Inspiring: Healing Our Relationships News Articles

[Loretta] Ross has worked at the forefront of the movement for reproductive justice. But recently she has become better known for championing “call-in culture,” a philosophy that approaches someone’s wrongdoing with accountability and, most importantly, love. In the summer of 2020 ... I felt myself crumbling. I called out snide comments by alumni of my college about Black Lives Matter protests, demanded people boycott the college newspaper ... and used Twitter to call out the behavior of fellow students. Each tactic left no room for discussion. Calling in, by contrast, asks us to always be the bigger person, even in the most hateful and painful situations. I ask Ross: Whose well-being are we prioritizing here? And why isn’t it our own? Ross tells me about another Black woman who asked the same question. “I’m confused,” Ross recalls the woman saying. “I don’t want to fall into the stereotype of the angry Black woman. But I feel like if I embrace the calling-in strategies you’re talking about, then I’m ... giving a pass to all this injustice. What should I do?” Ross responds with a question of her own: “Well, who are you inside? Go deep inside and find out who you are. What’s the emotion that you feel is true to you?” “Inside, I feel like I’m filled with love,” the woman replies. “Then, why aren’t you leading with your authentic self?” Ross asks her. Accountability and love are not mutually exclusive, Ross explains.

Note: Smith College Professor and civil rights activist Loretta Ross worked with Ku Klux Klan members and practiced restorative justice with incarcerated men convicted or raping and murdering women. Watch Loretta Ross's powerful Ted Talk on simple tools to help shift our culture from fighting each other to working together in the face of polarizing social issues. Explore more positive stories about healing social division and polarization.

Polarization is widely recognized as one of the most pressing issues now facing the United States. Even as polarization has increased in recent years, survey research has consistently shown that many Americans think the nation is more divided than it truly is. Meanwhile, Democrats and Republicans think they dislike each other more than they actually do. Social media companies are often blamed for driving greater polarization by virtue of the way they segment political audiences and personalize recommendations in line with their users' existing beliefs and preferences. Given their scale and reach, however, they are also uniquely positioned to help reduce polarization. Jamie Settle's work demonstrates, through a combination of surveys and experiments, that affective polarization is likely to rise when social media users encounter content with partisan cues, even if the content is not explicitly political. A 2020 study by Hunt Allcott and colleagues echoes these concerns. The authors asked some participants to refrain from using Facebook for four weeks. Afterward, these participants reported holding less polarized political views than those who had not been asked to refrain from using Facebook. Deactivating Facebook also made people less hostile toward "the other party." When people interact with someone from their social "outgroup," they often come to view that outgroup in a more favorable light. Spreading more examples of positive intergroup contact ... could go a long way.

Note: Read the full article to explore what social media platforms can do to reduce polarization. For more, read how the people of Taiwan created an online space for debate where politicians can interact with citizens in ways that foreground consensus, and not division.

Luc, along with just about every able-bodied Rwandan aged 18 to 65, participates in the monthly activity known as “Umuganda,” a Kinyarwanda word that means “coming together in common purpose.” On the last Saturday of every month, from 8 to 11 a.m., Rwandans across the country gather together to partake in community improvement projects. In Luc’s neighborhood, this has meant trimming back bushes that attract malaria-spreading mosquitoes, and making sure roads are clear. According to Luc, these monthly gatherings have helped his community recover from a long, devastating period of genocide, making it clean, innovative, loving and self-reliant. Across the country ... the tradition of Umuganda has unfolded in similar fashion, helping Rwanda to piece itself back together and recover from ruin. Though Umuganda is a national phenomenon, the mobilization of it takes place at the community level — specifically, in “cells” of at least 50 households called Umudugudu. Spearheaded by a community leader, members of a cell often use the mobile messaging service WhatsApp to work out the logistics. This small-scale organizational structure is key to making Umuganda work. Luc thinks Umuganda has value beyond the projects themselves, promoting self-reliance among Rwandans. “When you see something wrong within your surroundings, you do not wait for someone else to come and do it for you, you just go for it and do it,” he says. “Do Umuganda. Solve the problem yourselves.”

