You Don't Have to Be Mrs. Weasley: Building Community Your Way

I toy back and forth with using this platform as a way to provide concrete steps toward connection, a sort of FlyLady for human interaction.  (By the way, does anyone know of a Fly Lady equivalent that doesn’t tell me I’m a bad wife and mother for not having a clean sink and/or includes men in the daily help?  I love the planning and can’t stomach the self-hatred.)  Anyway, I want to just list daily connection tips or something like that because a) I feel like it would be easier to write and b) I think it might be helpful.

But the problem is that we all connect to different people in different ways and more, we all have different roles in our community.  I used to believe that there was one way to be a community builder and that way looked like a bustling middle aged lady.  Always busy, always with one project or another, knows everyone and gets shit done.  There are a million of these women around the world and it is true that we are lucky to have them.  But if, like me, you can’t keep that level of productivity up, there is a place for you in community too.

I don’t know who needs to hear this, but if you feel like you’re not doing enough to be connected to other people, or even worse, you feel like you don’t have enough within you to build connections, I implore you to rethink what community means.  First, work on self care. (Have I said that yet?)  We cannot pour from an empty bucket.

But after that, realize that part of the reason that our communities often feel so shallow is that we think there’s only one way to do this.  In my little community, I often plan, come up with ideas and tell people what to do.  I like it, I’m good at it, and for some reason people still like to be around me when I am nagging them.  In my mind, however, the most important people are the quiet noticers, who sit in conversation with one or two people and have the space and thoughtfulness to break through the tornado of energy that any gathering includes.

I love the people who ask just the right question at the right moment.  Not even just “How are you really doing?”  Beyond that to, “Wow, that seems hard.  Was it?”  or “I don’t know what I would do in that situation.  How are you handling it?”  These questions from my glorious introverts cut through our blustery keep-calm-and-carry-on to make real connections.  If we’re getting together to feel less alone, then nothing is more valuable than someone who reminds us that it’s ok to be uncomfortable and awkward.

Which brings me to those people who always feel uncomfortable and awkward.  Please bring your weird selves to the table.  We are all weird inside and some of us are just better at hiding it.  The more you can simply exist around us the better off we all are.  You don’t have to do more or be more to get connected.  All you have to do is bring what you are to the table and welcome us in to the delightfulness of authenticity.

To all of us: What you have is what is needed. Figure out how to use your gifts to help others and then go do it, however that looks. As Howard Thurman said, “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”