1. Weaving as Connection to Nurturing

When she had her warm cup of tea in her hands Alice said that hearing my words "I'd like to make you a cup of tea" had brought tears to her eyes. She lives alone, and does most things by herself, and had been feeling isolated, with no one to make her a cup of tea in a long time.

Alice had come along because she wanted to learn to weave, to find the courage to be creative again, and she was also longing for connection with other warm hearted people.

I love teaching the art of Basketry and I love the opportunity to connect with the person who comes to weave. In the web of Reciprocity there is Receiving and Offering.

I love teaching the art of Basketry and I love the opportunity to connect with the person who comes to weave. In the web of Reciprocity there is Receiving and Offering.

2. Weaving as Connection to Healing

Valerie spoke calmly yet with tenderness about being adopted as a child. She had reunited with her sisters, brothers, mother and father.

As she wove her basket, taking individuals strands and bringing them together with movements of her fingers, she said she was knowing an embodied experience of bringing all these pieces of herself back together into one place of wholeness.

While we weave I formally or informally open up the space for heart sharing. In our busy lives of nurturing we don't often have an opportunity to express ourselves deeply about what's moving within. The weaving then is not just an activity but a healing art. Healing is implicit in spaces where we gather and weave.

3. Weaving as Connection to Family

Aleena was so proud of her cute little coil basket that she had created in a day workshop. She knew the symbolism and significance of this creation.

Her teenage son had not spoken to her at all for several years as he went through his passage to manhood. She had given him this freedom and they had lived together side by side in the family continuing to love in silence until he was ready to resume conversation with his mum. Aleena spoke about her process of surrendering what she thought a healthy relationship should look like for a genuine relationship to emerge that was their unique mother and son relationship.

As this scenario reached a turning point she was celebrating her courage to preserve, have patience and to not take it personally and to grow beyond her known versions of motherhood. She was celebrating by gifting herself a weaving workshop to give herself some warm nurturing mothering.

Weaving is traditionally an art practiced in groups of men or women in different cultures around the world. The time spend with mature adults of the tribe is an opportunity to share wisdom and the sacred arts of relationships within the bonds of loved ones.

4. Weaving a Connection to Land

Gili was adoringly holding her new basket coil that she has just learnt to weave between the pads of her thumbs and first finger. She was rubbing the fibres in a sensory and tangible way. I could see a connectivity opening up between herself and the fibres of this land.

She said - 'Holding these fibres brings me to a place of being ready to love living in Australia. I have been in terror of living here. These Australian fibres are helping me connect to the land here.' Gili has moved to Australia from overseas 7 years ago.

The weaving techniques I teach are deeply influenced by traditional Australian Indigenous Culture. I have learnt form a lineage of Master Weavers in Arnhem land who have passed on the ancestral plant wisdom. Because I don't live in the NT, I have had to learnt to adapt and apply these principles from where I live in Coffs Harbour NSW.

5 Weaving as Connection to Remembrance

At Lila's first weaving class she was shown basic coil style weaving instructions and given Native Australian weaving fibres and then fell into a mysteriously mesmerizing silent trance by the fire, weaving for hours past the class completion.

Because Lila is a dear friend, and I was comfortable with her company, I joined her and we wove and giggled like kids by the fire well into the night.

There are signs that a women is a born weaver although she might not know them until after her first rendezvous with a needle and fibre. Lila and I discussed these signs afterwards. She had been - reading indigenous stories, collecting baskets from all around the world and vividly remembers a childhood weaving class.

Weaving is a calling, it will find and captivate you and its a calling beyond the basket and into your soul, to remember ancient wisdom and timeless versions of yourself.