To the Communities I have Loved and Lost

Why real community can’t be built, and what we lose when we try to sell it.

Community has become one of the most powerful tools in modern marketing. You see it everywhere. You are no longer a company or an organization, you are a brand. And you are no longer selling a product or a service, you are selling belonging.

Psychologically, this makes sense. Humans are wired for connection. Studies in social neuroscience show that belonging activates the same reward centers in the brain as food and safety.

It is not a luxury. It is a biological need.

(Much like my nachos are a need, not a luxury - same same, but different).

So business adapted and now you see membership models, group containers and private platforms - all of these ecosystems are designed to create retention, loyalty and emotional investment.

Now don’t get me wrong. I am a brand. I have an ecosystem with membership models and group containers. In many ways, this evolution isn’t wrong. Yet it’s in the subtly that I’ve come to be frustrated by it.

I am not here to build community.

That happens naturally by the space that I hold. I create the space for people to feel safe, to feel seen, to feel supported, to feel brave enough to create a connection on their own. I hold that space for that. I would never say I am building a community, that happens naturally because of the way I have curated my experiences.

Communities don’t form just because someone decided it should. Trust me, we’ve all walked into a space that promised community only for us to wonder how noticeable it would be leave immediately or should we wait til the end or should we try to slip out midway through.

Community it not something you build.

It’s something you hold.

And if you’re lucky, it holds you back.

We talk a hell of a lot about building community, but what no one really talks about is how to grieve it.

How to honor the spaces that shaped us.

How to sit with the versions of ourselves that only existed there.

How to let something end without rushing to replace it with something new.

I’m particularly shit at that last bit.

Turns out, not everything is meant to be scaled and, like Outkast told us, nothing last forever. Some communities exist for a season. That precise, perfect window of time where their power isn’t in the permanence, but rather in their impact.

For me, the cul-de-sac was my first community. It wasn’t just pavement. It was our battlefield, our soccer field, our ice skating rink. In another time, I’ll let ya know about how I thought I could be a figure skater in my rollerblades practicing on asphalt, but I digress. That cul-de-sac was anything and everything we needed.

It was where we learned how to belong.

We just showed up. That’s all we had to do.

Growing up, I found myself inside many of these spaces.

Though at the time communities looked more like afterschool programs, sports teams and other activities to make me a well-rounded human… did it work?

I found myself bouncing between volleyball teams (in 7th grade I was pretty tall, so I was the setter and my serve was pretty solid too - overhand which was a rarity in middle school days). Then I was oddly good at shot put, so I was on the track team and then I tried my hand at cross country. That one was rough because we had 5a practice times, and those runs were looooonnnnngggg, but it was those 5a runs that built that connection.

We might not have called it community, we used words like practice and teams, but really all we were doing was belonging, connecting, learning, growing, supporting, witnessing, championing one another.

Then I found dance, or the documentary version of this sentence would be… or should I say, dance found me?! I’m sorry I couldn’t resist. I danced afterschool, I danced at school, I danced pretty much anywhere people would let me. Let the records show that all of this statement still remains accurate.

By high school I was on the high school dance team as well as my studio’s dance team. And those two communities were as different as night and day. The one at high school, I didn’t belong. Everyone on the dance team was also on the cheer squad, which I was not on and therefore not part of the team. So for me, that experience was truly like a class that I showed up for. I wasn’t invited to lunches or weekend parties. I didn’t have people’s numbers and no one asked me how my weekend was. But I loved to dance and everyone on the team was such a beautiful dancer, just being in the room felt inspiring. Even if I was alone.

And then there was the dance team at the studio, a space where I had grown up. Although professionals would say starting dance at 10 years old is late, but no matter, I’m a miracle- haha. They were my girls, we not only trained together, but we sat on empty studio floors drinking Jamba Juice and eating the far too occasional Subway sub. We would travel to competitions together, perform together and ultimately become versions of ourselves we wouldn’t have accessed alone.

And then one day…

I never went back.

I never made another run to Subway between classes.

Never slicked my hair back into a tight bun with an asymmetrical part again.

Never sewed another pair of pointe shoes.

There wasn’t a ceremony.

No moment that said: this is the last time.

But it was.

Much like the last 5am run.

The last serve.

The last time a space held a version of me that would never exist again.

I’ve moved through many cities since then and found myself inside many different rooms, many different circles. And for most of my life, I didn’t realize when something was ending. I just thought something new was beginning.

Communities just… dissolved. I moved. I picked another gym, got another job, left a relationship and I never made that kind of connection before. I always assumed I could come back for a visit. And I have. I have visited the pole studio where I taught for years. I have brought friends to cities I have loved, only to show them spaces that no longer exist and build new memories in the new spaces that have taken their place.

Until now.

Because this time, I know.

In the last year, I’ve had to say goodbye to two spaces that I loved deeply.

And tonight, we close the doors to one that transformed right alongside me.

I was introduced to this space by someone I trusted and admired. At the time, I was stepping into work that felt new and vulnerable. It was the first time I was investing in me, you know beyond going to college. It was the biggest investment I had every truly made for myself. My computers costed less (as a creative director/designer this joke makes sense).

Inside those walls, I was reintroduced to me. I rediscovered passions and gifts, I integrated new tools into my life, experienced quiet breakthroughs, private moments… parts of myself softening in ways I didn’t have language for.

The doors didn’t just hold me. They opened me.

As I took shape, I found another corner in this space. And in this corner, I recommitted to my Reiki practice after nearly a decade of first going through the attunements. I found a mentor to not only guide me, but inspire me. To show me what is possible in this work. She connected me to opportunities and to some of the most incredible humans. There were times I leaned on her and times where I was able to return the favor. She believed in me.

As the walls grew bigger and the space held more, I was asked to teach.

To hold space.

To become part of the very thing that once held me.

An ask I didn’t take lightly. One I held in high regard and took much pride in.

Inside those same walls, I reimagined The Feral Experience.

I held potent 1:1 sessions and my first level I Reiki Attunement ceremony on my own.

And tonight… it ends.

For the first time in my life, I am fully aware.

This is the last time.

Not just for the space, but for the version of me that existed within it.

And still… I wouldn’t call it a loss in the way we’ve been taught to.

Nothing about it was accidental.

Nothing about it was wasted.

It didn’t fail.

It lived.

It held.

It transformed.

For me, that’s what real community is.

It’s not something you market, or something you promise with class pack or session. It’s something you participate in.

Something that changes you.

Something that, at some point… you will have to let go of.

And tonight,

I do.

With grief.

With gratitude.

With reverence for everything that was built, not strategically, but soulfully.

The communities that shape us most… are the ones we never thought to call “community” at all.