At the beginning of June Chris Guillebeau posted an article on his blog about community building. It couldn’t have come at a better time for me, as community is one of the things that’s been on my mind with regard to how I want to keep myself busy. As I noted in my last post, self-unemployment has not been conducive to a sense of community in my life. As a reminder, I defined community as having other people to interact with who are on the same or a similar path, people who want what I want and who can help me when I need it and accept my help when they need it. In his post, Chris Guillebeau defines a community as “a group of people united through a common struggle with the same stories”. His definition is more concise than mine, but I think we’re getting at the same idea.
Community is one of the few positive aspects of traditional employment. A traditional workplace gathers people together and provides them with a common struggle, resulting in the same stories. The common struggle may be against the competition, the management, or even the customer, but it is present regardless, and often results in a camaraderie in the rank and file. That’s something I’ve taken for granted in the past, and something which is not native to self-employment. When community is not provided, it must be sought out or built instead.
I think it’s important to have a community for any major goal you are trying to achieve. As I noted when I began this incarnation of the blog, I think it’s true that most of the problems people have in their lives are in the areas of health, wealth, and relationships. So it stands to reason that it would be helpful to be a member of a community in each of these three areas. Interacting with people who have similar ideas and goals as you do in these key areas can only help you stay on track with your goals, continue learning, and provide opportunities for growth (sometimes unexpected ones!).
I am currently following several blogs connected with these topics, and while these are fascinating and help me to feel less isolated as I read about people with similar struggles and stories, I think the facility of the Internet to connect people has its limits. Although I owe many of my in-person friends to connections made online, I think that if you don’t take these relationships into the real world, they will necessarily be stunted. Internet communities are valuable, but cannot take the place of face-to-face interaction. (Some of you may be surprised to hear this opinion from me of all people. To be honest, I’m a little surprised to hear it from myself.)
With that in mind, I want to find both online and offline communities with similar outlooks on health, wealth, and relationships.
In terms of health, I want to connect with people who are interested in losing weight and building muscle without expensive gym memberships or equipment. Cardio, weight-lifting, and calisthenics are topics of interest, as well as healthful, inexpensive food with plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables (i.e. fiber).
I read a bit about personal finance, and a lot of people are talking about getting out of debt, managing money, investing, and so forth. But I am more interested in the other side of the wealth equation, and would like to interact with people who discuss income generation — entrepreneurs, freelancers, and others with alternative approaches to employment and ideas about how to succeed on these paths.
Relationships are a little different, and I’ve already identified communities relevant to my interests and learned a lot from them, though I haven’t participated as much as I would like. I’ll go into this in a little more depth in another post, as it deserves a more in-depth treatment.
But people skills have never been my forte, and I’m not quite sure how best to go about finding groups of people who are already on these paths. Being who I am, Internet resources are first to spring to mind:
- Craigslist
- Meetin.org
- Meetup.com
- Blog searches
These resources can help to find groups of people who are talking about these things both on the ‘net and off, but how would I go about locating such people if I didn’t have the Internet at my disposal? What groups are you a member of and how did you find them? Are you looking for a greater sense of community? As always, comments are welcome.