A tuscan fairy tale

a complete natural renovation on the tuscan countryside

By Regina Roeder

July 8^th, 2018

With dirty feet, I am sitting in a camper van in Tuscany at a construction site right within an organic agriculture project. How did I end up here? Was it intuition? Or my guidance, that whispered the direction as so often in life? I cannot remember, but I knew I had to follow this calling.

Since I just had lost everything on my material plane along a two year journey through South America, I was more than free to train ride my way to Italy. Innerly I smiled, since I knew it was part of myself who wanted to become involved into a sustainable project on the countryside, bringing all I had learned on my journeys with the elders of the forest back to Europe. Blessed by life, I woke up in beautiful Italy, in the romantic region called Tuscany and between the pine trees and grapevines, I felt a sense of home instantly. Somehow on this path of a natural, independent state of living, I found myself on a sustainable construction site, a place where clay, hemp, rice and chalk were the ingredients to renovate the inherited finca of a now dear Italian friend. No coincidence. Within this circle. We learn from the past while creating our future. To choose and to question. To allow the impermanence of life to unfold with ease and patience. In the way of nature. Sometimes it is hard to make decisions in a world that is fast and makes so much noise.

'Listen to your heart,' the construction manager said. Words I won't ever forget and words that have guided me ever since. Or let's say I am still learning to make it my compass.

And we did. And once you do, guess what you will create?

Agrivilla i pini, is an honest project painted in the colours on how we imagine a future living and filled by 100% Italian handwork. Made by humans that truly enjoy what they are doing. It is an experience providing space to connect and contemplate. A space for solitude and communion. A place to share and receive. A place to inspire and be inspired. A place to come with friends and make new ones. A place to meet the family you might have been looking for as a child.

'Listen to your heart.' From this one choice everything unfolded naturally, yet magically.

My dear friends, Franziska & Benjamin, the owners of the finca and myself saw the vision of a project that is 100 percent transparent. Creating a space where we would love to stay. Based on the fact that each human deserves to know where things come from and which person stands behind each item you come in contact with during your stay. Whether this be the door you open or the carrot you eat. Everything handmade by neighbours and friends. Energy that fills every corner of the finca. A frequency you cannot only feel, but taste and smell. The room you inhabit, the food you eat and the garden that invites you to wander. A conscious circle of giving and receiving is being created while honouring Mother Earth and her resources.

At the same time we expanded the organic agriculture to one day fully sustain ourselves.

The more I experience, the more I learn and unlearn along the road. The more the road reveals the pillars of our current society. Pillars that don't have the well being of its living beings in focus. Nevertheless a system that makes it hard to leave since it provides a lot of outer security and comfort.

Therefore we are asked for courage to dare the first step.

I woke up from a long sleep of denial and it takes strengths to not drown under the current situation of the planet including its human beings. Letting go of inherited destructive habits while daring a change. Not allowing fear to be an option in a time that urges for a life that is sustaining, yet enhancing.

Our generation already came to realize that the pillars of our material success were not only hard work and sweat of our ancestors. Exploitation of Mother Earth and human beings had their fair share in the construction of a Western dream. Exploitation of some that society declared as being less worthy, to feed our own greed and comfort level and the use of materials that seemed so cheaply affordable to be true. What a magical and dangerous moment after World War II when everything was available at any time wrapped in shiny plastic paper. Who made them, what was in there? No one asked and some are still not asking. But I subconsciously know everyone wonders. No one dares speaking up since comfort is convenient and golden rays seem glittering upon the horizon letting us feel shiny and powerful on the surface. The technological revolution and its fast pace left little space to ask and question. Only now we know what we had been sacrificing. Tradition & wisdom, knowledge & hand craft. Above all a garden we were invited to tend including our own healthy body.

6 families of bees are on the terrain, having made this place their home, we leave them their honey since they already give so much to the agriculture.

Slowly slowly the vegetables are providing

Being back in Europe I came to wonder how blindfolded walk through life. How little we question and how little we care. Care for our body. Our mind. Our environment. Our community. It seems like future and security are more important than compassion and community. Consequently whom to trust? How to read labels? And if you have read my stories about the Peruvian cacao farmers you will know that not everything we are being told is true. How often do you buy straight from the person behind a product? The fast paced lifestyle in the western world has made it difficult to connect to the source of creation. Establishing a transparent exchange of energy. Nevertheless the project in Italy proofed it is possible. Everything is already there. From the carpenter to the blacksmith, the dressmaker for the curtains and the linen to the glassmaker. Each ingredient of the finca handmade by now friends of the Agrivilla family. What a wonderful endeavour. We had to dig a bit deeper and learnt a lot about how many chemicals and unnatural materials are used in modern construction, daring something new inspired by our ancestors was therefore apparently refreshing for everyone involved.

Keeping tradition alive while producing organic cold - pressed olive oil

It is more than one year ago since I have returned to Europe for the first time in more than five years, and it has been an interesting journey being back. Observing. Contemplating on a lifestyle that does not honour the human spirit. I see people running, trying to save time and overworking themselves in a pace that I have definitely had to unlearn along my journey. The well-being of community and nature's beauty is most likely priority.

