Our community vision

Mission: Harmony with nature, healthy interdependence and equality, gentle cooperative childcare, and food self-sufficiency are the underlying principles we are seeking in community.

From www.ic.org/directory/our-community-vision-looking-for-a-tribe/:

****PLEASE READ: We are not currently planning to form a community, nor do we have an established community. Right now we are traveling across the US, looking at some communities we are interested in joining. Below is our vision for the ideal community. We still welcome email inquiries from folks who resonate with our vision!****

Our goal is to build or join an intentional community of families working towards ecological and social sustainability. The clear place to start is through finding like-minded, like-hearted individuals with whom we can embark on this journey.

I hope that in sharing my vision, our family will either find an established community of families interested in our joining as potential members, or that we’ll find a group of families interested in embarking on the journey of creating an intentional community together.

ABOUT US:

We are a family of five humans. Joey is in his mid-thirties and I am in my mid-twenties. We have three children together – Peacy is 5, born in March 2011. Micah is 3, born in December 2012, and Ahmik is 6 months old, born last January. We currently live in northern New Mexico on a small and anything-but-sustainable homestead. We tend goats, chickens, rabbits, honeybees and a garden. We have a dog who lives with us, and three cats who live in our outbuildings, keeping the mice at bay. We have lived in a number of other places over the past few years as well – New Hampshire, Maine, Connecticut … and some other temporary spots along the way.

I am a natural childbirth (freebirth) advocate, a gardener, herbalist, baker… I love to work with my hands – to create beautiful things. I built a cob oven last summer, and it has taken a huge place in my heart – stoking the fire, kneading the bread, forming the loaves and letting them rise … and baking, and then finally eating them and feeling all that love made tangible. I have a newfound love for sourdough. I have a strong desire to become a master grower of brambles … to learn how to cultivate the BEST black raspberries ever … because what could be better than raspberries?? I am also incredibly in love with waterfalls, thunderstorms … stones, mountains, willows … moss, ferns, motherwort, yarrow, mint, roses … . I am learning how to be the best mother I can be – to be mindful and deliberate in my relationship with my children. This is my greatest challenge, but the process is so rewarding when I commit myself to it fully, and looking back, I can see in the last five years how I have made enormous progress in my ability to be a gentle, compassionate parent.

Peacy is in love with flowers. She has big questions for a five-year-old, like “where does water come from?” “How are rocks made?” “Do crabs breathe air or water?” Sometimes I know how to answer her questions but usually we just contemplate them together… . She gets me thinking and I really love getting deep into things with her. She is very guarded around people she does not know, too. Micah is a very gentle soul … very internal, but really fun to be with. He likes to watch little creatures, like beetles and ants and bees, and to talk about them. He loves to share his joy. He also has a mischievous streak, and he loves the moon. Ahmik is so sweet, so open and bright and excited to be with others. She has an amazing smile, and a beautiful laugh. I can’t wait to see what she will be like when she is older.

LAND:

I know that the land I choose to inhabit will ultimately shape my life to a greater extent than any other factor. So in that respect, there are a few aspects which I consider essential in determining where to live.

Firstly, nearby access to clean freshwater is essential. That could take the form of lakes, ponds, rivers, or year-round streams. (Ideally, they would be strong and consistent enough to support human use for washing, drinking and watering gardens in dry times. I would rather not rely solely on well-water for these purposes, although living with the right people is more important to me, so I would compromise on my desire to use surface water for our needs in exchange for the right community. I would also love to implement good, simple rainwater catchment systems for these purposes.)

Secondly, the land would need to be fertile enough to easily support permaculture gardens, fruit trees, chickens and annual crops such as potatoes, carrots, beets, garlic, onions and greens. This would be taking into account composting of human manure to re-fertilize growing spaces.

Thirdly, the land would need to be part of or somewhat near to wild, undeveloped places, with ecosystems strong and abundant enough to support sustainable, ethical hunting and/or fishing for meat and foraging for wild foods.

There are other aspects of the land which aren’t by any means essential but which would provide an advantage that I’d consider either important or just simply ‘nice.’ Obviously they are not all compatible with each other, and obviously a community/tribe could thrive without any of these, so this is why I don’t list them as essential. These include lush pasture for rotational grazing of domesticated farm animals, salmon streams, a long growing season, abundant sugar maples, and ocean or a large body of water within walking distance.

COMMUNITY VISION:

My ideal for a community is one in which the members make a commitment to live and work together, with a common vision and with common values.

A commitment to being together is essential. One of the main reasons for my dislike of the nuclear family model is that each family is working towards a separate goal of sustenance, making time spent together outside of the nuclear family rare. When we all have separate houses with separate meals to make, separate dishes to do, separate children to raise, separate gardens to tend, separate money to be made … where does that leave time to be together? If meals are usually shared, that means meal preparation and cleanup can be communal – and it means cooking and dishes can be more fun. If we raise our children together, we can share the responsibilities in ways that make sense for us and our children. If we work and build and grow food together, that can be more fun and more productive, too. Many hands make light work.

The vision of living together does not necessarily mean many families sharing one home, although it could easily take that form and work beautifully. It could mean many small, simple dwellings centered around a larger common space, where food is usually prepared and eaten communally in the common space … this seems to be the model in many traditional tribal cultures.

Making food central to community seems very important – food is central to our well-being, and with a shared vision of growing, raising and gathering our food communally – working together to nourish each other – it seems inevitable that we will see that we are all crucial to each other’s well-being. Because of this, in order to fully share meals, some overlap in dietary preferences seems necessary. It also seems like diet should be based on what the land can provide. It would be difficult to support a group of vegans in the arctic, for example.

