The Tenowa project

Please join us in creating a center for a new culture that will heal the human, actively let nature heal, and be a model that can show the rest of the world that a better way to live is actually possible.

Our western modern culture is destructive and depressed: we wage wars, bomb other countries, steal resources, pollute the Earth, consume too much, and it does not even make us happy. We have to consume more in order to distract ourselves from the pain that we would feel if we let ourselves feel all the horrors happening around the globe. The challenge seems so huge that we feel powerless as individuals, and we find ways to justify looking away.

Most people seem to think that peace is impossible, that human nature is inherently flawed, and that there’s no way other than competition, destruction, individualism and the blind worshiping of the consumerist culture.

But another way is possible. Committed people researched how to create sustainable peace on Earth. They eventually founded the Tamera Peace Village in Portugal (www.tamera.org).

They have formed a community of trust, where they follow the agreements of telling the truth, mutual support, and responsible participation. They do not shy away from looking at what is going on within the human being, in order to find sustainable ways to relate to one another in ways that are compatible with people’s inner truth.

They live in a gift economy. People know that other members of the community share the same mission, and they can all do their work, and trust that as a whole, they are achieving things that no single individual could achieve.

They live sustainably, they produce half of their energy, they restored the cycle of water on the land so that they are totally self sufficient with regards to the water needs of their 200 members, and they cohabit with many different animals (including horses, dogs, pigs, even wild boars).

They actively participate in peace work in areas of the world that desperately need it, such as Colombia, Brazil, Kenya, Israel/Palestine, refugees camps, etc. (https://www.tamera.org/grace-pilgrimages-and-peace-work-in-crisis-areas/)

They courageously developed and implemented a culture of truth in love, relationships, and sexuality. This is one of the core areas of humanity that our modern culture is too shy or afraid to look at, even though it runs our inner processes and is linked to so much trauma, as it is so often repressed until it comes out in destructive behaviors.

They discovered why so many attempts at community living fail: hidden conflicts in the areas of sex, power, and money.

At the scale of a village, they showcase a world that most would think is impossible. We need more people to know that it is possible, before they can in turn expand this new culture of peace. Why would people try to do something that they can’t imagine, or think is simply impossible? First they need to see it, touch it, feel it, experience it!

Tamera developed the Healing Biotope plan (https://www.tamera.org/healing-biotopes-plan/). The idea is to have a few Healing Biotopes around the world, each of them creating a field of trust and peace. They would act as acupuncture points on the world.

Here is a short video that summarizes what Tamera is doing and what a Healing Biotope is about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9SGkB2veSU

The Tenowa project is about building a Healing Biotope as defined by Dieter Duhm, co-founder of Tamera.

The Tenowa project is not about creating a carbon copy of Tamera. Tenowa and Tamera are not starting in the same era, they are not in the same countries, they are not in the same climate, they are not surrounded by the same society/culture. Different questions will arise, and the research that Tenowa will undertake will be its own.

Tamera is a Healing Biotope in construction, it is still a work in progress. That being said, Tamera is a concrete project, that people can see and eventually wrap their mind around, and Tamera is advanced enough that as a shortcut, we can point to Tamera when explaining what Tenowa is about.

The lazy way to explain Tenowa is to point to Tamera. The most precise way to understand Tenowa is to study in depth the book Terra Nova: Global Revolution and the Healing of Love .

There is currently a land project associated with Tenowa: http://buyland.tenowa.org. Several of us believe this piece of land would be a perfect fit.

If we can’t obtain this land, the Tenowa project is still valid, and can and should be developed, even when there is no other piece of land currently in sight. Many aspects of the Healing Biotope plan can be developed even in an urban environment.

Star Community is an intentional community based in Seattle, currently comprised of roughly 50 people, either living individually, or in one of four community houses spread across Seattle: http://star-community.org/

They come together for community events, such as Forum (invented by Tamera), visioning meetings, Possibility Management practices (https://possibilitymanagement.org/), and other fun events.

A Healing Biotope is a holistic approach to addressing the material, ecological, social, and spiritual aspects of life. Star Community has an incredibly strong base when it comes to the social aspect, and just for that reason, implementing Tenowa in close proximity to Star Community should be a huge asset and might be the only way to make Tenowa happen more quickly.