21: Mathia Milani on Permaculture, Regeneration, and Community Living

For further details about Mathia and his projects:
Tierra Iris
Tierra Iris Instagram

For further research on those, and topics mentioned:

Tamera
Damanhur
Pachamama
Findhorn
Huehuecoyotl
Biomimicry
Burning Man
Morphogenetic field
Cacao ceremony
Ayahuasca
Temazcal
Hopi
Bruce Parry
Penan
Tawai: Voice Of The Forest
Johan Hari
Jamie Wheal

Giancarlo: [00:00:00] Hello, hi, welcome to this episode of the Mango TV podcast. Today we have Mattia Milani. I will read you the biography as usual. This is a bit longer than usual, but I think it’s worth it. Mattia Milani is one of the founders of the Ibiza community, Tierra Iris. Tierra Iris is built on of two main ideas.

Gathering conscious, creative, and loving people in one place, and together, birthing and maintaining a regenerative land as a team. But more than anything, it is a way [00:01:00] of living, a way of understanding through experimenting, that the future of harmony, sustainability, and abundance exist so close to us.

Terra Iris began as an idea of experimenting through regenerative farming, but it has organically grown into so much more than that. It’s become a community. We’re beginning to deeply understand that it’s the people who give the place its name. It’s the people who make it such a nourishing place of growth.

With the principle of giving and receiving without doubt, in alignment with nature and each other, we have all grown our internal and external riches. It’s as if the vision is coming alive by itself, seeding, sprouting, sapling, pollinating through blooms of wisdom and through magic, expanding through time and space.

You could call Terra Iris a movement of people who aims to regenerate places, infusing their hearts, talent, and soul into physical space. It’s beautiful to witness when someone new comes. They change and enrich the entire farm with their [00:02:00] unique energy. When they leave, you still feel their loving presence everywhere, and the farm has magically changed again.

Soon, in the near future, we will be navigating towards new waters and spaces, reviving and enriching lands through the Terra Iris principle. Welcome, Mattia.

So Um, let me, allow me a couple of minutes of, of, you know, why you’re here. So Mango TV is, you know, mostly a production company and we are known for a number of documentary we made on psychedelic science, on psychedelic medicine. And then from there we evolved into. Um, uh, this exploration of regeneration.

What does it mean to regenerate ourself? What’s the difference between transformation, evolution? And of course the topic of building community, living in community, living in a more [00:03:00] harmonious way. It’s critical to not just to Mango TV interest, but to the fate of this planet. We are very interested to hear from you, how building the community Ibiza is going.

Also, Mango TV is developing a TV show called Post Capitalistic Societies, where we have the same host living one month in Finghorn, Damanhur, Tamera, Pachamama, Auroville. And more, we did already Tamera was very interesting. Hopefully we’re going to have an opportunity to talk about it. But let’s jump in with you and a little bit your personal story.

What’s your journey? What’s, what was the cathartic event that make you decide to live in community? Tell us a little bit your story. 

Matthia: Thank you Giancarlo. Um, the story. Um, [00:04:00] so, um, I was born in Italy in a little town called San Remo. 

Giancarlo: Oh, nice. Like my mother. Actually, I think we discussed it already. 

Matthia: Very close to the south of France with a very liberal mother, I would say.

She got me when she was 18. She was born in Finland and we grew up basically me and her together. And I never had this sense of family, right? Because it was just me and her. And so I grew up as a kid, like looking at. other kids life and looking at their family and taking example of them. And this is how I developed myself as a kid.

Uh, always try to copy and paste a situation where love was always present, which was lacking into my family system at the time. And then I Went to the high school in San Remo and then my mother, actually, when I was 17, she moved to Ibiza [00:05:00] and she moved with my little brother that the time was four years old, and then she gave birth in Ibiza of my little sister, Eva.

And so we always kept this very beautiful connection with the island. Apparently, when I was one year old, I started to walk for the first time in this land. And then it I’m TNR, 18 years old, I moved to Milan, I studied economy and management for the hospitality sector and funnily enough, my thesis was based on a branding of an agricultural product.

project, uh, which was related then to hospitality. And so I was not even knowing why at the time I was dedicated and focused my thesis on this, on this project, but then it ended up. that I currently doing this. [00:06:00] And, and then from Milan, I started to travel the world and moved to Argentina. I work with, um, with a big company that were, was doing agriculture and in, in the south of Argentina.

And then, uh, so I spent three years there and then I moved to Monaco and I started to work for the Italian embassy in Monaco. And then I moved in between London and Moscow working for a real estate, um, company. And when I was living in Moscow, uh, at the time, um, My project was mostly oriented to helping and facilitating people to buy property abroad.

It was like, but then the rubble collapsed and then I had to move back to London and I had no idea how I was able to self sustain myself in a city as London. And so, um, ideally I start this business in hospitality where I [00:07:00] was, um, renting property and subletting them for corporate rentals. And it has been very successful.

We had around 120 properties in between London, New York and Lisbon. And, and so I started to really deal with, with hospitality, right? That was like, um, taking care of, of the, of the holidays and of many, many people all over the world. And then Coronavirus happened and, and then my whole business structure collapsed because the cash flow was not, um, enabling for me to survive.

Giancarlo: Because people were not going on holiday anymore. 

