Collaboration

On the occasion of The Prem Rawat Foundation's 20th Anniversary, our creative writer Sean Morrissey writes about 'Collaboration', a theme we feel is central to the values and practices that inform the Foundation's work.

​“We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community.” These inspired words from Catholic social activist Dorothy Day are as resonant today as they were in 1952, when her storied autobiography was first published. 

We have all now experienced the long loneliness of isolation and uncertainty, and we have felt the instinctive pull back into the open arms of our global community. It’s at this intersection of community and collaboration, of partnership and possibility, that real lasting change is made. 

Because the high hurdles posed by climate change, regional conflict, and inequality are the end-results of a different kind of collaboration; a network of decisions and enforcement have brought us here, and it will take an equally concerted effort to see ourselves through to a more just, peaceful world. 

The Vietnamese Buddhist Thich Nhat Hanh has written extensively about the importance of community in helping to meet the demands of our day: 

"We talk about social service, service to the people, service to humanity, service to others who are far away, helping to bring peace in the world - but often we forget that it is the very people around us that we must live for first of all. 

If you cannot serve your wife or husband or child or parents - how are you going to serve society? If you cannot make your own child happy, how do you expect to be able to make anyone else happy? 
​
If all our friends in the peace movement or of service communities of any kind do not love and help each other, whom can we love and help?"

This passage provides an instructive primer in our ongoing effort to build a more collaborative community. By scaling the immediate needs of service down to our closest relations - be it spouse, our parents or children - Hanh has presented an effective, attainable place to begin the work. 

The same collaborative effort and energy that builds a stronger family unit can also be put to the wider community. Family can often present a safer space to fumble as we develop better listening and team skills, before extending to the wider community. 

The global challenges we face today are indeed massive, but they also present new exciting opportunities for cooperative action. Now is the time to nurture new relationships and learn from the unique skills and experience of our peers.