MUSINGS ON COMMUNITY LIVING

desire, echo chambers, the other as mirror, filling the well, and being a gracious guest

carmel valley as living laboratory.


A few weeks ago, I attended a life-aligned research collaboration. For 5 days, we lived together, cooked and ate together, laughed and cried together, brainstormed and problem solved together, and generally approached life as a series of adventures.

Every time I am in an intentional community project or setting, I try to gather the gems of remembrance from the experiment. Many of you know that I have extensive experience in intentional communities - from growing up in one, to creating and running three communities in very different settings, to educating and training others on how to create and (the hardest part) sustain communities - and thinking and writing about collaborative living is near and dear to my heart.

Every co-living experience is different, but here are some things I learned/remembered from this most recent living laboratory:

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1. Being a guest is a privilege. Use it wisely.

If you are invited to join a community as a guest, you have been offered a tender gift. A community that you are not a part of has decided they will trust you enough to open its doors and invite you in. I do not take this lightly - I know the disruption and rupture that bringing in people can cause - and I hold the role of guest with reverence and care.

This means that I try my best to avoid: complaining, attention-seeking, drama, pessimism, righteousness, judgmental impulses, us vs them mentality, defensiveness, and entitlement.

This also means I do my best to practice: gratitude, graciousness, humility, curiosity, patience, compassion, presence, hopefulness, participation, and going with the flow.

Of course, I don’t do this right all the time. But I am deeply aware of the impact of guest in both the literal and the archetypal sense. My interest and support of something in the group has a different flavor than the interest and support of the group itself. Conversely, I have seen how the judgment or close-mindedness of a guest can have a detrimental impact on the group’s energy and aliveness.

The archetype of guest is one of holding a mirror. As guests, we bring reflections that the group is too close to see. We share an outside perspective that can challenge and encourage the group to transform. In order for the guest to occupy their role, the group courageously extends an invitation for this alchemical work to occur. To invite a guest into community is for the group to show its soft underbelly. It is a deep value of mine to handle that with care.

2. The echo chamber robs us of our aliveness.

The community I was most recently was not similar to the circles and cultures that I usually spend time in. More metal, wood and air. Less water and earth. This means that I was not with people who shared my languages and cultures. Although there were overlaps, we live in different worlds. What one might call a “problem” to solve, the other might call an “inquiry” to open to. What might be seen as “woo woo” to one, might be considered “common sense” to the other. Topics and themes of connection might be approached very differently - for example, the discourse from a mathematician talking about chaos will be sewn from a different cloth than my perspective of chaos as a Depth Psychologist.

We typically spend a lot of time around people who are similar to us. It is a normal and natural part of the evolutionary biological imperative of humans, and for the most part, it helps us feel seen and safe. The problem is, we create an echo chamber for ourselves. A bubble through which we see the world and make more assumptions than would prove useful. Forgetting how other people think, doubt, believe, fight, and collaborate is a recipe for stagnation.

Personally, I love being with others that are different than mine. I come from many cultures, languages, places, modalities, etc., so the ability to traverse many realms and landscapes comes easily to me. A combination of being mixed, queer, multilingual (five languages for most of my life), a Mercury in Leo and Jupiter in Aquarius person, a multi-hyphenate - the list goes on. I have lived more lives in my almost 40 years than most, and that helps me jump into unfamiliar waters with curiosity, empathy, and excitement.

If you find yourself surrounded by people who think the same way you do, hold the same beliefs and opinions, carry the same biases and burdens, etc. I highly suggest you venture into less chartered territory. In all of my trainings (deathworker, midwife, herbalist, and astrologer), I always require my students to go to events in communities they aren’t familiar with. In fact, my Scorpio stellium nature invites them to dip their toes into waters they have aversion to. Are you someone who is holier-than-thou over Christians? How about you attend an evangelical grief group! Are you someone who is righteous about Covid either way? How about you attend an event on the “other side”!

These are the experiments that we can engage with so that we don’t lose our aliveness. The echo chamber robs us of feel stimulated, challenged, and uncomfortable. I deeply believe that discomfort is an essential aspect of the human experience of evolution. We have become so terrified of discomfort, that we coddle ourselves so that we never have to feel the very thing which will set us free.

3. You can only give to the group at the level in which you can take care of yourself.

I am an introvert. To most people, it is actually quite a surprise because a) I’m excellent at socializing and b) I love a lot of extroverted activities (Burning Man, anyone?!) People don’t know how much the high sensation of group engagement drains me, but it does. The battery will hit low and I will find myself crashing and needing to recharge.

