Written by even*dawn

I am an artist who carries inside me vivid recollections of my soul’s purpose: to arouse awareness of interconnectedness. I was raised in the wet tropics, living on the bushland edge of a tangled mangrove teeming with mudcrabs darting between finger-like aerial roots. As a teen I explored the tropical rainforest, tripping out on the intricate realms growing high in the mountainous ranges flanking the coastal coral reefs.

Growing up and moving on I went to live in a riverside city, where I studied illustration and made friends within a circle of lightworkers. These clear, bright beings are some who to this day I consider to be my soul group. We would meet up every thirteen days to meditate and to share the cosmic downloads we were receiving and reading about. 

We shared interests in channeled writings and teachings from Sirian, Pleiadian, Arcturian and other star systems. We were part of a network of Planetary Artists participating in synchronised meditations through an adaptation of traditional Mayan calendars. A new way of perceiving time, not as an empirical construct but as dynamics of energy expressed as radial art, became the foundation upon which my future practices of timekeeping took hold.

On weekends in nearby forests and going on roadtrips to outdoor dance festivals, I developed a  profound love for being outside. Feeling my feet worshipping the Earth beneath and revelling out the front of live fusion stages, writhing amidst masses of dance music lovers; I  opened my heart to diversity, inclusivity and my primal connection to the sacredness of nature. Back in the city my kinship with fellow planetary artists strengthened, dropping me into the processes behind hip-hop music production and artistic promotions. Between creating pixel maps  and models as a consul game artist in an inner-city tower by day and delving into the metaphysics of crystals, sacred geometry and entheogens by night, my hometown sweetheart and I  lived together as beloveds in a cottage in a leafy neighbourhood outside the central district.

There we lived with our wise striped cat, the bush turkeys and the possums, as we collaborated with friends in our network to promote local peace through culture events called the Day Out of Time. Connecting with others who were adepts of the 13 Moon Peace Calendar we drove in our campervan to attend a gathering at a community hall  where we participated in ceremonies as well as cooked, laughed and danced, played music and observed the celestial significance of the occasion. It was the first of two passages of the planet Venus across the face of the Sun, which occurs twice over a cycle of 243 years. According to the mystical prophecies and analysis of astronomical maps which were brought out and presented to the gathering, this event heralded a time of the dawning of a new age. 

The future date which became the focus of the culminating awakening was 21st December, 2012. Derided in sensationalist portrayals for being an apocalyptic “end of the world” – what it was about 2012 that interested me was the nuanced and multi-dimensional thinking taking place when we joined in discussions about the possible implications of a planetary awakening. These conversations brought forth factors such as exponential novelty and considerations of quantum theory bringing to light new potentials for collective shifts in consciousness. 

What mattered then was not what was going to happen in 2012 but that we were being inspired by what could happen if individuals activate divine consciousness.

From this vastly mind-opening perspective I had by the last day of the Venus Transit gathering, considering what may yet come of our collective experience of life on Earth, I felt compelled to dial the payphone in the hall to call the gaming company I was working for and let them know I wouldn’t be coming in that day. Instead, upon returning to the city I went in with my letter of resignation. I explained that I was leaving my screen production career path to pursue cultural community development as my calling.

So it was when collaborating to organise the next Day Out of Time festival, that my beloved and I let everyone know we would like to live in an intentional community. We had a vision of a natural time sanctuary which could become a centre for cosmic awareness. It happened to be that someone who was there had an empty house, on unkempt land nearby. Which is how it came about that we established  Moondani Natural Mind Sanctuary in a rough-hewn timber house perched beneath a red cedar tree, overlooking  a steep subtropical mountain range.

With my purpose so apparent to me, I remained in touch with our network of kin which by now had spread far and wide. With the budding availability of the world wide web coming through an off-grid satellite connection run by a petrol generator, we continued creating digital art and promoting peace through culture. Over the course of a year we published a compendium of zines with contributors from across the planet. The 2C zines brought together poetry, articles, artworks and updates from other communities following the 13 Moon Peace Calendar. It was then that my childhood love for singing revived, and with it came a love for songwriting. After many long years of living in union with my beloved, the time came for me to move on from our treetop sanctuary to venture solo to the south where I became acclimatised to the wonders of temperate rainforests, where lyrebirds danced and giant ferns grew amidst stately trees. 

