I have been fascinated by the photographs of Jacob Riis for many years. Riis was an anti-poverty campaigner and journalist whose photos are full of emotion and story. At the turn of the century he documented the appalling living conditions in New York City in the hope that they would move people to do something about creating better conditions and alleviate suffering.

Many of us are carrying past life memories of these kinds of lifetimes and also blood memories - carried in the DNA from our ancestors. If it is strong, or you have made past life vows in relation to creating wealth, it can develop into poverty consciousness - a constant and nagging fear that all will taken away from us again. It does not matter how abundant or rich our lives appear, when we carry this binding fear, it is as if we remember these times like they happened yesterday and like hungry wolves, they wait to engulf us again.

It is important to acknowledge and FEEL the wealth of our current lives. There are many, many people in the world still living in these types of conditions and worse. To fear poverty creates a barrier between us, it makes us want to turn from or push away what frightens us. It limits or crushes completely our creative impulse and trust in our dreams. And worst of all it binds us tighter into the whole obsolete belief of a class system. A system devised to separate us through fear - as if our living circumstances or education were a measure of our worth.

Instead of fearing poverty, we can:
Dedicate ourselves to living simply and frugally while at the same time feeling real gratitude for what we have
Spend long periods in nature and let ourselves remember how to know her intimately again and grow our own food
Enjoy developing self-reliance and making by hand what we need
Supporting our local community with conscious spending and buying locally
Share in times of plenty

We are remembering again what we used to be.

Kings Daughters Tenement Chapter, Kindergarten Games 1897

School 1890s

Baxter Street Court