Category: Community-culture


The Power of Hope—Bringing Community Together

Over here at Cathedral Park Cohousing we are strong believers in the power of hope. Hope not as an idle wish, but hope as a verb, as they say; hope as a companion to work, hope as the glimmer of deeper truth that keeps us rolling up our sleeves to bring the shared dream of... Read More

WebChat #35 Sky and Avi

Last month Sky Blue, Executive Director of the Foundation for Intentional Community, and Avi Kruley, Community Wellbeing Facilitator at the Mount Madonna Center, joined us for a WebChat looking at what makes an intentional community an intentional community. They explored the 5 R’s: Residence, Rationale, Responsibilities, Resources and Respect. From there they guided us through... Read More

Culture Change and Personal Transformation

Joe Cole’s recent WebChat focused on the challenges in community and the potential they provide for growth and transformation.  Living in community may be the hardest thing we ever do, and also the most rewarding.   The cultural infrastructure of a community guides the transformation from competitive culture to cooperative culture and determines the types of... Read More

Sharing Risk

Cohousing begins with the premise that we want to share things. We think first of big, tangible things, like lawn mowers and guest rooms. Then there are smaller things, the proverbial cup of sugar, a ride to the airport. We anticipate and cherish this sharing as part of our identity as a cohousing community. We... Read More

WebChat #21 Addressing Racism and Working for Racial Equality

Joe Cole joined us this evening for a thought-provoking presentation on Addressing Racism and Working for Racial Equality in Community Building. Joe started with a long view of history, noting that the competitive culture of domination is recent, only 5000 years. Prior to that human cultures were collaborative, demonstrating that a cultural values of sustainability,... Read More

WebChat #13 with Yana Ludwig

Yana Ludwig’s second WebChat was another great success. This time she tackled the topic of Cooperative Culture, giving us 6 of her 10 strategies for being effective in cooperative governance. Yana begins with an introduction to the extremes of the cooperative spectrum and the dangers of overcompensating. Then she guides us toward balance in the... Read More

Getting from “Gotta Have” to “Community First”

Cohousing community members begin with some basic assumptions. We expect to do some downsizing. We know we will be sharing space and will need to make some comprises about how we use that space. We plan to reduce our impact on the planet and increase our social connections. These tend to be shared assumptions and... Read More

Foster Parenting in Cohousing

This story was written in 2003 and first published in David Wann’s book Reinventing Community: Stories from the Walkways of Cohousing. We are republishing it here with permission because it is such a great example of how cohousing communities nurture and support beyond the community itself. We’ve been living with foster children in our house... Read More

Power in Cooperative Groups, Part 1: Yourself

Join Laird at the 2017 National Cohousing Conference where he will present several sessions, including Power and Leadership. I’m starting a blog series spotlighting the concept of power in cooperative culture. In the context of group dynamics—my main arena—power has to do with how people interrelate, but I want to start with the individual before... Read More

Defining Cooperative Culture

Back in 1974, when a group of four of us started Sandhill Farm, I started down a path that ultimately added up to my dedicating my life to building community. While that commitment has never wavered (the need for community today as more urgent than ever), I’ve frequently adjusted the lens through which I see... Read More