The Seventy-Seventh Question: Looking Back, Looking Ahead
The countdown to 2025 is on...
I fully intended to send this out yesterday. But I didn’t. C’est la vie.
As you’re surely aware by now, we’ve turned the calendar to the last month of the year. It certainly feels like it was just weeks ago I was trying to figure out what 2024 would hold for me and I what I wanted to experience/accomplish, and yet now here I am considering these same topics for 2025. There’s nothing revelatory for that. Time moves faster for all of us. It still startles me every time though.
But before we get into it, some last thoughts on community.
Answering the Question
We previously evaluated what community means to us and how we build it. On the way out of the month, we wanted to take a look at what community does for us, and what we do for it. Part of this came easy, part of it didn’t.
What I take from community? It’s easier to consider because that’s about me.
Community often gives me a sense of purpose, meaning, or mission. Whether that comes from simply being a member of the community (I joined a run club, therefore I am a runner), or because my participation in the community leads me to a deeper understanding of myself (through running, I learned XYZ about myself). I would say that being in community affords me the chance to reach something like a flow state thanks to the sense of physical and psychological safety, allowing me to find a deeper understanding of myself.
New friendships. Community connects us to like-minded individuals with whom we share a common…something. That’s fertile ground for building deeper personal relationships.
Resources/assistance. Our capitalist society breeds individualism that wants us to rely on services before we rely on each other. Turn to Lyft for a ride to the airport before we ask a friend. Use a moving service before calling a friend to help with your journey across town. Use a home cleaning service run by Silicon Valley (that are really just glorified middlemen) before asking your neighbors for a recommendation. Community is one of the best antidotes to that. Trusted referrals and introductions, resource-sharing, and a culture of favors and aid.
It’s easy to figure out the taking!
Giving? Not so much.
See, there’s what we intend to give, but really only our community members can tell us what we actually provide. Think of it like safe spaces. We can all say that we intend to provide a safe space, but the only people who are the most marginalized, the most unsafe, get to declare if that space is in fact, safe. So, while I intend to provide everything I take back to the communities I take them from (with interest!), I leave it to those I commune with to comment on whether or not I do. Who knows, maybe they’ll show up here to attest to the truth.
Question #77
Last December, we used the final prompts of the year to plan for the year ahead, and reflect a bit on the year that was. We’re going to use this month to do the same, and also to consider if we “lived our intentions” as it relates to the answers to those questions.
Where do we begin? With our sense of adventure.
What new experiences or adventures did you have this year? What new experiences or adventures do you want to have in the upcoming year?
As you start brainstorming, don’t forget to reflect on the answer you had last time we considered this:
Did you have all the adventures you intended to this year?
What about the ones you didn’t have? Are they still on your list, or have they lost their appeal?
What did you learn from the adventures you took?
What did taking those adventures require of you? How did you have to prepare? What did you have to sacrifice?
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See you Sunday!