Community: A Slow Living Deep-Dive
Ah, Bangor ME. How I love thee.
"Values help unravel problems and tricky situations. You look at things differently when you look at them through the lens of your values."
In this week's episode we talk about community - that sense of rightness or home or belonging that strikes when we truly feel seen in a place.
In part this episode was prompted by our own experience of searching for and finding community, and in part due to the many questions we've received about how and why we settled in our new community after travelling for 18 months.
As we travelled through Canada and the US in 2018, we found ourselves creating a list of traits we’d like to have in the place we eventually settled. We loved the access to nature and wild places offered by some of the smaller towns we visited in the Kootenays. We loved the energy and like-minded people we found in the foothills of the Rockies. We appreciated the local and sustainable focus of cities like Bend, Oregon and Austin, Texas. And above all, we simply appreciated the sense of community these places possessed. So we made a list, a collage if you will, of traits we valued and wanted in our own community when we settled back into our 'normal' lives in Australia, never really knowing if we'd find a place that fit with that list.
It's funny to see now that we kind of did, but the community we've settled in looks nothing like we expected it to - which is proof that while we can be intentional in our choices we also need to be flexible in our expectations. To focus more on how we feel rather than how it looks.
We also discuss:
How we've previously struggled with the idea of community, and what it actually means to us now
How our idea of community has changed over time
Whether slow living has anything to do with community and if it's possible to create a slow living community
How we were forced to rethink old beliefs, patterns and boundaries as our experience and ideas of community has changed
What the ultimate slow living community might look like
How you can find community in your work
Whether it's possible to find one community the delivers on all your needs
I then have a wonderful follow-up chat with Lauren from Season 4 to see how she went with her values exercise and whether she was able to experiment with a slow living media ‘fast’.
Lauren shares how her values exercise played out and how the values she was able to zero in on have helped her make big changes already (new job, new city) as well as sharing some of the really practical shifts she's made over the past few months (gratitude journalling and weekly review). No doubt, Lauren took her homework seriously and shares some insights that will be helpful to not only those in their twenties, but people at all stages of their lives who are looking to live more intentionally.
Enjoy!
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Things to Check Out After Today’s Episode:
Season 4 Episode 4: Can you live slow in your twenties or is burnout inevitable?
The two values exercises I sent to Lauren after our first chat:
This one is quite simple but gives a good indication of what is important to you
This one is a little more in depth but helps by combining both work and personal values
Myers Briggs personality test - 16personalities.com
Enneagram personality test - truity.com
As always, thank you for listening.