Social Health

Every level of the weave influences every other level. It is a moral ecosystem. Far off in the distance, there is a city we cannot see—the just society. But right in front of us, visible with the naked eye every day if you know where to look, there are people weaving, giving their heart and souls to daily acts of care. When you see that, you realiz

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

Some Weaving is in the neighborhood. We don’t talk about it much, but most social capital is informal social capital. It’s not somebody who sets up a non-profit. It’s somebody who invites her neighbors over for dinner. It’s somebody who rents a food truck and then invites everybody on the block to come out and eat. It’s somebody who starts a whiske

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

When things are going well, there’s a process weaving from the bottom to the top. When relationships are forming well, microscopic neural networks weave together in the brain, individual personalities weave together and are made stronger, families weave tight bonds and are made more resilient, neighborhoods become more coherent, towns more vibrant,

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

Most of us get better at living as we go. There comes a moment, which may come early or later in life, when you realize what your life is actually about. You look across your life and review the moments when you felt more fully alive, at most your best self. They were usually moments when you were working with others in service of some ideal. That

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

A good society is like a dense jungle. There are vines and intertwining branches. There are enmeshed root systems and connections across the canopy. There are monkeys playing at the treetops, the butterflies darting below. Every creature has a place in the great ecosystem. There is a gorgeous diversity and beauty and vitality.

A good person leading

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

The state has an important but incomplete role to play in this process. The state can provide services, but it cannot easily provide care. That is to say, the state can redistribute money to the poor, can build homeless shelters and day care centers. It can create the material platforms on which relationships can be built. But the state can’t creat

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

Relationships do not scale. They have to be built one at a time, through patience and forbearance. But norms do scale. When people in a community cultivate caring relationships, and do so repeatedly in a way that gets communicated to others, then norms are established. Trustworthy action is admired; empathy is celebrated. Cruelty is punished and os

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

Personal transformation and social transformation happen simultaneously. When you reach out and build community, you nourish yourself.

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

Whenever I treat another person as if he were a stereotype, I’ve ripped the social fabric. When I treat another person as an infinite soul, I have woven the social fabric. Whenever I lie, abuse, dismiss or show easy contempt for a person, I have ripped the fabric. Whenever I see someone truly, and make them feel known, I have woven the fabric. When

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne

The social fabric is not woven by leaders from above. It is woven at every level, through a million caring actions, from one person to another. It is woven by people fulfilling their roles as good friends, neighbors, and citizens.

David Brooks • The Relationalist Manifesto

Brandy Cerne