Emotional maturity and making communication a priority, even in times of conflict and difficulty, seems essential in community. Meeting many different needs simultaneously can be difficult, and conflict is inevitable – it should be planned for. If we can listen to each other with respect and speak honestly and directly when we need to express something, conflict resolution can be graceful. Without a commitment to everyday openness and vulnerability, the natural flow of emotions will be blocked and tension will inevitably build. So it seems crucial that all involved in a community are ready to articulate their needs, feelings, worries, etc., and at the same time be willing to really make the time and space to listen to others when they need to speak. It also seems necessary to give each other emotional space, with forgiveness and understanding that we are all on our own path of self-discovery, and mistakes in how we communicate are possible, not cause for creating more distance between each other, but simply cause for further, deeper communication. Nonviolent communication could be a very helpful tool.

My philosophy on being with children also holds a big space in my vision for community. They need respect and cooperation on the part of adults in the same way that we need respect and cooperation from them. If they are to grow into healthy community members, they need to be treated respectfully as human beings, and not as property. I want a children’s culture – a place where children are free to discover the world around themselves together through their play and exploration, or to join in with the tasks and projects of adults if they are interested. Respect for our children’s choices and their organic learning process is so important to me. Forcing children to comply with school, or even forced compliance with simple things like cleaning up, does not resonate with me. Naomi Aldort is an inspiration for me in this regard. Radical unschooling is an inspiration as well – not that school is inherently bad, but that the choice to attend school should be the child’s. All that being said, boundaries seem very necessary, as adults have needs too. It also seems necessary to have some parameters around children’s relationships with each other, specifically in terms of their conflict resolution – it seems only fair to guide their conflict resolution in a nonviolent way if a child is resorting to violence. Otherwise, it seems best to be aware but out of the way unless asked for. Respect for children starts in infancy – honoring their requests for closeness, comfort, and care through co-sleeping, breastfeeding on demand, etc., and through to their transition to adulthood by honoring their choices, as long as their choices do not interfere with the sovereignty/well-being of other humans. Through a balance of respect for our children’s choices and a commitment to vocalizing our own parental needs and requests, my hope is that a healthy parent-child dynamic will ensue, leading to greater respect and freedom for all.

Shared or communal childcare is also something that’s important to me, and something I am looking for in community.

Love for the earth and a commitment to working towards true sustainability is also so important. If we took the time to look at every facet of life to see if there is a simpler more gentle approach, we could greatly reduce dependence on industrially-produced tools and appliances. Minimal use of modern technology would be my ideal, obviously including electricity and gas, but with an open mind and a willingness to take an even deeper look at more simple technology to see if it actually improves quality of life or not, and if it does, what is the environmental impact of that technology and is it worth the trade-off? This would include prioritizing simplicity through natural building, simple tools for gardening, simple tools for cooking/food storage/food preservation, etc.

Another aspect of a tribe which I crave, but which would not necessarily be essential for me, is the regular sharing of celebrations. I am drawn towards pagan traditions in this regard, and would love to communally celebrate full moons, solstices and equinoxes, seasons, birthdays, weddings, coming-of-age, funerals… all of it. I feel like intentional celebration has the potential to greatly improve the health of a community!

The issue of meat is also one that I feel would play a role in community. Our family is omnivorous. We would strive to eventually raise or harvest all of our own meat, whether through ethical hunting and trapping, fishing, or pasture-raising farm animals, which would mean that a good deal of time each season would be dedicated to projects related to meat – slaughtering, butchering, preserving, hide tanning… etc. Animals do have many more similarities to humans than carrots or potatoes, which makes it easier for us to empathize with them. But carrots and potatoes are living beings too, with an incredible intelligence of their own. In order for life to be sustained, it needs to feed on life, and although taking the life of an animal can be devastatingly sad, our truth is that it is part of the natural cycle. So, we are not vegetarians, but we would not object to living with vegetarians.

How we deal with illness and healing might play a role in community life, and although I would be glad to live with humans with different philosophies on healthcare, I’d like to share my thoughts and personal philosophies in case they would cause conflict. I would prefer to, whenever necessary, have trust in my body’s immune system and ability to heal on its own. Susun Weed’s “six steps of healing” is an inspiration, as she starts out this way too – most of the time illness is caused by a physical or emotional imbalance that can be corrected through simple lifestyle changes or through emotional acceptance and release. If necessary, herbs can be a great ally. I would prefer to eventually grow and wild-gather herbs and tincture them, dry them, etc. to make an herbal pharmacy, with an emphasis of plants native to the region that I choose to call home, so as to be health-care self-sufficient. I have little or no interest in modern medicine, but I do have some interest in traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurveda, and various healing modalities of native tribal people around the world.

List of Interests/Inspiration/Community projects:

-Humanure composting
-Simple hand-powered types of construction & home building – cob, straw-bale, earth bag, cord-wood, etc.
-Cob/Earth oven building
-Sustainable cooking – high-efficiency fire cooking such as rocket ovens, rocket stoves
-Sustainable home-heating – rocket mass heaters
-‘Primitive’ skills including hide tanning, fire-making, home-building, hunting & trapping
-Permaculture
-Medicinal herbs – growing and gathering
-Milk and everything it entails – cows or goats, butter, cheese, yogurt, cream…
-Sheep, wool, spinning & weaving
-Raining chickens for eggs and meat
-Raising rabbits for meat and hides
-Gardening with heirloom varieties
-Herb and edible flower gardens
-Beekeeping & honey
-Maple-sugaring
-Rainwater collection
-Greywater gardens
-No-till gardening
-Root cellars, drying, canning and other simple food storage systems

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