Before long it was 2012, and I released my first song on a compilation album from our creative collective. I travelled to the place where a total solar eclipse was visible just weeks before the much anticipated 21st of December alignment of the Earth, the Sun and the center of the Milky Way. What I had not anticipated was being offered the chance to attend a sacred pilgrimage to the Maya lands being led by my Fifth Sun Journeys friends. An old schoolmate who I was visiting kindly offered to pay for me to attend the tour. This gave me the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do ceremonies at sacred sites during the closing of the cycle of the ages infusing in me a profound respect for Mayan cosmology.

Returning back home I resumed my regular life, moving onwards from the prophetic journey I had undergone. I relocated to the subtropics to live in a vibrant coastal community and worked for an independent newspaper. I went from usually being free-spirited and blissfully unaware of clock time to working in an artroom publishing weekly tabloids by print deadlines. 

I continued to promote cultural movements that I was passionate about, and ended up living a conch-shaped rainforest hideway, where I became increasingly aware of the astoundingly rich plant and birdlife all around me. All of the photographs that accompany this story are taken from that time. It was there at the Cloud Temple that I started to make nature observations in my notebooks and journals, and began writing about becoming Wildly Organised. I developed a key of icons which anchored my reflective writings in the cycles of the moon and astronomical seasons. A few years passed immersed in the awe-inspiring beauty of that hard to reach retreat. Then life took a turn and I suddenly needed to move on. But this time, I did so with the conviction of finding a lasting place of belonging that I could call home.

Coming full circle I was again inspired to live in an intentional community, formally this time, and it was with sheer commitment that I attempted to do so. Which I did so as co-founder of a charitable trust that purchased land not very far from where I had once lived at Moondani. The thrill of realising this long-held dream dramatically shifted to a state of complete inner and outer turmoil as the compounding issues of the worldwide lockdowns, followed by severe flooding combined with serious problems between myself and the rest of the community. 

Whilst I had achieved my goal of founding a place to live with a community, the sense of belonging I was seeking wasn’t to be found there. So, feeling isolated and ashamed of my extreme and reactive attachments, I started wandering deeper into the bushland beyond the boundary. Following the sound of a small trickling stream to its source, I stumbled across an old house in the forest which I didn’t know was there. I brought my notebooks with me, returning whenever I could, because although dark and dilapidated there was something about the energy of the house that I found so welcoming. 

I cut back the overgrown pathway leading to the back of the house, where I found a small outdoor deck built onto an enclosed sleepout. That was where I would go whenever I wanted peace and quiet to write. I even began to sing the songs that I had written long ago. Memories of my old me, who I somehow became distanced from along the way, came flooding back. As I sang my voice broke from the grief I felt at how little I now resembled the creative and passionately expressive self I had once been. At the back of this empty house, my muses re-enchant me.

I brought with me everything I needed to turn the outdoor deck of the house into an art studio, my Artisan Salon. This is where I come to sit at my altar, as I consult oracle cards, and make everyday little rituals like taking tea and arranging the flowers I forage on my walks. 

No one really knew where I would go to on those quiet days of solitude at my Artisan Salon. Until the day I met a writer called Luna Dusk, who showed an interest in my Wildly Organised drafts. I brought her by the empty house to collect my manuscript and she too could feel something special in the energy here. Although we had only just met around a fire the night before, we shared Persian love cake at a local cafe and I pointed out to her features in the landscapes I love. Whatever was in the air that day Luna Dusk came to visit, had changed her in some way. It was like she knew if she found her way back to this place, that this was where she could be who she really is. Which is what she has done, bringing barely anything but her poetry, writings and inspiration to experience enchantment.

Now that Luna has set up a writing nook in the disused kitchen she has been noticing something incredible is happening inside the house. The longer it is that she stays here, the more it is happening. I have noticed things changing too, at first I thought it was Luna fixing broken windows and starting to decorate but when I asked her about it she says that it was not her that did so. We don’t know who else could be changing things around in the empty rooms, but sometimes I think I see lights starting to flicker in the old fixtures here and there and the candles at my altar appear to have a peculiar glow surrounding them. 

The house seems somehow happier since Luna came to stay, I’m not sure how I could possibly tell that but it feels that way to me. It’s as though there’s something magical about it, which has kept bringing me back. Luna and I call it our Enchanted Halfway House. 

Now that I have a guitar, there are more songs to play these days. Songs from the past, my lost love and my longings but also about the growth I am currently going through. 

If you ever find your way to my Artisan Salon, around the back of our Enchanted Halfway House, I would love to play for you 

Carry Forth is my medicine chest, the collection of songs where as a woman and as an artist, I get everything off my chest.

It’s coming soon through the rooms of the Enchanted Halfway House. So stay tuned.