What if we didn't buy what they sold us?

What if we didn't conform to their ideas?

What if we lived our own way, lived our own lives, on our own terms?

What if instead of living apart, we all lived together?  It seems weird maybe, but all change is difficult at first.  Just think about it for a minute.

We are divided in so many ways.

We are segregated by age in schools, which as we all know starts at a very young age.  This multiplies through out each successive year, so by the time kids are in high school someone who is 30 seems incredibly old.  But the truth is, 30 is not old at all.  If children were to actually put in some time and hang out with 30 year olds on a regular basis then suddenly we would not seem so old.  This effect gets even worse when considering people who are fifty plus.

Think of the loss of social experience by not being socially involved with older and younger people on a regular basis.  Think about it added up over an entire lifetime. 

It is not that there is something wrong with hanging out with people much older or much younger, it is that it's foreign to us culturally because of the way we were raised.

Even before we started school we are divided socially by living individually with our own families, even within our own families.  Is it not obvious that it is much more difficult to raise children with two adults than with four or six?  All expenses would be cheaper, all time requirements at home would be lessened, all aspects of life would be better actually.  From birth we have been taught that we should grow up and go live on our own, support our own, provide for our own.  We never questioned this as children so the belief takes root and then dominates the rest of our lives. 

I think now is the time to question this.

How much better off would we be if we were helping one other, living with one another, living a more communal life.  I am not talking about some hippie resort, or commune, but just a more supportive way of life.

Sharing the burdens of life greatly increases the joy of life.

Always knowing your children are in good hands while you live your life.

It would create a completely different way of life.

What if we lived together instead of segregated?

What if children prefer to have more than just one or two adults around.  What if children prefer to have their grandparents around while their parents are at work.

What if all the reasons we have for not wanting a community life are only there because we grew up segregated.  We didn't even realize it, nor did our parents, nor our grandparents either, none of them gave it any thought.  Like us they just did what was done before them.  It has carried over from the days when the Church determined how people should live.  It has spilled right over into modern American culture.  It determined this aspect of our culture.

We are divided.

There are more divisions, but these are the two that keep us from living together socially as families.  We evolved to be social more than anything else, so it makes sense that we would be happier in a situation which provides much more social interaction.  Living in a place with more people of varying ages.

Yes, thinking differently about something that has only ever been one way your whole life is going to seem weird, it is going to seem impossible.  Nothing is impossible though.  There is a way we could come together.  Live the good life. 

What if instead of living in four separate houses we lived in one big one?  What if this didn't really change our lives much in terms of losing freedoms, what if it gave us more freedom?