Creating Space Project

My cousin's daughter, Amy, is turning 21. As a birthday present for her, I interviewed her grandmother, Carolyn. She told me about a phone call, in 1995, telling her that Amy, her first grandchild, had been born.

The birth of the first grandchild is an important and very happy occasion.

"In the background I could hear little sniffles."

"A little cradle… a little darkhaired, rounded baby."

Carolyn hopes that Amy understands how much she is loved by her family and extended family. Carolyn deeply values the preciousness of life, and the importance of family.

"The birth of that child was so important."

She hopes that, when Amy is a grandmother herself, she tells her grandchildren stories of her early life with Carolyn and other family members, and that Amy appreciates the time she gets to spend with those children.

Christine met Rodney in a boarding house in Sydney. She introduced herself to him and the two fell in love. That's as simple, and as complicated, as this story gets. They go bowling and are known to friends as the lovebirds.

He said "I don't want to lose you."

They hope to get married. Christine wants to wear a white dress and a veil. They are saving for a honeymoon on a cruise ship.

There are many losses in life. Christine and Rodney have both had their share. Christmas Day, for Christine, as for so many people, is a very sad time.

"Because at Christmas, it's my mother's birthday."

But, for Christine, Christmas with Rodney feels good. She gets to put down her sadness.

"I'm happy with him."

Isn't that a lot to be grateful for? To be happy with the person you love.

This interview is about simple abundance.

"They're talking about my brain MRIs and my blood tests and all my clinical symptoms and then just as an aside to me, when something is happening in the discussion, my specialist says 'Because you tested positive for these antibodies, by the way,' and this was the first I'd heard of this diagnosis."

Rhiannon was grateful to receive a diagnosis and for the quality of medical care she is receiving. At the same time, she felt powerless and excluded to learn of her diagnosis in a presentation of her case by her specialist to the immunology team.

"I guess I was expecting… that would change everything, like when I had the diagnosis, I would suddenly be able to start acting and be more focused and positive, and it would be this moment when I could take charge of my illness. And I think, the way I found out, made it really clear that was not in fact going to change anything."

It wasn't until she listened back to the story we recorded, that Rhiannon realised how hurt she felt about the experience.

"If you asked me right after I'd told it, before you played it back, I would have said control. I value control… But... I value the feeling that my feelings matter as well."

In her early 20s, Sharnie had a boss who believed women belonged in the kitchen and bedroom. At the time, she felt that she somehow encouraged his attitude and that she should have known how to handle the situation.

Now, Sharnie has a lot of wisdom to offer on self-compassion, letting go of shame, and accepting other people for who they are, rather than judging them according to a label.

"New situations come up and we often don't know how to handle them. Certainly not gracefully or tactfully."

"We choose to dislike people based on those labels. Someone could choose to dislike me because I'm female. And they could choose to dislike my son because he's male. And that's got nothing to do with who we are."

Sharnie believes it's important to be responsible for your own actions. She chooses to live with respect and kindness for other people, while understanding that you can't impose your own values onto others.

"I don't like to see people get hurt. So the value is that I can live with myself knowing that I'm not trying to contribute to any of that. I'm not choosing to see people negatively without knowledge."

What's it like to be the first in your family or the first in your community to study at university? Kara gathers stories from students who are in that position. Many of the students are Aboriginal.

Kara reflects on what she is learning from listening to these incredibly resilient students about injustice and their desire to help their communities heal from the damage done by colonisation.

"I think the more I listen… the more I realise I have no concept or understanding, not just about Aboriginal culture and Aboriginal history and Australian history, but about everything. The more I learn, the more I realise I know nothing."

"What you can do is really ensure that the time that you've got, you live well and you live with purpose and you live with respect."

"Farming, I think, is one of the most vital things you can do. If we don't eat, we die."

But how to do it without harming the earth…

Raised in the city, Alice left teaching to study Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security. She has started her own business, using Community Supported Agriculture, and is being mentored by the farmer she works for.

"I want my customers to be able to come to the farm to see how the food's grown and maybe even volunteer to work on the farm... so that it becomes a community asset."

Motivated by a passion for being of service, and wanting to model, to her daughter, being true to yourself, Alice holds a strong sense of purpose.

"I think the earth does have a spirit and I think… there's a lot of trust placed on us to look after it. It's a responsibility we have."

In December 2015, a month after terrorist attacks, Heba and her husband were flying out of Paris. When it came time to present their passports, they met with a hostility that frightens her to this day.

"The expression on his face really sticks in my mind a lot. He was glaring, he looked so angry, so mad."

Heba is a young Muslim-Australian of Lebanese background. She wears a headscarf. Her treatment at the airport in Paris was because of her religion.

"Considering what had happened in November, just before that… I totally understand why it would have been that way. So I was very cognisant of that. If someone looked at me, I would smile, just to make sure they felt comfortable around me."

The assumptions that we can presume the immigration officials held were in stark contrast to the values held by Heba: peace and calm.

"I value peace. I love peace."

Jackie is a young Indigenous woman from a remote community in rural Australia. She is studying criminal justice at university, with the goal of helping the kids in her home town.

In this interview, she talks about her passion for helping others, for making a difference in other people's lives, especially the lives of young people, and how those values emerged in her life.

"As an Indigenous person, I get told a lot that I'm never going to amount to anything because I am Indigenous. But you have that one person, like the youth worker, the Indigenous support officer at the uni, they tell you otherwise, they tell you you've got potential, you're gonna get somewhere."

"I want to stop racism. I know it's never going to happen. But I have that hope of stopping racism. I know what it feels like to be the victim of that and I don't want anyone else to feel that way."

"I want everyone to feel what I feel on a daily basis from my family and friends. And if I can do that for some young person and make them feel that love, I hope something will click in them and be like 'Oh yes, I do have the potential.' I think I'm already doing it."

"I think that's our [Aboriginal] value as well, the belonging, the acceptance."

A pink dress with shoe polish on its bottom.

A train made of fish and chips.

A hut by the beach.

Nanny Kim tells her granddaughters a story about a childhood holiday. Then we hear Tara and Zoe reflect on it.

Happiness. Love. The helpfulness of a family passed down generation to generation.

The insight and wisdom of children, when we remember to listen to them.

Denise talks about volunteering in Sri Lanka in the mid 90s. She went with her husband and two young children, and was pregnant at the time. She delivered her baby at home, in a small village in the middle of Sri Lanka, assisted by her husband and best friend. Amidst the beauty of mountains, waterfalls, and elephants walking through the village, Denise raised her young children, dancing around the couch and opening, joyfully, the parcels sent from Australia.

Connecting with people - your family and friends, the person next to you on an aeroplane - and enjoying where you are – being in the moment – are some of the themes that emerge in this interview.