The Real You: Finding Your Community
You might be “a New Yorker”, “the stamp collector”, “the art lover”, or “the hockey player” or all four based on memberships, affiliations, and how you spend your time. These are all part of your identity for yourself and to the rest of the world. Sometimes you choose to join a community to associate with others who share an interest and pursue it in a structured way such as an arts organization or a sports team. The pursuit with the community provides a sense of belonging and reinforces that part of your identity.
Furthermore, your chosen level of participation signals the strength of the identity that the community provides to you. If you are deeply immersed and spending a lot of time with a group or take on a leadership role that is public, the more people will associate you with that entity and the shared interest.
Let’s say you have an organization or entity that seems to offer what you want. How can you evaluate the alignment with you? And if you have more than one affiliation, you want to consider the balance of involvement to address your variety of interests. You might include family for sentimental-biological reasons; something at work so earning money is more enjoyable; school for shared pursuit of knowledge, sports for enjoyment and health, and other options.
Your communities and your current participation should reflect you, be enjoyable, and serve the purpose that you want. It is especially important to consider your current interests and goals rather than your past priorities. You need to recognize that as your interests change, your affiliations should change with them.
For example, you have a definition of yourself from being born and having lived in a certain place. Now, you might consider your current residence as more important to your identity, and, therefore, be involved in local activities. Or, the reverse, you might feel more aligned with your original home so you continue to vote there and be involved while your current neighborhood might not be of significant interest to you.
You Do You
You should feel some shared identity with others in any relevant affiliation. So we begin with looking at the strength of your identification with a group. Let’s call it the You Do You Ruler. If you are happy being part of a community because it reflects a current interest and a part of your identity, the rating would be a 5 to indicate a reasonable fit. To score higher, it should be an affiliation that defines you and is one of the first things you tell people as a reflection of yourself. If you are rating more than one community, the most important consideration is how the ratings relate to each other — the most “You” community should rate the highest. Some groups may be so similar in being part of your identity that they get the same score.
Take a minute to consider the score(s). Are you surprised at the result in some way? For low scoring connections, consider that wanting others to see you as having a certain identity or
status might have led you to join a group. Then habit or self-perception may have made it easier to stay than to leave.
Fun Times
As important as it is for your affiliations to reflect who you are, you also want to make sure that your participation is providing enjoyment and personal fulfillment. You should ask “Am I having fun?” for each entity. Answer the question with a rating from one to ten as you did for the You Do You score.
Again, the expected rating for a group should be a 5 if you enjoy being part of the activities and you like spending time with the other participants. Note that the most important consideration in rating multiple communities is how they relate to each other — the community that brings you the most enjoyment should rate the highest. And ties are allowed.
It’s Productive
Whether to provide inspiration for writing, an opportunity to learn or do a sport, find belonging, or a way to help others, communities have a purpose for the members. You need to think about whether yours are as productive for you as you want. To do this, you can ask “Is it working?”.
Score your community in the same as the two other concepts: the expected rating is a 5 if your affiliation is productive, a higher score indicates it exceeds expectations (such as a winning sports team) or the purpose is particularly important to you (such as a leadership group that helps make you more successful in your career.) If the entity has a goal such as poverty alleviation, you might consider that as part of the productivity of your participation — as a group participant, are you contributing to the goal in some way? Remember to consider how communities relate to each other too.
All Together Now
Now you can put the information together and get a better sense of what works for you and what does not. You want to focus on involvement with entities that rate at least five on each scale. If you are thinking about one entity, make sure it rates highly enough that it is worth investing yourself and your time in it.
If you want to compare options, you can do a small art project to get a visual — make a circle for each community with the size of the circle based on the You Do You score. Put each circle on a line according to productivity. Then color in the circles lightly or darkly depending on the level of fun. Here is an example with six groups mapped together.
Is this a good balance? Are all of these “good” affiliations? It’s a personal question. There is no right or wrong answer. The balance has to work for the person, and you are that person. Ultimately, this provides a framework for being intentional about your affiliations and finding the balance that feels right for you.
A healthy social life is found only when, in the mirror of each soul, the whole community finds its reflection, and when, in the whole community, the virtue of each one is living. - Rudolf Steiner
