There was a season in my life where I moved cross country every 2-4 years. I was making moves for education and career, and I became a packing and moving maven in the process. I had a system with my boxes and labelling and finding movers and laying out my apartment floor plan on graph paper so I knew exactly what piece of furniture would fit where. I had a system! But each time I did this, I also had to find community again, and that was hard. There’s the “Where do I get my hair done? Dry cleaning done?” kind of needs, and there’s there “Where are the people who live, love, think and imagine like me?” kind of need. And every couple of years, I was looking for both of those. It was a lonely process because building community takes time, trial and error, and persistence. For me, community is the space where I can be the me I know myself to me and feel accepted. I’ve never stumbled into it; I’ve had to seek and build and nourish that. And it’s completely worth it.

One of my 2023 New Year intentions was about community. I felt like I was changing in ways that my community was not. And I feared that if I showed up as this changed me, that I would lose a community that I value and that is important to me. Could I be authentically ME and stay in this community? My actual concern was: Will I be okay if I lose this community because I’m being who I am now? 

​I remember the fear with which I journaled about this. Because I knew full well that new community doesn’t sprout up overnight just because I might no longer fit into the community that I’ve been a part of for so long. 

So I know why people may not be their authentic selves with others. Or why they choose silence over voice. Or why they bear poor treatment from supervisors, systems and institutions. Because community matters and it’s a hard thing to walk away from. Especially a community you love without reason.

​Then life began lifin’ and I forgot about my New Year Intentions. Until the end of 2023 when I reflected back. And I saw that the fear was gone. That I was happily my authentic self without fear of losing my community. Did I lose community? Yes. I no longer felt comfortable and connected in a space that had once held great meaning and affinity for me. I edged my way out of those spaces slowly. I wasn’t genuinely a part of that community. Did I lose community? No. I’m sure most people didn’t notice as much as I did and my good friends watched me evolve and change and differ from them in significant ways, without a hint of loving me any less.

​I don’t think I’m alone. There can be tensions among authenticity, change and community that are not easily resolved. Living inauthentically is too painful a choice for me, so the change and community tension cycles around every X many years. And I never have answers. But I do know that I need more than one community at a time, and that I’ve needed different communities in different seasons of my life.

​This came sharply to my attention when I ended up in a kitchen chat with a colleague about her journey to become a Mama. And even though we had different journeys, I immediately knew that she needed to be in community. “Do you know,” I asked, “other women going through the same thing? Because I have friends who have and I just don’t think you should be alone in this.” I connected this colleague with my friend Erica Williams Simon who has a community just for women like her: women on an unexpectedly challenging journey to motherhood. (Check out the cool retreat and community she has HERE.) I recently did an Instagram Live with Erica about my own journey to Mamahood (catch me spilling all my personal tea here) and remembered how much love and support I had from my community in some difficult times. All these years later, I am still in deep awe and gratitude at the ways my people surrounded and upheld me. 

​I don’t know the magic formula to creating community, or how to graciously edge out of it either. I do know the deep joy of having community, and the hard loneliness of trying to find it. My wish for all of us is to dare to be who we really are, and to trust that we will not be completely alone if and when we show up authentically. 

Blessings,

Dr. Monica