SELF-CARE REVOLUTION MONTHLY JOURNAL MONTH NINE: The Power of Community

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2 MONTHLY JOURNAL MONTH NINE: The Power of Community Welcome to month 9 of the Self Care Revolution: The Power of Community Take a moment and reflect back on the previous 8 months and all that you have written in your journal. Feel into your body, mind and spirit and notice how this journey of self- care has played out in your life. Recognize the ways in which you have nurtured yourself by eating more vibrant and alive food. Have you noticed that you have a better connection to your most valued relationships, including your connection to the earth? Now let s take the journey further as we explore the Power of Community in your everyday life. A message from your co- host of the Self- Care Revolution Kevin Snow aka "The Desert Shaman" While standing in a Medicine Wheel in Abiquiu, New Mexico I was struck with the realization of what these Lakota words truly mean. When we truly acknowledge our connectedness to all things we are in right relationship with them. Right relationship is the key to the creation of functioning communities. We all must be in right relationship with ourselves in order to be in relationship with other humans and all other living things both physical and metaphysical. "Aho Mitakuye Oyasin.All my relations. I honor you in this circle of life with me today. I am grateful for this opportunity to acknowledge you in this prayer. To the Creator Great Spirit, for the ultimate gift of life, I thank you. To the mineral nation that has built and maintained my bones and all foundations of life experience, I thank you. To the plant nation that sustains my organs and body and gives me healing herbs for sickness, I thank you. To the animal nation that feeds me from your own flesh and offers your loyal companionship in this walk of life, I thank you. To the human nation that shares my path as a soul upon the sacred wheel of Earthly life, I thank you. To the Spirit nation that guides me invisibly through the ups and downs of life and for carrying the torch of light through the Ages, I thank you. To the Four Winds of Change and Growth, I thank you. You are all my relations, my relatives, without whom I would not live. We are in the circle of life together, co- existing, co- creating our destiny. One, not more important than the other. One nation evolving from the other and yet each dependent upon the one above and the one below. All of us a part of the Great Mystery. Thank you for this Life." (Lakota Prayer) Let us know how you re doing. We are here to support you! We were born to unite with our fellow men, and to join in community with the human race. Cicero

3 THIS MONTH S QUESTIONS Question One: What does community mean to you; and how does it serve you emotionally, mentally and spiritually? Question Two: How do you participate in community (ies) in your life? Question Three: How can you welcome community into your life as you live your life s purpose? Question Four: Write down 3 action steps you will take this month to nurture a deeper connection to your community (ies).

4 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY ONE First, we are challenged to rise above the narrow confines of our individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

5 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWO 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. ~ Rudolph Steiner

6 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY THREE A community is like a ship; everyone ought to be prepared to take the helm. ~ Henrick Ibsen

7 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY FOUR A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise. ~ Aldo Leopold

8 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY FIVE A community needs a soul if it is to become a true home for human beings. You, the people must give it this soul. ~ Pope John Paul II

9 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY SIX "It is vain to talk of the interest of the community, without understanding what is the interest of the individual." ~ Jeremy Bentham

10 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY SEVEN It takes a long time to educate a community and it can't be done by spellbinders, moneybags, hypnotizers or magicians or Aladdin's lamp. Character is what matters on a paper. ~ Harry J. Grant

11 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY EIGHT The spiritual path is not a solo endeavor. In fact, the very notion of a self who is trying to free her/himself is a delusion. We are in it together and the company of spiritual friends helps us realize our interconnectedness. ~ Tara Brach

12 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY NINE Cooperation is the thorough conviction that nobody can get there unless everybody gets there. ~ Virginia Burden

13 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TEN Spirituality is allowing compassion and love to flourish. When belongness begins, corruption ends. ~ Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

14 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY ELEVEN There can be no vulnerability without risk; there can be no community without vulnerability; there can be no peace, and ultimately no life, without community. ~ M. Scott Peck

15 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWELVE Never doubt that a small, group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. ~ Margaret Mead

16 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY THIRTEEN One of the signs of passing youth is the birth of a sense of fellowship with other human beings as we take our place among them. ~ Virginia Woolf

17 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY FOURTEEN One generation plants the trees; another gets the shade. ~ Chinese proverb

18 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY FIFTEEN In every community there is work to be done. In every nation, there are wounds to heal. In every heart there is the power to do it. ~ Marianne Williamson

19 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY SIXTEEN How does one keep from "growing old inside"? Surely only in community. The only way to make friends with time is to stay friends with people. Taking community seriously not only gives us the companionship we need, it also relieves us of the notion that we are indispensable. ~ Robert McAfee Brown

20 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY SEVENTEEN I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the community, and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. ~ George Bernard Shaw

21 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY EIGHTEEN We don't accomplish anything in this world alone... and whatever happens is the result of the whole tapestry of one's life and all the weavings of individual threads from one to another that creates something. ~ Sandra Day O'Connor

22 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY NINETEEN Self- actualizing people have a deep feeling of identification, sympathy, and affection for human beings in general. They feel kinship and connection, as if all people were members of a single family. ~ Abraham Maslow

23 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY The good we secure for ourselves is precarious and uncertain.until it is secured for all of us and incorporated into our common life. ~ Jane Addams

24 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-ONE The world is so empty if one thinks only of mountains, rivers & cities; but to know someone who thinks & feels with us, & who, though distant, is close to us in spirit, this makes the earth for us an inhabited garden. ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

25 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-TWO I think democracy is the most revolutionary thing in the world, because if you have power you use it to meet the needs of you and your community. ~ Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn

26 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-THREE In all technologically "advanced" countries, fashion has replaced tradition, so that involuntary membership in a society can no longer provide a feeling of community. ~ Wystan Hugh Auden

27 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-FOUR I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples. ~ Mother Teresa

28 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-FIVE I know there is strength in the differences between us. I know there is comfort, where we overlap." ~ Ani DiFranco

29 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-SIX Healing is impossible in loneliness; it is the opposite of loneliness. Conviviality is healing. To be healed we must come with all the other creatures to the feast of Creation. ~ Wendell Berry The Body and the Earth

30 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-SEVEN Every person is defined by the communities she belongs to. ~ Orson Scott Card

31 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-EIGHT Community is a sign that love is possible in a materialistic world where people so often either ignore or fight each other. It is a sign that we don't need a lot of money to be happy- - in fact, the opposite. ~ Jean Vanier

32 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY TWENTY-NINE The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual. The impulse dies away without the sympathy of the community. ~ William James

33 MONTHLY JOURNAL: DAY THIRTY Some people think they are in community, but they are only in proximity. True community requires commitment and openness. It is a willingness to extend yourself to encounter and know the other. ~ David Spangler