Finding Community:
How to Join an Ecovillage or Intentional Community

by Diana Leafe Christian (New Society Publishers, 2007) Finding Community presents a comprehensive overview of ecovillages and intentional communities and offers solid advice on how to research thoroughly, visit thoughtfully, evaluate intelligently, and join gracefully. Buy Finding Community at: Community Bookshelf New Society Publishers Amazon.com Barnes and Noble Your local bookstore What People Say  ~   Detailed Contents  ~   Excerpts

Click below for excerpts from Finding Community:

• Introduction • You'll Feel Safer  • What it Costs  • What Works Well in Community 
• Researching Communities • Getting the Most Out of Your Visits • Assumptions and Expectations
• Evaluating Communities  • Entering Community Gracefully

What ecovillage and sustainability activists are saying about Finding Community:

Diana Leafe Christian has done it again! Her first book, Creating a Life Together, has become something of a bible for would-be community founders. Finding Community promises to be just as important. Thoughtful, thorough, and engaging, and enlivened by stories from the trenches of real community life, it’s a must-read for anyone seriously seeking community.

—Liz Walker, cofounder and director, EcoVillage at Ithaca; author, EcoVillage at Ithaca: Pioneering a Sustainable Culture

Open-hearted and hard-headed in equal measure—and with a delicious sense of humor—Diana Leafe Christian takes the reader on a comprehensive tour of the world of ecovillages and intentional communities. This is the volume for those exploring the options and willing to learn from those who have already trodden the path. There could be no better guide on the path of exploring this lifestyle.

—Jonathan Dawson, president, Global Ecovillage Network; author, Ecovillages

When you combine encyclopedic knowledge plus wry humor plus a realistic assessment of what the future holds for all of us, you get the wise advice in Finding Community. In a world after fossil fuels, it can extend the keys to your next car, your next house, and the rest of your life. If there is a silver lining to the clouds on the horizon, it will be found in the redesign of human communities. No one knows this subject better than Diana Leafe Christian. To a troubled world, here is the core of the solution.

—Albert Bates, co-founder, Global Ecovillage Network; director, Ecovillage Training Center at The Farm

Through long experience and sheer social honesty, Diana Leafe Christian offers essential resources for and catalogs the oh-so-many pitfalls as well as delights of visiting and joining a community. Finding Community is like having an explorer’s compass and a roll of charts under your arm as you embark upon unknown waters. All the more important to learn these essentials before you’re out at sea!

—Richard Register, author, Ecocities: Rebuilding Cities in Balance with Nature; founder, International Ecocity Conferences

Finding Community is well organized, well thought-out, and easy to access. The information is of high quality, being based on good research and long experience. The reader will learn from members of a wide range of ecovillages, communes, co-housing developments, and co-ops, discovering the range of options, and getting a sense of what it takes to successfully make the leap from “normal” urban life to intentional community living.

—Richard Heinberg, Peak Oil activist and author, The Party’s Over, Powerdown, The Oil Depletion Protocol

This charming and commonsensical guide to approaching intentional group living should be read by every serious community-seeker. It offers an amazingly knowledgeable perspective, warmly sympathetic but sometimes wryly humorous toward both communities and those who visit and join them.

—Ernest Callenbach, author, Ecotopia

An amazing, comprehensive, collaborative and kaleidoscopic achievement! By showing community seekers practical living examples of cohousing projects, ecovillages, and other intentional communities, Finding Community has the potential to change the suburban way of life and help North America reconcile its ecological footprint.

—Declan Kennedy, Lebensgarten Ecovillage, Germany

This stunning overview of ecovillages and intentional communities is not only a terrific read, but abounds with essential, profoundly important information for anyone seeking more community and a sense of belonging in their lives.

—Joan Medlicott, author, The Ladies of Covington series

Finding Community is full of wisdom and “Convenient Truths” for anyone wanting to join an ecovillage or intentional community, and packed with advice for ecovillages and communities wanting new members, too.

