Finding Community

So there are a ton of studies out there that show how important community is and how much it can have an impact on our happiness, on our heart health, on our longevity. And also what seems to be clear is that these days not a lot of people really have it. So today we're going to talk about what community is and how we can find more of it in our lives. Welcome to The Art of Accomplishment, where we explore how deepening connection with ourselves and others leads to creating the life we want with enjoyment and ease. I'm Brett Kistler, here today with Joe Hudson. Hey Brett, how you doing, Joe?

I'm doing really well. I— that, that thing we did yesterday was so fulfilling. It was so heart-opening and wonderful, and And, uh, yeah, I'm still just basking in the glow of that.

Yeah, it was beautiful. For some context, we had a grief ceremony yesterday for somebody in, in our community who recently lost a child, and it was just really, really tender, really moving. And in the final sharing circle, it was just amazing to see how much unexpected value people got from it. That was far beyond just the expectation of like, we're grieving this loss. And I think part of what was behind that is just that there were so many different experiences happening in the same place.

Yeah.

And, and there was a sharing of it and a support that, uh, yeah, that's just something I really want to have in my life.

Yeah, it was an amazing situation because So for a little context here, a person who had been in one of my courses that you were in like 5 years ago or something, I hadn't heard from forever, called up and talked to me about the death of his child. And I immediately was like, "We need to mourn together as a community." And in my head immediately, I was like, "This is something that's important for the community and it's important for them." I think in their mind it was something like we were doing for them and there was notable hesitation. And I went speaking, his wife didn't really know the community and so she was kind of coming in blind and I called beforehand and what was really clear was that so many people who have had a loss, the funeral and that whole experience just kind of sucks. People are trying to make them feel better, which is not helpful, and/or wanting that— wanting to experience their pain as a way to— or their sadness as a way to, like, be able to purge their own sadness. And there's this feeling of obligation of the person who is mourning, and, and like, they're supposed to take care of people emotionally at least. And there's just all this stuff that happens. And so I was very clear with her, like, "Fuck all that. There's no obligation here, and I'm going to be really clear upfront." And our community generally knows this anyways, that it's not about trying to make you feel better, and it's not about having you feel the emotions for them, that it's about everybody feeling their own grief. And it was amazing how at the end of the ceremony, it really wasn't about them. It was about them primarily, but it was also about everybody else's healing that they got to go through and how their story and what they went through healed the whole community. And I remember just seeing this moment of, you know, she came into this thing blind, not knowing people. And then when she saw other people grieving and feeling the pain, It immediately let her know she was in this safe place instead of like, "Oh, are you okay?" It was like, "I feel you. I am with you." And you could just see that like, "Oh, okay. She saw that this was a safe place." And it was amazing. And it just made me really proud of the community that I get to be a part of that to some degree surrounds this work, but not only that. And yeah, I was really stoked by it and I was really I was really excited to be able to talk about it today since it was so fresh on my mind.

Yeah, one thing that, that struck me was just the, the difference in the feeling from like many funerals that I've been to and this particular, this particular moment. And there's a way that we could go into a grief ceremony and what made it different, but also there's just the overall like the community component here that I want to stick with. So I wanna, I wanna talk about what do we mean by, by community here? 'Cause there's, there's a lot of people out there with a group of friends and right. Yeah. A lot of those friends may also be feeling a deep loneliness and, uh, yeah. Not feeling a sense of community. And there's a lot of talk about community in, in my circles lately. And yeah. Also a lot of confusion about what exactly it is.

