Start Where You Live

Start Where You Live, a unique grassroots social media platform, has been launched to address the political, religious, social, and economic divisions and fragmentation in today’s society beginning with each person, each street, and each community. In many ways, this approach is based on the philosophy and practices pioneered by the Sarvodaya Movement.

Its strategy: to change the world by starting with yourself. Start Where You Live offers a host of practical ideas. The site has an organizing tool kit to build a face-to-face, real-world community based on universal principles and virtues.

“With so many studies indicating Americans and others feel disconnected,” says Richard Flyer, “we wanted to build an on-line network whose purpose is to build real-world Conscious Communities.” Flyer is the co-founder of Start Where You Live. According to Flyer, “By bringing people together to talk about common needs, we put a face on the person next door, as well as our neighborhoods and city. We help people reconnect to address their challenges from the grassroots up.”

The Start Where You Live web site is designed so that people around the world can start their own decentralized “Weaver Groups,” which they manage and expand themselves. Neighbors develop leadership skills, organize and grow together in a spirit of true collaboration. The strategy is to create a ripple effect connecting the forces of good already at work within each community.

According to Flyer, “Weavers support existing efforts in 10 building blocks to create strong, resilient communities a process called re-localization, including a strong local economy, local food and energy production, neighbors helping neighbors, cultural and spiritual awareness, and others.”

About Start Where You Live: Weaving
Conscious Community Conscious Community is a movement founded in Reno, Nevada in 2003 whose goal is spiritual, as well as cultural transformation. Focused in each local geographic region, the movement is embodied first in the way people live and radiates outwardly into families, social and work life.

Weaver Groups are a grassroots strategy within this movement where people get back to the basics of their humanity by breaking down the barriers that divide us and connecting heart-to-heart–with one another and with the positive aspects of community.

Recent articles about the Conscious Community approach and its “Get to Know Your Neighbor Day” have been published in PARADE Magazine and Daily Good and Sustainable Times.

Sarvodaya USA is part of a worldwide network of organizations sharing the inspiration and practical wisdom of the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement of Sri Lanka. Start Where You Live is a uniquely American expression of that vision.

To learn more and get involved, see www.startwhereyoulive.com