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Intentional Communities Newsletter: November 13, 2009
Promoting Community Living & Cooperative Lifestyles
Communities magazine, Directory, Video and more
Communities Magazine Upcoming Issues
#145 (Winter): Health and Well-Being
#146 (Spring): Family
Since 1972, Communities has been the primary resource for information, issues, and ideas about intentional communities in North America--from urban co-ops to cohousing groups to ecovillages to rural communes. Communities
increasingly focuses on creating and enhancing community in the workplace, in nonprofit or activist organizations, and in neighborhoods. Articles and columns cover practical how-to issues of cooperative living as well as personal stories about forming new communities, decision-making, conflict resolution, raising children in community, ecological living, and much more. We explore the joys and challenges of cooperation in its many dimensions.
Please subscribe today! If you're already a subscriber, tell your friends about us or better yet give a gift subscription.
Winter Issue: Health
and Well-Being
Arriving in subscriber mailboxes and on newsstands
in December, our winter issue (#145) focuses
on Health
and Well-Being. Here's some of what readers
will find:
Growing
a Culture of Community Health and Well-Being at Earthaven Ecovillage by
Arjuna da Silva. At
a permaculture-based ecovillage in North Carolina, care for the earth, care for
people, and care for inner health all benefit from a dynamic culture based on
local self-reliance, holism, and community.
Health and Community:
A Move to Edinburgh by Sophie
Unwin. Leaving London to regain a sense
of well-being, the author lands in a Scottish housing cooperative, where she
finds mutual support, health, and the ability to be herself amongst others.
Embracing a Terminal
Illness by Fred
Lanphear. A community
rallies in support of a long-time member diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s Disease,
discovering opportunities and possibilities for new connections with each other
and becoming more present to the priceless experiences of both living and dying. Here's
an excerpt from this article:
I received a diagnosis of ALS, better known as Lou Gehrig’s
Disease. ALS is a
fatal disease without any known cure; the life expectancy averages two
to five
years after diagnosis. It was about this time Songaia Cohousing Community
began the 10-week course Aging in Place Successfully, which explores the
notion of community providing a place to live until death. I was to be
a “guinea
pig” for the concept of aging in place, as ALS is a degenerative
disease that can
be cared for at home, but does require an intensive, shared care structure
as
the disease progresses. I requested a community circle in January 2008
to
share my diagnosis with everyone and to ask for their support as I move
into
the last phase of my life.
Garden as Therapist
and Community Organizer by
Craig Chalquist. Neither the therapist diagnosing
Major Depression nor the psychiatrist prescribing an antidepressant asked the
fundamental question: Do you like
to garden? When
the author discovers this doorway into the natural world, he also finds community
and inner and outer health.
Cell Phones, Education,
Farming, and Mental Health by Shepherd
Bliss. A professor and farmer
suggests that the nearly-ubiquitous cell phone may, instead of being the best
thing since sliced bread, endanger our health and threaten our relationships
within human and natural communities.
Gut Health by
Dona Willoughby. Both
in traditional cultures and at La’akea, close loving relationships, consistent
community connection, a life close to nature, fresh non-processed food,
satisfying work, regular exercise, clean air and water, attunement to biological
rhythms, joy, and laughter all support health.
The Shakers’ Secrets
of Longevity by Susan Matarese
and Paul Salmon. For
more than 200 years, a wholesome diet, regular physical activity, hygienic practices,
comprehensive health care, economic security, and social support combined with
religious principles contributed to the Shakers’ general good health and
longevity.
Artabana Solidarity
Communities: New
Paths for an Integrated Health Care System in Germany by
Ina Meyer-Stoll. Based
on principles of freedom, responsibility, solidarity, transparency, giving, sharing,
and healthy, integrated lifestyles, a European-based alternative health care
network offers practical models that could be enacted anywhere.
Healing Work in a
Healing Biotope: An
interview with Dr. Amélie Weimar by
Stephen Davis. Tamera
Healing Biotope seeks to promote healing on
physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual levels, within individuals, within
the whole community, and between genders, cultures, humans and nature.
The True Need for
Community by
Joshua Canter. Both
scientific studies and personal experience confirm the importance of community
in healing and healthy living. Mutual support and a sense of connection to a
whole help us thrive physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
Community Cured
My Asthma and Allergies by Mandy
Creighton. Turning
to her community for support and advice, and opening up to healing alternatives,
a chronic asthmatic finally discovers the health that has eluded her throughout
27 years of conventional treatment.
Want to Be a Healer?
Be a Creek! by
Niánn Emerson Chase. In
order for us to begin to feel union with others, we must realize that we have
a common need to heal, and that healing is an ongoing process—dynamic,
flowing, moving, and cleansing.
Community and
Health: Immigrant
Senior Cohousing in the Netherlandsby
Dorit Fromm and Els de Jong. Innovative
Dutch cohousing projects allow ethnic minorities to spend their elder years
in dignity, community, mutually supportive relationships, greater connection
to their traditions and families, and better health.
Senior Cohousing:
Establishing a Healthy, Sustainable Lifestyle for an Aging Generation by
Chuck Durrett. Senior
cohousing enhances quality of life, supports physical, social, and emotional
well-being, and allows seniors to live lightly on the planet at the same
time.
Health and Quiet—book
review by Chris Roth. Noise
and quiet can both affect well-being profoundly. Gordon Hempton’s One
Square Inch of Silence offers
ear-opening stories and perspectives, practical suggestions, and simple,
radical wisdom.
The issue also
includes letters, a
profile of the
PEACH Health Care Plan, a Cooperative Group Solutions panelist discussion
on "The Bully Question," and a retrospective on the historic community, High
Wind, in which its cofounder, Belden Paulson, reflects
on decades of work at the intersection of academia, community, and sustainable
living.
Please ask for Communities at your
favorite local cafe or natural foods store, or subscribe today.
Winter issue: The theme for the
spring issue (#146) is Family. If
you're interested in submitting articles, photos, or illustrations to future
issues of Communities, please follow
this link for details.
Contact Communities Editor.
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