Yeah, I would— a community is a— I would, in the most functional sense of the word, the community is where everybody understands that their health is tied to the health of the community, that their job is to help the community be healthy because it is a reflection of and an influence on their health. Meaning, If there's a marriage in trouble inside of the community, that the community supports that marriage. Because if a marriage is having trouble inside of a community, it is a reflection of something else happening inside of the community. And to help make that marriage functional or to heal that marriage or to heal whatever is there, maybe it stays or doesn't stay as a marriage, but to help heal that process also heals the community. It heals everybody inside of the community. And so for that kind of a community to exist, there has to be a tremendous amount of transparency, a tremendous amount of vulnerability, a good deal of impartiality. So it's not— what we have in our society often is like somebody judging. It's like I have my community and they're telling me how to fucking be happy or they're telling me how to save my marriage, but they're not being with me in it. They're not actually witnessing and experiencing my marriage with me in a nonjudgmental, open loving way and there's safety. And so in a community, it's about having that full vulnerability but not getting it faced with judgment or advice. It's, it's being with you in it and, and somebody seeing that it's not your issue because your marriage is bad, it's the community's issue. And so they're listening to it like without that judgment. I think that's what really great community looks like.

Yeah, yeah. And also the layer of what they make it mean. Because if there's a, if there's a problem, if there's a, if there's challenges in a, in a relationship within a community, does the community make that mean that something's wrong and it needs to be fixed such that they, the conflict stops and then it becomes an oppressive community or—

Right, right. Yeah.

Not that, or is it a bunch of avoidant people being like, yep, there's whatever, not my monkeys. That's been my role traditionally when there's been some kind of stuff like that in a community. I'm just like, okay. You handle that. Right.

Not my pig, not my farm. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So the, the not a sense of obligation, but also a commitment to the health of the people in the community with, and this I feel really is really important with impartiality. And I guess we could say view in general.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think the, the nuance is like It's not other, meaning it's not like I am there committed to their health. It is that is a reflection of this community's health. Meaning like, oh, if that marriage isn't doing well, healing that marriage doesn't just heal the marriage, it heals the community because it's a reflection of something happening inside of the community as well. So it's seeing all the issues in the community as our issues. As my issue instead of as their issue. And when you get that sense, like at the ceremony yesterday, you got that sense of everybody was healed by— this community was stronger by going into this morning together and sharing these stories together. They were happier, they were healthier, but everybody was. And the whole community was strengthened by it. And there's a bond in that community because of it.

Yeah, one thing that I think is key here is that, that yes, anything that's going on in the community is a reflection of the community, but not in a way that like, oh, you're reflecting poorly on the community, but, or in a way that I am responsible for fixing this thing with you because I am the community, but rather it's that, oh, there's something going on in the community. How can I work on the the reflection of that in myself? Yeah, such that I can show up to it fully.

And how do, how do I, you know, like in my case it was, hey, let's do a morning ceremony. And like, hey, can the community come together and support you and your wife? How do we do that? And these are tools that I don't think most people have or most communities have. How do we come together as a community to support somebody in a way that isn't judgmental, isn't trying to fix, isn't partial? It is in a way of like, hey, let's witness and be in this together so that nobody feels alone and so that everybody can see themselves more clearly.

Yeah. Okay, so given, given how we've just sort of described community, how often do you see this form of community in our society now.

Oh wow.

Relative to something else.

I mean, I'm lucky I get to see it a ton. Tara and I were just talking the other day and the fact that, um, we were laughing, we were like, yeah, people, maybe they come because of Tara and I, you know, maybe because of the podcast, that's why they come into this work, but they stay because of the community, you know, that like it's people wanting to be a part of this depth and support, you know. And, and so we do a week-long, we do a week-long event, and then we find out that that group of people have been like in communication for 5 or 6 or 7 years. I mean, this was a 5-year-old community, and like so many people showed up for it. So in the morning thing, so I get to see it a lot, but in society I see it, it's incredibly rare, you know. There's some men's groups that have it, or groups that have it. There are, you know, some very tight 12-step programs that have it. There's, um, some churches that have it. Um, there are some churches who have dysfunctional communities as well. So there are some places, some sanghas, you know, some Buddhist sanghas that have it, but that it's a pretty rare thing for it to be deeply vulnerable and that sense of, oh, this is, this is us. This isn't me or you. This is us. And so it's an incredibly rare thing. And if you look at the statistics, it's just like the number of friends that the average American has is like shrinking all the time. And I think I heard it was like under 3 recently, like 3 friends, people that they thought they were close to.