Note: Read about the community courts in Rwanda after the deadly genocide, which served as a powerful model for forgiveness and reconciliation. Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

“Don’t judge a book by its cover” is the kind of advice most people forget when they meet Joel Hartgrove. Maori tattoos cover his neck, ears and his shaved skull. Hartgrove is an open book. You can borrow him for 20 minutes, talk to him about his time in the Australian army, his Indigenous roots, his tattoos, anything you’d like. You’ll find you’re speaking with a deep thinker who answers nosy questions with humor and heart — a common trait among the “books” available for loan in Ronni Abergel’s library. “They are stigmatized,” Abergel says of his collection, “maybe because of their weight, their looks, their profession, their religious, sexual or political orientation, or because they survived abuse and traumas. We can’t just judge someone on face value.” Abergel, 48, is the director of the biggest and most beautiful library in the world: the Human Library, where you borrow people instead of books and speak with them about their lives. His library rules are simple: Treat the books respectfully; bring them back on time and in the same shape you borrowed them; don’t take them home. “They will answer any question you have the courage to ask,” Abergel promises. The Human Library is now active in 80 countries, with branches in Texas and Tokyo, Bangladesh and Berlin. Every reader who visits, virtually or in-person, chooses two or three topics that interest them: rugby, depression, refugees, sex work, cancer, grief. “There is a great book hidden in all of us, and most of us would be bestsellers,” Abergel believes.

Note: Don't miss a deeply moving series called HUMAN by filmmaker Yann Arthus-Bertrand, who spent three years collecting real-life stories from thousands of people in 60 countries. Their stories, although unique to them, speak to the human condition and the parts of life that unite us all: love, happiness, poverty, war, and the future of our planet.

Christian Picciolini was 14 years old when he attended the first gathering of what would become the Hammerskin Nation, a violent, white-power skinhead group. Picciolini embraced the white supremacist message he heard ... and went on to front a white-power punk band, White American Youth. But after eight years as a neo-Nazi, Picciolini began to question the hateful ideology he espoused. He remembers a specific incident in which he was beating a young black man. His eyes locked with his victim, and he felt a surprising empathy. It was a turning point. He withdrew from the movement and in 2011 co-founded Life After Hate, a nonprofit that counsels members of hate groups and helps them disengage. "Over the last 14 years I have actually helped over 100 people disengage from the same movement that I was a part of," he says. "[Neo-Nazis] know that I'm a danger to them because I understand what they understand but I also understand the truth." Picciolini's new memoir is called White American Youth. "I started one of America's first white-power bands to both recruit young people, encourage them into acts of violence and speak to the vulnerabilities and the grievances they were feeling so that I could draw them in with promises of paradise," [said Picciolini]. "It brings back a lot of shame, because I know that I put words out into the world that still today are affecting people and hurting people."

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

The Compassion Games is an annual international competition or coopetition as they like to call it, which ran from 9-21 September where teams and individuals around the world compete to be the most compassionate. The games have grown to include teams of all kinds from all over the world including schools, families, community groups and even prisons (last year a prison in California entered and had its first ever 11-day period without a single act of violence). For individuals, like myself, there is the secret agent of compassion option which is a series of 11 missions emailed to you daily over the course of the games. The missions include doing random acts of kindness, caring for the environment or the local neighbourhood, supporting charitable organisations and even just fully appreciating an everyday activity like brushing your teeth. My own 11 days of compassion involved ... making a tangible act of appreciation for the environment (I planted some seeds in our communal garden) and engaging in an activity that made someone smile (I joined in with my girlfriends fitness workout boy did that one work!). How did I get into all this? A newsletter in my inbox. Karen Armstrong, the former nun turned religious writer ... had won the TED Prize. Granted one wish by TED to change the world, she had chosen to set up a Charter for Compassion to implement the Golden Rule ... across the globe. I hit subscribe to the newsletters and one day received an email about the Compassion Games.

Note: Watch a short, inspiring video on how the compassion games changed a woman's prison from a culture of violence to one of caring. For more, see this inspiring article and this one.

Sister Mrosla [taught] junior high. She and Mark met ... in eighth-grade math class. One Friday after a tough week of algebra, she sensed that her students were struggling. She told them [to] pull out a sheet of paper. On every other line, she said, write the name of each student in class and next to the name write a kind word - a sincere compliment. That weekend she compiled the lists for each student on yellow legal-size paper, adding her own compliment at the end. She handed the papers back during the next class. On Mark's paper, among other simple compliments, somebody had written, "A great friend." On Judy Holmes Swanson's list, someone noted that she "smiles all the time." "No one ever said anything about the exercise after that class period," Sister Mrosla wrote. "It didn't matter. The exercise accomplished what I hoped it would - the students were happy with themselves and one another again." Years passed. Mark was killed in Vietnam. At Mark's funeral, [his parents] were waiting for the nun. "We want to show you something. They found this on Mark when he was killed," [James Eklund] said, gently taking out a worn piece of paper that had been refolded many times. "I knew without looking at the writing," Sister Mrosla wrote, "that the papers were the ones I had listed all of the good things each of his classmates had said about Mark." A few of Mark's school friends who were gathered around also recognized the paper, and one by one they told her they still had theirs.