Matthia: So that’s, that’s what happened, but that’s more or less what happened until, uh, I’ve landed. in Ibiza. So this year of, of the coronavirus were very fundamental in my, in my [00:08:00] personal journey. I have decided to dedicate my time and my life to my passion, which was, was about permaculture.

And so I started to study permaculture in, in Mexico. And then from the permaculture, the evolution was, uh, randomly. I, I accessed to this course of one month in one of the oldest eco community, uh, where in Tepoztlan, Mexico, which is called Huevo Coyote, which with Findorm and Damanur and many others are the one that are hosting this course, which is called Ede course from the Gallo University, which basically are teaching you how to build eco community.

And then, uh, and after I, I started there, I started to understand about, I had this cathartic moment there when I understood that there was these things called collective [00:09:00] intelligence and the collective intelligence was way more powerful than individual intelligence. 

Giancarlo: But 

Matthia: how did you get this awareness?

Uh, it was through a simple activation where we were, asked to present our project, uh, to a group of people in the, in the course. And these people, they were able to access the information of the project and then implemented, implementing it with their ideas and see what was happening in the end of the, of this activation.

And, and you start to, and the project at the time was, was a land in Bacalar in Mexico, which I would love to regenerate. And. I started to understand at the time that there were so many people that they were coming. to me and asking me like, so when we’re starting, you know, and it’s like, I can’t because I don’t have the financial budget now to start it was [00:10:00] like, well, we don’t need money.

We can just, we just need to go and volunteering our time and making sure that your project could be, could be alive. And I was like, Oh, these people are really existing. And at the time was fascinating to see that there are so many people around the world that they’re really. They’re really coming from a place of love and, and truth where they really want to be aligned and living in a vision of, of, of living in harmony, you know, and for them there is no condition or precondition of like how we should work in order to get something back.

Um, and so I was like, ah, wow, there are these, these humans around the world. So I really want to connect with them and really want to work with them because this is how it feels. This feels right to me. And I also understood with this collective intelligence that there are many [00:11:00] people that they’re sharing the same vision in life.

And if you’re able to connect them through, through a meeting, then whatever is coming out through this meeting, it’s super powerful because everyone really is really bringing their soul into the circle. And there is this intelligence that is, it’s the intelligence of the universe of the world where everyone is participating in, in, in, in a little thing or a big things.

But in the end, the final result is perfect. And while this final result, if starting only from an individualist, it’s not perfect at all. If we can. 

Giancarlo: But so this individual, they had in common this, um, integrity about their desire to live in harmony with himself, with others and nature. But what does it mean?

Matthia: It means that as, as you probably said in your introduction, while you’re having a very profound experience or deep connection with nature that could [00:12:00] come from psychedelic or just for the fact that you have been always living in connection with nature, you understand that living in a society or in a system that it, doesn’t represent you anymore.

Um, um, it’s not easy. And so certain people, they decided that they want to live differently. And these people are the one that they want to reconnect and having this, uh, harmony with nature. And so I feel that that’s their vision, right? Um, so I feel that it’s just kind of separating themselves from, uh, Uh, much more, uh, uh, common vision of how we should live.

And these people, they just try to figure out another way. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. Which is maybe not so individualistic, but more based on the rhythm of nature. And, you know, they talk about bio mimicry. So following nature operating principle, [00:13:00] which is a flow, constant change. There’s no linear solution. And, um, so that was your beginning of your awakening.

So you, that you were in Mexico. Uh, the beginning of awakening 

Matthia: definitely happens through psychedelic journeys before before that. Yeah, I was, I think it was in Burning Man and, uh, it was my birthday in my life. Which, which year were you, which year was that? How long were you in that birthday? I think I was maybe six years ago, six years ago.

And funny enough, I, I grew up in a family where Um, I had, they had a lot of problem with drugs and alcohol and so on, like very heavily. And so I always. I find myself in a, um, in a position where I knew what was coming after this, this kind of, this kind of situation. So I was like always, I never tried drugs.

I never tried cigarettes. I never really drink [00:14:00] alcohol. And then I was in my birthday Burning Man and it was like, ah, someone offered me this chocolate mushroom and I tried and there was things that start, dots start to connect very easily. And then from there it was like, it definitely starts this very light spiritual awakening.

And then I’ve been testing my multi discipline around spirituality. And then I think the beginning of the journey starts when you start to build your own place, right? And how you want to have it in harmony within yourself. And so that was the beginning. 

Giancarlo: And when, which year, that was six years ago. And which year was Mexico?

The permaculture course, 2020. Okay. Two years ago. And so you decided that you felt the resonance with this other individual, you felt the power of this common goal of living in harmony with nature and, and, and what brought you to Ibiza then? [00:15:00] 

Matthia: Um, Ibiza was never into the, the scenario was always like very far away.

I was at the time and before during COVID actually, it was like thinking to moving to Portugal because my boats. some land in Portugal and I was like, I’m moving to Portugal and I’m just going to start my new project, which was not related to eco community, you know, it was related to eventually permaculture, but not to eco community.

And, and then I received a call from one of the partner about this land within, in, in Portugal and, um, was. March of last year. So 2021 in Detonia, I, I, I rent out this, this beautiful land in Ibiza and I wanted to go and live there with my family. But then all of a sudden I’ve been renting out another, another property, [00:16:00] which is a little bit more luxurious.

