What’s on Your Plate (Really)?

The quiet truth of what we carry — and why sharing it changes everything.

Most days, when someone asks “What’s on your plate?”, they don’t mean food.They mean life.

Work. Kids. Deadlines. Health. Hopes. Worries. The quiet things we carry that no one sees. Sometimes our plates are piled too high, spilling over. Sometimes they feel empty, leaving us hungry for something more.

At The Table, we begin by asking this simple question: what’s on your plate right now?

Because radical hospitality isn’t just about making space for someone else at the table. It’s also about noticing our own plate, and recognising that every plate is different. Some people bring abundance, others bring exhaustion. Some bring laughter, others bring grief. Some bring a story they’ve been waiting years to tell.

The challenge — and the gift — is to sit together anyway. To welcome what each plate carries. To risk the discomfort of seeing someone else’s hunger or pain, and to be generous enough to share what we have.

Tables Are Never Just Tables

When you think of a table, what comes to mind? Maybe it’s your kitchen table, scattered with crumbs and coffee cups. Maybe it’s a workbench, piled with tools. Maybe it’s a café table where you lingered too long in conversation.

Eddie, community leaders at the Village Well, recently reflected on how tables show up everywhere in our lives:

“Kitchen tables and picnic tables. Workbenches and desks. Coffee tables and community halls. They’re places where we learn, create, celebrate, and rest. They hold our stories — the laughter, the arguments, the everyday moments that shape who we are.”

A table is never just furniture. It’s a place where lives intersect. Where we welcome, where we argue, where we celebrate, where we grieve. A table can be ordinary — but it can also be transformative.

At The Table, we are reclaiming this image: a place where stories, justice, and empathy meet. Where creativity becomes sustenance. Where belonging is not assumed, but built together.

Why It Matters Here, Now

In the heart of Box Hill sits a building that many have walked past without noticing. For years it has been part of the landscape, but often overlooked by the city, by time, by progress. And yet, in those quiet cracks, creativity has been waiting to grow.

AFPS are partnering with The Village Well to reimagine what this place can be. Not just four walls, but a living hub: inclusive, alive, and driven by art. Together, we’re creating a space where connection deepens, creativity flourishes, and community feels at home.

What was once unseen is beginning to take shape as a centre of belonging — a place where stories are shared, voices are heard, and change is made possible.

When we gather at the table, it’s not polished. It’s powerful. Every scuff on the floor, every crack in the wall, every mismatched chair is part of the story we’re telling together: that belonging isn’t about perfection. It’s about people.

What’s on My Plate

If I’m honest, my own plate is often messy.

Original Photo by Martin de Arriba on Unsplash

Some days it overflows with ideas and energy; other days, it feels scraped bare. There are weeks where I wonder if I have anything left to bring — and yet, when I sit at the table with others, I discover I’m not alone.

Maybe that’s what hospitality really is. Not offering a flawless feast, but daring to show up as we are — plates chipped, mismatched, half-empty — and finding that together, we make a meal.

I think of the woman who once told me, “I don’t have much, but I always have soup. There’s always room for one more bowl.” That is radical hospitality. Not abundance without limits, but the courage to share what you do have, even when it feels small.

A Wider Table

As we begin The Table, we want to ask three questions of you:

• What’s on your plate right now?

• Who do you want to share that plate with?

• What might it mean to notice the plates of others?

These questions are not just metaphorical. They are the heart of what we are building. Because when we see each other’s plates — the burdens and the gifts — we begin to weave a stronger community.

This is why we are creating not just an arts project, but a living hub. A place where stories are told, creativity is shared, and overlooked voices are heard and honoured. A place that can hold both laughter and lament. A place where the village makes the well, and the well sustains the village.

Your Invitation

This month, we invite you to join us — in person, online, or in spirit. Pull up a chair. Share what’s on your plate. Add your story. Because there’s a place for you here.

And if you’re not sure you have anything to bring, come anyway. Come with your hunger, your exhaustion, your questions. Come with your joy, your stories, your silence. Come as you are.

Because the table is never full until you arrive.

So, what’s on your plate right now? Share a line, a story, or even a photo in the comments — we’d love to hear it.