Yeah.

So, and so many people have had like that funeral, like had like a dysfunctional form of it that they're just like, yeah, It's easier to be in my phone or in my screen, or it's easier to not feel it. But like, it's like not working out, you know. You— it takes a toll. It like, it starts making you weaker and less resilient, and it, it, it like, it becomes a heavy weight on your system to not have it. And, and it's a pandemic as far as I'm concerned. Like, there's just this tremendous lack of community. And I don't even think people know it's possible. It's one of the things that I saw when I was looking around the room of whatever it was, 20, 25 people there yesterday. I was like, there are some people who didn't know our work or weren't a part of it. And I could see how touched they were that this was possible, that it was possible that we could come together and support each other in this way in which nobody felt obligation and nobody felt like they had to take care of each other.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And something you mentioned there was how, how so many people report in like surveys as having like just 2 or 3 friends. And in a lot of cases, a lot of times I've seen a lot of times that people have like 2 or 3 friends. Often those friendships are sort of like, let's hang out and watch Netflix together, but we're not really going to go deep into our stuff. And, and so like, it's, it's in the zeitgeist right now that the loneliness epidemic has been in the news. And people are talking about it. And so what is it, what is it in your opinion that makes it, that makes community in the way that we've been talking about it rare in society right now?

Yeah, I think a lot of it is just what, you know, what's known and what's not known. Meaning like, I didn't know that this was possible growing up, right? So my experience of growing up was you had one or family had one or two family friends and there was things you talked about and there was things you didn't talk about. Anything real you didn't talk about. About anything fun you did talk about. There was no example whatsoever that it was even possible to be witnessed and loved in a nonjudgmental way. And oftentimes when our community has problems, it's people coming in telling them how they should be because what's happening is they don't want to feel something. Like, "I don't want to feel the pain of the death of your child, so I'm going to say, 'Oh, feel better,' to you." Or, "I don't want to feel..." the fact that my marriage could fall apart or that financially I could be in trouble. And so I'm just going to come in and tell you how to handle stuff. And so the help that people experience from community isn't actually very frickin helpful. So why the hell want it, right? Like, if all my only sense of community is that it's very unhelpful, why would I think that it's a useful thing? If my only sense of community is that I have to look a certain way and I have to be a certain way and I have to feel a certain way to be accepted, why the fuck do I want community? I don't want that shit. You know, what I want is a place where I can be loved for who I am, where I'm at in this moment. And if I had that sense of community— and, and it's— and as far as I've seen, anybody who tastes that, anybody I've ever seen who tastes that, they're just like, I want fucking that. I want that. Like, it's like water on a dry sponge. But I don't think there's a lot of examples of it.

And I think there's a lot of counterexamples.

Exactly. Yeah, exactly the word I was gonna say.

Yeah. Yeah. I think, I think a lot of people have had experiences of community growing up that were, that felt stifling to them. Maybe they were a form of community that had worked for the previous generation, but for them just wasn't working. And so they might've just decided, okay, I'm just going to be better off going on my own path and then not finding new community.

Right. If, if for instance, every person in America had witnessed when their parents had problems that 10 or 12 other couples came around, sat in a circle, witnessed the mom letting out everything, the dad letting out everything, witnessed the anger being released in a healthy way, witnessed the, the community doing a forgiveness ritual for one another and the community asking forgiveness for not supporting them better. If they had witnessed people speaking their truth that is really hard to speak and being loved for it, everybody would want community. Everybody would want it and they would sacrifice money to have it and they would sacrifice power to have it because it is unbelievably nourishing. And, you know, as soon as you see it, you know it. And I cannot tell you how many people, when they see it, they're just like, yeah, that's the thing that I want in my life. But instead, they didn't get that. You know, they got, don't talk about it, give people advice, you know, act right for the neighbors, look good. Great. Yeah. Yeah. Not healthy.

