People sometimes forget that it’s all about community. Why do people take a dance class? or are part of a group? or part of a dance company? or take lessons? or work a certain job? Is it for the technique? or the teacher? or for the money? or for many other very superficial reasons? For the most part, it’s actually about the community. Community fulfills a basic human need for connection (a health need – sometimes “need” has a bad connotation).
Community is a good thing. Through creating community we create friends, people that can help each other out. The ability to work together as a group to accomplish things that otherwise would not be able to be accomplished alone. Group classes are a form of community – a group of people who all pool their money together to afford lessons. They can also support and encourage each other.
How do you create community? How do you improve the health of a community? How do you grow a community? What things get in the way of a community growing? What things drive people away from the community?
Criticalness
If people come into your community to evaluate it, to see if they “fit-in”, to see if it is right for them, if they feel they are accepted, what will they be looking for? If someone who is new to dance and comes to a social dance and they get met with someone who is not going to just dance with them and have fun and play, but bombards them with criticisms and telling them what they are doing is wrong, how are they going to take that? Are they going to feel accepted into the group?
Maybe perhaps more dancers would be more prudent to take a break from the judgemental attitude and just have fun for a bit. (Maybe it would be healthy for their own dancing as well to allow themselves to be more forgiving of their own dancing. Grow a dancer, not a robot!)
Negativity and Gossip
This can be a double edged sword. In a way you can bond with someone by complaining about a common problem or person, you create a common enemy. Or maybe you are playing some sales line that your teacher told you to say, “well, you don’t want to learn wrong do you?” in some hopes to discredit some other teacher. In the end, these things fail.
Many people see through this. They think, “this group is petty and mean, why should I join them? There are a hundred other groups I could join that don’t have this kind of negativity.” And they run away from that social group or community – rightfully so!
Small Group Thinking
In an interesting study social scientists put mice in different sized colonies and observed their behavior. Something interesting happens when a colony gets bigger than 150. The group gets big enough that not every member has to work hard and contribute to the group – some become noticeably mentally unhealthy.
How would you behave in a small group? Like growing up in a small town? What if you knew everyone would eventually hear exactly the gossip you spoke? (That kind of happens even in large groups!) There’s good reason why most of the religious rules and politeness rules exist and are common across the entire world.
Create and Grow
How can you grow your community? It’s actually pretty simple – people want community in the first place. It’s mostly just being careful not to kill its growth. So go out, be friendly. Ask people questions and learn about them. Make them accepted for who they are and ok for them to feel like they can be themselves. Don’t tell them right away that you hate pink dresses (especially if they’re wearing one at the moment). What’s more valuable to you in the long run? A person’s friendship and support, or if they don’t wear pink dresses?
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