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

I moved to Fawkner, Melbourne with my partner and kids about five years ago, in search of affordable housing. The suburb was nice enough but I felt unmoored. Then I signed up to help with our school garden. On volunteer day, my partner pushed our kids to school in a wheelbarrow, and I was armed with a shovel and pitchfork. Around 50 people turned up to the school on a Sunday to help with the garden, and while the kids played, the adults chose jobs according to our levels of ability and enthusiasm. My partner opted to repair the garden beds and I went for the lower-stakes job of weeding. It was slow and careful work, pulling out dandelions and chickweed. Between gardening and tending to the kids, there were moments of socialising: a nod of thanks from a teacher, a chat with another parent about the out-of-control compost heap that lives behind the mud kitchen. These conversations were tentative, at least on my part; the pandemic and early motherhood had left me out of practice when it came to socialising. However, the school garden was the perfect place to learn how to be with other people again and I could see that I was surrounded by the sorts of people who I wanted to befriend. Working together in this way brings us close to what Aristotle called “the friendship of the good”. This, according to Aristotle, is the best kind of friendship: it happens when you see the good in another person, and they in you. It is very different to what he calls a “utilitarian friendship”, where we spend time with another person because of what they can do for us. A friendship of the good, conversely – like the school garden itself – is about creating something bigger than ourselves.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division and healing the Earth.

Tina imagined the sound of Ira’s key in the door, and then she realized she would never hear that sound again. It had all been stolen from her. Someone would have to pay the price. “Whoever killed my son,” she said, “they were gonna get it.” In the days after Ira’s death, there were other things besides retribution to keep Tina busy. Tina had wondered for a while about $50 that disappeared from her bank account. Then a woman approached Tina at a vigil for Ira and told her a story. Her boyfriend had been beating her, and Ira found out, and he gave her $50 for a bus ticket so she could get out of town. Turned out he had his own little ministry. And Tina continued that ministry: listening to Ira’s friends, having them over for lunch or dinner, occasionally giving someone a place to crash. She thought less and less about revenge. That December, a grand jury indicted two men for the murder of Ira Hopkins. On October 27, 2017, following guilty pleas, [Jy’Aire Smith-Pennick] appeared in court for his sentencing. Almost seven years passed from Jy’Aire’s sentencing until the day Tina saw him in person again. “I’m in prison for participating in a murder,” he would later say. “And the mother of this man is here, present, on behalf of me, watching me receive my degree.” When Jy’Aire gets out, he plans to study sociology at the University of Pennsylvania. He and Tina will work together on the IRA Foundation, teaching at-risk kids that there are better options than drugs and violence.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division and repairing criminal justice.

By the early 1990s, extremist Hutu propaganda had started to spread in newspapers and on the radio, radicalizing Rwandans. Over the course of just 100 days [in 1994], about 800,000 Rwandans, primarily Tutsi, were killed. On April 22, 1994, [Hussein] Longolongo recounted, he and an armed group of men entered a chapel where dozens of Tutsi were hiding. “We killed about 70 people,” he said. “I was brainwashed.” Eventually, more than 120,000 Hutu were arrested on charges of participating in the genocide. In prison, [Longolongo] was forced to take part in a government-sanctioned reeducation program. He initially dismissed much of what he heard. “But as time went on, I became convinced that what I did was not right,” he told me. Longolongo also participated in more than 100 of what were known as gacaca trials. Gacaca—which roughly translates to “justice on the grass”—had historically been used in Rwandan villages and communities to settle interpersonal and intercommunal conflicts. Now the government transformed the role of the gacaca court to handle allegations of genocide. Many survivors were initially reluctant. “They would say, ‘How can you forgive those people?’” [Albert] Rutikanga told them that these conversations weren’t something they should do for the perpetrators. “Forgiveness is a choice of healing yourself,” he would say. “You cannot keep the anger and bitterness inside, because it will destroy you.”

Note: Read how a Rwandan woman forgave the man who killed her husband during the 1994 genocide and allowed his daughter to marry her son. Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division.

