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Joining the Dances of Universal Peace International Camp in Yalova, Turkey

September 27, 2022 by Luvian Iskandar

A few weeks ago, I had the wonderful chance to participate in the Dances of Universal Peace International Camp that was held in Yalova, Turkey. It was a 5-day camp where we did a lot of rounds of sacred dances, meditation, and workshops with participants coming from all over the world. And I’m thrilled to share that the dance is coming to Asia in the coming months.

All of the dance leaders, musicians and participants of the camp

The Dances of Universal Peace is a practice developed by Sufi teacher and Zen master Samuel L. Lewis. It is a transformational practice that invokes an embodied sense of unity, presence and compassion and touches the spiritual essence within ourselves through reciting sacred phrases, music and dance from various wisdom traditions of the world. This practice can be done by a group of people anywhere from five to hundreds, even thousands of people creating powerful resonance and harmonic vibration. You can learn more about the dances at dancesofuniversalpeace.org. 

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The whole experience of participating in the dances has been really heart-opening for me. In the beginning, we didn’t really know each other, we simply shared our presence without much connection. In a session, we did a number of dances one after another. And by the end of the first session, it felt to me that all of these people (there were a little more than a hundred of us) that I don’t know before are my brothers and sisters. We all come from different cultures and backgrounds (there were 27 countries represented from South America, North America, Europe, Central Asia, Middle East, and Asia), yet it was so easy for us to feel connected, and develop care and love with each other. As a result, talking and getting to know each other at a deep level during meals and between sessions became a very effortless process.

We were lucky to have very experienced dance leaders that have been doing this for decades – some even for 50 years! They guided us on how to utter sacred words (mantras or dzikrs), sing the melodies, and also the dance movements. After five to ten minutes of instructions, suddenly one hundred people are all dancing and chanting together in beautiful harmony. It is magical to see how I can move in rhythm and sing very firmly despite not having much experience dancing and singing. I think everyone regardless of their dancing or singing skills can easily in these dances.

Listening to the instructions from the dance leader

The focal point of the dances is participation rather than performance. It is totally okay to make mistakes and forget the sequence from time to time as the most important aspect of it is how much involvement and devotion we give when chanting and dancing. I tried to give my utmost involvement during the dances and invoke as much devotion as I can within myself. As the sessions go by, I felt that my heart opened up like the petals of a flower in the morning. Opening up to receive as much light from the sun and fully express the beauty within, not being worried about anything that’s coming – the breeze of the wind or the rain. Living in contemporary modern society, I feel the need to shut myself and numb myself from the pain that arises from witnessing all the things that don’t feel right like people taking advantage of others, wasting resources, violence, slaughtering of animals, deforestation, pollution, etc. I’m grateful that through practice that is done collectively in a safe atmosphere, I learned how to open up my heart and put aside the protection when I feel it’s safe to do so. It is an inner skill that I think will be vital for my growth as a person.

The Dances are coming to Asia!

Having experienced the effect of the dances myself, I am really thrilled that GENOA is collaborating with DUP International to hold several workshops in Asia and have more connections with the dances. It is a beautiful and powerful collective tool to build connection, community, and awareness. Something that perhaps the ecovillage movement in Asia could really find fitting. I also think that this can be something easy to overlook as from the outside it looks like we’re just a group of people dancing, not doing anything tangible for the world. But I believe the transformation that is happening within each person through the dances will find diverse and beautiful ways to tangibly manifest in the future. I can already feel this possibility within myself. 

We invite you to experience this wonderful tool of unity with us. Please feel free to extend this invitation to your friends and family that might be interested to come along. You can see the dates below. More info will be announced soon, so please stay tuned to our social media channels.

See the Event Page and Fill out the Interest Form

Remember, anyone regardless of age, gender, race, religion, belief, dance, and singing skills can participate in this practice. Let’s build connections and recharge each other with energies of compassion, unity, and harmony. See you all there!

We came together beaconing unity, love, peace, and harmony

About the Author

Luvian Iskandar, Communications Coordinator at GENOA

Luvian has just completed his studies when he joined GENOA as communications coordinator. As he became aware of the social and environmental degradation in the world, he resonated with the holistic approach within the ecovillage movement in regenerating social and environmental systems. He chose to study the early development stage of ecovillages for his master’s program, thinking that he might be involved in such a project in his home country, Indonesia, in the future. He feels that building bridges across divides is one of the most relevant works today as we need an understanding of unity to overcome the global issues we are facing as humanity. He hopes to contribute to such a cause through his role in GENOA.

Filed Under: articles, arts, partners Tagged With: community, community building, Culture, dances of universal peace, paradigm shift, turkey

Southern Life Community Participating at the Daomi ‘ao International Contemporary Art Exhibition, China

October 26, 2021 by Luvian Iskandar

The second Doumi ‘ao Contemporary Art Exhibition was commenced on 30th September 2021 in Doumi ‘ao Village, Songyang County, Zhejiang Province. The village is an ancient village rich with cultural gems, with more than 400 years of history. Recently the village resources have gradually lost their vitality and their resources have been underutilized due to the urbanization trend of young people.

