Community
There is an innate desire in all of us to have community. You see it in people as they rally together with a common interest. Whether it be your Sunday Church go-ers, the local sports club, the coffee aficionados/snobs, or the knitting club that meets at the library every wednesday from 2-4pm. Whether positive or negative, everyone is looking for community. I believe that’s the way we were creative to live. Together with other people. I believe that it is the heartbeat of any society.
I believe it’s important for us to be aware of the Communities that we are in and to realise that what we say and how we think and act affect our community much more then we’d like to think. We all know that coffee snobs are probably generally nice people. If you’ve ever experienced what it is to be judged though when you order a Mocha with 2 sugars, you will know what I mean when I say, the way we think, act and speak affects people either for the good or for the bad.
Some people are hard to deal with, I get that. Most of the time everyone is struggling to interact with those types of people. But the responsibility still lies with us to give that person some form of dignity. It may not be giving them all of your time, but perhaps just a nice gesture and thoughts of good will.
If you are part of any community, you know what it is to be on the in and you know what it is to be on the out. Look for people who are on the out and invite them in. It may not be inviting them to your close friends birthday dinner, but perhaps just being friendly to them with the time that you have with them in that moment will help them move from feeling out to feeling in.
Life is built on community. Remember that just because you’re in right now doesn’t mean in the future that you won’t ever be out. Treat others in the way you’d like to be treated and hope you never have to go through being excluded ever again.