Right. And, and this guy out of. out of nowhere, ask me, why don’t you start to apply all the principle that you learn into this, into this Land of Ibiza. And then, and then, uh, if it works, then whatever is going to happen next in Portugal, we could, we can replicate it. So just, Take this as an example in Ibiza and we see it as an experiment, you see how it goes.

Nothing to lose. Let’s try it. So the island was calling me back. I had no picture, no video, nothing to understand how the, the, the land was at the time. Um, but I remember very clearly that, um, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, One meditation that I had with, with, uh, with the cacao, uh, I was able to see this land from, from above and I was already designing it from above.

And when I came to Ibiza, [00:17:00] it was just exactly the same place that I had in my, in my previous meditation in Mexico. I’m not 

Giancarlo: going to let that go. Now we need to unpack it a little bit. So, so the cacao was a bridge to some sort of morphogenetic field? 

Matthia: Uh, I think, I mean, the cacao came after an Ayahuasca ceremony.

It was a few days after. Normally when I’m doing ceremony, which is happening once a year only, the I’m going in, uh, in this in service and I’m praying, so I’m not allowing myself to go into, into many dimension. Uh, because I’m, my job, that’s what I’m feeling is just to keep sustaining the, the process. And so when I’m, when I’m in ceremony, I’m always, I’m always going for praying, not for any other purpose.

Uh, while when I, I’m taking cacao and when I’m going to very deep [00:18:00] meditation, I’m allowing myself to go into different dimension and, and cacao was, was, was this medicine for me that it’s really opening my heart and allow me to go into this 

Giancarlo: remote, remote, yeah. And I mean, you drop it casually, but I mean, science doesn’t believe that, you know, that of course.

Matthia: Um, okay. So you saw the house, I saw the house, I saw the land and then from above we start, I start to design it. And it’s, it was quite fascinating. It’s quite fascinating. And so when, when I arrived was not, I was, was. kind of a new place physically, but not emotionally. And, and the island was, it has been so kind to me since, since day one, like all the character that they had to arrive at the right time, they arrive at the right time and allow me to be patient and to understand that it was a process.

And, [00:19:00] and so the universe, as we want to call it, like this, was pushing me to go into this direction very, very clearly. And so, And that’s what’s happening right now. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. That’s beautiful. You know, like, um, Jimmy will, and, um, they talk about the, you know, the, when you are in flow is when, um, what you feel, what you think and what you do are in alignment.

And then the universe play balls with you, then you meet the right people, the right situation just happen. It’s beautiful. I had that. Not always. 

Matthia: It’s like this amazing river, you know, you’re in, you are into this river and you’re just flowing with it. And the only person that can really stop the river, it’s you, if you just want to stop in the middle.

Yeah. Surrender. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. Surrender. And it’s, it’s this idea of being, being engaged, but not being attached, which is difficult to understand because [00:20:00] people say, what do you mean if you’re engaged and you give all yourself, you’re also so attached about the outcome. But no, it’s, there is, you find that, that space where you do your best, you feel you’re in service and you just trust.

And if you, if you fail this, you just think that’s part of the process. But you know, it’s easier said than done. 

Matthia: Well, the land itself was. rented land for a certain amount of years with no clue how we were able to activate this. It was very little financial. So, I mean, at the time, because of this whole COVID situation, my whole other companies, they went completely down.

And so like, The idea is also the universe was preparing me to surrender to the fact that I had to do things differently and not think in a way that, uh, I would have act before, you know, with this business mentality, the scarcity 

Giancarlo: mentality. Yeah. 

Matthia: So the scarcity mentality helped me to be very creative and also think out of the box.

Yeah. You know, [00:21:00] and so it was perfect. Like everything was making so much sense. But this idea of using this land as a playground and not being. attached to it, you know, like knowing that at the beginning we’re like planting so many seeds and trees and like putting so much effort and work and knowing that it’s not yours, brings you into this space of non attachment because a lot of people, they wouldn’t understand the process.

They would say like, Oh, it’s not even your place. Why you’re putting so much love because it’s like the, the soil in the land is for everyone. There is the idea of a private property. It’s just. It doesn’t resonate with me any longer, you know, especially when it’s about the 

Giancarlo: land. Yeah. So, so, so let’s continue with the chronology.

So you find the right, you called a few friends, you find the right partner to get to do the, to sign up the lease. 

Matthia: So that’s another thing. The lease was already, it was already signed. So for me, it was the agreement that the head was. Uh, mostly to, [00:22:00] to repay back, uh, the entire, the entire year of dailies.

And then, and then I think that the, the whole experience of Terra Iris start with the name itself. Um, at the time when. Right before arriving to the land, um, I was working with Alvaro, which is one of my best friends and he wants to be involved in this project very, very deeply. And we were like thinking about, okay, what we’re going to create in this land.

And Mia was coming from all of this permaculture retreat and I was living, uh, at the time with so many of these people that we can call them hippies. And I was graduated as a, as an hippie in my eco community design course. And And then it was like, I really want to bring this principle into this land.

And the principle, basically, they gravitate [00:23:00] around this main focus, which is how we should, um, recreate harmony into our land and how we can regenerate. 

