Community is a word that can mean different things to different people. It can be neighbors and the friendly smiles they give as they pass when they’re walking the dog. It can be the church group you attend every Wednesday night, where you laugh and learn together. It can be as simple as family, or as elaborate as the 17-person friend group you became a part of in college. The funny thing is that the true definition of community comes down to fellowship. Now, we could break the definition of fellowship down just as we have with community, but simply put, togetherness is the root.  

I grew up in the same small town in New Jersey my whole life, and my community was set from a young age, but at the time, I didn’t see it as community. Kids look through a lens of friendship, teammates in a sport, or study buddies. Whatever it was to me at the time, I had it; family parties, and birthday celebrations, someone to just hang out with at the pool. When I left for college, I was separated from that community. As exciting as that time in life is, for an introvert, it was a challenge that struck hard. The saying, “you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone” kept ringing in my head for about 5 months during the transition. I couldn’t even figure out what it was that was ‘gone,’  It wasn’t a single person, or event, more so it was fellowship, the sense of being known and supported. I realized it was community that I had, and community that I longed for.  

If I learned absolutely nothing else from the 4 years of classes in college, I learned that sometimes it takes a while to build up a new community, but it’s worth every uncomfortable conversation, and outstretched hand. My college, Liberty University, had a state-of-the art rock climbing gym. Trying to get involved and push myself, I walked the 2 miles from my dorm to the gym to try out the new sport. Little did I know, that one event led to me find community. All sitting on a mat under chalk-filled rock holds, a handful of people came up to me and encouraged me to climb. This became my routine. We all had a common interest in being active and loving the outdoors,  trying new things and pushing each other to reach goals. My community was built from pushing outside my fears.  

I know you aren’t reading this to find out my whole life story; although I could go on forever about the incredible people I’ve met in my life. It’s a fact of life for many people to go through a relocation in their life. Whether it be for work, family, or the desire for change. Moving causes an inevitable separation of one community, to create another. While there are many ways today to find community IRL (in real life) as the kids say these days, community can stem from online sources.  

Although social media can get a bad reputation sometimes, there can be so many positive outcomes through Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, especially for small businesses. The amount of exposure that came come from social media alone, is reason to invest in that avenue of community. Think about your already solid community of people in your current town. Say you were starting a business, and had an ad, or post created to gain attention. If each person in your community of friends posted one ad, and they each had between 400+ following them, the ad could reach thousands of people. Social media is a form of community that allows connections to be global. Support can happen in more ways than just a pat on the back or a list of encouraging words. There are a multitude of people in the world that have the same interests as you, and it’s as easy as typing in a buzz word to find those people to connect with. Although inauthentic to some, it truly is an amazing tool to spread word of a new product, service, or business and create beautiful content that will appeal to hundreds.  

Community is not a physical thing that we can hold in our hands to say we ‘have.’ It’s having people to confide in, and a comfort through support and love. It’s a way of networking for a business or keeping sane in a rough time. No community is too big or too small, so join that small group at church, follow a few new people on Instagram, and push yourself outside your comfort zone, trust me, it’ll be worth it!