So you’ve decided to seek the path to liberation and enlightenment with the collective strength of a community rather than all alone against the forces of the entire world. Great choice! But building an intentional community is, in itself, nearly as difficult as escaping the subjugation of a sleepwalking society.
As with the tenets themselves, the Church of the Savior Self condones all prescriptive teachings; we must each walk our own path, replete with pathfinding and obstacle avoidance. More plainly, the Church has no answers, because we believe the only answer is that each person determines their own actions based on reasoned contemplation, or what may otherwise be called mindfulness.
Every community built on the mindfulness of its members will be different, and therefore there is no universal blueprint for what the community must be. However, the Church can offer guidance on some important ideas that are generally foundational to all communities, and should be considered by individuals wishing to found an intentional community.
Communities generally develop organically over time from people interacting with one another and finding spaces where they fit, like pieces in a puzzle. Healthy communities typically foster diversity across beliefs and traditions, insofar as those beliefs don’t interfere with each other’s goals (see On Tolerance). But an intentional community must be less organic and more designed; the parameters of the community must be discussed and debated at its inception and vigilantly enforced throughout its lifespan.
That doesn’t mean there’s no space for diversity. Diversity is as crucial to community as it is to nature; homogeneous groups and biomes do not fare well on an extended timeline, and it is only through diversity that we can adapt and grow. However, even the most anarchic communities should establish a baseline definition of what the community is and– more importantly– why it is.
It is also important to recognize the duality of human nature; although we aspire to be a communal, unified collective both within our communities and across the world, we each contain rich internal worlds that must be nurtured as well. It is therefore important to define spaces and practices that foster individuality, solitude, and privacy.
Let us examine these simple concepts in greater detail.
Common Goals
The ultimate goal of the Savior Self is to find modalities for living that are more harmonious and yield a higher “net happiness” than our current liberal capitalism. But harmony and happiness can each have vastly different definitions to different people. Thus, each community should begin with a concise thesis. As in writing, the thesis should be definable within a few sentences and should serve as the immutable foundation for the community; although strategies, tactics, and even specific goals may change, they should all be in service to the community’s thesis.
If, for example, the thesis is to reduce harm to all living creatures to its least possible extent, every decision within the community should consider this underlying goal, even if it cannot realistically fulfill it. Simply put, the thesis is the “intent” of an intentional community.
This may seem so facile as to be unnecessary, but it is perhaps the most important aspect of developing a mindful community. Every member of the community should– or really must— accept this foundational tenet as a non-negotiable truth, and this should be enforced. Any action that is opposed to this thesis should be prohibited; any decision that does not at least indirectly serve this goal should be carefully reexamined.
When we contemplate ourselves deeply and truthfully, we will find that we each hold contradictory beliefs simultaneously. As a basic example, the desire to reduce all harm to its absolute minimum is challenged by the desire to maximize individual liberty; if someone’s definition of Tenet Four (‘reducing all harm to its practical minimum’) wishes to use their liberty to inflict (what we may consider) unnecessary harm to another, we must deprioritize one belief to support the other: we must either idly allow this harm to happen (inaction being an action unto itself), or we must impose rules or consequences to restore the aggrieved and prevent future harm. Either way, we must decide which belief or ideal we value more. The cumulative effect of several– or dozens or even hundreds– of individuals attempting to reconcile these contradictions can quickly lead to conflict and disharmony within a community unless a priority is clearly defined.
Thus, even if a community wishes to uphold several theses as its immutable foundations, the theses should be defined within a hierarchy that allows the pursuit of a single, topmost goal to override the others.
Beyond the core thesis or theses, the community should agree upon all of its goals as the parameters upon which the members operate. Is the community seeking isolation or federation? Is justice restorative or punitive? Does the community foster hedonism or asceticism? Regardless of the level of governance a community chooses to enact, having a set of well-defined goals ensures that all members agree on the most fundamental aspects of their chosen home.
To be certain, a community should have multiple explicit goals. It is important to define these goals specifically enough for them to have meaning, rather than becoming ineffective platitudes or leaving so much room for interpretation that conflict may arise. At the same time, however, the goals should not be so rigid that they impede progress, nor should there be so many goals that they become dogmatic. It is a difficult but important balance to strike, one that will most likely require patience, spirited debate, and multiple revisions.
Common Practices
The community’s practices includes those deliberate actions that are in service to their goals as well as those that are the basic logistics of daily life. What are the community’s rituals and routines? How are chores and duties handled? Are meals communal, and does the community impose dietary restrictions? Are issues that affect the broader community decided via consensus or committee?
Even in the most anarchic collective, some baseline of interpersonal norms must be defined and agreed upon in order for a community to operate. Practices should be defined in adherence with the community’s goals and, as with the goals themselves, should not be proscriptive. The founders should calculate the value of each defined practice based on how strongly it supports the community’s goals as well as broader harmony amongst members versus how restrictive the practice may be, and whether the community could support its ideals without codifying the practice.
Ultimately, participation in a community is intended to be actively opt-in; that is, members of the community make a conscious decision to join the community. Thus, a community is subject to the same “market pressures” beloved by capitalists and libertarians alike; communities that define either their goals or practices too rigidly may not thrive if people remain unconvinced of their value and decide to leave or not join in the first place. Conversely, communities that do wish to adhere to a strictly-regulated method of living are free to do so, as disinterested parties will not join and only like-minded members will remain.