The exhibition is part of an ongoing government effort for rural revitalization and protection of culture. The Songyang County government has started to implement the “One Hundred Artists Settled in Songyang Village Plan” in 2018 in an effort to slowly bring abandoned villages back to life. At present, the county has organized the preservation of 142 old houses, 63 houses and formally signed a contract with 60 artists to create a batch of art villages such as Doumi ‘ao Village. The first Doumi ‘ao International Contemporary Art Exhibition in 2019 hit national headlines and made local villagers see the hope of revitalization in their hometown.

Southern Life Community, participated in the exhibition by renovating an old house in Doumi ‘ao Village and transforming it into an exhibition hall. In this exhibition, they show the development history of their community over the past five years and make art installations using objects from their daily life. Other than being an exhibition space, the house will also serve as a working and living space for artists and other community members.

About the Southern Life Community

Southern Life Community is one of the first intentional communities in Mainland China. It is a community based on openness and sharing. We welcome visitors and residents from all over the world to join our way of life and co-create in working teams. We have always been committed to accommodating groups discriminated against by society including women, people with disabilities, farmers, and sexual minorities. We share the common view that we are friends no matter who we are. So our members often do not care about external image, skin color, gender, and other differences. We believe that there is no garbage in the world, only misplaced treasures. In our community, each of us has access to public resources and a vote. Everyone has the right to speak up during and initiate a meeting.

We have a wealth of crafts going on where women play an important role in this work. Men are often engaged in manual labor. However, people are able to freely explore what they want to do in our community. Our daily activities in the community over the years have been to build houses, farm fields, play music, make sculptures, and build bridges between people from all over the world. Through the daily processes of action, understanding and integration happen quietly.

By organizing and planning a large number of art activities every year, we try to make social integration truly happen through art. Through the beauty of art, beautiful moments where there is no difference between people often appear. 

We believe that ecological civilization is the future. Ecological civilization is a civilization that embraces diversity. Nothing is absolutely bad, and every species has its meaning and value of existence, and its value and significance are balanced. With this in mind, we also engaged in ecosystem restoration and research and have restored 200 mu (1333+ square meters) of wetland in a nearby area over the past years. 

Our community is made of new residents who are attracted to the countryside and want to settle here and also local people who have a passion for active social work to build their area. New residents who came have been paying attention to the countryside, they use their experience and understanding of city living and bring new perspectives and different possibilities to the local peoples’ daily life and work. There are also short-term residents who come for volunteering, research and engaging in different projects. Through interaction with different people coming from different backgrounds, local people get a fresh and different view of their daily life. Gradually, local people become more involved co-creation process of our community as organizers and co-sponsors of on-site projects and facilitating gentle integration of new residents with local conditions. With the gradual deepening of the relationship between new residents and local people, the formation of a common goal of sharing life and mutual assistance happens naturally.

The formation of our community will be an experimental sample of new rural communities in China, exploring the values of sharing and altruism, the worldview of peace and goodwill, and the consensus community with scientific and artistic thinking. Hopefully, we can be a long-term inspiration for the transformation of more villages.


Tang Guanhua, Founder of Souther Life Community

Tang Guanhua is the founder of Southern Life Community. He is an artist and an intentional community enthusiast. At one point in his life, he moved from the city to LaoShan mountain with his wife to experiment with self-sufficient lifestyles and built a self-sufficiency laboratory for youth to learn self-sufficient lifestyles. With such experience, he established AnotherLand NGO, the first and only NGO focusing on eco-community development in China. He organized China Intentional Community Summit two times and helped the Chinese people to understand the concept of an intentional community better by refining the term in the Chinese language. He is considered to be the founder of the China Intentional Community movement by the Chinese media. In 2015 he founded Southern Life Community, an experimental intentional community in southern China that attracted thousands of people to come and explore sustainable lifestyles. He has been awarded the China Post-85 Charity Figure Award, Top 10 Public Welfare Project Awards of People’s Daily, nominated for UNDP Equator Prizes, and shortlisted for the UN 2018 Young Champions of the Earth. His artworks have been collected by the Museum of Contemporary art Beijing, Alibaba Foundation, Tamera Peace Research and Educational Center, Federation of Damanhur, and much more.

Filed Under: arts, ecovillages, Uncategorized Tagged With: arts, China, ecovillage, intentional community, Southern Life Community

“Share in the Miracle” a Poem by Devi

May 1, 2021 by Luvian Iskandar

As she celebrates 8 years living in a deep connection with nature in Edenhope, Devi expresses her gratitude and appreciation of life that is true, serene, and present through this beautiful poem.