So So one thing I noticed is that when people have, when people have like felt exiled by community in, in this way, or felt the, a long-term lack of community that's just become kind of baked into the way that they see the world. Yeah. That when they find real community, there's a way that they're scared of it and also deeply attracted to it at the same time. Yeah. Often. Yeah, which can often lead to sort of attacking it a little bit to test it and then also like clinging to it.

Yeah.

So I want to kind of talk about both of those angles a little bit. What— let's start with what scares people about the, the kind of community that we're talking about here, the kind where they're seen.

Yeah, we heard it multiple times last— yesterday, right? Like yesterday, last afternoon, we Multiple people were like, "Letting this amount of love in is hard for me." It's scary because it will rip out your identity. The comparative mind, "I'm this and you're that and I'm not good enough or you're better than I am or I'm better than you," that shit doesn't exist very long in the community like that. That's scary. It's also scary to be vulnerable generally like, "Oh, I'm going to be seen. I'm going to get rejected." I'm going to get I'm gonna get pushed out, I'm gonna get ostracized. So you have all the fear that came up your whole life with being real in front of people now shows up in this community.

Yeah.

So I think those are the main things that really scare people about the community, is that, oh, I'm gonna be deeply loved or I'm gonna be deeply rejected. Um, both of those are very scary because both of those are, you know, fuck with our identities in a big way.

I think another thing that happens is that when you, when you drop the defenses that have kept you safe in the past, there's a lot to feel.

Yeah.

And those defenses were there because feeling those things wasn't safe. So yeah, there's sort of when, when you're in a group and your defenses aren't necessary or they're seen through or they're loved in a way that was not previously experienced, then it's scary because you're now in territory that was once dangerous.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's— I mean, so I think all of that. I think the other thing that makes it, um, I think the other part of feeling everything that makes it scary is that you have to feel everything. Like, all that shit has to be felt. And I— one of the hallmarks of a great community is that everybody's like they welcome each other's feelings. They're not trying to fix each other's feelings. That's what makes it really healthy, is like that deep welcoming of the, of the emotional experience.

Yeah.

And so what are some other— it's going to come up, it's going to come up because, I mean, if you weren't mourning yesterday and you were with 20 people who were mourning, it's a difficult place to sit, you know. It's, it's not, it's not, it's not easy to sit with a whole bunch of people having emotions if you're not willing to have the emotions. You'll get very agitated, very you know, or judgmental and shit like that. Yeah.

Okay, so, so what makes people love this, this form of community?

Uh, you know, we are all— we all want, on some level, we all want to be seen and loved for who we are and be met with non-judgment, to be met with acceptance. Like, if you're listening to this right now and you close your eyes and you just ask yourself, like, what would it be like to be met with acceptance and love for who I was and not have to put up a front. Like, do you want that? And I can't imagine somebody being like, nope, that sounds like shit. You know, um, there's this great experiment that I used to talk about, which was— I called it the island experiment. And it's, imagine you were dropped onto an island and there was 12 people who unconditionally loved you. They, yeah, they drew boundaries with you. They, they, they wasn't like they were just accepting your shit, but they loved you unconditionally. They accepted where you were and they loved you unconditionally. And now if you imagine that you were stuck on that island for a decade, right, and you're with these basic kind of like saint, saints almost, like people who are just like in that kind of deep love, like who are you at the end of that decade. Like, where, where, you know, where's your fear? Where's your love? Where's your— like, how do you interact in the world? How do you see yourself? That's why everybody wants it, because they know if they're met there, what becomes of them— they become the thing that they, they truly are. And, and so I think that's the thing that really pulls people, and, and they— and people can sniff it out.

