Psychological and Health Institute

27/01/2026

27/01/2026

Gratitude ♥️

27/01/2026

Fresh Food Swap 🍅🌱

Swap and share your excess produce and help reduce food waste!

Give what you can and take what you need - no money exchanged.

Every Thursday at the Portland Library.
Pop in between 10am and 12pm, or stay for a chat, meet like-minded community members and pick up some gardening tips and tricks along the way.

Fruit, veg, herbs, seeds and seedlings, jams and chutneys, flowers, eggs, honey and recipes are all welcome.

If you have any questions, please contact the Health Promotion Team at healthpromotion.pdh@swarh.vic.gov.au or 5522 1197

11/01/2026

Battle of the Jams is a relaxed, community-focused event which celebrates the talent and creativity of our local youth. Bring your family and friends, throw down a picnic rug, grab some food from the vans and enjoy live music in the heart of Portland. It’s free, family friendly and open to everyone. No tickets required, just come along and support the next generation of local talent. 🎶

04/01/2026

The Hare and the Tortoise

“Once there lived
a tortoise
and a hare,
who both ran a race.

And on the outside,
it appeared that the hare was destined for success,
for it could run far faster than the tortoise,
which was far slower
and moved almost at a snail’s pace.”

“Was it that the tortoise won the race?” the small boy asked.
“And surprised everyone, as it was not expected to win?”

“No,” the old man said, smiling.
“The hare did win the race.

But the hare discovered, by winning the race,
that it had raced past every past experience in its life.
It had never truly been present
to its surroundings.
It had never fully lived
any one moment of its life.

The hare was constantly distracted by:
‘What is the next best thing I can achieve?
What is the next gold medal I can obtain?’

And by focusing on everything
that it felt it lacked,
that it mistook for existing
outside of this present moment,
it missed out on being present
to everything that did surround it
in this moment of its life.

By believing that joy
only existed
and only could be found
in some other time or place,
it raced through its life,
never truly being able to attain it,
as it always lay in the future.

And the future only ever existed
as an idea in the hare’s mind.”

The old man smiled thoughtfully.

“We can learn the lesson
told by ‘The Hare and the Tortoise.’

Do not mistake your
ability to rush through life
for a life well lived,
or how quickly you achieve success
or attain certain milestones
for the quality of your life,
focusing on the end of the race
so much so
that you miss out on enjoying the race itself,
falsely believing
that getting married at 18
is superior
to getting married at 28
or 38,
not recognising that
the success of something
lies not purely
in how quickly it is attained,
but in the experience itself.

Taking time to do something
does not mean
it is wasted time.

Once seen through these eyes,
achieving a dream at 20
is not inherently less brilliant
than achieving a dream at 80,
if you see each moment of your life
as equally valuable,
not mistaking what appears in your life
for your appreciation of life,
or granting anything in the outside world
permission to dictate
how happy and loved
you will allow yourself to feel.

No temporary experience
or attainment of success
need ever dictate
how valuable you are,
but by virtue of being human,
you are worthy of being alive
and present to each and every experience.

You are equally lovable
and loved
both at two months old
and a hundred.

This is how you win at life:
By not seeing life as a race
and not forgetting the gold medal
that is already around your neck.

Life is not about winning a race.
It is not even about racing,
but about beautifully living each experience
and fully appreciating the joy
that it is to be alive.

When you live your life
as though this is the only thing that matters,
everything becomes like a gold medal
for you to win at the Olympics.

But when you live your life
as though your worth
is not something you must search for in each action,
but may bring to each action,
you remember the gold medal
you have been wearing all along.

And there is no longer the need
to win a race,
as you recognise
a race can only ever exist
when you are living your life
in comparison to the lives of others.

And they each have their own timeline
and clock that they are living by
that bears no resemblance to your own.

In living in the absence of comparison,
you discover there was never a race at all.

And so it is impossible to win the race,
because there was never any race to begin with.

You simply travel through life
at your own pace,
the pace that feels most beautiful to you.

How quickly you attain something
does not dictate
the quality of what you attain.

Everything you experience
is a fleeting and temporary experience.

What lasts and endures
is not anything that surrounds you
in the outside world,
or anything that the world outside of you can give you,
but your capacity
to appreciate it fully.

Words by Tahlia Hunter

Artwork by Claudia Tremblay

04/01/2026

Kindness..

04/01/2026

A Shelter Within

Why not dedicate the new year to simply loving yourself more?

Loving yourself is often about learning to show up for yourself
the way you would for someone you cherish.
It’s noticing your needs
before exhaustion does,
listening to your own voice
amidst the noise,
and giving yourself permission
to take up space in your own life.

It means forgiving the versions of you
that didn’t know better,
and resisting the urge to punish yourself
for surviving the only way you could at the time.

Sometimes loving yourself looks like courage;
other times it looks like rest.
Often it looks like boundaries
that feel lonely at first,
because you are choosing your well-being over approval.

Loving yourself is not about believing you are perfect.
It’s about believing you are allowed to be imperfect
and still deserving of gentleness.
It’s the slow trust
that you can be honest with yourself
and still remain whole

Over time, that trust becomes
a shelter you carry within,
a space where you can safely grow,
release what no longer serves you,
and begin again,
without ever abandoning who you truly are.

~ 'A Shelter Within' by Spirit of a Hippie

✍️ Mary Anne Byrne

~ Art by CallyJohnson-Isaacs Cally Johnson-Isaacs Illustration