In our second Compassionate Communities conversation it was a pleasure to talk with Dr Aditi Sethi who is a hospice and palliative care physician, end-of-life doula, and American Folk and Traditional Indian musician. Featured in the documentary “The Last Ecstatic Days”, Aditi is the founder of the Center for Conscious Living & Dying, and an emerging and important voice for shifting our culture’s understanding and approach to dying, death, and bereavement care. If you missed our conversation we invite you to watch it here.
Our next conversation will explore “the role of the arts in death”. We will be speaking with Victoria Spence founder and director of LifeRites.
Have your say
There has been a high level of interest in CCAus since our launch and we are in the process of connecting with the many people who have reached out.
Over the coming months, the CCAus board will embark on strategic planning to guide our organisation over the next 3 years.
The CCAus Directors would like anyone with an interest in Compassionate Communities to share your thoughts on our future direction via our online questionnaire.
Thank you!
Connect with us
Please join our directory which will help friends of Compassionate communities to find you.
It is open to champions, groups and organisations that are actively engaging or supporting Compassionate Communities.
For more info and to register, click on the button below.
Meet…
Kalamunda Compassionate Communities
Kalamunda Compassionate Communities working group is supported by the City of Kalamunda, Western Australia. Activities to date have involved hosting an Artist in Residency with the Kalamunda Hospital Palliative Care Unit and the day hospice. This led to a series of eight large scale portraits capturing the life stories and legacy of patients, their families and staff.
Two community workshops were held to raise community awareness and understanding of a public health approach to end of life. Workshop One was an individual painting workshop where participants painted their own Banksia flower, chosen as a symbol for life and death, representing the natural circles of life through the flower’s life cycle. Workshop Two was a community art mural, where the participants painted three mobile boards and discussions took place about how the community could come together to better support each other in sickness and at end of life. The free workshops attracted a diverse range of community with unique perspectives, discussing legacy, death and dying from an optimistic perspective that celebrates life. An art exhibition, a celebration of life and legacy, featuring all the artworks was on display throughout their Dying to Know Day program.
Kalamunda Compassionate Communities also held a Legacy Lantern Ceremony where lanterns were lit and floated on the lake at Stirk Park in memory of loved ones at sunset.
More information on this group can be found here.
Dying to Know Day
Dying to Know Day (August 8) is a great catalyst for community-led events focusing on end of life matters. The CCAus team were pleased to be contribute to a number of activities across Australia. City of Swan hosted a presentation by Prof Samat Aoun on Growing Compassion in life and death while the other directors were involved in panel discussions, forums and expos. CCAus also held a free screening of the film, The Last Ecstatic Days.
Save the date…
September 27 | Compassion Symposium, University of Queensland
November 16-17 | Sydney Death Festival
World Compassionate Communities Day is November 1. The CCAus team looks forward to sharing with you our social media campaign in our next newsletter.
Compassionate Communities Australia is a registered charity. If you would like to support what we do then we would love to hear from you. Contact us on comcomaust@gmail.com