Blog Post NUMBER ONE!

Abbey Turpin

Christina Ivey

Communications & Culture

5 Sept. 2017

A Sense of Community: What Does it Take?

For my first blog post, I will be expanding on the question within chapter four, titled Compassionate Critical Listening, which asks, “What kind of community will nurture and sustain you?” Although this seems like a simple question on the surface, when you take a step back to give it greater thought, you will begin to realize just how deep the roots can go within yourself. What does it mean to be nurtured? What do you need to feel sustained? Once you give attention to this, you begin to see that each individual will give a different answer- simply because we each have had different experiences within this reality coupled with different identities. It is truly beautifully complex.

To understand this question to the greatest ability, let’s start with defining community as it does on Google: a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals. To bring a sense of companionship to a group of individuals, communication is immensely vital and we must be sure we are doing it to our greatest prospective. There are two sides to communication- the act of speaking to the listeners and the act of listening to the speakers. As we discussed in class, there is a difference between hearing and listening. Hearing is purely biological: the sound waves vibrate within your eardrum. On the other hand, listening requires comprehension. We can use a technique to listen with a more profound potential called active listening. It requires that the listener fully concentrate, understand, respond and then remember what is being said. Rather than listening to reply, it is important to fully submerge yourself into what an individual is saying to truly conjure your true thoughts and feelings inside. Not only will you show the other that you genuinely care by taking the time to say what you truly mean, but it will relieve you of frantic, unnecessary stress and pressure. 

Communication is vital in creating and sustaining communities. For example, Hurricane Harvey has recently swept through the gulf of Texas. Right now, to nurture and sustain the communities within the region, communication must be used to it's greatest capacities. To help as much as possible and as quickly as possible, all must be actively listening and thus properly communicating so the right aid is given. 

Catastrophes can be quite glorious, for they show the human's capacity to come together to work towards a greater good.

So, what kind of community will nurture and sustain me? I have not found such a community in our strange reality to meet these desires, yet within the latest of hours of these summer nights, as I hear the crickets chirping in through the bushes outside my windows, I take myself to a place that meets not just my inner desires, but a whole community’s. I have a strong belief in people. I believe that there is an undying light within each and every single human being. When we shine a light on individuality, growth and empowerment soar farther than we have capacity to understand. Each person comes to this world with a gift to offer a community as a whole. When we feel wonderful within our skin, a deeper capacity to nurture emerges. If all beings are uplifted and uplifting daily, a true sense of a nurtured and sustained community will be formed. To start such a change, one much dive into the deepest of oceans within self, and with due time, a proper sense of love will evolve. From there, will we finally realize we are all one. Free and proper communication will soar, light will be shed, and humans will be uplifted.