Building community post pandemic

In the last 10 years, my ideas about what community should look like and how it should function have taken a beating. Between the pandemic, leaving a church because of intolerance towards LGBTQIA+ people, and being in and out of various online communities I’ve learned quite a lot about what I want out of these spaces. My feelings have always come down on the side of having an open table. That feeling has only solidified with everything I’ve seen and experienced over the years.

We humans need community. We need friends and family. And if we don’t have family, we need friends who function as family. We need folks around us who can meet our needs and who we can help provide for as well. As a teenager and a young adult, I thought that I needed to be able to do everything for myself. But what I’ve learned is that is neither possible nor particularly desirable. It is wonderful to be able to share troubles and sorrows as well as celebrate milestones and good times. Our communities are the place to do that.

The room where it happens

I want to talk specifically about art communities here. I’ve been a part of quite a few over the last decade. I’ve seen the good and bad. In the good ones, people are open and authentic and share out of a place of abundance. They can be a place where we find a mentor, a co-conspirator, a cheerleader, or any or all of those. They can be a soft place to land when the going gets rough. Hopefully, you can network and make connections for future work or collaboration. But also? Meeting some new friends who share your interests is a solid reason too!

I think the pandemic made all of this so much harder though. In the before times, we could meet in person: at coffee shops, the library, or hang out at someone’s house. It was so easy! And then with the pandemic, we all moved to Zoom.

Zoom made things easier while it also made things harder. I love being able to stay in touch with people over Zoom! But Zoom eliminates the casual conversation that you might have at the beginning or end of any gathering. Being on Zoom means there’s an agenda. We work through the agenda and only one person at a time can speak. We have to stay on task so we can get our meeting over in the 40 minutes allotted. On the flipside Zoom lets me stay at home in my casual clothes. I can plop down in front of my computer exactly on the hour and I’m still on time for the meeting!

And I feel like that ease of use allowed for some really bad habits to develop for me. I don’t wanna leave the house. I don’t wanna drive anywhere. Also I don’t wanna have to get dressed to drive anywhere. I want to stay in my paint clothes (which are really my pajamas), drink my Diet Coke, work in the studio, and play with my dogs.

So here I am trying to relearn how to human outside my house and be a good contributing community member. My partner and I have been making an effort to go to more in-person art events. These are activities we loved early in our relationship. But they got demoted as the years passed and we had kids. We were busy with other things and then the pandemic caused us to need to stay home.

And even in my online communities, I’m struggling to forge connections and build tables where people feel welcome. I feel like we’re all struggling with that a little bit. Engaging with people via comments and messages seems harder now than ever before with our attention split between so many platforms and in-person things to do. 

What I’ve learned

We need to show up for each other. That looks different in almost every case. If that’s comments on a post or taking a casserole to someone’s house, we need to do that. We need to make time to do that. I need to be better at making time to do those things. I’ve been trying to note in my bullet journal who I’m doing any given task for. Is it for myself, my family, or my community. It’s an eye-opening look at how I’m spending my day-to-day time. Having some community work every day, even if it’s small, is important.

Networking can look like a lot of different things. I used to think networking only looked like Rotary Club lunch meetings. But it can also be chatting with people on Instagram or Facebook, visiting someone’s art show, having email conversations or gasp! writing letters to put in the mail! Connecting with people comes more effortlessly for some of us. But the good news is that we can all start small and make a one or two connections and be diligent at tending them.

Building community is HARD. Showing up when it seems like no one wants what you are serving can feel pretty soul crushing. I have to continuously go back and remind myself that bigger is rarely better. That a group of small committed folks can be just so very good for each of us. I’m learning this in The Workshop gatherings I’m holding. We always have a very small group but it’s so good when we gather.

Each of us have more to contribute than we think. I’ve had conversations with several people over the past few weeks who think that they don’t have anything to offer the groups where I know them. But each of them have kindness to offer. They have problem solving abilities and know-how that others need. And all of us can be better at offering a listening ear. So many people just want to feel heard and seen and that only takes listening to them for a bit.

Online community is every bit as important for me as in-person community. I know this isn’t true for everyone but it is very true for me. I easily get just as much from socializing on Zoom and via chat as I do in person. In some ways, it’s better for me. I worry less about how I look and what people are thinking of me. I don’t worry about the logistics of going out and getting home to take care of people and dogs. I’m learning to allow myself to be ok with that. I’m lucky enough to be able to partake of both kinds of community.

Slow down

And so here I am again at my word of the year. Slow has been my touchstone and my reminder and my mantra so much already this year. Some years when my word is this powerful, I kinda resent it. But not slow. I love that it is a reminder to be patient with myself and others. That building anything takes time. And not rushing is a reward that is just waiting for each of us. It reminds me that this year things won’t be solved quickly or maybe even at all. And that’s ok. Good things can sometimes take a lot of time. Community seems like one of them.

Tell me about your community experiences! What are you learning and enjoying? Catch up with me on socials, email me, or go old school and leave a comment on this post to be immortalized for all of time.

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