Almost two decades after the first iPhone was released, a trend for lower tech devices appears to be taking shape, with a growing minority swapping their smartphones for “dumb phones”. With new models such as the Boring Phone, the trend is partly being fuelled by young people’s suspicion of the data- and attention-harvesting tech they have grown up with, as well as a bid to live more offline. And while smartphones are the obvious target for this trend, the “newtro” (a portmanteau of “new” and “retro”) movement is heralding a revival of analogue media, including cassettes and fanzines, against the backdrop of the enduring, and much-heralded, vinyl boom. While Jess Perriam, 39, had become exhausted by her Instagram feed, she knew she wanted to keep a window into the lives of others. So she turned to Postcrossing, a site that connects people who want to send and receive postcards from strangers around the world. “I still wanted to have that connection with people and learn more about different cultures, but not necessarily while being aggressively marketed at,” she said, adding that she receives “stacks of reading recommendations” through the post. The community has more than 800,000 members across 207 countries, with 77 million postcards received since it launched in 2005. As well as writing to people she has never met, she also corresponds with an old friend in the US. “It forces me to sit down and think, what do I want to communicate to my friend?”

Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division and technology for good.

Brandon, Jackie and Julie meet for dinner every Thursday, sitting at their regular table. As they leave, there’s no check to pay for this generous meal. The pop-up cafe at a church hall in Chelmsford, England is one of 80 held across the country throughout the week. They’re an initiative of FoodCycle, the UK’s largest community dining organization, which turns produce that supermarkets would otherwise throw out into a free meal for anyone who wants to attend. In 2022, FoodCycle’s pop-up cafes served nearly 500,000 meals to 62 communities across the UK, saving 209 tonnes of food from going to waste. Forty-three percent of people who attend FoodCycle meals, like Jackie and Julie, live on their own, with 68 percent of them feeling lonely, according to a survey of 910 FoodCycle guests in 2022. Loneliness is considered to be a significant mental and public health issue in the country, affecting over half the population, with the Mental Health Foundation linking it to depression and declining physical health. Sixty-eight percent of FoodCycle guests worry about affording food, and 92 percent are concerned about the increasing price of food, to the extent that 75 percent regularly skip meals. “These issues are intertwined and interlinked. We know there’s a correlation between people who are facing food poverty, and feeling isolated and disconnected from their communities,” says Sophie Tebbetts, FoodCycle’s head of programs and incoming CEO.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.

Community wealth building initiatives are taking hold in cities across the world, strengthening worker pay, local economies and democracy. A recent help-wanted ad for a laundry worker in Cleveland contained some unusual language, asking prospective candidates: “Have you ever wanted to work for a company that is 90 percent employee-owned?” The ad went on to identify Evergreen Cooperative Laundry as the only employee-owned commercial laundry firm in the country, citing a commitment to building the wealth and careers of its employees. The cooperative movement in the Rust Belt city of Cleveland has deep roots in community struggle for shared wealth. Its earliest origins are in the Mondragon co-op movement of the Basque Country in northern Spain, where tens of thousands of workers are organized into a vast co-op network that has flourished since the 1950s. Here in the U.S., when steel companies were closing down throughout the Ohio Valley in the 1970s ... a small band of activists promoted the idea of worker ownership. The model is a simple one: First, identify anchor institutions — hospitals, universities, seats of government — that are not going to relocate in search of higher profits and incentivize them to do their procurement of supplies and services locally, so that those dollars stay at home. Then, make regulatory, financing and policy changes that support the growth of cooperatives to supply their needs, so that the business profits stay with the workers.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.

A Jewish man who was badly injured when he was beaten by an Arab mob has told of his joy at reuniting with the Arab nurse who saved him. Fadi Kasem, a nurse at the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya, went to a riot scene in Acre two weeks ago, during a spike in Arab-Jewish violence, accompanying a sheikh who was appealing for calm. An 11-day conflict between Israel and terror groups in the Gaza Strip, which ended Friday, sparked violent riots in Jewish-Arab cities within Israel, including communities long seen as models of coexistence. When Kasem arrived at the scene in Acre he was shocked to see a Jewish man lying on the ground after he had been surrounded in his car and then attacked outside the vehicle by a mob wielding stones, sticks and knives. “I was scared he was going to die,” said Kasem. “There was lots of blood and a head injury.” Kasem administered first aid to the victim, Mor Janashvili, 29, and saw him taken to the hospital. Janashvili ... is back home in Haifa, still in a wheelchair and in significant pain, but recovering and convinced that Kasem’s intervention made all the difference. Just before Janashvili was discharged from the hospital, Kasem paid a visit to his room. Janashvili said to him: “You saved my life. I don’t know what I would have done without you.” Kasem replied modestly: “I did what had to be done.” “It was a very moving meeting,” Janashvili recalled. “After all, in a place where people weren’t showing humanity, he showed such great humanity.”

