Turia Pitt is truly inspiring. This beautiful Australian lady has bounced back from a terribly traumatic event that would crush 99.9% of people. Yet she says she has never been happier. What is her secret? How does she stay so positive and upbeat. What is Turia’s story and secret to happiness?
Turia’s ordeal of fire
For those of you unfamiliar with her story, Turia suffered burns to 65% of her body in a grassfire when she was running in a 100km ultra-marathon in Western Australia in 2011. She waited in agony with another runner for many hours before rescue came and then spent years in hospital and rehabilitation. Turia, just 24 at the time, lost seven fingers and has to live with enduring pain and scarring, which has affected her natural exotic beauty and athleticism. Having now endured 24 operations to restore her lost tissue and improve scarring, she reveals what a trooper she is. Turia is a fighter.
I think Turia was always a fighter, a strong spirit and a beautiful person and this accident has forced her into the limelight where we can appreciate her tenacity and beautiful soul. Turia is a mining engineer. You don’t get to become an engineer without a lot of discipline and study. Engineering is a very difficult course. The mathematics alone would defeat most students and engineering is still a man’s world.
Turia’s new life
Turia no longer works as an engineer. She was made redundant after her accident. Abandoned. However, her beautiful man, Michael, did not abandon his girlfriend of nine years, so Turia was and is fortunate to have a loving partner and family. She is now married to Michael, and they have two young sons. Life has turned out well in that respect, but very different in other aspects of her life.
We never know what bullets life will fire at us or what detours we will encounter on life’s journey. It is not always “I’m going from A to B” and you get there via a straight line. Sometimes you go to C and this retrospect is often a better place. It happened for beautiful Turia.
Turia, has by necessity, reinvented herself. Her website shows her newfound life’s path, and it is a very life-giving path. Gratitude for life and to others has made Turia want to give back, so she writes books, courses and teaches what she knows and has learnt from her years as an athlete. Add to this, the skills and mindset she developed during recovery and Turia is a truly inspiring and loveable woman.
Turia does ‘happy’
This brings me to her latest book titled Happy and other ridiculous aspirations. The title alone shows us that Turia has a cute sense of humour. Her book is full of it. I love it. Just reading the book makes you happy! The book is even dedicated to the reader. How special is that. What a great idea. This alone validates Turia as a give back type of gal. But reading on, as one can’t but help do because of her engaging prose, Turia treats us to some of her hard-learnt wisdom.
We learn some of her secrets. She presents them in an easy-to-follow way. Chapter one is all about Gratitude, Anticipation and Savouring. Remember the acronym GAS or AGS or SAG whichever order of letters you choose for whatever order you want to try out these three essential tools for being happy. These three tools all make you see the good in life and so make you feel good.
Get into GAS
There is nothing like being grateful for what you have, or who you have in life. There is also a lot of fun and thrill in anticipating something or seeing someone and lastly it is good to reflect and savour the good moments of life. Combine these three feel good experiences and bingo! You too can feel happy.
It might take some practice, Turia says, you might have to verbalise or write down your moments and your thanks, but the more you do, the more positive and vibrant you will feel. Once you feel buoyant and happy you will want to smile and give back like Turia does. GAS or SAG or whatever is the antidote to misery, self-pity, depression and general whining. We can all think of a few people who need a dose of GAS so they can get over themselves and their petty grievances and offence.
No more whining please
In fact, it seems the more fortunate many people are, with all the comforts and security of modern life, the more they want to whine. It seems there is nothing like trauma, or a near death experience to put things in perspective. During wartime few people had the time to bitch and whine about their lot and criticize others. But in an affluent society, this whinging happens in epidemic proportions.
So, if you know someone who needs a good dose of perspective about their lot, tell them about Turia. Even better, buy her books, now three, and gain some wisdom and laugh a lot with this remarkable woman.
Terrific Turia. Love you. Love your books. I’m into the GAS groove now.
Photo by Catalin Pop on Unsplash
Joni Scott is an Australian author with three published novels: Whispers through Time and The Last Hotel and Colour Comes to Tangles. Joni also co-hosts a women’s blog; https://whisperingencouragement.com/ and has her own website; https://joniscottauthor.com.