Clear Intents
Conflict arises from misunderstandings. If goals and practices are not well-defined, they are subject to interpretation, and differing interpretations can lead to disharmony. If we are to promote a truly consensual modality, it is vital that every member clearly understands everything to which they are consenting.
Communities should establish a charter that clearly defines its theses, goals, and required and recommended practices. The charter should make effort to define each item as specifically as it needs to be and no further; that is, it should minimize the possibility of divergent, good-faith interpretations without descending into tomes of legalese. Once again, this is much more difficult than one might assume.
Of course, bad-faith actors can always argue semantics or word choices no matter how detailed the provisions are. In such cases, communities may choose to assemble an ad-hoc committeeOr jury, if you will. to review the situation and render a decisionOr verdict, if you will.. Yes, it sounds like court, but in most cases it should not require all of the complexity that a modern judicial system entails, if most everyone is operating in good faith.
Bad-faith actors should also be addressed personally to identify the root cause of their behavior; in some cases it may be a personal grievance, whereas in others in a more fundamental disconnect between their personal beliefs and those of the community. Mediation or counseling may be helpful to re-align the community and the member, but it some extreme cases, it may be discovered that the member is not a good fit for the community.
Shared Spaces
Modern society has largely eliminated the idea of community. In all but the smallest of towns, people are systemically conditioned to avoid and mistrust their neighbors, to keep to themselves, and increasingly to forego even communal commercial spaces to enjoy private consumption at home. Inhabiting shared spaces is depicted as a nuisance, inconvenient, or a symbol of lower economic status.
The reasons for this are very clear. Consumption is far greater when every individual demands ownership”Or of their own thing instead of going to a place with shared things, so there is more profit to be made. Almost every modern apartment has in-unit laundry machines; hundreds of tons of machinery that sits unused for 98% of every week because people have been taught to believe that the slightest increase in convenience justifies mindless consumption. The same is true for movie theaters, coffeehouses, public transit, and virtually all retail sales: we are indoctrinated to believe that we must have our own home theaters (with a curated firehose of content for our every whim), espresso machines (typically with single-use pods that produce literal tons of plastic waste), and cars (idling in gridlock traffic and burning hundreds of gallons of fuel a year); everything else should be delivered straight to our doors within two days from the other side of the country, once again while consuming countless tons of disposable packaging.
The other reason is that individuals are far easier to control than collectives. Coffeehouses were the de facto scene of the cultural revolution of the 1950’s; better to have people safely in their own homes, consuming online content that is carefully curated by profit-driven media empires, or is otherwise closely monitored by companies and the government alike. Individuals feel more isolated and alienated from society, which culminates in a complacency with or resignation to the problems of the world; of course it also leads to a rise of extremism and random violence, but that’s a small sacrifice we must make at the altar of infinite consumption.
Community is not a spontaneous phenomenon; it is the result of conscience action. Establishing shared spaces reinforces the interconnected nature of our species and promotes conscientiousness, empathy, and flexibility in thought and action. By using shared resources and occupying common areas, we feel that we are a part of something, rather than apart from everything.
Fostering shared spaces within your community– and, ideally, with your broader community beyond your commune, no matter how seemingly-incompatible their beliefs may be — is perhaps the single most important element to nurturing our humanity and returning to a state of harmony within our world.
Shared spaces can be either functional or recreational; kitchens, laundries, gardens, game rooms, and dining quarters are all obvious candidates for communal areas. Although they typically promote sociability, shared spaces must not necessarily be social; libraries, workshops, and art studios can also be shared, even if community members generally work on their own projects or studies.
Of course, shared does not necessarily mean singular, particularly for larger communities. Shared spaces and facilities should not cause perpetual inconvenience from lack of availability; the more essential spaces like kitchens should account for the fact that most people generally eat around the same times every day, and capacity should be planned accordingly. For less frequent or urgent spaces such as laundries or lounges, members may be expected to adapt their schedules to accommodate a practical capacity.
Solitary Spaces
Despite our inherently social nature, humans clearly also require privacy, possessions, and space for introspection. Members should be given ample, dedicated private space that belongs only to them. There is a sense of refuge for even the strongest extroverts when they can retreat to a place they know is their own, which they can decorate and organize as they please, and in which privacy is fully respected.
Similarly, there can be common areas where solitude is gently enforced, such as meditative gardens or isolated areas of the property which members can use without being bothered by others. Whether access to these areas is structured via a schedule or simply with an “in use” indication, such spaces can help members feel greater “ownership” of the community by not confining their personal space only to their living quarters.
Conclusion
Looking at this framework, we see that it largely resembles any other modern social structure: charters, laws, juries, public works, private property. These modalities are integral to a functioning interpersonal community of any size, and are not wrong unto themselves. It is only through their poor execution and the corruption of those in power that these constructs become a problem.
No matter how optimistic one’s view of humanity, it is hard to envision a complex system of interpersonal relationships that does not require mediation. Pure anarchy does not seem like a viable strategy for a stable and harmonious community; in fact, there can be no community without defining it and providing perpetual effort to nurture it.
