Happy Community Project Blog
A collection of thoughts and reflections on how community leaders, advocates and volunteers can make the world a better place.
Recognition & Partners
We have proven the effectiveness of the Happy Community Project Tool Kit. Our success has been recognized internationally by several universities and organizations. Our partners are critical to our success.
The Happy Community Project is made of many collaborations
Ideas, Musings and DetailsThe Happy Community Project continues to gain momentum
New communities are starting up, third party organizations are taking an interest in us, and most importantly, real projects are getting launched – projects that bring people together as a community.
The foundational idea is that communities that are highly socially connected across diversity enjoy a greater sense of belonging, meaning, sufficiency, security and fairness – the fundamentals for a contented life. I recently had a meeting with Anne who captured our goals beautifully. “I used to be able to walk our streets and meet people I knew – it used to be a social event. Now people don’t walk, they drive up to the store they want, and if they do walk, they have their head down and you don’t get a chance to make those connections. I want people to remember how important those accidental connections are to their wellbeing. We used to know and now we have forgotten.”
Sackville
… Read the restThe Happy Community Gets Stronger
UncategorizedIt’s thrilling to be part of making the world a happier place. There is so much happening, so much energy and so much interest.
97.5FM Community Radio has offered us a ½ hour weekly show.
On the Happy Community show, we can put life to the principles that make communities happy and talk about the real-world experiences of communities that are embracing their own Happy Community Project. We will be broadcasting to 400 thousand listeners around the world. Be sure to stay tuned in.
The Sackville Community Project is moving into high gear.
· They decided to build a network that connects every citizen in Sackville to the Happy Community Project.
· They partnered a shared objective with the Sackville Community Food Garden to piloy the Happy Community Project way of doing things to strengthen … Read the rest
What the Core Group Does
Ideas, Musings and DetailsWhat the Core Group Does
Social Connections Are the Answer
Ideas, Musings and DetailsRese
arch shows that the more socially connected we are, the happier we are. Charles Montgomery, the author of The Happy City, demonstrates in his Tedx talk that trust goes up when social connection is high.
Our Happy Community Project is designed to build a sustainable way of creating greater happiness through stronger social connections. It is designed so that ordinary citizens can participate in the happiness of their community.
Find out more in the details of the Happy Community Project.… Read the rest
Social Physics in Action
Blog, Ideas, Musings and DetailsSocial Physics Principles
From the ideas of the MIT Media Lab
The Pillars of Success
The village decides the outcome. The village attracts the members with a connected intention to make the kind of change they know is important.
Trust is built in an environment of diversity through strong social connections and equal speak time and forms the foundations necessary to recruit new members, explore ideas and come to consensus on taking action.
Everyone connected to everyone else within a neighborhood provides the flow of ideas necessary for arriving at practical, creative solutions for obtaining results.
Social incentives are designed to support productive behavior of idea generation, membership growth, and measurable results. Incentives work best when the community benefits more than the individual.
Exploration both inside and outside provides the new ideas for creativity and productivity.
Measurable results provide the reality for transparency and feedback for the village. For example it could be tons of food locally produced … Read the rest
FAQs- The Happy Community Project
Blog, Ideas, Musings and DetailsWhat is the Happy Community Project?
Based on research and experience, we have developed process that increases a community’s wellbeing and resiliency. The Happy Community Project provides communities that want to increase their happiness and resiliency with a simple process that brings communities together around common purpose.
Why is the Happy Community Project important?
As we move deeper into the age of disruption, it is the strength and resiliency of our communities that can provide us with the capacity to roll with the punches and come up smiling. The Happy Community Project is designed to increase the capacity of the community for happiness and resiliency.
How does the Happy Community Project work?
We provide a process and the citizens of the community apply the process in whatever way think is best. The process brings out the creativity and energy of a community and focuses it on building the social connections within the community that form the foundation for wellbeing and … Read the rest
The 7 Criteria for a Happy Community Project
Blog, Ideas, Musings and DetailsWhat Makes a Happy Community
The biggest indicator of a happy and resilient community is how strong are the social connections within a community. These are personal connections involving face to face contact. In most communities, you can’t know everyone, but you can know about 100 people really well and recognize several hundred others as being part of the community. When the whole community is connected by at least 2 degrees of separation, the community has the basics of hat it needs for happiness and resiliency.
What are the Happy Community Criteria
In the Happy Community project we create projects that are designed to both benefit the community and build strong social connections.
To accomplish this, the project needs to meet 7 criteria. When all 7 criteria can be checked off, the community has a happy making social connecting project
Project Check List – 7 Criteria
Do a large number of citizens feel strongly about this?
Does this project … Read the rest
What Makes a Happy Community?
Blog, Ideas, Musings and DetailsWhy is Reshaping Our World Important?
Blog, Ideas, Musings and DetailsFor almost 3 years now, I have been working to bring people together to reshape our world. It started with the idea that my granddaughter’s future is at risk when she is in the prime of her life 30 or 40 years from now. I wanted to do something that makes a difference to that outcome.
We have had three conferences and countless meetings trying to figure out how to bring focus to this idea.
What I have concluded from these three years of efforts is that most people agree with me – our world is heading for trouble. I have also learned that most people want to do something about it; most people just don’t know what else we can do besides trying to be good neighbors, parents and employees. We want to make a meaningful difference; we just don’t know what it is or we don’t have the support we need to make the difference.
That is why … Read the rest