We ourselves define success, don't we? And well-being is not part of it as far as I can observe. We as a collective created a system including inhuman working hours sacrificing our health of their bodies and souls seeking our worth outside, since we cannot find it within. And behind everything. A word of four letters. Fear. A collective trauma of having lost our spiritual connection and our inner worth. The finca's guests are visiting the land from all over the world to find silence and ego recharge their batteries. To disconnect to connect again with nature and themselves.

I experience beautiful, also emotional encounters when guests from metropolitan cities ground themselves in a natural environment, where there is no reception and noise, but the birds and the crickets sing you gently to sleep. A place created from the heart. A strong reminder that humans need nature now more than ever, alongside systems that allow a harmonious way of living together. We have fallen out of rhythm and now we are invited on a journey to remember what we have forgotten. Our connection to the stars and the sky, the earth and the ocean, remembering that we are part of a universe not separate.

When the chef himself picks fresh herbs from the terrain...

...and the girl who washes the dishes plays guitar.

We do not have it figured out. Never will we have this, since life is a constant movement of change and letting go. A beautiful transience to provide space for the new. An involution which creates the foundation of an evolution. Together we are invited to see an opportunity in this crisis of health and environment. A moment where the world seems to divide again we receive messages from the Earth and our bodies to opt for change, to plant different seeds. Of heart and truth. To take over responsibility and not give it away. Those that stick with it, honestly, peacefully though will shine beautifully. To not repeat the same structures again, while being the first ones having tried to let go of an old system that is not life sustaining. And not for themselves, but for all of their grandchildren. It is a little game we are thrown into on this planet and sometimes we are the actor. Even though we have given the invitation to be the act.

I sometimes wonder, what did 30 years on this planet teach me? Having explored different ways of living. Yet always finding myself back in nature. Slowing down a bit more with each solar return. Realizing everything that happens to us, happens for us.

San Giovanni water, which is applied in the morning of San Giovanni to give force for the new changes that are coming up.

Night of San Giovanni, celebrated to let go of things that do not suit lives any longer to make space for change

A lot have asked me whether I am back to Europe for good. I don't know. I needed a pause and steady place for a bit after all this rush of movement. A lot of you have lived through my adventures and you were a great encouragement to continue, to continue although my body was tired and my soul needed time to process everything I had discovered. I was forced to rest. To pause. To breathe. To come back to the centre and realize anything is possible. Anywhere on this planet as long as you commit your heart fully towards it. Don't ask for the how, just take the first step. Don't look at the mountain, but your feet. And go.

Remember your heart is a magnet and along the way you will attract everything you need for your own pilgrimage.

Natural materials used throughout the construction process

2018. The less I asked from life the more came towards me.

Non - attachment is definitely a lesson we all came to learn on this planet, but I found myself quite frequently in situations where my definition of life was taken away from one moment to the other. Inviting me to ease into deeper conversation. The freedom that comes in this thin space of nothingness. Where in the end anything was possible. If one believed in it. Sometimes you need to loose everything to free yourself and trust that the path will appear once you walk it and disappear again at the same time.

I was fortunate to be part of the creation of a wonderful project that enriches the planet. A project showcasing what is possible and how it feels to live in harmony. To choose from the heart and be surprised by what one is constantly receiving. I wrote these words to remind all of us that this is the greatest force and no matter at which crossroad you might be in your life right now, use your heart space and allow its wisdom to steer your journey. That is freedom and within freedom lies love.

Any day of the year the 14 hectar land provides something

A plate significant of the project, Orto, garden. A plate where each bite is different and a base of lentils and dried olives are the flavour carriers.

This is why I love the raw. A place where wild flowers grow, where weeds are considered as food, where honey stays with the bees, where butterflies and insects are living in harmony with the elements, a beautiful symbiosis, where space is shared with the animals and birds while sharing with them what we have while realizing we are one with the universe and we do not own anything. We have lived way longer with nature than without. That is why we instantly feel home being in a harmonious system of fruit trees and herbs, vegetables and flowers. A holistic system that you can taste, smell and most of all feel. The more people I have been talking to on my journeys and the guests at the Agrivilla, I realized that was exactly what everyone was longing for to create in this lifetime.

A transparent way of living with nature and one another.

This is a perfect timing to built something sustainable, something for our community, where we work together.

Then it is exactly this fairy tale that you imagine now. This garden Eden we were invited in the first place.

This is why nature is important since she nourishes us in so many ways. From the fruits and vegetables that nourish our physical body, to the sun and the moon that move us through cycles, the water, our emotional body, the sky and the earth our cosmic bridge to not only ground ourselves but also to see beyond the visible realm. Realizing everything we see in her, we carry inside. She teaches us everyday to listen and to not force ourselves, to breathe and let go. We are here to live our story, learn from the past and create our future. To built a place where we are grateful to be living, excited to be alive. An honest haven for us and our grandchildren.

guests just being naturally part of the whole experience, the family

I am thankful of having been part of this wonderful project in Tuscany that is still hosting guests every year, giving them a glimpse on how we can live together in nature. Honoring seasons, cycles and giving back equally.