“Equality comes in realizing that we are all doing different jobs for a common purpose. That is the aim behind any community. The very name community means let’s come together to recognize the unity. Come … unity.”
~ Swami Satchidananda
Happy Cinco De Mayo everyone! For me, I celebrate May 5th as Grandparents Day. It is the day of passing for two of my grandparents, as well as Spencer’s grandmother. While our grandparents weren’t big party people, they loved life and family. It seems fitting that they left this earth on a day of celebration, released into the grander community in the sky.
I’ve been thinking alot about community lately. For Buddha, it is one of the three jewels – the teacher (buddha or enlightened beings), the teaching (dharma), and the community (sangha). Buddha’s personal attendant Ananda once asked: “Lord, is it true what has been said, that good spiritual friends are fully half of the holy life?” To which Buddha replied: “No, Ananda, good spiritual friends are the whole of the holy life. Find refuge in the sangha community.”
Why are communities so important? In the end, I think each of us reaches a point in our own learning that we wish to share our gifts. We may also have reached a point of stagnation in our learning that we need teachers who can encourage us onward. And if the audience-teacher isn’t there, we begin to feel a sense of isolation, loneliness.
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr writes:
“What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thing is to create stable communities in which the terrible disease of loneliness can be cured.”
So very true … It takes courage to stand where you are, and somehow bring a community together.
My yoga teacher has begun to talk more about not finding what she needs here. Will our yoga community survive without her? I’m not so sure. Another friend is leaving, because he too, needs a more thriving wellness community. A stateside friend is moving on, because she can’t find a sense of belonging in her current town. She says the town has a weird undercurrent.
William James writes:
“The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual. The impulse dies away without the sympathy of the community.”
And Pope John Paul II:
“A community needs a soul if it is to become a true home for human beings. You, the people must give it this soul.”
So how about you? What does community mean to you? Are you happy in your community? Do you even have a community? Are you looking to join or create one? No matter your answers, I hope that you’ll give it some thought, and seek it out … Either as a member, or as a teacher, there is a group who needs you (and me) ♥
