Finding a place to call home, and the community to build it with

For the last few years I’ve been doing a lot of listening.

Podcasts while doing the washing up. Articles saved and reread later when the kids are finally in bed.

Brilliant people talking about communities, business, the climate, citizenship, gathering, systems change… all of it. People who seem to understand both the scale of the problems we’re facing and the possibility of doing things differently.

Just like most places, Bedfordshire has an insane amount of change coming its way. 

As a parent, trying to raise kids who feel empowered to create their own future, I finally felt ready to get started. To show them what was possible, and how to start. 

Starting with people we already love

Our little experiment started with another family in our village - the Cooks.

Over the last few years we’ve become one of those families that just sort of… merged. 

Big shared meals, kids running around outside until it gets dark, movie nights, getting lost in woods and rivers.

At some point in between all that we realised we also share something else: we both care quite a lot about the place we live.

We wanted to build community, a reason to invite friends, neighbours and those curious to spend time together thinking about how Bedfordshire could be better for people and for nature.

And honestly, doing it with people you already love makes it feel… easy.

Not easy in the sense that the problems are simple. They’re not.

But easy in the sense that you’re just spending time together anyway. Now there’s just a bit more intention behind it.

Here’s a few things I am learning as I go with building community, and hopefully it will inspire you too!

Filling the inspiration cup

Part of what pushed me to start was realising just how much inspiration I’d already absorbed over the last few years. From writing and community engagement for a sustainable business academic centre and now a think tank and impact consultancy, I feel so privileged to be able to connect with incredible thinkers and doers. 

I have been so inspired by:

• People like Priya Parker talking about the power of gathering.

• John Elkington pioneering more purposeful business.

• Matt Golding highlighting community power across the UK.

• Mary Portas reminding us that business can actually be beautiful (and that working like a woman might just save us all).

• Immy Kaur building something extraordinary in Birmingham.

• Kate Raworth giving us Doughnut Economics - a model so simple and so radical at the same time.

And then there are storytellers like Baratunde Thurston and Jon Alexander who remind us that citizenship isn’t a spectator sport.

After a while my inspiration cup was basically overflowing. At some point you have to stop consuming and do something with the energy.

I’m now learning from movements like Act, Build, Change and We’re Right Here to help equip myself with more knowledge and skills. 

One small step is still a step

One thing I’ve had to learn is to be a bit kinder with myself about scale.

I’m a chronic optimist. I almost always think I can do more than is realistically possible in a week that already contains work, children, laundry and the general chaos of life.

For a while that optimism meant I was permanently on the edge of doing something bigger… someday.

What I’ve learned instead is that small actions done consistently - with other people – have a surprising amount of power.

You don’t have to fix the whole system. You can just start by gathering a few people in a room.

So that’s what we did!

Here is a picture of our first gathering - it felt scary putting ourselves out there so we decided to start with a Friends and Family gathering. It was fun, inspiring and full of hope!

It’s good for you, too

There’s also something else I didn’t quite expect.

Taking even a small step like this changes how you feel.

A lot of us carry around a low-level anxiety about the world right now. Climate, politics, inequality, the sense that things are slightly… off.

When you start doing something - even something small - that nervous energy has somewhere to go.

So, what’s next?

We are building Future Bedfordshire Collective at a pace that fits with our lives so it is sustainable and life-giving to us and our families. We are working out what will be the most impactful way to establish a movement that empowers residents to create a bold vision for our future together- and how to get decision makers to work with us on developing our home.

If you live in Bedfordshire - you’re invited to join us.

If you’re feeling a bit disconnected from your community and you feel ready to, you’re invited. Drop us a message if you want a conversation before joining us, or sign up to our mailing list to follow us online!

If what you’ve read is enough and you’re ready to build this collective with us, join our next Planning Party where we will be talking about how to move forward, and plan our first campaign.

If you’re deeply embedded in community work already and you want Bedfordshire to thrive as one county, you’re invited. We want to be united for the amazing existing work in Bedfordshire, and believe we have a better chance for impact together. Have a chat with us to work out how we can work together. 

And if you’re not entirely sure what any of this means but your curiosity has been slightly activated, you’re invited too.