Hesperian Health Guides
Chapter 1: Building community builds mental health
Connecting with others also leads to more people helping each other out in small ways as well as joining together to fix bigger problems. Starting out can be as simple as gathering to clean up the school yard or creating an event for neighbors to meet. Building community can also include ongoing efforts to end violence, fight discrimination, prevent hunger, and stop evictions. Large or small, any improvement in housing, jobs, schools, and the conditions to lead a dignified life allow people to worry less, and suffer fewer hardships.
Community organizing is mental health work
People may not think of organizing or participating in community activities as mental health promotion work. Yet all these efforts clearly support community mental healthâthey help people get to know their neighbors better, develop their abilities to change things for the better alongside others, and make the community a more enjoyable, fair, and safe place.
There are many ways to support and grow a stronger community, including:
- Find spaces in urban areas to create parks where children can play, adults and teens can relax and socialize, and groups can gather for tai chi or dancing, or to grow food in community gardens.
- Celebrate culture by holding events with food, music, dance, different types of art and artists, presentations and films, and spiritual practices or rituals
- Invite and support young people to participate in music, the arts, and sports, and to have time outdoors and in nature.
- Reclaim and celebrate community history by marking or restoring sites with historical meaning, and involving elders to pass that history on to youth. Removing or replacing monuments symbolizing harmful or incomplete ways of telling history is sometimes a first step.
Back to the garden: Domestic workers care for each other
Joining together for mutual support is incredibly powerful. This is especially true for domestic workers because itâs not easy to find one another. Domestic workers are nannies, housekeepers, and caregivers each working for one or two employers. Domestic workers are not properly appreciated despite so many in US society depending so much on them. The stressful work, low wages, and long hours make other parts of life difficult too. Domestic Workers United (DWU) in New York City was founded to push back against the invisibility and isolation of domestic work, and to help workers know their rights.
DWU members discuss shared challenges and organize to improve working conditions. They show how creating community heals and brings hope, directly improving everyoneâs mental health and showing the pride and beauty of Caribbean, Latinx, and African cultures.
DWU activities help domestic workers gain power and respect, but the shared sense of community is what helps people get through each day. Members connect over text and meet Saturdays at a local community garden under a giant willow tree to lift up, encourage, and support each other. When someone is facing a tough time, a member tells them: âCome back to the garden.â
âCommunity is each of us and our families. It is our cultural networks, neighborhood networks, and ties to our home countries.â
âCommunity is food: gathering where itâs grown, handing out bags of fresh produce, and sharing herbs that heal and foods we prepare with flavors from the islands.â
âCommunity is finding the artist within us, sharing stories, dancing, and joining public theater and writersâ workshops. All ways of telling our truth to power.â
âWe are building a movement. Together, change is possible and feels good!â