I used to have a tendency to override this need. A mixture of FOMO, people pleasing, and dopamine hunting in the past would lead me to stay in conversations way longer than I should have, avoid bedtime when I knew I needed to sleep, and allow energy vampires to feast on my delicate flesh (more on energy vampires in the future!)

Flash forward to me as an almost 40-year old woman. I am incredibly discerning with where I place my energy. If there is something happening in a group I don’t have a good feeling about, I don’t spend tons of time trying to figure it out or make it work. Instead, I follow the thread of aliveness and see who and what lights me up and leaves me feeling nourished. I constantly check in with my body and see what she needs - more water, food and sleep perhaps - and ensure that my animal being gets out in nature as much as they can.

At this most recent event, I was very intentional about how I spent my finite resources. I didn’t try to be friends with everyone - rather, I felt into where relationships seemed in the flow and placed loving attention there. I left workshops to make tea, or scream on the top of a hill, or doodle with markers. I went to sleep hours before others did, so that I could be rested and ready for the next day. This tending to my bodies (my emotional, physical, and animal) allowed me to be available for connection and contribution.

It’s a cliche because it’s true: only from an overflowing vessel can we give fully and without expectation.

4. You won’t ever have a need met if you don’t reveal it.

One of the things I loved about this recent event was the encouragement to be clear and direct in your desires. If someone wanted a specific kind of connection or conversation, it was expected that they would clearly and directly share that with the group. If they needed something from someone, or had a topic they wanted support exploring, it would be brought to the community.

This is an exquisite practice. For one, we live in a world where people hide their desires (or even worse, can’t even access the desires themselves), and then expect everyone to read their minds. We see the trope of passive aggressive wives with their dumdum husbands trying to figure out why they’re upset and the resentment of someone who never gets what they want since they don’t ever take the risk of asking for it.

Here’s the thing: sharing a desire can be incredibly vulnerable.

Being in touch with what you want and need can be deeply confronting, triggering, disorienting, and scary. That’s why so many people lock their desires deep in a basement in the hopes that they never see the light of day (and spoiler alert: your exiled desires always find a way out and often unskillfully). To bare your soul in saying “here is something I hope you could give me” with the very real possibility that the other will say no is a tender and tough spot to be in.

In my relationship, I have had to practice asking for certain things, hearing a no, and sitting with the discomfort of what arises from that place. Without intentionally reaching out and navigating the pain that comes from “rejection”, I would still be someone who pretended they had a lot less needs than they do. I am, in fact a needy bitch! I want a lot of affection and connection and I think of all my younger years where I tried so hard to be more “chill” and all I got was an experience of starvation and resentment with a lot of compassion.

I am now someone who is very clear and grounded in their desire. I have no problem making almost any request and being with whatever the outcome will be. This took years and years of my life in order to do this - and the highest level battleground/playground for this work is in relationship. I am grateful to have a practice partner who is 100% honest about what they are willing, able, and wanting to do. I trust his no so that I can trust his yes. And through this work, I can be with the very normal but often resisted experience of asking for what you want and seeing what happens on the other side.

At the workshop, I vocalized that I wanted someone to brush my hair. This was me stating a clear desire in a group of people I didn’t know. And guess what? I got to sit for an hour and have my hair brushed and played with and even braided while having an amazing conversation about mothers and motherhood! I got to receive the nourishment and love that I so often give to others. I got to have a desire met because I took the risk and shared it directly.

Don’t demonize your desires and exile them to the corners of your psyche. They are potent and tender and deserve our exquisite attention.

5. The other is always a mirror.

I can already hear folks saying “ugh, not always Binyamina! Sometimes the person is just an asshole!”

I totally get it. And…

Every single person can be a mirror for our internal landscape. Every relationship is an opportunity for our own awakening. There is no limit as to how deep this work can go and for me, that is a wonderful thing.

So often, we are locked into “othering”. We other people, land, animal - our existence is a constant disconnection from that which is around us - especially if we deem it “bad”. Through our fixation on having things make sense, we categorize people in the blink of an eye. This person is good, cool, etc. and that person is bad, cringy, etc. If we find ourselves with someone who has qualities we dislike or are even disgusted by, we automatically blame them for whatever is happening and push ourselves even further away.

What if we decided to lean in instead? What if when we found ourselves with someone who we didn’t enjoy, we got curious? What if we sat with the person long and deep enough to see what other parts are swimming in their waters? Through the Internal Family Systems perspective, many of the parts we encounter as annoying, rude, defensive, mean, and judgmental are protectors for more tender parts. Parts that may have burdens around belonging, insecurity, fear, loneliness, or shame.