Yeah, and speaking of sniffing for it, what, what are the signs of a healthy community? Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of different communities out there, and some of them can be dangerous, and there's a reason why people have been— have become rather hesitant about community in our society.

Vulnerability, top to bottom, is a huge one. Emotional fluidity, top to bottom of the community, or side to side of the community, are really important. Transparency, really important part of a healthy community. A feeling of, um, that there isn't us and them in the community. It's, it's just there's an us-ness to it, um, as far as like if there's a problem in the community, it's all of our problems. It's not your problem is another really healthy aspect of a community. Not a feeling of obligation, that people aren't acting in the community out of obligation. If they feel obligation, they announce it and everybody realizes that nobody wants someone to act out of obligation. That's another great sign of a healthy community. Non-judgmental. It's not a judgmental— there's— it's not performative. People don't feel like they have to perform to be a part of the community. Um, healthy boundaries, you know, very healthy, clear boundaries about like how— what this community is and isn't. When, you know, if, if you want something— no, not like trying to hold people into the community— and having a very thoughtful way of a, of a community person leaving. So those are some of the things that make like a community like a strong container. Yeah, makes it something that's really healthy. And it can be less or more conscious. I've seen very healthy communities that are not like all that conscious. It's not like, hey, we're in a community. It's just like there's just been like a couple people in the community that are really great examples and You know, and it can— I've seen it in a small town once. It was amazing to see that, and where it was just like it just had become the culture. It just had, you know, and I've seen some companies— I've seen two companies have like a really great sense of community as well, and I think it was really conscious to create that community on some levels of the organization, but it was very unconscious and also in a lot of like— so it doesn't have to even be like, hey, we're in a community and we're doing this. It's something that can actually happen a little oddly, a little bit unconsciously, or not conscious to everybody in it.

Yeah, yeah. I'm curious about some example sort of like boundaries, as you describe, about like what a community— what this community is or isn't, or what— like, I guess there's a spectrum here from, from not, not being consciously created to being very principled and very well-defined. Yeah. I'm curious to hear kind of a couple of data points from that spectrum.

Yeah, like yesterday I was really clear inside of that container. It's like there's— we're not here judging each other and we're not here to make each other try to feel better. We're accepting people for each other for how we feel, and whatever is true for you and your feelings is what, what we want to hear about and be shared and share. That's, that's like a boundary. That the community— if it was not that, it would not have been a very healing situation for anybody, let alone everybody. So those are all examples of it. Um, things just like lying probably would be another great boundary. Like, yeah, we're not lying, we don't gossip, you know, we work out our shit. If there's problems between us, we work it out, and we work it out with witnessing. Those would be all potential boundaries that you would have.

Yeah, and I imagine another boundary might be that we don't always work it out right now because sometimes we have other agendas.

Of course, of course. I need space, but I will come back to it. That's— yeah, yeah. And I— for me, I don't— like, another boundary would be just like, you— no man can tell another man what to do, or no woman can tell another man or woman what to do. Like, there's a there's an understanding that everybody is responsible for themselves, um, which is an odd paradox, but that we're all responsible for the community. But that only really works when everybody is taking responsibility for themselves. It doesn't work when somebody is like— feels like a victim to the community, not taking full responsibility for their actions. It doesn't it doesn't work. Both things have to be there.

All right, so, so I want to give people something practical that they can— so they might go find community, but also a beautiful thing to do is just to cultivate community where you are and like plant a flag. And I'm curious what, what people can do to, to cultivate that in their lives, whether it is to go find it somewhere or to plant the flag and start cultivating it on the spot.

