The importance of gatherings | Tom Shaw and Rain Trozzi (re-posted)
Magic happens when people come together. Gatherings are central to community building and collaboration. [September 29, 2023]
As Over to the Youth (OTTY) prepares for a big relaunch, I felt like sharing this podcast between myself and my best friend Tom Shaw from September. I´ve had the pleasure of knowing and working with Tom for nearly two years because of OTTY, and find his outlook on life (which he often expresses through his creative poetry) very enlightening and inspiring.
Tom is kindly giving away three free one month access tickets to his premium member portal. If you would like to claim one of these gifts, leave a comment and I will assign one to your email!
Description
Join Tom and I as we discuss the importance of gatherings, how we´ve implemented them into our organization, the intricacies we have discovered over the last year and a half of experimentation, and how our own gatherings have affected our lives and those of our community members. We go on to explore how to use technology to connect with others around the world, and the fine line between useful and wasteful applications of such technology on the individual and collective level.
I hope you and enjoy this discussion. To be notified of OTTY news, consider subscribing:
 | A guest post by
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Gathering = Ecclesia in Ancient Greek. Where we get ecclesiastical - our word church from. Not a building or mammals organisation but a group or gathering of people. Jesus said “when two or three are gathered together in my name I will hear your requests (prayers.) Not two or more but two or three. That way you don’t need a leader (priest) or money or organisation etc. Small is beautiful as E F Schumacher said.
Rain & Tom,
I just listened to your podcast with my morning coffee and I want to say how very grateful I am for what you have created. As an older person (old enough to be your mum!) I am so impressed by the term "using digital space as a physical reality," and how we are "serving" this space. It's been difficult to age into this, rather than to be born into it. I have shunned all the zooming and isolation out of refusing to accept this as my sole demise from "being with people." It made me walk more and work on tangible gatherings, however, I absolutely adore this digital space of Substack and have really embraced your term, as the community feels so tangible. Everyone working for the good of each other. I pray it's not swallowed up like other apps.
Don't stop! Everyone should hear this as it truly lends a hope to those who feel hopeless with the digital youth. Thank you 🙏🏻✨