Traditional Aboriginal healing: the ancient art of wellness

17 September 2024
Original content by Natasha Dragun

From vast wilderness areas – to traditional Indigenous wellness ceremonies and native bush medicine, here’s your tonic for wellness on a Discover Aboriginal Experiences tour.

Think wellness is protein shakes, superfoods, day spas and mindfulness? Aboriginal cultures put another spin on what we perceive as a modern trend.

Practised for tens of thousands of years, Indigenous healers have nurtured the physical, emotional and social wellbeing of their people through food, massage, bush medicines and ceremony. If the spirit is healed, the body will heal.

Aboriginal peoples regard food as medicine, and a closer look at the produce they pluck from the bush reveals astonishing health qualities. The popular Kakadu plum, which grows in northern Australia, has the highest vitamin C content of any fruit in the world, offering up to 100 times the level of vitamin C found in oranges. Meanwhile, native Australian herb lemon myrtle is rich in calcium, and endemic wattleseed is exceptionally high in protein, iron and zinc.

You can taste this wondrous bush tucker with Dale Tilbrook Experiences at Mandoon Estate in the Swan Valley, just outside Western Australia’s capital city, Perth/Boorloo. Tilbrook will also proffer emu and goanna oils, which have long been rubbed on arthritic and sore joints.

Dale Tilbrook Experiences. Credit: Tourism Australia

A one-hour tour with Karrke Aboriginal Cultural Experience & Tours, near Kings Canyon in the central Northern Territory, also exposes you to such things, as well as the witchetty grub (an insect that produces a nutty, popcorn flavour when cooked).

On the south coast of New South Wales, Dwayne Bannon-Harrison is proud to continue the oldest food culture in the world. As well as managing an Indigenous foods catering company where healthful eucalypt, tea tree and paperbark leaf are used, he runs Ngaran Ngaran Culture Awareness.

Along with introducing people to medicinal plants, he shares Aboriginal healing methods. In line with his ancestors, he uses meditative vibration and song as a form of sound therapy, while smoking ceremonies act to cleanse those who move through the scented wafting air. His traditional Djiringanj sunrise ceremony recognises that each day is unique and must be lived well – a ritual that speaks to the mindfulness so many of us now practice.

Maruku Arts bush medicine walk. Credit: Tourism Australia

Ceremony and bush healing are also key to the Anangu, whose spiritual homeland is around the Northern Territory’s soul-stirring monolith, Uluru. There, traditions are still a part of everyday life, and guide everything from diet to storytelling. It’s vital that traditional remedies survive – something visitors assist in, by engaging in immersive learning such as the bush medicine walk (available for private groups) offered by Maruku Arts.