By Laura Henderson / Executive director, Growing Places Indy
For more than 15 years, Growing Places Indy has been committed to cultivating individual, family, and community well-being through urban agriculture, access to fresh local food, and mind-body education. At the heart of this mission is the belief that humans aspire to do more than survive – we want to thrive. Perhaps thriving is the very purpose of life. Well-being, equity and belonging are inseparable in the pursuit of this goal. In this worldview, well-being is a right – and rights belong to everyone.
There are many models for understanding the dimensions of well-being. We generally consider the following ten dimensions: physical, mental/emotional, social, occupational, intellectual, environmental, financial, spiritual, cultural, and community.
I am certainly not the first to point out that if rights are not for everyone, then they are not rights, but privileges granted only to some and thus denied or restricted from others. And yet it seems this is an increasingly difficult understanding of rights. If rights are treated as privileges, then they aren’t guaranteed to anyone. In a society in which the well-being of some groups is threatened, denied or neglected, the entire society becomes less resilient, more divided and isolated, and less capable of nurturing the self-actualization of individuals and communities – including those currently in a privileged group. If you don’t yet see your well-being as dependent upon the right of immigrants, refugees, transpeople, people of color, women, people with disabilities, people experiencing homelessness – then you likely don’t know what you’ve already lost and just how big the losses are that lie ahead and how they will affect you too. In this scenario, no one wins. The outcomes will be worse for everyone.
I have had a perhaps unique opportunity to witness how people’s understanding of well-being, equity, and belonging expands when viewed through the lens of history – and experienced through community-based land stewardship.
The story of the United States is a story of land and people’s relationship to land in the United States. Time and again, I’ve heard people – across all ages and racial identities – express that the more they explore the history of the United States through the land, people’s relationship to the land, and how control of land and people intertwined to shape social hierarchy, the more aware they are of how much we all have lost through divide, conquer and control.
Likewise, through the practice of community-based land stewardship, people express experiencing what we have to gain from choosing to prioritize well-being for everyone. The benefits of a society committed to well-being, equity, and belonging for all are limitless. There is no ceiling to well-being or thriving – except the limits we impose on ourselves. We must choose to be, in the words of Wicked’s Elphaba – “unlimited.”
We are interested in hearing from our neighbors. In what ways are you working to ensure unlimited well-being and thriving? What actions of resistance are you imagining or participating in that engage creativity and connection to uphold well-being, equity, and belonging? What relationships are helping to weave a tapestry of collective well-being? What world-building efforts are you part of – or aspire to be part of? How can we inspire and connect with each other in solidarity? Reach out, connect, and share at info@growingplacesindy.org.
