Al – Amalgamated Amalgamations

5 to 20 Minutes a Month – Organize Hikes: Walking and Talking

Why?

It’s a great way to build community. In addition, it has significant health benefits to everyone that joins in:

The smart move is to combine them all.

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Introduction – What’s Here and Why

Why does this website exist?

I’ve always been interested in things that strengthen the community. That ranges from political organizing in my 20s (aimed at providing stable housing and keeping neighborhoods working as a communities) on to ongoing efforts to get folks together for potlucks, hikes, dance parties, family reunions and the like.

Recently I noticed that a variety of political and social commentators have names a strong network of friends as a key antidote to political craziness, social media manipulation, and even some negative health effects.

I agree and have argued the same. I’ve thought I’ve trying to add what I’ve learned to the pot.

What finally tipped this this website from concept to reality?

A Paucity of Words

What’s wrong with this picture?

This diagram above is from a course on user interaction design. The teaching:

Motivation is tied to emotion. (Agreed.)
It’s important to understand that when designing user experience. (Agreed.)
And here are all the relevant emotions in one useful diagram! (Agreed…until I started thinking about it.)

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Build Bridges – Resource Links

Random list of possible resources for bridging political divides

Empathy
- Powerful internal training video from Cleveland Clinic
- All That We Share
Persuasion:
- How We Can Reduce Prejudice with a Conversation
- Our Culture of Contempt: The problem in America today is not incivility or intolerance. It’s something far worse.
  - “What we need is not to disagree less, but to disagree better. And that starts when you turn away the rhetorical dope peddlers — the powerful people on your own side who are profiting from the culture of contempt. “
- talking to people ftf is the best way to convince – find link
- Conservatives’ Love Of Nostalgia Can Be Used To Promote Liberal Values
  - That’s a fairly irritating way to put it. Perhaps there are only ‘values’ which are not dissimilar across the spectrum.
  - From the article:
    “A large portion of the political disagreement between conservatives and liberals appears to be disagreement over style, and not content,” they write in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Dialog:
- Reddit – Change My View
People who changed their life (love beats hate):

The Chart – Keeping the Peace in Group Households

(Relatively) Easy Group Living: The Chart vs Keeping Count

I’ve lived with groups of people my entire life. Currently (at age 65) my wife and I live in a house with another couple and the last of the three ‘kids’, our son, Griffin, in his early 20s. We bought the house together some 25 years ago. This is not two flats. It’s one house with one kitchen, 2 master bed rooms and 3 other bedrooms plus living room, dining room, family room, and library.

Living with groups of people can create some conflict…most often around household chores. Thirty five years ago we figured out The Chart. It was a break-through!

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Why potlucks?

Simplest: Anarchist Potluck

What’s wrong with this picture?

(Relatively) Easy Group Living: The Chart vs Keeping Count