—Max Lindegger, cofounder, Crystal Waters Ecovillage, Queensland, Australia; director, Global Ecovillage Network Asia/Oceania

Heartwarming and fun, Finding Community will help readers make informed choices about joining a community. Diana Leafe Christian knows what people want!

—Hildur Jackson, cofounder, Global Ecovillage Network (GEN)

What Finding Community covers:

Introduction: Ecovillages and Other Intentional Communities

Section One: Communities, An Overview
1. Why Community?

•    You’ll impact the planet with a smaller ecological footprint.
•    You’ll feel safer.
•    You’ll most likely be healthier.
•    You’ll save money.
•    You’ll grow as a person.
•    You’ll experience connection and support with like-minded friends and colleagues.
•    You’ll have more fun.

2. Ten Most Common Fears About Joining a Community

• I don’t want to live out in the boonies.
• I don’t want to live with a bunch of hippies.
• I don’t want to live a “poverty consciousness” lifestyle with limited resources.
• I don’t want to live with countercultural types who are trying to avoid responsibility.
• I don’t want to have to join a religion or take up some spiritual practice I don’t believe in.
• I don’t want to live in a hierarchical system or follow a charismatic leader.
• I don’t want to have to think like everyone else. What if it turns out to be a cult?
• I’m afraid I won’t have enough privacy or autonomy.
• I don’t want to have to share incomes or give all my money to the community.
• What if we all can’t get along? I don’t want to live with a bunch of bad-tempered grumps.

    Other Common Questions about Community Living
                      * Do I have to go nude? * Do I have to go to a lot of meetings?
                      * What if I yearn to live in community but my partner doesn’t?
                      * Are intentional communities mostly middle-class white people? Are people of color welcome?
                               Are there any communities comprised of people of color?
                      * Are gays and lesbians welcome in community?
                      * Can “hermits” — people who need a lot of alone time — live in community?
             • Sidebar: Love Relationships in Community

3.   Community Living Day-to-Day
4.   Ecovillages: For Future Generations
5.   Cohousing Communities
6.   Urban Communities: Group Households and Housing Co-ops
7.   Rural Homesteading Communities, Conference and Retreat Centers
8.   Spiritual Communities
9.   Christian Communities
10. Income-Sharing Communes

Section Two: Researching
11. What Does It Cost?
            • Factors in the Cost to Join
            • “If I have no funds can I still join a community?”
            • Cohousing, Housing Co-ops, Conference Centers, Spiritual Communities, Communes . . .
            • Do Communities Tell You What It Costs?
            • Sample Costs: What It Costs to Join a Community
                      • Chart: Sample Community Costs in the Pacific Northwest

12. What Does It Take to Live in Community?
            • Not for the Faint of Heart
            • What Works Well in Community?
            • Who Does Well in Community?
                      Someone who: * Doesn’t “need” it. * Has a healthy sense of self. * Is open and flexible, and able to hear and consider other points of view. * Has a sense of connection to people, an interest in the well-being of others, and well-defined boundaries. * Is willing to find a balance between community goals and personal goals. * Is willing to speak up. . . . and to listen.* Is willing to learn and practice good communication skills and fair and empowering decision-making skills. * Has a desire to see themselves as they really are. * Is willing to stick with it.
            • Who Does Not Do So Well?
            • Preparing for Community
            • What Do Communities Want from You?
            • What About Young People Just Out of School?

13. The Communities Directory, the Internet, and You — Researching Communities
            • Print and Internet Resources
            • Communities Directories and the Internet
            • Separating the Wheat from the Chaff

14. Your Criteria for Communities to Visit
            • Where to Start
                      • Chart: Values, Location, Finances, Work
            • Community Size
            • Can the Community Choose Its Members?
            • Age of Members and Rate of Member Turnover
            • Independent-Income and Income-Sharing Communities
            • Your Future Community: Ideals, Realities
                      • Sidebar: “High Demand” Groups — Get More Information

