This shouldn’t need to be said, but considering how long the human race has been saying things, repetition is popular and maybe even profitable. There’s value in community. Dull. Yes, we know that. Tell us something we don’t. Yes. No. The things we need to repeat change because our world and society changes. Particularly now, in the turmoil of 2025, the value of community is rising.

A hundred years ago, the messages to repeat were still mostly about crops, livestock, and surviving the winter. It was about the time that messages shifted to emphasizing factories, education, and, in many cases, migration. Community was implicit because entertainment and news were local and communal.

Globalization means local includes the entire planet. News comes from everywhere. The number of people involved is limited to billions instead of hundreds. News is unlimited and surpasses a human’s ability to absorb it. The Saturday night dance and Sunday services are no longer the limits to the world, a weekly distraction from the other days which were filled with everyday chores.

“Hey. This blog is about personal finance. Why’s he going on about this?”

Friends and news have always been valuable, but we’re still adjusting to this new era when the old definitions are gone and replaced with people and sources that don’t necessarily (there’s that word again) apply to our lives. It has become easy to feel for, care for, and maybe even help someone on a different continent who is in the midst of an otherwise unimaginable trauma. Our compassion can be overwhelmed. 

Overwhelm has become the norm. Just ask the stock market, or at least take a glance at it. Great economic forces continue to influence it as ever, but now it swings on tweets. Conventional wisdom is great for the long-term, smoothing over daily interruptions, but convention is also being challenged and changed.

Concentrating on what matters to you can sound self-centered, but with shifting politics, social awareness, and the continually changing technological realm, it has become easy to become disconnected from the trends – or, more importantly, for the trends to become disconnected from you. Feeling left out and overlooked? That may be what we have in common, in a variety of ways.

I had a conversation earlier in the week (over tea, of course) which brought this to mind. It was with a person who is courageously challenging their lifestyle. Instead of talking about it, they’re doing something about it. Instead of guessing at an answer, they’re exploring and researching possibilities – and are willing to travel to do so. 

This is a person who watches trends, dives into personal values rather than blindly accepting what some gatekeeper (or advertiser) tells them to think, and is articulate about the lot.

Over a few hours of conversation, we sifted through the similarities in our situations, their uniqueness, and the fact that we’re not alone. I’ve had other such conversations, and am glad to have friends who can play with such issues. (Listen to IntriguingCreativity.com for a monthly podcast with Steve Smolinksy for one example.) Very few of the people I know who watch and follow trends agree on where this world is going. Confused or contracting trendwatchers may be a clue that there’s less agreement than usual about what comes next.

One person sold everything in the market and is hunkering down to build a local resiliency.
One person is traveling the world in spurts to find better solutions and cultures. 
More than one person is struggling with the consequences of long Covid and realizing they can’t rely on central authorities for answers. 

In every case, they’re relying on community to learn about possibilities, and to share what they know.

In every case, their conversations have shifted to rarely including talking about stocks, and are more likely to be considering cash so they can concentrate on more immediate changes. None have agreed on the validity or security of US currency. They all have opinions and have taken actions, but they are all different, logical, and valid.

(And the one stock they’re all familiar with is MVIS. Go figure. Really. Go and figure out that one.)

Community has been the key. Community has been the most valuable resource. Politicians and news outlets are dealing with the macro issues. There’s wailing and lamenting and protesting. But the most practical benefits have been from talking to others. Yes, the news is important. Yes, the news affects us. Yes, politics has become more influential than ever. But the things that seem to have the greatest improvements in their lives have been finding or building new communities that address their needs. Regardless of the turmoil, or maybe because of it, community has become more valuable than stock swings.

I am an eventual optimist. (As my near-term internal pessimist coughs to get its vote in.) We will find a way through. We’ll probably find many ways through. Humans and human society have developed into a civilization because that is what we do, intentional or not. In the meantime, as the world has its cathartic episode, I see value in each other, not to be us versus them, but to redefine who us is. We may find that the various communities blend and reinforce each other based on current realities and not old anachronistic ideologies.