In our current climate of the power of the individual we have left in its wake a lot of what makes it great to be human: other people and a sense of community. Last year I did a simple, not very fancy, video on the meaning community for a local organization called TBD. Ever since hearing two gentlemen that had just moved to Bend talk about their ideas of community and what it means to them I've searched my heart to see if I have a definition for community in my own life. And if I do how do I value and nurture it?
I saw community just a month ago. In the loss of my cousin Rick I realized there are a group of people that are very human and very real but have a great sense of coming together than anyone I've ever known. You hear stories about village and what that looks like. Well in a moment of tragedy I witnessed love and togetherness. Something in me drastically bent. I began to see that there are still people in this world that hold onto the idea that we do nothing alone and this is a principle that is very important to me.
What to do with that becomes the question? How do we begin to create this sense of belonging amongst our next door neighbors and people where we live? The honest truth is I can get caught up in the minutea of it all just trying to create what I saw, but I think now I'm realizing that community is a very personal project that comes from years of simply investing in people and their lives. This has been hard to do because there always seems to be a learning curve every time I return from my trip during the summer. But it is something I mean to search and and try to see in my own lifetime.
The second thing comes from something I heard in a Aesop Rock track (don't ask me which one). He talks about how each of us was born destined to greatness in the one thing that we are most passionate about. That it is time for we as a people to rise up and define our own ways of making a living and really even just living life. And this is so true. It goes along well with something I used to tell people all the time...find that thing you do well and love and chase after it with all your heart.
As we age we become so conditioned to think that what we need in life is what I like to call the big four: romantic/sexual relationship, MONEY, material wealth, and some identifier that makes us an individual. What if everything we did made us our very own unique person? What if we decided instead of being pulled in by a meat market dating culture that we will instead learn to just enjoy people for who they are without any preconceived nothings of entitlement or mammalian mating rituals? When I stop and think about even the idea of this I get scared because it is so new. If I want to make that film the only one stopping me is me. If I want to live in the woods and eat twigs for the rest of my life I am my only obstacle.
So there ya go. There ya have it. My first real posting since my return. I'm going to try and get on a schedule with these things but you know...why? I do love posting here though so you will be sure to hear from me again sooner or later. I'm glad to be back folks...wish some of you were closer...but it is good to be home. Hopefully with all the community I can handle.
One Love
J...
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