Personal Perspectives

    In my understanding we are the Kotema Community carrying on the ways which have been evolving here over the last few years and before. The history of Kotema has grown out of the processes explored by the activities of the A.O.Y. group in the early nineties, the alternative options and Healesville Greenhouse which followed and community kitchens at Confest.

    It is a history of supportive, self-organising, creative community, enabling a diverse range of people the opportunity to connect with self and others. Our processes continue to explore the art of being self-responsible autonomous humans, working together to create a caring community space.
Beginning with little more infrastructure than a kettle, the Kotema community has explored the simple healing processes of sharing life stories and experiences, food and music, laughter and tears, around the glow of a fire.

    The organically self-organising ways easily invite people to participate, offering endless opportunities for any individual to feel the sense of well being which comes with belonging and contributing to community. A feeling of extended family is pervasive and growing, the sense of being part of some thing replacing the sense of isolation, integral to our culture.

    The competitive and scientific approaches adopted by western culture arising from the industrial revolution and the renaissance have affected the way we see the world, this in turn affects the ways we relate to each other.

    Living in isolation from our immediate neighbors, with separate creative processes (jobs) which often have no personal meaning to us, with the TV to entertain us, supermarkets to supply us, and the government to look after us, what need have we of community?

The Need For Community

    Since the human race began we have lived in community. Only in the last century or so have we adopted the insular life style we see in the suburbs surrounding our cities. The affects isolation within this society are well recognised.

    So many of those who have found their way to a Kotema fire have a story to tell. Again and again feeling of stress, anger, victimisation or despair are lighten with sharing and fears of being different annulled by hearing similar experiences from others. Loneliness and isolation become friendship and companionship around the fire, and the burdens of abandonment and personal pain put down to share a cuppa.

   The emotional healing and general well being we find growing within our therapeutic community are still unfolding;

   A single mother shares her reality of non-stop childcare and general lack of support, with a man who struggles with the feeling of an estranged father
   The silent are encouraged to find their voice and the talkative invited to listen.
   One with feelings of having been rejected again and again by some one they wish to know, hears the story of one who understands them self to having been stalked.
   Timber worker meets environmental activist.
   The older of us are amazed by the innovations of the younger, and the young sit by the fire hearing the wisdom woven through the stories of the more mature.
   Friendship, knowledge hardship and joy are shared by all who would partake, bringing understanding, compassion, and healing to all.
    Children find a village to raise them, parenting skills are shared and primary care givers can take a moment’s break from the constant vigilance that little ones require.

    The advantages of shared resources are obvious to those of us with limited income. The feeling of belonging to a creative process counteract what would otherwise be a growing sense of helplessness and disconnection.
The experience of the Kotema community, amongst ourselves and as we come into contact with the public, has crystalised and reinforced our understanding that belonging and contributing to community is a basic human need and an overall indicator of well being.

So ………. What does Kotema mean to me ?

    During my involvement in the process of Kotema coming in to being as a functional community, I have found myself face to face with myself again and again. At times I have liked what I saw and my sense of well-being and self worth grew, my heart sang. At other times the sight I was meet with showed me a side of my self I was yet to come to terms with. Feelings of aggression and anger traced back to myself and I was encouraged to face them. Inadequacy and fear melted away in the light of attention and self-acceptance, while a near constant need to stretch myself to encompass the feeling of intense emotional energy and new awareness gives me a sense of expansion.
   
There is a joy in working within a group of people such as the Kotema crew,
   A sense of acceptance, self-value, belonging and hope, a redefining of community and an awareness of the process of self-healing.
   Kotema holds an invaluable role in my journey of self discovery.

Michael

   Kotema is a place where the boundaries between the human animals and all the other animals, birds, insects, plants and earth is an almost insubstantial membrane, an intellectual concept rather than a concrete physical obstruction.

   It is a place where the boundaries and differences between the human animals themselves becomes a dynamic space where energies and ideas are freely exchanged, and new thought is an attainable treasure from the mixing.

