There is a lot of talk about "divisions" and "separation" and "othering" in the world right now and so many lamentations about whether we can heal the rifts and come together, and I tend to think it's incredibly simple, but also incredibly hard. Shifting culture and living in to new ways of being requires a specific set of principles and the willingness to fake it until we feel it, wrap our heads around these values and ideas and practice them until we can feel them in our bones and we've woven them in to the fabric of our lives and consciousness.

I think the simple part is the cognitive part - the thought process and outlining of the values themselves (so long as we are willing to be curious but not critical, skeptical but not destructive, able to engage in conversations that explore the nuances without spending time explaining why this could never work). The harder part is feeling into it, taking that leap of faith into practice and trusting that we can both hold each other and be held by these principles.

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There are so many amazing people who have spent time and energy thinking about, talking about, researching the principles, the ways we can create systems of belonging that center the well-being of all of us (plants and animals and the entire connected web of nature included). I tend to believe they have come to some very solid conclusions that I've played with and want to share. The rest - the practicing, the faking it until you feel it, the setting aside your disbelief or fear or disdain and just seeing what happens when you try it - that's up to you, and that's the hard part. The best news is that it's only hard because it's new, because it goes against the very foundations of colonialism and capitalism and western culture (patriarchy, white supremacy, superiority culture) that we have all been steeped in for hundreds of years. It is increasingly clear to me that these old paradigms are failing us in spectacular ways, so what do we have to lose if we agree to try building and inhabiting systems of care and belonging?

So what do folks think it will take to build systems of collective care and belonging?

• Agree that everyone belongs - We don't get anywhere if we don't start here. And this is both breathtakingly simple and easy to complicate. The way we keep it simple is to not spend time imagining all of the different "types" or groups of others we can think of. Rather than immediately working to find exceptions, we can simply accept that every single sentient being belongs.
• Center and prioritize relationship - We are all in relationship to one another in so many ways. We live in relationship to nature by breathing air, eating plants and animals, walking on the earth, drinking the water, digging and planting and building things on the ground, etc. etc. We exist in relationship to microorganisms that help us digest our food, that live on our skin and that even make us ill from time to time. We are in relationship to other humans, to our pets, and to ourselves. Sadly, we have become very skilled at building systems that purport to serve humans and animals and plants and the earth, but that quickly begin to prioritize the health of the system rather than the health of the individuals the system was built to serve. When we can go back to centering relationships, we ask very different questions about how to do things. (One huge example: the US healthcare system is supposed to be in service to keeping people and communities healthy. During the early days of the Covid lockdown, when it seemed impossible to supply healthcare workers with enough Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to keep them healthy and safe as they were treating patients, that was the system centering itself. When you hear things like "logistically, that's too difficult" or "it is going to cost too much money," you know that the system is being centered. Had we centered the humans and relationships, we would have thought much more creatively about how to find PPE and make it available, because the goal would have been to save lives and prevent future illnesses, not to make the system efficient and cheaper to run.)
• Prioritize structural change - The question isn't "how do we make change," but "how do we sustain those healthy changes over time?" When we can create systems and structures that cultivate healing and connection and center relationship and interconnectivity, we can begin to hold ourselves accountable to the principles of belonging and course correct when we get off track. This includes recognizing and addressing power dynamics; who has a voice? How are we understanding identity as multi-faceted (intersectional) and evolutionary? What happens when we make adjustments that have unintended consequences and what are the procedures we can build in to remind us how to get back to our values?
• Understand the importance of co-creation - When we work together to generate ideas and solve problems, we all become more committed to the solutions. Finding ways to have difficult conversations without giving up and walking away, understanding that creating spaces where diversity exists necessarily means that there will be different ways of seeing situations and disagreement, and crafting opportunities for folks to work together to find new ways of operating is key to creating systems of belonging. Honoring alternative forms of wealth (lived experience, creativity, language expertise, etc.) and seeing ideas as valuable building blocks rather than creating hierarchies where some have more clout than others can lead us to unexpected places where we all understand more deeply how to move forward together.
• Mutual responsibility - It is incredibly important that we all understand that when we begin to live as though we belong to one another, this means that we are accountable to one another. It doesn't mean that we can't make mistakes or that we won't occasionally cause harm, it means that when we do, we work in relationship to learn from those things and repair the harm. Each one of us benefits from and is responsible for the connections we have in systems of collective care and belonging. The principles of individuality and self-sufficiency are second nature to most of us do not apply here. We are not independent in any way, shape, or form, and recognizing and honoring our interdependence is both a refuge and a requirement.

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What would it look like if all of our systems were predicated on the principles of belonging? What if we designed school systems and transportation systems and food systems this way? What if our health care system reflected the belief that we all deserve to be cared for in meaningful ways? How could our lives be different? How would you make decisions if you knew you would be supported and that your choices had a real impact on every sentient being around you?

It may feel impossible, but there are communities where folks are beginning to practice these things, and there are some that have done things this way forever. We have this narrative that says we just need to "find our tribe" and then we'll be okay. But what if we are already each other's tribe? What if we are born belonging and all we have to do is slow down and recognize it and begin to act like we know we belong just as much as everyone and everything else does? If we prioritize connection, relationship, and collective well-being, we can begin to feel secure in the knowledge that we all belong to one another, and it just might change everything.

My latest memoir is here! Check it out!