My Travels in the World of Communities

Communities have always been important to me. I enjoy sharing my life with groups of people. For example, I enjoyed spending two days with my class during my biodynamic agriculture studies, eating and sleeping at the school. I also enjoyed it when my two stepchildren brought all their friends to our place for pancakes. You could call it an extended family. Since 2009, I have been either visiting or living in communities.

From 2021 to 2025, I visited various communities, ecovillages, and co-living spaces. Currently, I am writing a book about my experiences. Below is an excerpt from the book Communities — Experiments with Social Change. I hope to finish writing it next year and publish it soon after.

A few years ago, I spoke with a man at a community meeting where I used to live and work. I told him that I intended to write a book about communities, a topic that interested him. I don't remember how the conversation turned to this topic, but at one point, he said to me, "What you want to write about is actually a world characterized by wholeness as opposed to a world characterized by separateness." This is precisely the subject of my book. In it, I argue that community is a way to connect with ourselves, others, and the world around us. However, our current societies are characterized by separateness. We are individual citizens, consumers, and economic entities walking around in an alien world. This separateness causes fear, which must be controlled. Along with the idea of competition, we view others as potential threats. We create fragile networks that give us a false sense of security only by forming alliances based on ideas like religion, political worldviews, or economic interests.

This book is about transitioning from separateness to wholeness.

Human beings are not made for this way of living. For thousands of years, we lived in small, medium, and large communities, finding security in the group. This organizational structure was based on the understanding that we are social creatures who create abundance for ourselves and others through cooperation. In other words, we knew how to relate to each other in healthy ways. We were also closer to the living world around us. The many paintings in grottoes around the world, some of which are tens of thousands of years old, depict the close relationship between humans and the natural world. This book is based on the idea that this natural way of living gives our lives meaning. However, we have lost that meaning and are suffering the consequences: loneliness, depression, violent behavior, numbness, and emptiness. We try to fill the emptiness we feel by buying things we don't need, using substances like cannabis or alcohol, and engaging with social media and competing political views. This book is about transitioning from separateness to wholeness. Wholeness is the feeling that we belong. It is the feeling that we belong to this planet. It is the feeling that we belong among the great variety of other species. It is the feeling that we belong together. It is also the feeling that we belong to ourselves. For too long, we have given away our uniqueness, abilities, and power to external authorities who have decided what is important in life for us. There is nothing more rewarding than taking responsibility for your own life, standing in your autonomy and power, and shaping your life accordingly. I call this the "flowering" of a human being. Interestingly, this does not clash with the flowering of other people. We can coexist as part of a group while also being fully autonomous individuals.

The main question was: How can we build sustainable communities?

At the time of my conversation with the man, I was about to embark on a journey. The community I lived in was falling apart. Despite being aware of what was happening, I could not change it. I decided to leave and visit other communities to learn from them. Over the years, I had visited other communities and participated in a Global Ecovillage Network (GEN) gathering, sharing insights for a week. I decided to spend a year in Latin America, beginning in Brazil, where I planned to visit an indigenous tribe in the Amazon jungle. I wanted to compare tribal and modern communities and see what we could learn from each other. The main question was: How can we build sustainable communities? Many communities nowadays suffer from internal conflict, which threatens their existence and success. People are not accustomed to living together and often have romantic ideas about living near nature. There is a deep longing for that lifestyle, but building and maintaining a community is hard work. Community is a verb. It is something we practice every day through listening, cooperation, and the willingness to work through conflict. It is a process of reinventing ways to connect. Communities are social experiments. The inner and group work stemming from this inability can be difficult, confronting, and tough. This book is aimed at newly founded communities that are rediscovering how to relate.

