For a long time I have been trying to answer one of the most important questions of our time: Where and how do we live?
After spending most of my adult life traveling to communities around the world, I have landed in the belief that there are few models as effective as the village. Especially if that village is both rural and futuristic, self-sustaining and community-oriented and embodies a uniting clear mission.
As the world becomes more fragmented, I believe that pockets of coherence become more important to the collective.
Over the last decade, this is what we have been building at my home, Londolozi Game Reserve in South Africa – A Futuristic African Village. This village is founded on what we call hardware – the integration of sustainable technologies and practices enabling us to live in harmony with nature; and heartware – our way of being together.
This terminology quickly became a shared language that has helped to unite people from vastly different backgrounds.
Heartware is the technology of the human heart. It is the unseen force that turns a place into a village, and a group of people into a living system of care.
At Londolozi, it became the daily practice of showing up with the intention of uplifting fellow villagers. And it was activated when we created a shared goal for the village that is bigger than any one person. As each person orientated to their responsibilities – not their rights – the village began to thrive.
Villagers will keep the fire burning.
I believe the village is the ideal unit of human connection to each other and to the natural world. It is a living example of a better way to live. And it is a way that others can replicate wherever they choose. A functioning village should have strength in self-sustainability, harmony and resilience. A truly activated village should become self-replicating.
Villages can (and must) be built anywhere. When we embrace living in this way, we are participating in something much bigger – a new consciousness that holds the possibility for restoring the planet.
The village shows us a better way to live.
For your business, it is about standing for more than a product. It is about creating shared vision, strong culture, and igniting individual purpose.
For your community, it is about showing up for something greater. It is about coming home.
Byron Katie once said to me: The village you’re trying to create, the village of perfect harmony. it already exists. Can you wake up to it?
Begin with your hardware and your heartware. The village will form where you are.