   The interaction between all elements of the community is a giving/sharing self organizing system that ranges in scale from the tiny wrens who regularly hop into the human living space in the early morning, dancing quite unconcerned across sleeping humans in their hunt for crumbs of food around the hearth, to the giving and sharing of the energy and resources that sustain an entire community.

   Kotema is a place where the boundaries within each human animal become fainter, gentler, it is a place where the seemingly innate barriers of internal human conflict become a dialogue with self that begins and consolidates a path of healing, learning and evolution.

   Kotema is a place where the concept of 'other' is out of place.

   We are all related.

Kristen Joy

   Before I came to Kotema I was living in Warburton with an old liberal with emphysema who sits at the dining table watching TV smoking 50 smokes a day only moving 5 steps at a time. I had my garage sale over the weekend, the first day was a smoky ashen day which was the start of me getting sick and ended with a give-away on Monday.
   Craig came and picked me up and we camped in the bush. The next night we went to Kotema for a party where I only knew two beings; my mate Craig and Gracie the dog, the people I met changed my direction sooner than I thought, people just being and doing what makes them happy, the party was like six parties in one, that night I slept on my knees and forehead with no pain of any kind. The next night I did not sleep at all but fell asleep at 9:30 PM just after telling a friend I usually don't go to sleep until midnight and woke covered with doona.

Craig Mc

Kotema to me is a karmic meeting place for, energies, ideas, people, and plans, to create a peace of mind for at least the individuals them selves, or at most for them as a whole, where we can look at our lives as if through a magnifying glass, so we can stand to deal with the path we as humankind have created...

Craig

Community Circles

More and more I'm seeing people wanting something more out of life…
Something that the competitive economic system cannot provide…
The competitive market economy divides us...
While we sense that it's unity that we crave...

I see, again and again, the joy and peace on the faces in a community circle And the wonder on the faces of those new to such a circle...

I see the way people bring their special gift to such a community circle…
The gift of openly sharing who they are... and the talents they have...
Openly sharing their stories...their hardships and pains... their loves
and joys... bringing their own special delicacy to our banquet of life.
I see an abundance of; food and music, dancing and conversation, skills and resources, insights and understandings...woven through
the community circle gathering.
I see the healing effects, of acceptance within the community circle...
And the richness of diverse personalities, tastes and ways of being...
FUNCTIONAL OPEN COMMUNITY
This is the more that people are wanting...
This is a way that people are healing...
How might community function?... As a way of healing...
As a way of living...

Within the community circle we have a non-competitive economy of gifting Outside the circle?... The dominant paradigm a competitive economic system... The system recognizes us as separate "legal entities"... we are divided and conquered.... Treated as single economic units... to negotiate
society's impersonal, competitive economy as we may...

YET. . . Within our community circle, we would treat with each other in a
non-competitive, gifting economy, as a group of self-responsible beings.
The system only recognizes a " legal entity"...
SO. . . might a legal entity (i.e. a company, co-operative society)
provide us the space we need for our community circle to become our way
of living within the world's dominant competitive market place.

Michael

The Gathering

In the glow of the fire we gather…
Our eyes shining bright…
Reflecting the flames…

People have been gathering like this forever…

Each one sharing something of themselves…
A tale of a hardship overcome, or a realization had …
A cake baked at home, a pot of soup, or a packet of
Biscuits brought on the way …

On the way to the gathering of community …
Where …
While one talks of a past experience of emotional pain, another nods …
With empathy born of a parallel relationship, and the growth within …
A third or fourth might be listening, spell bound by the openness of expression
Or by glimpses of experiences yet to come …

Some dance or sing to the beat of the drummers …
While others talk or eat …
From a smorgasbord of ideas, food and feelings …
that all have prepared for our evening together …
And perhaps one sits alone, a small distance away …
in quiet contemplation … Watching with joy how our family play.

in the glow of the fire we sit …
our eyes shining bright, reflecting the flames …
And perhaps too, reflecting the spark of life within us all…

People have been gathering like this for ever.

Michael