Designing Communities
This year has provided us the opportunity to reflect on what it means to be human:
To me being human is about nurturing relationships. Building relationships is about creating a common ground for coexistence. Creating a common ground is about finding a common purpose. Finding a common purpose is about building a community.
Designing communities will be a new frontier for designers in the post lockdown future. The isolation and suffering of the past year have forced us to reflect and reimagine how we want to live. The process of reflection has brought into our awareness of the artificial boundaries we created between work life and personal life. We are beginning to understand the importance of self-improvement through greater alignment with our inner sensitivities, capacities, and potential as much as through refinement in our professional skills. We are discovering that the pursuit of happiness is not just about one’s own progress and prosperity but also about caring for the well-being of the family and the community.
This awakening is bound to create opportunities to envision a future society driven by caring, connectedness, and reciprocity. We will co-design new interactions and rituals for meaning-making.
An important learning for me during the pandemic is- creativity helps overcome negativity. The book of poems I wrote during this time triggered creative projects. From this experience, I realized that the real opportunity for designers is to provoke, and empower the imagination of everyday people so they can collaborate and co-create artifacts and experiences that bring them a shared purpose. A group of people engaged in creative collaboration is more likely to create joyful memories. Joyful memories are more likely to encourage them to have more curiosity and confidence in their innate capacity to contribute to the well being of their community. A community of curious, compassionate, and creative individuals will emerge stronger in supporting each other and in finding solutions to problems during times of crisis.
