

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

Natalie sadly passed away in early 2023. May she rest in peace.

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Dearest you.

We’re starting season six as we intend to finish — by listening and learning, and then moving into informed, intentional action. In this episode, I interview racial justice educator, attorney, grief coach, healer and author, Rachel Ricketts, about acting in allyship to Black, Indigenous, People of Colour vs. allyship, and what “doing the work” actually looks like for white people who hold the most power and privilege.⁣

She educates that we all rise when white people undertake the work of racial justice, and that when white people truly do this work, everything in their lives will change. They must also be prepared to lose things – friends, money, time, identity – and if they’re not, they’re not committed to racial justice. 

But, there’s more to gain than there is to lose. 

Rachel’s new book, Do Better: Spiritual Activism for Fighting and Healing from White Supremacy, is directed at white people but is for Black, Indigenous, People of Colour. She discusses what that means in this episode, educating that white people can’t be allies, but they can act in allyship. She also shares that white people must have a tolerance for f*cking up because they will. The need to be right can not supersede the commitment to racial justice, and that a white person’s fear and discomfort isn’t life-threatening but being a Black, Indigenous, Person of Colour is. 

Rachel asks that we do this work with a deep lens of compassion. Her book Do Better: Spiritual Activism for Fighting and Healing from White Supremacy is available to pre-order now and hits shelves February 2, 2021. 

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

I'm closing season five with an Ask Me Anything episode. I answer 15 questions sent in by you — my cherished listeners. 

Topics include overcoming imposter syndrome and negative thought patterns, why we need to find our fulfilment within, staying positive when trying for a baby, how to develop confidence, what areas of myself I'm working on, the leadership resource that helped me the most, tips to communicating authentically online, the way I think about building a conscious business and where I believe authentic creativity comes from.

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

An honest conversation with proud Goreng Goreng woman and contemporary artist and designer, Rachael Sarra. 

In many ways, this episode stands for the complexities that come with the commercialisation of creativity. We also get a small insight into the deeply nuanced responsibility and pressure that comes with being a young, Aboriginal artist with a fast-growing Instagram following.

In this honest conversation, Rachael opens up about the relationship between energy, inspiration and emotion when it comes to creating, the good and bad of using Instagram to grow a conscious business, the importance of pulling out of jobs that become unaligned, why cultural protocols will always come before creation, overcoming her fears about how she might be perceived based on her commercial decisions and why her ancestors aren’t just part of her spirituality, they are her spirituality. 

She also shares her personal experience with land ownership, online dating in 2020 and beyond, and gives some sound advice to young creatives trying to establish themselves in an era that’s increasingly governed by comparison. 

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

An honest conversation with Vedic astrologer and holistic kinesiologist, Dalia Gencher. 

This episode is for anyone who is looking for higher answers to questions like: 

• What is karma and can we overcome it?
• What is purpose if it’s not actually linked to our careers?
• How do we align to what is most evolutionary for us?
• How can we use our birth chart to find direction and clarity?
• Cosmically, what happened in 2020 and what can we expect in 2021?

With reverence and respect, we also explore the ancient, Indian spiritual practice of Japa — one of the most profound Yogic technologies accessible to us. It has the power to completely rewrite the neural pathways in our brains. 

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

An honest conversation with Carson Tueller, a performance and empowerment coach based in New York City. His coaching methodology is rooted in the philosophy that our lives are lived inside of the narratives we’ve created about ourselves, our circumstances, and our experiences. 

Let that sink in for a moment. How much of the way you identify in the world is based on a story? A story about where you’ve come from, what you’ve been through or what your job title requires you to be? 

This episode stands for new perspectives and new beginnings. For reframes and radical acceptance. Carson is an educator, an activist and an advocate. 

In this honest conversation, Carson shares his journey to coming out as a queer man, the major life event that led him to step into his purpose as an empowerment coach, what true disability advocacy looks like, acknowledging unconscious ableism, why we need to re-examine our definition of sex, pleasure as a spectrum of feelings and why it’s OK for empowerment coaches to feel disempowered sometimes.  

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

An honest conversation with the hosts and founders of Shameless, Zara McDonald and Michelle Andrews. 

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be catapulted into the public sphere with one of your best friends before the age of 25? Oh, and add to that the whole thing is being recorded and millions of people are not only listening and enjoying what you say, but some are also judging and critiquing what you say.

The timing couldn’t be more perfect for these three women and podcasters to record together. Zara and Michelle recently released their first book, The Space Between, which is dedicated to the mess and madness of our twenties. It is as fun as it is nuanced and deep. 

In this honest conversation, Zara and Michelle open about navigating privacy, learning which stories are theirs to tell, how being rejected from mainstream networks was the throughway to their success, the importance of therapy to process their experiences, how they’re thinking about building a modern media business in 2020 and beyond, and so much more. 

I hope you love getting to know two of Australia’s most exciting, young media pioneers on a deeper level.

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

An honest conversation with evolutionary astrologer Daisy Clementine Douglas. She’s on a mission to help people understand why their soul incarnated. 

In this episode, Daisy explains why our birth chart is a reflection of everything we already are, and also shares what parts of our chart relate to things like our unique gifts, our work and our karmic path. 

This episode was recorded in March 2020 when Australia was in its first lockdown, and Daisy reveals what she believes is at play cosmically for this year. I was particularly intrigued to learn that Capricorn is asking us to look more deeply at patriarchal constructs and definitions of success. 

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

An honest conversation with chiropractor, certified Neuro Emotional Technique (N.E.T.) practitioner and founder of Selph Health Studios, Dr. Evan Sgammotta.

N.E.T. is an approach to stress reduction that focuses on breaking behavioural patterns and stress points that can show up physically in the body. It also helps symptoms related to trauma and unresolved stressful events, by helping to eliminate conditioned emotional responses and prevent recurring patterns of pain. It compliments chiropractic and borrows from acupuncture and kinesiology. 

My own interpretation after being treated by Dr. Sgammotta, is that it’s an emotional clearing of sorts. I spent nine months sitting with what came up in my session before having an honest conversation with Dr. Sgammotta. In less than five minutes, he got to the root of why I suffer from anxious attachment — something I haven't spoken about on Offline before.

If you’re suffering from a chronic emotion and the stress associated with it, I hope this episode helps you. 

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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Dearest you.

An honest conversation with New Zealand-based freelance fashion creative and founder of Sauce, Zeenat Wilkinson. 

Zeenat grew up in Mumbai and completed a degree in psychology before leaving to study fashion at Central Saint Martins in London. Today, she lives in New Zealand with her husband and their new baby girl. 

This episode honours the journey to successfully making a living as a fashion and lifestyle creative. Zeenat shares how she got her start in media, what it was like working for titles like Vogue India, why she chose to move to London to study at such a prestigious creative college and how being personally impacted by the lack of diversity in media publications led her to create Sauce — a community-led platform that exists to showcase and celebrate diversity of voice, ideas and skin colour. 

She also opens up about her journey into motherhood and how her decade-long dedication to practicing Buddhism helped her find the courage to leave a relationship. This is a very personal story I am grateful Zeenat shared with the intention of normalising our tendency to make decisions that please other people but devalue our own needs. 

Thank you for being here.

Alison xo

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