Giancarlo: Do you have them on top of your head? This permaculture principle? Um, yeah, most of them. Let’s, let’s, let’s, let’s, let’s mention them for our listeners. Um, Oh, wow.

That’s so, so there are nine. Okay. Maybe the one that resonated the most with you. I know that the, the, the symbol of the permaculture is the vulture. Mm-Hmm. that basically recycle life, right? Because the vulture, it’s dead people and then gives baby to little vulture. So turns. death into life, 

Matthia: which is also the, the, the symbol of the third door of the themaskal.

In any case, um, one of the main principle, especially when you go into, into a new land, into a new land is to observe the land, not, uh, act So, human beings are actively doing anything, not thinking [00:24:00] with our mind, but just observing what nature is telling us to do. And so you need to spend a certain amount of time in order to understand exactly which one are the dynamic, knowing that there are many living beings into this land.

And one little action from humans can change the course of their ecosystem. And so spending time just in observing the land is maybe one of the most important action and then actively start to designing, um, uh, the land in a way where, um, the energies can flow in a certain way. Permaculture, it’s, it’s a way of designing lands.

It’s not a way of, of living, right? It’s a way of, of designing. That’s why they call, when you do your PDC, which is the permaculture design certificates, is a way of designing spaces and, and, um, One of the most [00:25:00] important aspect is, um, as, as a humans, where we place ourself into, into this lens and where we have this energy, uh, zonification and how we can create this zone where the energy will be contained.

And, and so with all of this principle, there are many, many more, um, I start to design the land of Tirreiris, but the main one was definitely, um, okay, let’s how we should promote ourself. And so the name, it’s one of the most, uh, important aspect of it. And, and I was trying to find the name and it was like, um, This idea of like, you know, Casa Armonia or like, uh, Harmony House or whatsoever.

And nothing was really aligned with what I was, um, thinking. So at the [00:26:00] time, I remember, um, two years before I had this incredible Temazcal in, in Mexico, in, uh, in Oaxaca.

And it was a very intense one. And I think second or third door, I start to see a lot of rainbows and, and every time I’m, I’m seeing something very powerful in one of these deep connection with the, with the cosmos or with the, with mother earth, I’m always asking myself why I’m seeing this. And at the time I was asking myself why I’m seeing rainbows.

And the answer, information that I received was that rainbows the world. And so every time we see a rainbow, we should see it taking our time and manifesting what we want for our life. And then the rainbows is opening this portal for us. And so I think when [00:27:00] I was already in Spain and so one night I was looking at the sky and I saw this beautiful sunset with.

And then, uh, and then remember this, this, this, um, uh, experience I had in the Temascal with the, with the rainbows and it’s like, ah, let’s, Let’s, let’s check it out, you know, in Google, if what, what they find out about the rainbows, they were exactly, they were exactly the information I received and, and, uh, all of a sudden I was not able to find any of this, of this information in, in Google.

And the only thing that popped up very clearly was this, this, um, This prophecy, and it was a prophecy from the Native Americans, from the Hopi family. And the prophecy was saying exactly this, that our motherhood in one moment in our [00:28:00] history will start to be sick and tired. And our water will start to be dark and gray and our soil will start to be infertile and the animals that will start to disappear.

And when I was reading this, I was like, Oh, wow, this is exactly the moment I’m living in right now. And, and the prophecy continues and says, well, just in this moment, um, they’re going to come new, a new group of individuals, a new group of souls from different color, different gender, different culture, different nations.

And they will gather together and they will reestablish harmony in mother nature. And this. people, they will be called the Rainbow Warrior. And so I was like, Oh wow, this makes so much sense. And so Terra Iris means the land of the rainbow and means, uh, in that we are We are this land [00:29:00] that want to gather this rainbow warrior to come together and to establish harmony in mother nature.

Giancarlo: Beautiful. But it is in which language means 

Matthia: rainbow and Greek. Yeah. 

Jingle: Beautiful. 

Matthia: And RA means land, soil. And so that was the, the main idea around the name. And basically with the time we, we gathered many, many rainbow warriors. Amazing. It’s still happening. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. And so, okay, so let’s get into the specific, uh, how many, um, how big, how many beds do you have?

Um, how many people can you have 

Matthia: a full capacity? Can I just do one, one sequence back, the sequence back is that, um, we start with this idea of permaculture design and regeneration of the land and everything was beautiful. We did many. workshop and course around how we should treat our soil and many workshop around music and art and then [00:30:00] Um, the project started from, from individuals with this idea of like with different ideas and how we should operate, uh, this, this land.

Um, but the, the idea of the community was to, was there on my side, but was never really, um, part of the big scheme when I, when we started this project. Um, by the end of last summer, we start to understood that individual, they have different opinion, different idea. And And this is when, um, uh, especially was one very interesting problem, which was around cleaning of the house, you know, very, very simple one.

And then, um, And then we were like, just discussing how many times the cleaner should come. And there was so much conflict around little problems, and I was [00:31:00] not able to sort it out because everyone had his own opinion, you know. And so in September, I just woke up one morning and I was like, I don’t think that none of us, could have to choose, like, who is right, who is wrong.