Section Three: Visiting
15. “My Marathon Tour of Communities” —Jane Gryhra
16. Planning Your Visits
            • Setting Up Your Own “Marathon Tour” (or Multiple Shorter Visits)
            • What to Pack
            • Bring Work Gloves
            • Don’t Bring Fido

17. “Excerpts from a Community Seeker's Journal” —Sue Stone
18. How to Be a Great Guest (And Make the Most of Your Experience)
            • Community Etiquette: What Hosts Would Like from Visitors
                        * Agreements * Energy-Awareness * Asking Questions * The Kindly Gift of Work
                        * Meetings * Love Relationships with Community Members
            • How to Get What You Want from Your Visit
            • That Elusive “Sense of Community” (Don’t Count on It Yet)
            • “Come Here, Go Away”
            • Did You Hear About the Visitor Who . . . ?
                        * Shows up unannounced; insists on directions, tours, or accommodations.
                        * Treats the community like a tourist attraction or amusement park.
                        * Brings Fido. * Brings Johnny Walker. * Brings a moving van!
            • The “Great Guests” Hall of Fame
19. “Seriously Seeking Community” —Patricia Greene
20. Evaluating Your Visits (And Debunking Some Assumptions and Expectations)

Section Four: Joining
          • Signs of Health, Signs of Distress
          • Assumptions and Expectations: What’s Realistic?

• You will feel included in the group right away — experiencing that wonderful “sense of community”.
• The community should be ecologically, spiritually, and/or politically correct.
• The community should be well-established and its physical infrastructure built.
• Communities are frozen in time: what they’re like when you visit is what they’ll always be like.
• What you see is what you get.
• Communities are either healthy and functioning, or not. And if they’re not, that’s their normal state.
• The views of a departing member with grievances against the community gives the visitor an inside scoop.
• If you don’t see many people or community-like activities, the place hasn’t got much going on.
• A project or business run by one or more community members reflects the community’s values.
• Community culture should be like mainstream culture; I’ll be as comfortable there as I am in my own home.

21. Taking a Second Look
            • Values • Mission and Purpose • Overall Friendliness • Lifestyle • Aesthetics
            • Your Children’s Needs • Potential Friends • Housing • Financing

22. Choosing Your Community: The “Insider’s Guide”
            • Who Owns the Land?
            • Is the Community Financially Stable?
            • Do You Get Your Money Back If You Leave?
            • What Are Grounds for Asking People to Leave?
            • What Legal Entity Does the Group Use to Own Property?
            • How Does the Group Make Decisions?
            • Who Has Decision-Making Rights and When Do They Have Them?
            • The Membership Process: Organized or Laissez Faire? “Narrow Door” or “Ya’ll Come?”
            • Could You Make a Living, Really?
            • What Else Should You Consider?
                      * Should you ask for references? * Could you live with the community’s idiosyncrasies,
                      inconsistencies, and foibles? * Should you compromise? * Should you “go out on
                      more dates”?
            • If No Community Appeals
            • Don’t Marry the First Community that Asks You     
                      • Sidebar: Red Flags and Cold Chills

23. The Membership Process
24. Entering Community Gracefully
            • How to Win Community Friends and Influence People
                 * “You’re joining us; we’re not joining you.”
                 * Energy Etiquette.
                 * Duct Tape and Work Gloves.
                 * “Ask Not What your Community Can Do for You . . .”
                 * The Surprising Power of Humility.
            • “Come Here, Go Away” — Take Two
            • Like a Wolf Entering a Wolf Pack
            • Developmental Stages of the New-Member Process
                      * The Honeymoon. * The Honeymoon’s Over. * Acceptance and Understanding.
            • What If I Don’t Like It?
            • What If They Say “No”?

25. “The longest, most expensive, personal-growth workshop you will ever take.”
            • New-Member Criteria
            • Rights and Responsibilities of Community Membership
            • Application Forms and Interview Questions
            • Membership Processes
            • Membership Agreements

Appendix A: Sample Community Membership Documents

Appendix B: Can Living in Community Make a Difference in an Era of Peak Oil?