Yeah. So I mean, I remember like moving and going, okay, I need a sense of community, and going and finding it. And, um, the way that I did it was I just looked for any— like, I went to any place where I thought there was a sense of community, and I looked for healthy ones that were communicative and deep and there was a lot of acceptance. I went to 12-step programs for Children of Alcoholics, I went to yoga classes, I went to book clubs, I went to like— and I just like, until I found the place where, where that, that strong sense of community was in existence. Um, so, you know, our courses is another example, other people's courses. There's lots of places where there's just that sense of community. And so it's just a trial and error Get a feeling, go where you're interested, but also don't stay long if you don't feel this really tight sense of community. So that's one. As far as cultivating it yourself, what I notice is that if you're in view, if you're doing vulnerability, impartiality, empathy, and wonder as a way of life, not as a communication practice. Um, but it's like, oh, this— I noticed that when I treat myself and others like this, it's— my life is better. Then that will cultivate a sense of community. There are some skills that you need for like the whole community part of it, right? Like, like how to do a morning ceremony is something that, you know, you might want to look into. Like maybe the Quakers or East Africa has some really great ceremonies. Um, So, you might want to look into other people's ceremonies and see what you can replicate or the stuff that we do. But, the core of it is that vulnerability, impartiality, empathy, and wonder with each other and cultivating that and learning those skills together is a great way to create that sense of community. And, what happens is that when you act that way, because other people want a sense of community. Like, it oddly— it's just more and more people come to you. I mean, I've seen you experience that in your life. The more you're there, the more people come to you. But not only do they come to you, but they want to be there in that depth with you. And so even if it takes some time, it just— it happens. And it happens to everybody I've ever seen, like, deeply cultivate this. Is like, when you know how to connect, people want to connect.

Yeah. And In, in my world, I've noticed how, like, over the course of the past number of years, Alexa and I have been really seeking to create community. And earlier on, it was like very hands-on, like, okay, let's find the people that we wanna have community with. We're gonna pool together and buy a piece of property, you know? And sometimes people do that and it works. It didn't work out for us in that particular instance. And what ended up happening though, is that we've ended up having community around us because we did something like planting a flag. We did something like just, okay, here's, here's what we want. And like, we, we kind of created a world where people could come around us and be around us. And yeah, we're not like running or leading a community, but what happened was that we started a bit of a center of gravity that has coalesced into, into a beautiful sense of community that still, of course, has its its figureings out and its challenges and its conflicts. And what is this? What is, is this a community? Who's in it? What is it? All of those. But there's a lot of questions that just, there's a, one thing that I can say to define this community is that there's a number of people who are sitting in the questions a lot of the time. And as a result, there's just a lot of support available and there's a lot of gatherings and there's a lot of there's a lot of spaciousness to move things individually or as groups and with support. And yeah, it wasn't top-down created.

Yeah, yeah, I saw it in your— at your wedding, right? Like, that was a really strong sense of community. It was incredibly transparent, incredibly forthright, incredibly— like, it wasn't like, oh, let me tell you a cute story about Brett and Alexa. It was like, here's some real shit. And, and like, you could just see that sense of, of death. It was, yeah, very clearly there. Whether there's a structure to it or whether you call it a community or not, there was a lot of people being transparent and supporting one another.

Yeah, yeah. And it felt— a lot of it felt very self-organized, the, the community aspect of it. Just the way people showed up makes, makes the community.

Yeah, it's— I mean, it's our nature to be in community. We're like— we're not a non-communal, you know, individual, uh, solo, uh, species.

Yeah, yeah, beautiful.

Cool, awesome. Yeah, good to be with you. Good to be with you yesterday. Yeah, and I, I just like— I want to For those in the community that came yesterday, I just want to thank you very much. I was deeply touched and healed by the ceremony yesterday. So I just want to thank everybody who showed up. Yeah.

All right. Thank you everybody for listening. If you have any follow-up questions from this episode, I'd love to hear them. Maybe we'll do a community number 2 someday. And you can reach out to us on on— it's X now— plus Twitter, um, or in a Circle community, or email, or on our website, artofaccomplishment.com.

Yeah, take care.

Awesome. Thank you, Joe.