Like, let’s just gather a group of the people that are currently spending more time into this place. And let’s try to define the rules and the agreement of this place. And from these agreements, uh, we start to understood that in the group, there was this, uh, perfect output coming out, which was making everyone happy.

And, and so the principle of the community were born from a disagreement of individual. And the land itself was asking us to gather as, as, as a group and to find solution as a group. And, and that’s when In September of last year, we started to activate [00:32:00] this experiment of a community, which now it has been more than nine, 10 months.

It has been working quite perfectly in harmony and disharmony, but quite perfectly. And so from there, like everything, it has been evolving in, in, in, in, in, in, in, Um, in a very expansive way, um, and the project of these two individual finish on September last year. And now it has been open for many more to, to be part of it.

And, and so I feel that especially when, when you’re taking care of a lens, the idea of, of doing it alone doesn’t work. And. And so that’s what. 

Giancarlo: So these two individuals that finished their job that was the, the syncretic, um, agriculture from Brazil, that, that, [00:33:00] that is entropy that give you some guidelines to how to create this regenerative, uh, agriculture.

And so you were saying that it started with the cleaning, for example, you felt the need to set down. some sort of rules and regulation of the community. Um, but so is this when you’re a full capacity, how many people live there? 

Matthia: Uh, full capacity, we have 12 people of the community plus another 12 to 15 people, uh, visitors during the summertime.

I see. 

Giancarlo: So you have the main house, then there is some, some RV, some teepees, some tent. So there is this, you know, there’s the, the, the resident all year round and then the visitor. And, um, Okay. So what are the, um, the challenges? I mean, uh, what does, you know, if you think about the moment where you were the most frustrated, the all, no, I’m sure you were not almost ready to give up because I felt almost every week,[00:34:00] 

but okay. Tell me a couple of example when you were really frustrated. 

Matthia: Uh, well, you, you, you know, you just pen. And, and, and most of your money into this project, uh, especially for the community, most of your time and energy, and then,

and you’re doing it for others because you are in service. And then if you know that some other people, they have their, their. personal life and they’re putting their personal life before the need of the community. That’s when you’re getting most of the frustration. 

Giancarlo: I see. But so they are some basic financial sponsors.

That’s the first, I think, maybe, uh, imbalance because there 

Matthia: is an imbalance in this because, um, Going back to the, to the print, to the beginning of this land, there was, there was never the idea of, of having a, uh, community. [00:35:00] Uh, and so if I would have to start it again, eventually I would take a land and then we would divide equally the, um, The rent.

The rent and the, and the first part of the activation. But then, Eventually, we also need to understand that most of these people that have a lot of energy and hope and heart, sometimes they’re not really integrated with the, with the, with the mindset that we have about working and times and so on. So sometimes they have very little resource.

So and responsibility and responsibility as well. So I don’t know if it exists, the perfect formula. I think the perfect formula would be we take a land altogether and we share all the cost. Um, I think that it’s very difficult to achieve this. So you always need to have someone that is transparent. truly believing into this process and activating it.

And then, [00:36:00] and then surely, I mean, and then equally share the, the responsibility and the financial needs in, in, in a second step. And then people, they start to take their own risk and their own responsibility, and they really dedicate their life for the, for this vision. Yeah. Um, 

Giancarlo: but so, You know, I just want it to be very, very granular, you know, almost, almost boring for some people.

But, you know, we’ve done on this podcast a lot of theory and I, I really want to dig into the practicality. So um, you know, you could be, you know, there’s nothing stops you from get your equal partners now. Um, and, and why you do think it’s been difficult to find like minded people that want to commit to take chunk of the rent and, um, Why?

Because you said, you know, maybe if I could go back, I would take equal partners. But why is that not possible now? [00:37:00] 

Matthia: Well, if you invest yourself 100 euro and you want really to do it, you can’t ask after that that everyone is coming equally to share. There are 10 people to share the 10 euro, you know, because maybe they’re gonna ask you why did you spend a certain amount of money on this and a certain amount of money on that.

It becomes 

Giancarlo: a more democratic process on, on, on how many trees to plant, what tree to plant, and stuff like that. 

Matthia: Exactly. And sometimes, you know, in little things, for example, now we’re in a full community project, but sometimes, You’re carrying a vision that other ones, they might not have at the moment.

They’re going to go into the process of having it. And sometimes you want to take the risk of planting more trees because you think it’s necessary. Um, is the right approach or not? I don’t know. Yeah. Yeah. Um. Um, it’s also interesting to find, especially now we’re talking about Ibiza in, in the [00:38:00] practical way, but like funding a land and having 10 individual fully committed and fully financed to, to take over land in Ibiza, it’s, it’s quite complicated.

Because it’s expensive. It’s expensive. And, and eventually people that don’t have access straight away to this, to this, this amount of money. 

Giancarlo: But you guys have a way now, you, you’re trying to monetize your, um, you know, the, the sound healing and, uh, and, uh, some of the product that you are, um, growing. I see you have a beautiful Terraris shop.

There’s a lot of things there. So the idea is to becoming sustainable. 

Matthia: The autosufficient. Yeah. 

Giancarlo: And how far away are you from that? I mean, I don’t want number just, is it growing? It’s 

Matthia: growing. It’s a process. It’s a big process. Um, these few weeks ago, we started, uh, our first, uh, vegetable garden for the community to start to [00:39:00] be autosufficient and not buying products at the market anymore.

