Tassie’s Kindness Connection

Tassie’s Kindness Connection

Tassie’s Kindness Connection

What is Tassie’s Kindness Connection?

Tassie’s Kindness Connection is a network of people doing COVID-safe acts of kindness anywhere, anytime.

As well as recognising activities from organisations and individuals already promoting kindness, Tassie’s Kindness Connection is inviting you to put your hearts and souls into one or more of these all-ages team activities:

The idea for Tassie’s Kindness Connection arose during the coronavirus lockdown, when a University of Tasmania survey showed concern for others during the pandemic was a dominant theme in our State.

We’ve always known Tasmanians are kind, but boy were we proud when we read these results!

With such a fabulous head start, there can be only one way forward: we have to keep the kindness coming, so older Tasmanians and everyone else can continue to make life-affirming connections and contributions.

Our Hearts Know Kindness When They Feel It

Did you know that doing acts of kindness makes our own hearts stronger?

Bonding with someone through acts of kindness produces oxytocin that can make us feel happier and increase our cardiovascular health. That’s the view of David Hamilton PhD, author of The Little Book of Kindness, in an article in HuffPost. It must be something about one heart touching another, and each heart passing it on.

What You Can Do

Through Tassie’s Kindness Connection, COTA Tasmania, supported by the Tasmanian Government, has created a hub for listing, promoting and recording acts and messages of kindness from around the State.

There are dedicated TKC activities outlined below, but these are just a small part of this community project.

Every person and every organisation can make a difference to someone who has become disconnected from their community through COVID-19 restrictions or any other circumstances. In fact, many individuals and groups are already cultivating kindness. TKC is an opportunity to recognise these achievements and help them grow stronger for longer.

Tassie’s Kindness Connection is proud to be aligned with the wonderful @yougotthistassie project by YNOT, the Youth Network of Tasmania.

As well as participating in Tassie’s Kindness Connection activities and any other acts of kindness that appeal to you, please post to your own social media and to the TKC Facebook page, @tassieskindnessconnection, using #tassieskindnessconnection and #yougotthistassie. Or just email your stories and photos to us at admin@cotatas.org.au, and we’ll share a selection on our social media and our website.

Activities for Hearts and Souls

* We are looking for ambassador teams for each of the activities below. Please email us at admin@cotatas.org.au to nominate people with a passion for kindness, a love of community and a sense of fun.

Tasmania surrounded by an ocean of steps as a graphic to illustrate Tassie's Kindness Connectcion's Stepping Out Our Kind Island activityStepping Out Our Kind Island

Tassie’s Kindness Connection is setting Tasmanians of every age the challenge of collectively walking the entire coast of our State before the end of the year! Our aim is to collectively walk 2,832 km (3,716,896 steps), the circumference of our main island, with a stretch goal of 4,882 km (6,405,184 steps) when we include the coastlines of all our offshore islands.

  • In July the UK’s Captain Tom Moore was knighted by the Queen for doing 100 laps of his garden before he turned 100 to raise money for charity.
  • At the start of August 2020, residents of Moran Sylvania nursing home in Sydney reached their target of amassing enough steps between them to cover the height of Mt Everest.
  • In Women’s Health Week (7-11 September), women’s health NGO Jean Hailes is hosting a fundraiser called Take Steps for Women’s Health (see below).

Tasmania has a part to play in all this stepping out! In the biggest Tassie Kindness Connection get-together of all, we’re asking you to form mixed-aged teams and work together to pool as many steps, metres or kilometres as you can between you, in a COVID-safe way, for the pure pleasure of the challenge.

We’d love it if at least one of your team members was over 60.

Your team can walk together in a COVID-safe way and multiply your distances by the number of people, or walk separately and pool your results with each other over the phone or the internet.

Walk as much or as little as you want. No tally is too small, because every single step you record brings us closer to our goal.

How to Tally Your steps

At the end of each week, get one of your team to submit your score to our online trust-based tally room. You can submit in steps, metres or kilometres – we’ll convert and keep a Statewide tally, as well as tallies for every team. Please use the same submission form below to register and then to add your tally each week. You will receive the same automated email each time, telling you we have received your submission. A day or two after each of your updates, you will also receive an email from us with your aggregated tally, converted to kilometres.

 

So send us your tallies each week to spur on everyone in the State. And if you’re feeling extra creative, dress up your busy toes and post a pic to social media, or email us a photo with permission for us to share.

You might even consider using your team’s steps, metres and kilometres to do a walkability audit of your community.

And as an aligned act of kindness, please consider making the tally of your steps during Women’s Health Week (7-11 September) do twice the work by signing your team up to Take Steps for Women’s Health as well. Or make a donation to one of its existing teams, such as #mapoftasmaniawalk.

Image of a heart made of pebbles as an illustration of Tassie's Kindness Connection's Filling Our Heart Shaped Island Home activityFilling Our Heart-Shaped Island Home

Get together online or in a COVID-safe space with at least one other person and bring your creativity to the task of filling something in the heart shape of Tasmania’s big island. It would be great if at least one of your team members were over 60.

And we’re not just thinking paint, though art will surely be a favourite. Your canvass could be a cake, a table, a lawn, a garden, a hand-built raft, a zoom collage, a dance, a stage… The possibilities are endless. And it can be as big or small as you like, as long as you can snail mail, post to our social media or let us upload to our website an image or video of your creation, with permission for us to share.

Most importantly of all, try to fill your version of our heart-shaped big island with things you think reflect your local community or your cultural ties.

As an aligned act of kindness, if you are living in the Huon, consider doing a joint project and submitting to both Heartfelt Huon Valley and Tassie’s Kindness Connection.

graphic of a saxaphone blowing hearts to illustrate Tassie's Kindness Connectcion's Music From Our Hearts and SoulsMusic From Our Hearts and Souls

Make music from the heart and soul of your community. Whether you come together as a duo, a trio, a band or a choir, the only stipulation is that you must be COVID-safe in your performance.

Ideally, at least one member of your team will be aged over 60.

Just snail mail, post to our social media or let us upload to our website a video of your performance with approval for us to share, and we’ll do the rest. If you’d like to send us words that explain the community or cultural connections, all the better.

 

 

 

 

 

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