Intention

Whenever I attempt to describe my commitments as a JV, to things like simple living, spirituality, social justice and community, most of my Berkeley neighbors nod their dreads and reply, “ Oh, so like a commune?”  And as a child born in the eighties, I must confess that I have no idea whether JVC truly resembles a hippie commune or anything else people might randomly associate with my newly adopted lifestyle.  And while I find the four iconographic tenets of JVC to be helpful signposts for the journey, they do not fully capture the spirit that seems to animate our experiences thus far.  In just our first few months of living together, I cannot tell you the number of times my casamates and I have asked each other, in total bewilderment,

 “Ohhh, so that’s what you mean be simple living?  That was not my understanding of it.”

“You want to fast for what?  And what good does that accomplish?  How is any difference affected or justice accomplished by your fasting from food, or T.V. or the internet?”

At which point someone else will put down her fork that she’s been raking the last of her rice with and quietly reply,

“How do you know what kind of interior effect it will produce until you try it?”

These four, supposedly stable tenets of JVC are not as clear as you might think.  Though we have arrived in response to a certain soul summons, we have all managed to translate the meaning of that call into different practices. So what then characterizes our community life, apart from the desire to live authentically and peacefully together?  What can we say this experiment in post-collegiate home-making is all about?

Whatever insight I’ve gleaned so far has happened while traveling together.  Traveling not just metaphorically, but literally in a clunky old truck down a highway that parts a long stretch of camel-colored fields.   The windows are rolled down and the breeze is tossing our hair wildly as my casamate, Kelly, and I share a great conversation about our personal habits of consumption.  We are asking each other questions like, How much do we really need to survive?  Does our reliance upon excess have an impact on those who live in absolute scarcity?  Or, more immediately, how does it affect our character, what we depend upon for satisfaction or completion? 

And in between these words, I find myself absolutely mesmerized by the quality of my life, shooting up what one of my friends has dubbed “little arrow prayers of gratitude.”  These offshoots of the heart keep firing throughout my conversation with Kelly because it is here, in this car, on this common journey, that I am able to sense the energy of intention, swelling around our words.  You see, beneath these ongoing conversations, is a subtle momentum that drives all of us to live with greater consciousness.  We strive to be conscious of our spending practices - not just on groceries and heating - but how much compassion we spend on the people we serve, how conscious can we afford to be of their anguish, how much love can we bear for those who appear too calloused to receive it?

 It matters so very much that we are placing our intention upon concerns such as these and while a tidy definition of JVC evades me, I must still confess that something powerful is astir here in our community and in many like ours.  It is a kind of energy that ignites important conversations.  Not just weighty, philosophical musings on the meaning of life - but thoughts that determine what we shall eat, where we will shop, from whom we shall learn and how we will dream.

  There is an unnamed desire throbbing within all of us to create something beautiful with our lives.  Yes, we are a community that has chosen to let ourselves be challenged and formed by JVC’s four tenets. But I suspect that beneath these principles of simple living, community, spirituality and social justice, runs the electric charge of our intention.

Maggi Van Dorn, Oct 08