And, and financially as well, you know, like when we were hosting, uh, retreats or we were hosting people with. try to have all the people of the community that are involved in some of the activities so they can get back some of the incomes that we’re generating in the land. And we are still far, but not too far.

Like I would say we’re halfway, halfway, halfway. And it’s, it’s one year that we’ve been there, so it’s not too long. And I think that, that’s, As nature is telling you, there is a process of accumulation and then a process of abundance. Uh, we’ve been into a big process of accumulation and now we start to be abundant.

And so we’re able then to, to share, you know, what, what we get into our land through all the rest of the community. And abundance means this, you know, when you have a lot of, uh, [00:40:00] products, you can choose what, what you want, which one is the best out of it. And, and that’s what’s happening right now. Like we basically just.

We’re able to share more and more of the resources that are happening there. 

Giancarlo: I see. So, so, so the model is that, you know, there is, there is a, a financial sponsor who has the vision, who bankroll the activity. And so it’s a little bit the traditional capitalistic model. Of the, of the, of the business 

Matthia: owner.

Um, uh, uh, yes, I think it’s a mix. I think, I, I, I think the capitalistic journey is not completely wrong. I think it should be readapt. I think, uh, what is the intention behind is the most important part, which we’re mostly missing into the capitalistic journey. And what is the level of speed of growth we want to, we want to apply.

And in my case, it’s [00:41:00] mostly referred to the fact, um, that the intention is so strong that and the trust on the, on the, on the universe is so strong that I know that everything is going to come at the perfect time and the perfect, and the, the, the, also the financial needs they’re coming in the, in the, in the right time.

So. To make it grounded, yes, you need someone that needs to activate this process first. Um, now we’re learning for the next. project of the next land, how we should take responsibility and risk together as a community. And so we can eventually gather these 10 people that eventually they don’t have their financial needs, but instead of always thinking that they need to put money, maybe they can put work and they can put their talent and then, and then it could go equally, uh, Uh, [00:42:00] into their support for, for the next, for the next project.

And so there is not anymore. One, one, one leader that needs to take care of and responsibility of the financial resources, but it’s the whole community that is taking care of the, of the, uh, of the whole needs of the community. Yes. 

Giancarlo: But so, so there is 12 resident and 12 visitor, let’s say, um, how does this, the selection process, I mean, Um, you, this is something that you decide personally, or you have a committee that votes.

I mean, when, when, when there’s someone leaves and there’s an empty room, maybe you have several applicants. 

Matthia: Yeah. We’re discussing about this today. We’re not there yet. For now, there was only a. Uh, moment of trust from the, from the universe of the people. So whoever comes at the beginning, yes, now the, the, [00:43:00] this, the circle is closed because we need to work and we need to integrate and we need to, you know, we need to move forward.

You need to be sustainable. I need to be sustainable. And yeah. The next process is how we are going to be able to, um, allow other people to come in. And, um, I don’t really have the answer right now for that. We are learning it as we’re evolving. Um, but definitely there is, it’s very interesting because I’m not very attached to the idea of space because I open up the door of everyone to be part of it, but the community itself sometimes is getting very attached and very protective about their space.

And so you always need to create this, this moment of entropy, you know, where you put

people, new participant in order to, to have the, the movement growing. If [00:44:00] not, it’s becoming a bit sometimes static and stagnant. So I feel that this idea of keep this community open to other, it’s one of the essential rule of Tierra Reyes, because we have this idea of creating a caravan of people that they can go and activating other places rather than having one land where we all sit together and we stay there.

We do believe that The work that we have to do as, as, as humans, uh, it’s, uh, it’s a little bit larger than just staying into one place, especially right now in the, in the moment we’re living in. We do feel that we need to go, um, around and reactivate and regenerate other places. So outside Ibiza, outside the world.

So we’re definitely open for other people to come in as maybe it’s not part of the physical land at the moment, but could become a part. Someone wants to be part of this community, [00:45:00] could become part of it in the near future for other, for other lands. Um, and so, 

Giancarlo: yeah. And the practical organization, for example, of the like, you know, shopping and cooking, do you guys take turns?

How does it work? Oh, everybody has a little space in the fridge. 

Matthia: So most important is the group meeting. So once per week is a group meeting where we discuss about the task, the to do list and the emotional problems we had during our week. It’s the most. most important, uh, process of a community. And then, and then, uh, regarding the space, yes, everyone has his own space where he can store his foods inside of the fridge or outside of the fridge.

Uh, we. Try to have, um, community lunch and dinner at least once a week. The rest is very open, and we try just to be together without specific agenda. Exactly. [00:46:00] We have agenda about what’s happening in the farm, the farm around, you know, uh, training together, having once a week meditation together. And, but that’s, that’s, that’s required or, well, the, now we have this farming day, which is required.

Mm-Hmm. . Yeah. We have. Three, four hours farming every Thursday evening, which is required for everyone if they want to eat their own food. Yeah. So that’s not, there’s no learning. It’s really farming. It’s really farming. Yeah. This is going to be once a week. And then the rest is required. Yeah. But it’s quite open.

We don’t have like very rigid rules. Also to have other peoples that, you know, they, we feel that we can create this bridge with, with other beings that they’re not. fully committed and they want to commit, but they have a slower process to commit. So we keep it quite open. 

