Creating Compassionate Communities in 2025 and Forever

In mystery, love, and gratitude

Stillness, silence, the cold of winter, a day of sunlight. Longing for the warmth and flowers of springtime. Trying to be grateful for this present moment.

Recalling traumatic events of recent years: the results of the 2016 US election; the long, deadly COVID pandemic; the attempted insurrection of January 6, 2021; the decline and passing of younger brother Duncan; the devastation of Hurricane Helene here in Swannanoa, NC; and the results of the 2024 US election.

Returning to this present moment of goodness, perfection, aliveness, awareness, possibility, and gratitude.

In the present moment, however, it is getting harder to put on my trousers, getting my foot in the leg hole, and pulling them up and over my feet, knees, and thighs. How long will I be able to do this?

Just returned from morning walk with Abby the collie in our mountain-forest neighborhood (photo above) and meeting Fred, our ninety-four year old neighbor. I asked him if he also has trouble putting on his pants. He said that after he gets dressed each morning, he is exhausted. I agreed, and said that I am not sure that I will make it to ninety-four. He replied that he is grateful for each day. I concurred.

On a recent Skype call, Cosmas, a former UN friend in New York, said that for many years I have been a “voice crying in the wilderness” writing and speaking about the coming of ecological and societal chaos, and that the time seems to have arrived. I have also called on humanity to catalyze and embody a new compassionate civilization emerging from the chaos.

My sense is that our focus should be on creating compassionate communities.

Here in Swannanoa, we have begun to do this with Helene recovery, and plan to intensify efforts over the next five to twenty years through joint planning and action of groups such as the Swannanoa Grassroots Alliance, Beloved Asheville, Bounty and Soul, and other local nonprofits, Ingles supermarket and other local businesses, local religious groups, Warren Wilson College and other local schools, Buncombe County government, many other local groups and concerned individuals, and outside volunteers and programs.

What about you? What can you and your neighbors do where you live to create a compassionate community? Who would be involved? How can you and I demonstrate how to create socioeconomic justice, ecological regeneration, participatory decision-making, and collaborative action in our communities?

In each of our local communities, we can care for those in need - the displaced, the unhoused, the poor, the hungry, the elderly, the young, the sick, the uneducated, the disabled, the anxious, the lonely, the voiceless, the confused, indeed all local people and all living beings and ecosystems.

The models and methods of the Doughnut Economics Action Lab (DEAL) can be a great help. Group facilitation strategic planning methods such as the Technology of Participation (ToP) can be very effective. Practices of mindfulness can provide calm and focus. Methods of social artistry can promote creativity. Integral frameworks can help structure our thinking and planning. Third Act can assist. Sunrise Movement can help. And there are many other resources to draw on as well. Please let me know if you need assistance accessing any of these.

Also, please let me know if you want to help Swannanoa with funding or other resources.

Coming back to the present moment, I am grateful for so much - for this body-mind, for health, for family, friends, and neighbors, for invitations to speak and write, for having a house, income, and food, for societal institutions, and being part of the living Earth of air, water, soil, plants, and animals, and part of a solar system, a spiral galaxy, and a living cosmos. What about you? What are you grateful for?

Even in the midst of gratitude and happiness, my heart breaks for the suffering of all people and all living beings from Sudan to Swannanoa. What causes your tears to flow?

May you and I and all people of goodwill help relieve suffering. May all beings realize peace and happiness.

What an impenetrable mystery! To be born, to live, to care, to die, and to continue forever as an ancestor through the impacts of our words and deeds. May it be so.