The Bottom Line: Community Building

on purpose

The village is no more. That reality in which people were born, worked, and died within the same twenty mile radius may no longer be relied upon to create a feeling of connection, make meaning together, and deepen the experience of being human.

Now we change place and people as often as we like and, with the constant shifting of context, no literal or metaphorical place remains to accrete its own sacredness and psycic weight, unless that space is set aside on purpose.

Today, in a world where entire cultures are created simply to sell a non-essential product, we must build community on purpose in order to set the stage of our lives so that the dramas we live may find some context in which meaning arises. I need you to matter to me and my family to matter to yours so my children can know there is a place to go where people value them, simply because they are beloved, beyond any achievement they may acquire and distribute.

Community building is what began Beamish Process Arts which became Association Building Community. Most of us were involved, at one point or another, with an ongoing group participating in and following up on Community Building Workshops (CBW) supported by the Foundation for Community Encouragement co-founded by M. Scott Peck.