Our April visitor program began with a snowstorm, then spring slowly emerged. As the pear trees' knobby branches began to bloom luscious white blossoms, baby goats pranced and played games of King of the Hill on the picnic tables. Tulips, poppies, and daffodils emerged in village gardens, along the quiet, car-free lanes.

Our group of 10 visitors began to emerge too. The social husks from COVID isolation, and the burdens many of us carried from the past couple of difficult years, began to drop away in the warm, accepting community atmosphere. Fairly quickly there was a lot of excitement in just being with a group of new people and quite a bit of laughter, delight and lively, insightful conversation. Some of us yearned to learn about natural building and sustainable living, some were more focused on how the community lived together.

Our first shared task came the second morning. We were given the task of figuring out what we would do about breakfasts for the rest of the two-week program. What would we eat? Would we each make our own breakfast? Make a schedule as a group? Assign everyone a spot? We were to choose. A seemingly simple task, yet it challenged us to be participants rather than just observers of community.

After a brief moment of social nervousness (who would take what role?) the task bonded us as a group. I was impressed by the wisdom of DR in giving us this task of actual temporary community formation. This called for us to voice our preferences and work together, or not. We were free to choose. This set up a group understanding of freedom to choose that extended to all aspects of the program. When participation is voluntarily chosen, rather than assumed, the energy of the group is more authentic and alive.

Our group took volunteers each day to cook the next morning’s breakfast. This let us respond to individuals' energy levels on different days. This worked fairly well, with just a little nudging of one another to complete dishes when we were engaged in exciting conversation. We had some great breakfasts! My personal favorite was smoked cheddar rosemary scones!

The rhythm of the program days was masterfully crafted by many members of the Dancing Rabbit community. This seemed designed to meet different styles of learning and to flow in mode from interpersonal to introspective, from creative expression to informative. In this way, the community unveiled different aspects of the ways they live together, both in a practical sense and how they play and enjoy each other. As a participant, I felt many dimensions of myself were engaged in sequence, an enlivening and integrating experience.

In addition to ecological sustainability, we were introduced to the concept of inner sustainability; that is, how we meet the authentic needs we each have for participation and belonging, autonomy, intellectual engagement and a host of other needs. Addressing a wide range of human needs in a sustainable way was a subtext of the entire program. The view is that we will only choose to live sustainably, which is better for our world, if we can do this in a way that is actually fulfilling. Rather than having to use huge amounts of fossil fuels to go here and there, looking for something to fill needs we may not even be aware we have, this community seems to be saying, “we can make our own joy and engagement and live an ecologically sustainable life.”

This way of understanding individuals and community is based in nonviolent communication, among other models. From this perspective, joyful, expressive togetherness, social potlucks, inner process and communication workshops, five rhythms dance, song circles, meditation, music and vocal improv jams, seem as valued as meetings on how to deal with solar energy, shared community automobiles, or the nonprofit’s budget.

Information on many topics including permaculture, natural building, and modified consensus government were followed by experiential engagement. For example, a movement exercise to give a felt sense of consensus and the difficulty in achieving it and a reflection on the role we usually take in group process, was followed by a small group activity of an imagined life-threatening situation of being shipwrecked and seeking our own small group consensus on what we needed for survival. We then observed an actual Dancing Rabbit community meeting utilizing a modified consensus model.

Hands-on learning experiences included dragging young maple and oak trees out of the forest and debarking them until they were beautifully smooth and ready to be used as posts for natural building. We helped various community members plant their garden, worked as teams to dig up non-native plant species, and toured the houses with an expert builder.

I was impressed by the diversity of roles individuals take in the community. Someone offered a serious lecture on environmental justice at one moment and led a playful song in the song circle at another moment. There was an acupuncturist who also directs a natural construction team, a former university professor excited about making tempeh. Restorative justice was brilliantly presented as a model by one of the work exchangers at Dancing Rabbit.

We were invited to witness a community meeting, as members discussed challenging topics. Through skillful facilitation everyone’s views were heard. There was an almost sacred atmosphere of respect and skillfully practiced communication, even when individuals deeply disagreed with each other. How much we need this in our world today!

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