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

It’s called “Political Blind Date.” And far from being a hokey reality show for the political set, the popular Canadian series aims to break down walls around contentious issues from gun rights to climate change. At a time when political exchanges are often caustic and unyielding, a Canadian TV show is modeling a different approach. It creates space for rival politicians to share views and experiences respectfully – and viewers love it. With filming of a fifth season underway, about 50 politicians have participated, spending two days together with each other’s constituents. The show has been optioned to the United Kingdom, France, Israel, and South Africa, and is being shopped in the United States. “It’s a moment,” says director Mark Johnston, “where people are trying to heal and listen to each other.” Getting beyond the media scrum, the yelling during parliamentary question periods, the sound bites on nightly news, and the callous swipes over social media, producers set the stage for participants to engage one another with the time and respect that complex problems require. “Respect is at the heart of it. Not only are politicians, in the way they are using political rhetoric, not respecting each other; they’re disrespecting their citizenry,” says Mark Johnston, showrunner of “Political Blind Date.” The goal is not to get the two politicians to reverse their positions, something that rarely happens. It’s to slow down and study policies in all their complexity, and to hear the human concerns and perspectives that lie behind their support.

Note: Enjoy a wonderful compilation of inspiring stories from the pandemic times on this webpage. Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

One day, during her usual chat with her eight-year-old son about school, Tracey Cooney got an answer she didn't expect. "There was nobody to play with. Everyone was playing in their own little groups," he confided. She was surprised because he was usually outgoing and confident. Cooney felt a little upset, but remembered something she had seen on social media and wondered if it could help children in his situation. It's called a Buddy Bench. The idea is simple - if a child feels lonely, they can go to the bench as a signal that they need someone to play with. Another child will see them, go and talk to them and include them in their games. So Cooney asked other parents and the head teacher at Castlemartyr National School in Cork, Ireland, whether they would be interested in getting one - their answer was, "Yes." "We use the bench as a reminder for children of things like communication, mutual support and opening up about feelings," says Judith Ashton, a psychotherapist and co-founder of ... Buddy Bench Ireland. Apart from reducing social isolation and improving mental wellbeing, the hope is that the benches can tackle another problem: bullying. But do children actually use the bench? "They don't see it as stigmatised," says Sinead McGilloway ... who led a study of 117 pupils at three schools which have benches. Forty per cent of the children she questioned said they had used the bench, and 90% said if they saw someone else sitting on it they would talk to them.

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

In the misty hills of southern Haiti, the town of Beaumont sits on a fault line of tension. Yet in this uncertain landscape, a quiet movement has been unfolding, one led not by international nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) or government officials, but by local mediators who believe that peace must begin with conversation. Their work, modest in scale but profound in effect, is helping rebuild what years of unrest have eroded: people’s belief in one another. At the heart of this effort is Médiation Lakay (“community-based mediation”), a grassroots initiative reflecting the work of local community leaders in Haiti who mediate disputes over land and resources. Elders, local officials, and church figures convene to discuss disputes before they escalate. Rather than waiting for formal judicial intervention, these mediators facilitate dialogue between families, helping them reach agreements and restore communication. “It’s not about who wins,” says Wilfrid, a local Haitian pastor. “It’s about whether both sides can share a plate of rice after.” The process blends traditional dispute resolution with restorative justice principles, an exchange of listening, acknowledgment, and reparative action. Disputes that might have lasted years are often resolved in weeks. The team keeps no written records, to preserve confidentiality and community trust. By focusing on rebuilding relationships rather than assigning blame, Médiation Lakay is gradually reweaving the social fabric that conflict had torn apart. “People came to understand that fear had made them cruel,” [school teacher] Josette says. Beyond conflict resolution, the group’s meetings have become spaces for collective healing, where villagers discuss shared trauma from past hurricanes or lost livelihoods. By focusing on rebuilding relationships rather than assigning blame, Médiation Lakay is gradually reweaving the social fabric that conflict had torn apart.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive healing social division and repairing criminal justice.

