What does community mean to you?
Let's start with what does community mean according to Webster's:
Definition of community
1. A unified body of individuals: such as
Definition of community
1. A unified body of individuals: such as
- the people with common interests living in a particular area broadly : the area itself the problems of a large community
- a group of people with a common characteristic or interest living together within a larger society a community of retired persons a monastic community
- a body of persons of common and especially professional interests scattered through a larger society the academic community the scientific community
- a body of persons or nations having a common history or common social, economic, and political interests the international community
- a group linked by a common policy
- an interacting population of various kinds of individuals (such as species) in a common location
Process
Finding Commonality
The core skills needed to create successful community is the ability to listen without judgement and to identify when you hear a thread that can lead to building shared understanding and commonality. There are many other skills that need to be developed in conjunction with the core skill around not taking things personally, understanding that it is not about you, and that you are gifting the person in the best way by taking the time to hear their story. Hearing someone's story is a gift, because we all need to be heard, in fact we often cannot hear until we felt we have been heard. This is one of the lessons taught in the workshops.
Building Relationships
Building relationships is what this is all about... if you cannot do this it can never succeed. Sadly, this is a skill that we have all but lost as a society, that is unless we want something or have a commitment based on family and love... more about that in the later pages. This is a skill we must relearn, from our core to an understanding of both needs and fears of those around us. The positive message here is that we are wired for community and relationship, but programmed not to pursue them except in specific and defined instances. This is why there is an unlearning aspect of this process. Welcome to step one in learning to human!
community
Life is about engaging and participating, it is not about individualism and making it alone. Community is not about religion, work, family, or people connected to other people you, or your family know. Community is about building relationships based on commonality, trust, compassion, empathy, and understanding that we are better together.
Our language is full of mixed messaging, just look at the definition of community above. We are told to love our brother and care for our fellows, to be good shepherds and stewards yet we are taught to win at all costs, that everything is a competition, that everyone is out to get us, that success is based on the amount of money you can acquire. You can see how this creates a conflict in our ability to build relationships and create community. The Kitsap Resiliency Project is a first step in aligning our humanity and creating cross supporting communities across the county. We are wired for this. We are driven to achieve connection, we just need to acknowledge the societal programming that has broken our social contract and work to overcome it. We are sorry that there is no pill to fix this, the Matrix aside, we have been following this failed social path for a very long time and it will take generations to correct our human trajectory, see Ishmael by Daniel Quinn, . This will take a lot of work and a lot of intention, beginning with unlearning fear of connection, resetting definitions for life, success, community, relationship and our humanity. Finally, teaching others to do the same. If we don't start immediately, we will not need to bother since we will slowly degrade into extinction.
Join us in this journey to community, resilience, and our shared humanity.
Our language is full of mixed messaging, just look at the definition of community above. We are told to love our brother and care for our fellows, to be good shepherds and stewards yet we are taught to win at all costs, that everything is a competition, that everyone is out to get us, that success is based on the amount of money you can acquire. You can see how this creates a conflict in our ability to build relationships and create community. The Kitsap Resiliency Project is a first step in aligning our humanity and creating cross supporting communities across the county. We are wired for this. We are driven to achieve connection, we just need to acknowledge the societal programming that has broken our social contract and work to overcome it. We are sorry that there is no pill to fix this, the Matrix aside, we have been following this failed social path for a very long time and it will take generations to correct our human trajectory, see Ishmael by Daniel Quinn, . This will take a lot of work and a lot of intention, beginning with unlearning fear of connection, resetting definitions for life, success, community, relationship and our humanity. Finally, teaching others to do the same. If we don't start immediately, we will not need to bother since we will slowly degrade into extinction.
Join us in this journey to community, resilience, and our shared humanity.
Connected Community!
Imagine what could happen if we really had connected communities?
What would that even look like?
It might look like someone has your back, and that you have their backs?
Humans are built to live in community, it is only our cultural construct that tells us that the individual is more important, that community is about like mindedness, and not relationship. The cultural messaging has labeled us and kept us in silos of religion, politics, race, gender, economic status... the list goes on and on. As humans, none of that is more important than making connections and building relationships. When we are at our most human, together, amazing things can happen!
What would that even look like?
It might look like someone has your back, and that you have their backs?
Humans are built to live in community, it is only our cultural construct that tells us that the individual is more important, that community is about like mindedness, and not relationship. The cultural messaging has labeled us and kept us in silos of religion, politics, race, gender, economic status... the list goes on and on. As humans, none of that is more important than making connections and building relationships. When we are at our most human, together, amazing things can happen!
What would it look like if law enforcement was an integrated part of the community?
What if officers had a neighborhood role in times of emergency, working with their community and businesses to organize and care for each other? |
What if people's hobbies became a key part of recovering from disaster?
A Mosquito fleet that reconnects people and delivers needed supplies... A Pony Express that does the same? |
Working together creates capacity, connection and caring creates compassion, organizing creates ability! All together you create opportunity and your community thrives!
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Project Ownership
The Kitsap Resiliency Project is owned by the people of Kitsap County, Washington, though most of them will never know that. Change is driven by those who show up and those who take an ownership position. That number grows daily and the people of Kitsap will be better off for it. If you want to have a voice in the process, bring your puzzle piece to the picture being formed and join in the work.
The Kitsap Resiliency Project is owned by the people of Kitsap County, Washington, though most of them will never know that. Change is driven by those who show up and those who take an ownership position. That number grows daily and the people of Kitsap will be better off for it. If you want to have a voice in the process, bring your puzzle piece to the picture being formed and join in the work.
“I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples.” – Mother Teresa
A HUMAN INFRASTRUCTURE
At the core, humans have some very specific needs. Those needs are not being very well served in this culture; people are hungry, homeless, unemployed, and it is not getting better. The vast majority are one paycheck away from being in the same boat. More to the point, our agriculture practices are killing the soil and the nutritional value of our food is 50% of what it was in the 1960's. Add to that, that aquifers all over the United States are about to fail, yes the ones big ag uses, and food will be a national issue, prices will soar and people will go without. The power infrastructure has not been significantly upgraded since the 1960's. We can do better!
Why does this not already exist?
It does, in Germany and other places in bits and pieces. For the same reason that we cannot take meaningful action on Climate Change, it is not in the interest of corporate profit. There are many ways to say this that all lead back to this truth. To change this and address the many other changes necessary to create a human culture and true resilience it requires a grassroots effort that has not been seen this century. And if we do not come together, now, our future, and our children's looks stark indeed.
It does, in Germany and other places in bits and pieces. For the same reason that we cannot take meaningful action on Climate Change, it is not in the interest of corporate profit. There are many ways to say this that all lead back to this truth. To change this and address the many other changes necessary to create a human culture and true resilience it requires a grassroots effort that has not been seen this century. And if we do not come together, now, our future, and our children's looks stark indeed.