Through this framework, we can have curiosity and compassion for the person in front of us. We can see where their shadow mirrors or reflects a shadow of our own (advanced level practice!), and we can give them a little more grace. Our brains and systems make such severe judgments in mere seconds of meeting someone, and what gets lost is a willingness to be wrong.

In the near future, I will share about how I have transmuted my constellation into one that genuinely LOVES being wrong about people. It has been one of the most transformative processes of my life. But for now, I’ll just invite you to lean in a bit, get curious as to why you might be triggered by the stranger in front of you, and see if there is any gold you can glean from the mirror.


Part two will be forthcoming - I absolutely adore community and living and creating and experimenting in the hive which brings me to a VERY special offering below ❤️

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🌊 CARIBE: THE ARTIST RESIDENCY

CARIBE is an artist residency, a hive of creation, a collective ritual, a living experiment, and an ecological communion.

A small hive of open-hearted artists will gather for a week of creative practice, deep nourishment, and ritual in community. You will be artists-in-residence in one of the most special places on Earth - the Puerto Rican island of Vieques where wild horses roam, the sea sings you to sleep, and the jungle pulses with life.

This artist residency will give you the spaciousness to explore your creative practice, rest deeply, connect with other inspired people, and be held by the ocean. CARIBE is a devotiional portal to the muse and we wilil immerse ourselves in ritual, play, and communion.

A day at CARIBE might look like: Breakfast in silence, community gathering, solo creative practice, lunch on the terrace, ocean time, solo creative practice, dinner outside by candlelight, and community practice such as embodiment journey, ritual, SoulCollage, and other group experiences.

The nest for the artist residency is stunning with jungle surrounding us, a saltwater pool, and many places to engage in your creative practice. All meals will be lovingly prepared and deeply nourishing. Vieques is a place of rich history, biodiversity, and a culture that is vibrant. This experience is off the beaten path for a reason: through returning to the wild, we find the primordial muse.

We gather June 18 - 25 and the hive will be small. All levels of artistic education and experience are welcome - we are looking for creative beings with a willingness and desire to be open to the muse, connect with the land, and dive deeply in community. Find out more and apply below - this project is my heart and joy and I can’t wait for us to step through the portal!

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✨ COSMOS: AN ARCHETYPAL ASTROLOGY TRAINING

Archetypal astrology is the dance between the infinite cosmos and the intimate human experience. It explores the planets and stars as living beings who co-conspire in our awakening. This realm of celestial work weaves together depth psychology, spirituality, mythology, ecology, and creativity to bring forth the primordial wisdom in our bones.

COSMOS is a year-long practitioner training. We will explore the archetypal terrain of the planets, the houses as mythical landscapes, the energetic imprints of the zodiac, understanding the dance of aspects, cosmic mapmaking through astrocartography, and so much more. Archetypal astrology is not a predictive tool or an identity-making machine - rather, it is a mythopoetic invitation to dance with the cosmos and excavate our shadow and brilliance. In this training, you will live out your celestial studies - through in the world assignments and experiential learning. Embodiment journeys, artistic practices, ritual, and ecological communion are just some of the modalities used in this work.

COSMOS also includes a stargazing retreat in the high desert of Joshua Tree, California! In September, we will be cosmic storytellers under a starry night sky, soaking in the hot springs, communing with the wild landscape, singing and dancing myths by the fire, and traveling through time and space with a sound bath at the Integratron, among other magic pieces of the journey. This retreat is usually not included in the training but this year I am feeling especially generous and expansive.

This is the only training I am holding in 2025. COSMOS is unlike anything out there - my 25 years of education and practice in astrology is imbued with my archetypal work as a depth psychologist, my magic as a ritualist, my intimacy with the land, and my creative explorations as an immersive artist. Whether you want to be a full-time astrologer, weave astrology into your work, or use it as a path of awakening in your own life - all are welcome. I won’t be offering this training again until at least 2027 and I am keeping the hive small so that I can provide intimate mentorship.

We will begin at the beginning of the astrological year - the time of Aries calling us forward on March 23. We gather two Saturdays a month with pop-up journeys and experiences. Weekly practices and assignments and field practice with clients is an integral part of the training. Guest teachers will be inspiring and our time together will be deep, rich, and out of this world!

A blessing: may you find yourself filled with awe and wonder and may you lean into curiosity.

Xoxo Binyamina Aisha