Gardens of Inspiration

''A thousand years ago people wore different clothes. They had different instruments at their disposal. But that is not the essence. Back a thousand years ago, just like today, people had the same feelings. Feelings are not subject to time''

 - Anastasia (book 1)

Hi everyone! Good health to your thoughts :)


Wow so where to begin? So much has been happening recently, it has been so incredible to watch this divine process unfold. Through Santosha I have connected with so many amazing beings and many of them share the desire to create a space of love. Truly, we are all now connected by the grand energy of co creation!


More and more I find myself haunted (in a good way) by visions of Santosha. It constantly occupies my thoughts and I can picture the future in greater detail every passing day. 


I have begun a new exercise regime where I wake in the early morning and power walk around my neighbourhood. I find I can cover a large distance every morning, giving me the chance to explore streets I have never walked down before. There is a magical energy in the early morning and very few people around. I love looking at peoples gardens, picking the trees and plants that I like and mentally placing them somewhere on my domain. When I get home I soak my feet in water, pour them on my vegetables and water the garden. Then its a shower, 20 minutes of Yoga followed by meditation. This new regime gives me a chance to think about life and about what I want to create :)



It turns out I am not the only one who is haunted by visions of Santosha. Check out these incredible photos of artwork done by future kinsmen of Santosha, David.


This incredible work is done on his cedar necklace. I got so excited when I first saw it, I think it's absolutely stunning! For my part, I have taken up drawing with water colours. I have found them extremely easy to use, and have really enjoyed sketching out scenes of our future domain!


Though summer has its own charm, I am really looking forward to Autumn this year, as I have plans to gather up the seed pods of all the trees I have admired from around Perth. After weeks of not finding any Oak trees anywhere in Perth, it seems I am now seeing them everywhere!!


I have been guilty of taking longer routes home, just so I can drive past an Oak tree! I didn't even know what an Oak tree looked like until this year, but now I have fallen in love with them. When I looked at the shape of the leaf, it awakened a cellular memory inside of me, possibly from lifetimes ago in Europe. That first night, whenever I closed my eyes I saw the shape of the leaf...


On that note, in our facebook group, we have created an album featuring pictures of some of the most common European trees. Hopefully this should serve as inspiration and education, as we gradually learn to differentiate between a Beech tree and an Elm (I cant tell the difference though!!).


http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.300519403326350.73630.222417754469849&type=1


However, a picture can only do so much, so for people who are really interested in learning all the different trees and choosing vegetation for their future domain, I want to share three of our favourite places to go to for inspiration. 




Golden Valley Tree Park


This place is my absolute favourite! This place is literally a 'Tree Museum' where tree's from around the world grow so people can come and enjoy them. I have been back three times now and I intend on visiting it again and again. This arboretum features Birches, Oaks, Cedars, Willows, Ash, Maples, Amber's, Elms and a massive variety of fruit trees. All of the trees have plaques so you can learn the names of the trees and they also have the year they were planted! This is so helpful so you can understand how many years it takes for a tree to grow to that height. The energy is just spectacular, I give this place my highest possible recommendation!!


http://www.goldenvalleytreepark.org.au/




King's Park

King's park truly is a treasure. It is immaculately maintained all year round and the staff are always friendly and happy to answer questions about the flora. They have now put plaques underneath most of the trees to help people identify them. It was at King's park that we first discovered the 'Australian Cedar' tree! Many of the trees are from across the globe, tree's we have never heard of before. If you live in Perth, I suggest checking it out in the evening. Give yourself a treat and go for a walk among the trees. Let them fuel your dreams of co creation :)


http://www.bgpa.wa.gov.au/kings-park




Wanneroo Botanical Gardens

I had never been to this amazing place before this year, but some friends and I headed out there one weekend to play miniature golf (so much fun) and just loved it! The gardens are incredible. The gazebo's and footpaths are blended seamlessly with massive tree's, vines, flowers, ferns and streams. The whole place was so lush! We even picked bananas off the tree's and ate them :) 


http://www.botanicgolf.com.au/




The Legal Structure


And now down to some of the business side of Santosha. Since we first wrote the blog, there have been many changes to the proposed legal structure for Santosha, though these are mostly technical changes. We still intend for the legal structure to be extremely thorough, so there is no doubt about people's legal rights to their land and we still intend for the structure to be founded on the principles of equality and democracy.