A recent survey from the British Standards Institution found that 68% of teen respondents said they feel worse when they spend too much time on social media, and 47% would remove them from existence if they could. So it’s not surprising that hundreds of thousands of people are now attending ‘IRL’ events (in real life) where phones are either banned or limited. Several new services are now curating “offline experiences” for social gatherings and dating, and the number of these events that are landing on the calendars of Americans and Europeans is a testament to the deep desire for human-to-human contact. The Offline Club of Europe has over half-a-million Instagram followers (an ironic yardstick of success), and chapters across the continent gather at venues where one’s smartphone is locked in a box at the start of the event. Once inside, reading, chatting, sharing a drink, playing a board game—in short, everything we used to do to socialize—are preferred over looking down at your phone. In addition to the Offline Club, companies like Kanso, Sofar Sounds, and the app 222, are making a business out of disconnecting humans from their social media feeds that overflow with targeted ads and AI-generated drivel. Each one has found itself a niche, but all are returning us to the social activities that our parents used to do before phones. There are likely more options for engaging with the world and humanity offline; these are just a few that are exploding in popularity.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division.

Portugal has a life expectancy nearly four years longer than the U.S. despite spending 20% of what the U.S. does on health care per person. According to the 2021 Global Security Index, which measures the ability to respond to pandemics, Portugal ranked third out of 195 countries in providing access to affordable health care. The United States ranked 183rd. Portugal has a national health care system, entitling every resident to free or very low-cost health care. It embraces innovative programs such as “social prescribing” that expand the boundaries of what is considered health care, while progressive laws on drug use and treatment have been credited with driving down overdose deaths, even as they rose in the U.S. Central to its success is a network of primary health care clinics embedded in neighborhoods, working alongside regional public health units. Their care teams become part of the community. They include doctors, nurses, social workers, and often most critically, front desk staff who calmly work to help coordinate appointments and keep streams of patients flowing. On a recent day at the Baixa Family Health Unit, in Lisbon’s lively historic center, patients of all ages from a panoply of nations flowed through, receiving what truly is family care. “We follow the whole family, from pregnancy until they’re dead,” said Martino Gliozzi, the physician who coordinates the center. His oldest patient is 104. The clinic embraces what Gliozzi calls “out of the box” ideas, like Walk with a Doc: Early in the evening, physicians stroll city streets with patients to encourage exercise. Under the leadership of another young doctor, Cristiano Figueiredo, the clinic was the first in the country to embrace “social prescribing” — using patient visits to ask about social issues affecting their health and start to address them by linking patients with the community resources they need. In the 1990s, Portugal had one of the highest rates of heroin use and fatal overdoses anywhere. In 2001, the country not only decriminalized the use and possession of drugs, but also, in partnership with several non-governmental organizations such as Crescer, created a network of mostly free inpatient and outpatient treatment centers and mobile street teams that seek out drug users to provide medical care, clean needles, and support to enter addiction programs. Two decades later, drug overdose deaths have fallen sharply, from one per day to about 70 to 80 per year. New Jersey, with a smaller population than Portugal, sees 3,000 a year. HIV infection rates have dropped dramatically, too.

Note: Read our Substack to learn about social prescribing and other inspiring remedies to the chronic illness crisis ravaging the world. Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division and healing our bodies.

Since 2014, [French choreographer and dancer Alice Chauchat] has been conducting choreographic research on human togetherness amid all our differences. The result are several choreographic scores that activate paradoxical relationships: distant intimacy, attentive autonomy, impersonal engagement, pleasure and unknown play. Chauchat’s work takes place in dance studios, in exhibition spaces, on stages ... and increasingly dance gatherings in public spaces in Copenhagen, Barcelona, and of course Berlin, sprawled across the neighborhoods around where she lives. Strangers invite each other to dance as a practice of being with oneself and being with one another “without thinking about dance as self-expression, but instead thinking of dancing as relating.” I ask Chauchat what dancing means to her. “Dancing is a space where we can practice life. Because dancing is observing and being active at the same time. You perceive a situation, and you take part of it. I chose to see dancing as a form of relating. So for me it is never just dancing but always dancing with.” She sees dance as a way to offer something to someone, as a form of productive confusion, as a structure of unexamined trust. The dance gatherings, she says, give people a frame and therefore a safe space and opportunity to experience what dance can do: “You are not exposed to being a great dancer or a bad dancer. You are busy with something that relieves emotional pressure.”

Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing social division.

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