Building Hope Through the Power of Community

One of the reasons I love working at Prospectus is that the people I work with inspire me to help make the world a better place, and the amazing charities we work with and the incredible candidates I am fortunate enough to speak to give me hope that it is possible.

One of things I truly believe in is the power of community, and the subsequent connections and networks of support they bring, and the webs of love they create. At a time when so many of us are feeling so powerless at the state of the world and the suffering that is happening, this feeling of community is essential for giving us hope and keeping the faith that change is possible.

Outside of my work at Prospectus, I am an aspiring musician, DJ and audio producer, and I love to write. These things help me process and understand my emotions, as well as helping me to try and make sense of this world that we live in. So, why am I sharing all of this now and what has this got to do with community and hope?

Well, over the last bank holiday weekend, me and my wonderful wife decided to throw a small intimate festival in the beautiful Welsh countryside. After a really difficult past year for both of us, for a plethora of reasons (not to mention being exceedingly busy!), it's fair to say that we really were questioning why we had decided to take on such a huge task at such a challenging time in our lives. Why had we decided to drain ourselves even more at a time of such struggle? Reflecting on the weekend, it’s been made abundantly clear why we were crazy enough to take on this venture!

We spent so long thinking about this event and how we could help create that feeling of community that we all crave and so desperately need. With the help of our friends, old and new, the event we held was everything we had hoped for and more. Everywhere you looked there were acts of kindness, expressions of vulnerability, compassion, understanding, humility, laughter, tears and a shoulder to cry on. We don't see and feel enough of this in our crazy world and yet these things are so vital to that feeling of community and all the subsequent things that come with it; a sense of belonging, being supported, being empowered, feeling like you don't have to hide who you are because your community is there for you. This feeling of acceptance and love inspires us and creates a ripple effect of positive energy that can help lead to change.

The support we received in this venture was overwhelming. The festival was only made possible by the help of a team of amazing volunteers, some incredible musicians, artists, and DJs (who we couldn't even afford to pay their travel, let alone a fee) and the support of our friends and all those who came to create this amazing community. I learnt so much from everyone who came and shared their stories and beautiful music with us. I learnt more about love and loss, and cycles and spiral, hearing stories of pain and suffering, but also of rebirth and growth, and how often they are intrinsically linked. We heard about how times of immense hardship in one's life can actually create a pathway back to our real selves - a more genuine and loving us who we may have lost in all the overwhelming chaos in our lives. People talked about the importance of nature and the stars and how it gives us a perspective that we so vitally need in a time of such turmoil. All of this isn’t possible without vulnerability, and vulnerability takes courage, but it also takes a safe space to be in so that we feel we are able to be vulnerable. It takes a community. The vulnerability that I saw and felt ripple across our festival was inspiring.

A supportive community creates a space for us to feel those feelings that we sometimes don't feel we have time for, or simply can't face. They give us a place to grieve, where you can feel all the pain but know that there is still hope. And it’s a community that allows you to feel hope and keep that faith. It supports you and cradles you with a love that we all yearn for and need. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that despite the enormity of the task and the stress and resulting exhaustion, I've come away from this weekend feeling grateful, inspired, humbled, rejuvenated, and most importantly, hopeful. It has reminded me how now, more than ever, we all need our community to keep us going.