As humans, we are created for relationship.
We all desire to relate with others and with something greater than ourselves.
What is Community?
Community is a group of individuals formed by having a common characteristic with one another.
Why Do We Seek Communities?
I think that whenever people are trying to do something that is difficult and outside of “social norms”, whenever a group is trying to change the culture at large, and whenever that change requires discipline, the members of this collective are more likely gravitate towards each other for support in order to be successful.
Having this group gives people a place to speak their language. Rather than having to explain acronyms and terms all of the time, within their community one can be not only understood, but also interacted with. Mentorship and guidance is of course natural, but it feels different when each member has something to provide that the others can learn from.
The FIRE Community
Although I am pretty new to this world of nerding about personal finance, I have started to see that there are so many blogs and podcasts about financial independence and different philosophies and perspectives on the topic. I have found that almost every niche has someone blogging about their money from beer enthusiasts, to doctors and lawyers, and any other profession you could think of.
What is unique about this particular community is their vulnerability to sharing every aspect of their finances. I was raised to think money is an extremely private and personal thing, and finances were rarely, if ever, discussed in my home as a kid.
People in the FIRE community are different. In the past year I have seen and heard about the income, budgets, and portfolios of so many total strangers! I felt at first like I was hearing secrets when I heard Doc G, of the What’s Up Next podcast, ask a panel of guests “What is your income?” and they all answered immediately!
I have noticed in this community, ironically, is that your worth is not in your net worth. Everyone treats each other as equals. We are all on the same team, regardless of where we are on the journey towards financial goals or what someone’s income or spending is. I say goals because not everyone’s goal in FIRE is actually to retire.
This community is a welcoming place where like-minded people share experiences, advice, and useful tips on living a fulfilling life.
Community as a Fire
Last year, I heard this analogy in a Catholic Stuff You Should Know podcast, and it has stuck with me since. Community is like a fire which requires both fuel and heat. Only fuel, you have a pile of wood. Only heat, you have a spark that never catches.
The fuel of community is consistency.
The heat is vulnerability.
Members of a community need to know that they can depend on others whether that is weekly, monthly, or annually. They also need to know that they can be themselves and share the deeper things which requires being known which takes time.
Christian Community
As I mentioned, we all want relationship. We were created for it. Our parents are the first ones we encounter and our immediate desire is to be known, loved, and cared for by them. We cry so that we are attended to and fed emotionally and physically so that we can grow in this world.
Being a Christian is the greatest part of my life because God is the one who knows, loves, and cares for me the most. He demonstrates this constantly and invites us to share in his life (CCC 1).
However, living this faith today can be isolating and difficult at times. Luckily, we have a family, the Church.
If we want to know God, we have to get to know his family. It is there that we are home. It is consistent (with most churches having mass every day), and it is vulnerable (with writings and revelations on any topic you can think of from JPII’s Theology of the Body, to St. Augustine’s Confessions).
Genuine communities of faith are all over the world, striving to live life more fully and more alive.
What’s even greater is that the community of the Church is universal and eternal.
Searching for Truth
Conversation. This is my favorite part of real communities.
In college, I encountered a lot of questions, as well as a wide variety of answers. Many of the answers that I got from teachers as well as classmates were emotional and rooted in what people felt like they wanted to be true. Even more often, my peers just didn’t care. They were “living their own truth”, which I found odd at a university where you are there on the assumption that you have things to learn still.
My sophomore year, I got to know a group at the Catholic center. I found that when I asked questions, this community either wanted to lead me to understand what is true, or they would say “I don’t know, but let’s dive in and talk about that.”
For the first time, I encountered real conversation and dialogue.
Real conversation is not blindly spewing information. It is working through logically to find a truth. It is hearing others lived experiences and reflecting on your own life to understand our purpose and how to live life more fully.
The Catholic Church and the Financial Independence communities are two places where I have most consistently seen real conversations about truth and deeper realities. I have seen members of these groups striving for virtues and working together to grow.
Let’s start a conversation, walk together to find what is true, and continue to create community.
