Last week I participated in one of my favorite annual experiences: getting together with a handful of close friends from college for a weekend away. We take a long weekend at a rental house and hike, play music, make food, and hang out. It’s an opportunity to reaffirm our friendships, give each other some moral support, and have fun.
This is our third year doing this event and it’s reinforced a few key community lessons for me.
It’s easy to forget that merely gathering like-minded people is powerful. It probably won’t surprise you that I’m the organizer of this event. What might surprise you is how little I do: I harass my friends until they fill out a survey about when they’re available, find an airbnb, and book it. Yet they shower me with praise for doing it…because in our busy world, actually pushing past “we should get together” has value.
Remember how I said I just handle the booking part? The best chefs in the group handle the food. We collectively research places to visit and hike. Everyone pitches in on washing dishes. One of the core powers of community is that you can do more together than you could do alone.
The first and third years we met up were magical. Year two was…nice. What made the biggest difference was the venue. Year one was an airy, luxurious house on a plain overlooking the mountains. Year three was a sprawling ranch house on a cattle ranch with endless rolling hills around it.
Year two was in a cramped house with crummy furniture in the middle of a suburb.
Did we still love connecting with each other? Of course. But part of putting people in the mindset for a magical weekend is putting them in a magical place. Setting the stage affects the way people approach the experience. Taking the time to build the right space with the right vibes is crucial.
An irony about humans is that we value our free will so much that we sometimes avoid directions that could actually help us. (Anyone with a child knows the pain of trying to get your kid to put on a jacket.)
What we discovered is that the warmest part of the weekend happened after we had caught up on each other’s lives and opened up about our challenges…but these happened in small silos scattered across the weekend. We weren’t all fully connected and opened up until the end of the weekend.
So this year we kicked off the first night with life updates. There was joy, tears, hugs, and high fives. And suddenly, we were past the biggest hurdle to connecting and everything felt easier and more joyful.
Similarly, some of the songwriters in the group (myself included) wanted to share some of our songs but didn’t want to be the attention hog that says “HEY CHECK OUT MY NEW SONG”. So we explicitly built song-sharing into the weekend…and suddenly instead of it being awkward, it encouraged others to share and resulted in a beautiful night of music and sharing.
Priya Parker calls this being a “benevolent dictator” of your events. If you’re truly acting in the interest of everyone involved, they’ll thank you.
If you’re reading this I’m sure I don’t need to remind you of this…but even though I live community all day at work, I sometimes forget how much my cup is filled by connecting with friends.
And this is only going to become more true: Harvard Business Review found that employees who worked with AI were more lonely and had a greater desire for connection.
We are soon going to be having more conversations with computers than ever, and the cup-filling power of community is going to be even more important than ever. Our work will only grow in value to companies but also to individuals who are suffering in silence.