During my travels, I lived in a neighborhood in Rio de Janeiro and visited social projects there. One project was run by a woman who connected people by teaching them to dance the samba. A "bairro" is a community, and being part of one provides a sense of security and cooperation. The people take care of each other. I also visited an indigenous tribe in the Amazon jungle called the Yawanawa and stayed with them for a month. From them, I learned about supportive leadership and the importance of ceremonies that strengthen the bonds between tribe members. I also learned what it means to be an autonomous individual operating within a group. Next, I visited an ecovillage called Piracanga in the state of Bahia on Brazil's east coast. There, I learned how to generate abundance in communities because they were very successful at doing so as a group.

During my month with the Yawanawa people, I met a man who told me about Tamera, a community in southeastern Portugal that has existed for forty years. I decided to leave South America and return to Europe. I spent a month at Tamera taking a community-building course. There, I learned about activism and peace work, as well as how the liberation of love and sexuality can contribute to peace. I was also impressed by how they live in harmony with the animals on their land, including wild boars that roam freely. After that, I lived at A Quinta da Lage, a restoration project and co-living space near Tamera, for about nine months. Then, I moved to the community where I currently live: Cento e Oito. Cento e Oito is an intentional community, meaning its members live together with the aim of learning to coexist. This is where I found my home and family. I am currently in the process of becoming a member, which means I will take responsibility for caring for the community members and the land.

For a long time, I tried to change the system from within. But this only led to exhaustion and burnout.

This book is based on my experiences and observations of the similarities and differences among various communities. Before traveling, I had already visited several communities in Sweden and Germany. However, the journey that led to this book began much earlier. It began with my growing discontent with our current societies. I increasingly felt alienated from society because my needs, desires, and values did not align with its norms and values. For a long time, I tried to change the system from within. But this only led to exhaustion and burnout. Since then, I have started exploring places and projects operating on the margins of society. I wanted to find free spaces where I could breathe and flourish. I began by attempting to become self-sufficient by returning to school. I learned how to grow vegetables using the biodynamic method. This allowed me to grow my own food, but I wasn’t able to build a house or learn many other necessary skills. By the time I realized this, I was already part of a community. I saw that community could be the solution to building a sustainable life. If we cooperate, we can all contribute our skills, such as building houses, and share our other practical abilities.

Community is a verb.

After reflecting on my two years of traveling to several communities, I realized why I was unable to save the community where I lived. It was not my responsibility alone, but rather the responsibility of all its members. We build or break communities. Living in a community is like reinventing the wheel. It requires people with good intentions who are willing to endure difficult times, stay open, and learn from experiences. A community requires its members to be open to personal growth, which means breaking down everything society has taught us. Then, we must learn to understand the social dynamics within communities. We tend to project our blind spots onto others. We gossip and form factions to protect our identity and worldview. These tendencies can potentially disrupt a community. Unlike the Yawanawa people I visited, we are not born into a community. We are born and raised in modern societies that are characterized by separateness and control. Many of us have difficulty with this kind of life, yet it influences us more than we often realize. We carry a bag full of obsolete narratives—ideas, convictions, and views—and we lack a clear picture of how things can be different. This doesn't mean that change is impossible. However, being aware of the potential disruptive baggage we carry is a good first step in finding new ways to connect with each other.

As mentioned, communities are social experiments. The romanticism surrounding living with others in nature is sometimes far from reality. Fortunately, we are not alone. Many people share my discontent with living in a society where you are seen as a unit of production, where you have to compete and fend for yourself. Modern societies lack the things that make us human: being together, cooperating, finding meaning in life, feeling at home, growing freely, deciding our own fate, and loving freely. This book is for people who, like me, want to live differently. Written from a subjective perspective, it aims to offer insight into my experiences and how I became a functioning community member in a well-functioning community. One thing I have always had, though, is the ability to think critically. I have always questioned so-called "common truths," including those I had internalized. Over the years, I have let go of many of these beliefs, opening the way to seeing things from a different perspective. What you read is my truth, and I strongly advise you to read this book with a critical mindset. I hope this book inspires you to learn more about yourself: how you want to live, what is important to you, and what is keeping you from living your own life.

Wende