Giancarlo: But so what happens if someone never comes to the group meeting, doesn’t do the farming, doesn’t really feel [00:47:00] part of the community.

There’s going to be a moment where you have to give them a notice. Oh, it’s not that strict. No, like, like 

Matthia: my son. No, no, no. Of course we’re going through this process as well. Like right now as well. Like it’s all about sharing in the group and finding the best outcome without having. Uh, personal attachment to this person and just making sure that the vision that we have as a group is respected by everybody.

If someone doesn’t respect it, it’s, it’s, I think that naturally they’re leaving their space. You know, it’s not, you don’t want to spend time or, or, or, uh, or your, or your life with the people that you love. Eventually you don’t, you’re not aligned. So we had people into this process that they tried to be part of it and naturally they left the place, you know, because they were not completely aligned with, with our vision or our way of thinking and doing things, which is, [00:48:00] which is totally fine.

Giancarlo: So you don’t have different departments, like someone in charge of ceremony, someone in charge of booking rentals, someone, okay. So 

Matthia: everyone in, in this group of. 12 people has his own responsibility. We have the And this democratically, 

Giancarlo: what happens if two people want the same responsibility? 

Matthia: Again, it was a very natural process, very organic.

Everyone filled in with, with what they wanted to do. Yeah, 

Giancarlo: 12 is a small group 

Matthia: after all. Yeah, it’s a very small group. So we have the house manager, the person in charge of the event, the person in charge of the farm, the person in charge of the animals, of the Uh, food. But 

Giancarlo: you are the pillar. So if someone in charge of the animal is sick and tired of the animal, it comes to you.

Uh. Or brings it out in the group meeting. Brings out in the group meeting. And then someone maybe wants to 

Matthia: replace 

Giancarlo: him. 

Matthia: So then we have tasks every week that we keep changing so everyone knows how to do certain tasks. 

Giancarlo: And so tell me about the emotional. What is [00:49:00] the, what is the dynamics that comes, you said, you know, we, once a week we share the emotional.

the emotional problem. If I don’t want any private information, of course, but, um, what is the recurrent thing that you see? And even more important is, are you guys implementing a practice to face this, you know, this conditioning and this blind spot that might not be in line with the communal living and being, you know, connected to the, to this purpose of harmony with each other in nature.

What is, what do you see in the human psyche as the most recurrent obstacle to harmonic living, 

Matthia: harmonious living? Uh, well, everything that we’ve been learning in our life now, which is Which is a great obstacle, because we have What do you mean? Our, 

Giancarlo: our, our culture, our 

Matthia: Our culture, our system, our society that imposed a certain Our [00:50:00] cultural conditioning.

Which is mostly based on the fact that we are competing within each other, and not collaborating, and not Co commit or co create, right? We always have this idea that something it’s mine and it’s not yours, and I’ve been doing this and so we want to be validated about what we’ve been doing. And I think the emotional part is mostly coming from the fact that constantly when you’re living in a community and in the same space, you’re constantly a mirror with yourself.

And so you’re always like projecting your your personal fears and within, within another person. And, and these kinds of emotions are coming out almost daily. And the only way to, to clear the space [00:51:00] and to make sure that this yield is about, um, first of all, um, you. being completely honest of what’s happening, having the open heart and like saying this is what I perceive, this is what I feel.

And the person that is receiving it doesn’t have to take it personally, right? It’s like, and then once, once this emotion it has been shared, um, I think the group is very capable of, of, um, Understanding the process of the person and, and making sure that we can put some sort of, of um, of rules of our agreement that are helping this person to, to, to do the to having, uh, a faster and easier process.

To feel validated. To feel validated and to make sure that the harmony could be recreated in the group. Because in [00:52:00] the end, what we keep seeking into this group is like having this harmony within each other. Right. And so if there is something which is out of place, we’re always trying to put it back and, and, and, and, And, and so having this conscious listening and making sure that we are able to, to help, um, this person processing this, this emotion, it’s, it’s fundamental.

Yeah. Yeah. It’s fundamental. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. Very interesting. Um, have you heard about Bruce Perry? It’s this English adventurer who popularized anthropology and he visited so many tribes and he fell in love with the Penan. It’s a tribe in Borneo. They’re like egalitarian tribe. You know, you give a cigarette to a Penan, they take it in 20 little pieces.

Um, um, piece of tobacco and give it to all the tribe. They, you know, they, they, they hunt a monkey and they divide the monkey every organ. The liver goes divided in [00:53:00] 25 people, the community, like super egalitarian and, uh, and then they were asked to settle to get title of their land. And so. You know, he made a documentary called Tawai, the voice of the forest, which I think you should be screening at Terra Everest and Bruce is in the island now, we’ll see when he leaves, maybe you can invite him.

And, um, he says that for the Penan, the beginning of the end was starting agriculture and starting to accumulate because until then they were like, you know, nomadic, nomadic hunter gatherers. So there was like this four or five family of maybe 30, 40 people. They were moving around in the forest. They were like super in tune with the forest, radically egalitarian, and everything was perfect.

