The Horrors Persist And So Do We

But JFC Can The Horrors Ever Take A Lil Nap?

If you are like me, you have been really knee deep in existential dread and are in the midst of an epic battle to nobly stay informed against the tantalizing urge to completely detach. And there you are, finally having a peaceful moment, then bam- a push notification. Apple decided you were in desperate need of alert to the fact that children (okayx2, I’ll tamp down on the Boomer in me- they are all young adults) are now able to access incredibly sensitive government information at the behest of just some-fucking-guy at best, and at worst, three runny terds in a trench coat.

Grimes- please come get your Baby Daddy. We have enough shit to deal with down here.

I don’t really have any good answers for you on how to shake that feeling. I’ve been doing some deep breathing, sticking only to cozy, low-stakes video games, and burning enough sage and Nag Champa that negative energy had to vacate to the next county. It is all a good starting point, but I think collectively we gotta take that self care a step further. So, for this post- I am doing a bit of a deep dive on building and maintaining community as well as mutual aid.

Well, hopefully maintaining a community that’s twice the pizza and a fraction of the flaming dumpster fire.

In a previous post I had made some suggestions on how to find joy when it’s pretty bleak, and while I briefly touched on it, community is at the core of almost all of the suggestions I made, even the ones that can be done solo. We all know the cliches about how mankind is a pack species, how we thrive when we are connected with one another but that fact is just true. It bears repeating the impact connectedness has on humans- in a Stanford Medicine paper penned by Dr. Emma Seppala notes the tangible benefits to a strong social connection, such as strengthening your immune system, and 50% increased chance of longevity. While, conversely, loneliness and isolation can be linked to obesity, smoking, and high blood pressure (source: Social Relationships and Health- House, James; Landis, Karl; Umberson, Debra).

As a youth, I never particularly struggled with making friends and finding connections. For one, I am and have always been a Grade A certified yapper. My number one feedback in elementary school was that I would talk too much and distract the other students. As a small tyke, I would prattle away a story I was in the midst of daydreaming up (always centering my favorite protagonist and first ever OC, Princess Shaniqua and her dog, also named Shaniqua) to the unfortunate shopper ahead of us in the check-out line fearlessly, and with little concern to their enjoyment. In middle school, I was bullied for my loud laugh, but I quickly learned it was really just a small number who had a problem with this, and more so learned that my boisterous guffaws drew people to me. But as it does for anyone with a pulse and ounce of feeling, self confidence issues came for me at last, and I began to shrink myself down, quiet my laugh, and duck my head when called on to participate.

Then, a canon event occurs, I experience a very difficult friend break-up. Probably one of my top heart-breaks to date. And I have been put into the position to take stock of my community. I had really neglected to foster, and nurture the new connections I had made, or even to rekindle ones I had let smolder. My late twenties, and now into my early thirties- I am looking to rectify this. I mean- selfishly, my husband and I are family planning, and they say it takes a village. I can’t wait to be a mama, but I have tasted what DINK life and what a blessing it would be to have a surplus of aunties, uncles, and cousins (play and real obviously) that love my child as much as I do? But more practically, because it is community and mutual aid, never government, that cares for one another in times of need or crisis.

Me and my homies doing hoodrat shit like establishing produce exchange channels

These words have been thrown around a lot though. So to get a better idea of what mutual aid is, I took a look into how it was defined. Per wikipedia (don’t @ me)

Mutual aid is an organizational model where voluntary, collaborative exchanges of resources and services for common benefit take place amongst community members to overcome social, economic, and political barriers to meeting common needs. This can include physical resources like food, clothing, or medicine, as well as services like breakfast programs or education…Resources are shared unconditionally, contrasting this model from charity where conditions for gaining access to help are often set, such as means testing or grant stipulations.

Yeah… that last part is the critical part, the key component, to mutual aid. You just… give it to who asks- when they ask, because you have excess of it. Because you have the means to. And if you do not- it’s okay, because there will be someone else who does. And in turn, maybe immediately, but eventually, the person who needed to receive aid will have surplus of their own resource.

Oops, wait- please, don’t click out! I know what you’re thinking, “Sounds like a handout to me, Haley, I’m not trying to support someone elses’ lifestyle or poor decisions”. Okay but- think about it like this…: you have a BUNCH of tomatoes* from your cute lil backyard garden, and your family doesn’t love tomatoes, so outside of a few uses, they just sort of sit in your freezer like frozen little crystal balls of potential marinara. Your salsa business hasn’t taken off yet- and by not taken off, I mean it doesn’t even exist. You don’t even know if you make a good salsa, and you JUST learned that different kinds of tomatoes are better for different things, and you just bought Tomatoes™.

And sure, you could just throw em at people you hate as you drive by them, but your neighbors’ cousin could use them for her career making those off-putting food videos that nobody (normal) asked for. You know, the ones where they are dumping nacho fix-ins DIRECTLY onto their countertops and then hand mixing them? So you give them to your neighbor. And in a month or so- your neighbor notices you had foot surgery because you broke it helping a friend move a rattan patio loveseat down her deck stairs in twilight, only to stumble on the second to last step and land very poorly. Anyway, they see that, and notice that you aren’t making it out to mow the lawn and they remember how you helped their cousin shoot the tippy top of the counter-food-video-ratings thanks to your generous donation of fruits, and offers to help you maintain it. That’s it! You’ve just done it! Mutual Aid!

*(I randomly picked tomatoes and this has nothing to do with the ziploc bags upon bags of them in my freezer that I swear I will eventually use to make pasta sauce. Unless…)

Okay, let’s talk about building community. Who gives a crap about mutual aid if you don’t have moots? According to Dr. Brower, in a Forbes’ article titled How To Build Community And Why It Matters So Much, purpose, belonging, and resilience are the cornerstones to ensure you are able to build a strong and lasting community. Now, I have the opinion that these building blocks work more like a flow chart, one principal bleeding and mingling into the next. To me, purpose truly is the founding and rooting idea- of course in life, but certainly in building a community that will push you, help you grow, celebrate your wins, mourn your losses, and rebuild with you when devastation, or calamity strikes.

For a lot of people, their purpose is their loved ones. Maybe their hobbies or passions. Maybe there is a cause, or special need they hold near and dear to them. Whatever that may be, it’s good to identify it, and also to hold space for multiples, or even that your purpose may change and shift according to need, circumstance, and surroundings. Ultimately, we must ensure that our purpose enables maximum good, and mitigates harm. This means seeking out and vetting your community to ensure that they meet those standards, while also being equitable and charitable to your community when they fall short them. And in this grace, you must also remember we can only hold ourselves and our peers accountable if it is being done from mutual respect and trust, and rarely if ever are successful when doing so by animus.

TLDR; Enmeshing ones’ self in spaces that draw you closer to your objectives and increases your stats makes you more powerful overall, and along the way you’ll build a party whose stat-grinding balances yours and you’ll share loot and be OP!