In short, now we are creating a co operative, rather than a company. A co operative is the ideal structure for what we are creating at Santosha, and the process is well under way. We have been writing the 'rules' or 'contracts' for weeks now. It is a very intense process that has taken many many hours, and we are still not complete yet. At the moment, we have about 30 questions that were sent a few weeks ago to the department of commerce (who have been very friendly and helpful) and we are still waiting on their reply. The questions we asked were quite in depth, and the legislation is very new and so they told us it may take some time for a response. Once we receive answers to these questions, we will work hard to finish writing all of the legalities as quickly as we can.


At that stage we will be sending out those documents to people who have had a dialogue with us to review. They will not be finalised at that point, but shared with the Santosha community to bring in more people to the process and ensure there is nothing important that we have missed. 


In addition to the legal rules we will also be sending out 'Alex's Guide to the Contract' which puts the rules in easy to understand terms, though we expect people will want to read both. We didn't want to send out just the rules because the legal language can be very intimidating at first glance. Already the contract is 27 pages long and it could easily double!


This is to cover the many contingencies that are unlikely to ever occur, but nonetheless provide a safety net. Reading the document, however, might give the wrong impression that Santosha is all legalistic and complicated, when we intend it to be anything but! Santosha will be a magical place of gardens and children, but we feel that having a solid legal framework in place is the key to unlocking paradise :)


These new developments do make some of the information in the initial series of blog posts obsolete, so once we have finalised the new legal structure, we will update the information there. 




Dialogues


The excitement of Santosha continues along, and Emily and I have had a number of dialogues recently. These dialogues are so much fun, as we chat and laugh about the Ringing Cedars and what kind of life we picture at Santosha.


Though there is a lot of interest, it is still hard to gauge exactly how many people are committed as 'definite' until we have the legal structure set up and have taken deposits. I would say that we probably have 8 or so families who are absolutely sure that they will sign up, with perhaps that many again having expressed strong interest. It's hard to say, but there is just so much momentum at the moment that it feels like everything could be happening very soon. 


In a very exciting development, after having a dialogue with us, one family indicated that they might be interested in purchasing more than one domain, giving the option for families to buy them at a later date. This is something we are currently exploring, as it will allow us to buy the land much sooner. 


For those who see the writing on the wall and know that self sufficient living is the way for the future, this opens up conscious investment opportunities. For families who are unsure, or who haven't heard of Santosha yet, this gives them the option of joining Santosha when it is already a thriving, established community. We haven't figured out all of the details yet, but options like these will allow us to be proactive in securing the land for Santosha :)



We have also been in contact with an eco village on the other side of Australia called Bindarrabi, who have been kind enough to share their legal documents with us. There is much to be gained with this kind of co operation, and we expect this to continue into the future. Emily is flying to the Eastern States for a few weeks in January and she will be visiting Bindarrabi to be shown around the property. The people who have created this community have been really friendly and we hope to be able to share resources with them in the future.


http://www.bindarrabi.com/


We have also been in contact over email and Skype with a couple in Southern Queensland who are looking to create a community similar to Santosha. It has been such a wonderful experience to connect with these people from across the country and feel their positive energy and inspiration :) If anyone is reading this blog in the Eastern States, check out their thread on the Ringing Cedars Revolution website:


http://www.ringingcedarsrevolution.com/group/australia/forum/topics/gold-coast-kins-domain


And so the journey goes on and on. Every step is beautiful...


Our blog has had almost 1500 views already! If you have been following the progress of Santosha with keen interest, and are considering joining us, be sure to get in personal contact with Emily and I so that we can have a dialogue :)


Also be sure to sign up for email updates in the side bar. This will notify you when there is a new blog post up, so you stay well informed with all the goings on. 

We know Santosha won't be the only large scale domain community in Western Australia. Within the decade there may be hundreds, or thousands! We invite you to the future. We invite you to co creation. We invite you to Santosha!


Many many blessings x


''Now you and a lot of people will be able to see this splendid future materialised. The energy of her thought is extraordinarily strong, and her strength has no equal anywhere in space. It is perfect and quite specific, but the main thing is that she keeps on gaining strength thanks to the help of other people's thinking. She is no longer alone''


 - The Energy of Life (book 7)