Share in the Miracle

Share in the miracle
of a space where Love is Sovereign
& time but an illusion;
a place in which the nature
returns one to itself –
a place of true serenity
in which the fruits of inspiration

grow wild
Share in the miracle
for it is freely bestowed:

the priceless reality of the given moment,
never to be sold, nor lost
in the exchange of meanings traded
by the words and laws of others


Share in the miracle,
through your deeds and thoughts;
& in every act to which you cast
attention, for we all are listening
to the heart speaking its silence


Share in the miracle,
simply for the joy of it, of being
here at play in nature and with each other;
whilst others may rue their days and waste
their labours, here we smile in remembrance

of what always stands true
Share in the miracle, friend,
for we welcome you to us:
have we been watching at the gate
as the Grace moved you here?
Has it been lifetimes already?
Now are you ready to come home?

About the Poet

Devi, Edenhope, Vanuatu

Originally from Australia, Devi has lived in Vanuatu as
part of the Edenhope project since 2015. Her service
has included the communication, outreach projects
and administration of the Edenhope Foundation. She
is deeply inspired by the exploration of endemic
biodiversity as part of daily life, including immersion
in nature, preparation of natural plant-based foods,
and researching the social issues faced by indigenous
women of Vanuatu. Find more about Edenhope here!

Filed Under: arts Tagged With: ecovillage lifestyle, edenhope, vanuatu

“Melting Snow” a Poem by Eve Ballard

May 1, 2021 by Luvian Iskandar

Eve is one of the co-founders of Permayouth, a global community of youth engaging in permaculture, [pr]activism, eco-regeneration, and humanitarianism. She was also an active participant of the ReGEN-Nations program. Eve is also a poet who writes and shares her poems related to environmental activism. In this issue of our newsletter, she shares her poem “Melting Snow” which portrays the voice of youth coming together to urge change. 

Melting Snow

The living is losing colour…holding onto faded love?

will there be time to rediscover?

Life is a waiting game…

tick tock, tick tock do we want more of the same?

The oceans are heating up like a fever… 

And I tell you there’s no room for non-believers

The planet is covered by winds of blue

Not blue as the colour but blue like a sad, old, worn out, shoe

Our beautiful complex planet is hurting, alerting and asserting

Alerting us that new perspectives and actions need reworking

How a single word can set the world turning from one moment into the next 

We can’t just sit back lost, fearful and feeling perplexed

We can rewrite a page in our cultural dictionaries

Write a page on change making without quandaries

We can redefine what activism means

Relook at the juggernaut crisis the world is seeing

The world has profoundly changed exponentially

Economically, tech-no-logic-ally, socially and eco-logically 

We are making a global movement, making our messages echo

Changing the activism code from when people loved art deco

Activism is not always about ramming boats

Or tying yourself around a tree in trench coats

It’s about finding your own role to play in this critical time

Using your own skill sets to effect change along with a new paradigm

There is a transformation that is happening

It’s happening from an unsuspecting group that is unravelling

Young people,  the unique generation is rising

Young people  are rising with no compromising

Young people  are the largest generation that’s ever existed

There is 3.5 billion of us rising up tight fisted

The UN calls us “the new global power reshaping the world”

We are changing the narrative on the way people see us  unfurled 

From all around the world forging change in a diversity of ways

Making a global movement inspiring, leading and stepping up to challenges ablaze 

There are no borders, no boundaries that stop the activism we do

Changing perceptions and the way we relate to the planetary view

United to leap forward we have more in common than what separates us

We are stronger together,  so stop waiting for that fossil fuel guzzling bus

If we have learnt something it is to stop procrastinating

What we do on a daily basis is the biggest threat to our race and its accelerating

The beauty of the situation is that we can change and relate

Kicking ourselves now,  so too little is NOT too late

This is our chance to see a shared reality

It’s our chance to declare a stance and a commonality

It’s getting the facts straight that gets us to act and not to wait

Take mother earth into your heart and connect as soul mates

The protection of our future is universal

And it should be anything but controversial

Youth bring insight, a bright light to exciting solutions never tried before

Let feathers perched on our souls and sing a tune of hope to restore

For it is our hope in our soul that resides in our core

To keep rising up, uniting for our earth is totally worth fighting for

For one day I will have grandchildren of my very own

I don’t want to be the one to tell them they will never see snow

About the Poet

Eve Ballard is a young Australian environmental activist and a co-founder of Permayouth, a youth-led community that has come together to make a positive difference in the world. Eve also is a talented eco-poet and shares her poetry at monthly Global Permayouth Festivals and other gatherings where people and leading mentors come together to share ideas on Permaculture,
regenerative, and ecological challenges. Eve lives on a Permaculture property along with her family in the beautiful Noosa Hinterland where she is able to practice Permaculture as a part of her daily life.

Filed Under: arts Tagged With: poem, youth

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