And the moment they settle and they start to accumulate, then they start having problems. They start connected, even losing connection with nature. They wouldn’t feel so much when the animal was, they would be becoming less good hunter. And, uh, [00:54:00] and in particular, Bruce thinks that, you know, once before agriculture, we were completely in the right.

brain, completely intuitive, can connect with nature. And when we started with agriculture, we started developing the left brain, which is more like calculating and rational and, and, you know, Einstein says that we created a society that glorified the rational, but lost contact with the intuitive mind. So, so this is interesting.

And, and, and in Tamera they were saying that, you know, the most important thing is that They’re, they’re more than you guys. You know, there, I think the 150 resident, and then there’s another 200 visitor, and they, they think that, you know, the most important thing is that, you know, the, the resident, the community feels safe and they develop trust.

And then they have three times, three meetings a week also, because they’re much more, and not everybody goes at the same time and they mirror each other on the group level. And, uh, and, um, yeah, they’ve been [00:55:00] successful this, they have a waiting list now for people to join. And, um, you know, Auroville, they also have a big waiting list, but both for lack of physical space.

Um, yeah, this is super interesting. We’ve been together almost an hour, so maybe it’s a good time to, to start wrapping, you know. Is there anything that, um, what, uh, you know, uh, the reason why I’m so interested in your community, first of all, I’ve been there, I felt the vibe, there’s lots of love in the house, there’s beautiful creativity, beautiful musician, beautiful sound healing, and, um, and then, you know, in Ibiza, like, Um, many place it is just more affordable to live in community.

And sometimes it’s just possible to live in community because the land and the housing is so expensive. Um, so, um, what advice do you have for people that, you know, also, also not to jump [00:56:00] from topic, Harriot wrote a book on depression. He spent eight years researching those clinical trial. around depressed people.

And really what they find out is that what really caused depression is the lack of community, is lack of connection. So this is, you know, we’ve created this very individualized society that really compete with each other, which is very alienating. So how, what advice do you have for people that want to explore living in community.

Any, any books, any expert, any program? The only expert is nature. Only expert. Yeah. So you say starting with permaculture. No, like to, to 

Matthia: resume of what you’ve been saying, it’s, it’s beautiful to observe that Um, our society is, uh, is a reflection of how [00:57:00] we perceive and we work with nature, right? So, um, when you talk about agriculture, uh, our individualism, it has been projected in nature and we have been trying to, to take from nature and we start to create monoculture, which is amazing.

Come. Completely a reflection of who we are right now in our society. We live in single box in our apartment, completely separate to each other. And the same things it’s happening to, to plants and trees. We separating the plants and trees and, and it’s, it’s beautiful to observe how the soil It’s scaring.

completely deployed from all the resources because we’re applying this principle. Yeah, it’s a great metaphor. And our soul, which is basically the essence of the soil, it’s exactly the [00:58:00] same. Humans that are living into their individual box, they are completely soulless, you know? And, and so how we should bring back this, this soul and soil into the, into alignment, into the, into the harmonies by observing how a wild nature is working, right?

Like wild nature, it’s the real nature, it’s forest. And you can observe in the forest that there are. different, um, plants, different trees. Everyone is serving a purpose, a very beautiful purpose. And into the forest, uh, plants, they are living out of unconditional love. Certain plants, they’re dying to make other plants rebirthing or like just making sure that the [00:59:00] ecosystem could continue growing.

And And we lost this as, as humans, you know, uh, we, we are going to this competition, um, process, um, and we are not acting from a place of love. And if we, Go back into this process of learning how plants are living in community and learning that everyone has his own process, has his own task, and making sure that this one is serving a much more larger ecosystem and a much more larger vision of the universe.

Um, then we will find our mission and, and it will be much easier for us. to live as a human when we find, when we find out what is our real mission in, in our ecosystem, in this case, in our, in, in, in a community. And. [01:00:00] So I do see only a perspective where humans they can live as a community and and where they can really elevate each other into higher frequency.

Um, because alone we are not able to find our mission. And so my only suggestion would be Spending more time in nature, observing how animals and plants, they’re talking to each other and, and applying exactly the same rules as humans and would make everything much easier. 

Giancarlo: Amazing. Thank you so much for your time.

It was amazing. And, um, I love to invite you here, like every, I don’t know, every six months, so you can update our listener on the, on the, on the, on the progress of the community. Um, we’ve got an experiment, which is an experiment, of course, a beautiful experiment. Um, tierrairis. com. 

Matthia: Yeah, [01:01:00] we, we didn’t put too many, uh, information about what’s going on, but Instagram is quite good.

And now we’re. We’re going to put some more information in terrarilis. com on what is our mission and vision and, and how we should, what is the Rainbow Caravan, which is this community that wants to expand and moving around and reactivating and regenerating places. Like 

Giancarlo: the ambassadors of Terrarilis.

Amazing. But, but do you have product on your shop 

Matthia: that people can buy? Well, now like everyone in the, in the, at the farm is like starting to create their own products. Um, but, uh, at the moment we are, don’t have, we are not still in this process of abundance where we can sell our products for now. It’s mostly for our.

Farm to table experience or for, uh, for, for people of the house to use it, uh, for their own, for their own cooking. But yeah, we don’t have products. 

Giancarlo: Amazing , [01:02:00] congratulations. Thank you so much and speak to you soon. Congrat.