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Habit Six: Community
by Bruce 02/07/07
“The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body.” St Paul. “Whenever two or three of you come together in my name, I am there with you.” Jesus.
Read the introduction to the Seven Habits of Smiley Spiritual People and the previous habit 5 in this series.
Happiness and spirituality combine most strongly in community. Positive Psychology research shows that the happiest people tend to be members of faith communities with strong social ties. Sure, it is possible to explore spirituality all on your lonesome but it really works best in community. You’ll learn far more about the road to enlightenment if you’re walking with others in the messiness of everyday life than you might if you were to withdraw and hide. For example: three failed relationships will teach you more than not having any would.
The easy part of the equation is that happiness is found through friends but counter intuitively, research shows that quantity is not necessarily quality; sometimes having a lot of friends dilutes your time too thinly to really benefit from what you might gain from having a few very good friends. Turn the clock back 10,000 years and the size of the average tribe would be 150 people and you shouldn’t be surprised to learn that we’re still driven the same way having an average number of contacts in our address books of 150 people. We’re made that way but we’ve lost the community spirituality aspect, at least formally, (adolescents particularly seek out informal group experiences of the transcendent).
The hard part of the equation is how to explore spirituality in community. So, the challenge is laid before you; a challenge that I wish had an easy solution. How can you explore smiley spirituality with others? Instead of me offering suggestions why not leave your ideas below in comments. We’re surrounded by churches but to most that doesn’t seem like the answer anymore, (although I’m sure if you took them by storm and demanded some changes then you may get your way).