The Invitation
Somewhere along the way, I learned that surviving isn’t always about getting stronger.
Sometimes it’s about getting softer.
Not softer in conviction. Softer in posture. Softer in the way you meet the world when it rushes at you faster than you can possibly keep up.
One of the first books I was ever genuinely excited about during my teenage years, was the Tao Te Ching.
Not because it was assigned. It was a gift. I didn’t understand most of it then. But I remember how it felt to hold it.
It was my first trip to Manhattan. Shoot it was actually my first time in New York. It was the summer after my High School Junior year. I was exploring Central park, and somewhere in that maze of peace, I found this semi-open shaded grove. A loose circle of people were gathered there, not under a big tree exactly, but tucked into this little pocket of light and shadow.
In the middle of it was an older man, moving. Not fast. Not forcefully. Just deliberately. Softly. Like he wasn’t performing for anyone at all.
I didn’t walk up close. Instead, I sat under one of the nearby trees. Not close enough to distract. But close enough to try to catch a few words. The distance made it difficult. His voice didn’t really carry, so I just watched.
I watch how some of the students were trying to follow and learn his movements. I could tell a small handful of students, had been here before. Their eyes were closed as they moved through their forms. Forms that were part of their souls.
I ended up staying for the whole session, probably forty minutes. I didn’t realize how still I had become until it was over.
When they finished, and after the last student left, I finally walked over. I remember giving a small, semi awkward bow as I really didn’t know if that was appropriate to the culture he came from. But I knew it was something I had been taught in martial arts. And it felt right.
I was so excited to thank him for his lesson. He smiled and said he saw me under the tree. He asked me what I learned, and what I knew before I came.
I told him I had learned about movement and peace watching them. About being part of nature. Then proceeded to share my novel knowledge of Hakdari Seogi & Juchum Seogi, how to posture your body to breathe. These had been two of the core teachings in my years of Taekwondo. At least two of the ones I could put into words to match what I seen that day.
I shared I had trained, for a time, under Master Chul Koo Yoon of Indianapolis, a grand master of the Korean Tae Kwon Do Academy.
He smiled, and nodded.
Then invited me to sit, and proceeded to offer me one short lesson.
It was small. Quiet. Almost nothing you would notice from the outside. But, my how this moment would live with me the rest of life.
The Lesson
The kind man, walked less than five feet from where I sat down. He took this deep focused breath, and as he exhaled, he proceeded to show me…
Where to place my weight.
How to soften my shoulders.
How to let my breath fall lower in my body instead of lifting in my chest.
After the lesson, I thanked him so much. I ask him what I could read if I wanted to understand more about this. More about its essence.
He walked over to this little brown leather bag.
Reached inside.
And pulled out a small book, and handed it to me.
A gift for you, he said with a smile.
It was called, The Tao Te Ching.
The Tao Te Ching still feels like coming back to that shelf.
It isn’t a book about how to fix the world. It’s a book about how the world already moves.
About softness.
About patience.
About not forcing.
About water.
About how enormous forces can be met, not with resistance, but with attention.
This has been quietly sitting in the back of my mind for years in my community development work.
But it’s not only how I see our work. It’s how I try to see the world.
When I think about young people leaving our communities. When I think about how many families are told, over and over, that housing is the only real way to build wealth. When I think about how there will always be people who want to take more than they need. And how there will always be others who are far stronger than you.
I don’t read those as failures anymore.
I read these as mere forces.
Currents.
Human movement.
I remember how much I was thinking about all of this before I chaired my very first neighborhood meeting with my Deer Park family.
I was nervous. Really nervous. Those meetings ran long. I never complained, well, not out loud, but damn… they were long.
They started at 7:00 pm and usually ran until about 9:10. Every evening, of the second Wednesday of the month, I would watch people quietly slip out early. By the end, everyone was ready to go home to their loved ones.
And I kept wondering: What if we are working against people’s natural energy instead of with it?
That night, when it was my turn to bring something new forward, I asked a simple question.
Would it be okay if we tried something different?
Would it be okay if we kept the meeting to fifty minutes?
I was holding the book in my hand.
The Tao Te Ching.
The one the man in the park had handed to me.
I told my mentors, my friends, briefly, about the teaching.
About not forcing. About movement. About how sometimes the way you create more energy in a room is not by asking people to stay longer…
…but by giving them their time back.
I told them I had this small idea.
That if we made the meeting intentionally shorter, just a little too short, people might actually stay afterward. Not because they were obligated. But because they wanted to. Because they still had energy. Because they still had breath. Because they hadn’t been drained by process.
They loved it. They smiled. And I remember how early and excited I sounded as I tried to explain what this little book had been teaching me.
That moment changed something for me. Not because the idea was revolutionary. But because it worked. And it confirmed something I had been slowly learning: We don’t need to fight human nature. We need to design for it.
We don’t need to outmuscle the strongest forces in the room. We need to understand where they are already moving, and then shape the space around that movement.
That is how I try to do community work now.
And honestly…
that is how I try to move through the world.
Because here’s the honest truth:
We are never going to stop the human drive to strive, to build, to grow, to take, to compete.
We are never going to stop Capitalism or Globalization from moving.
We are never going to stop young people from wanting to leave, explore, adventure, wander, and test the edges of their own lives.
That energy is not a problem.
It is a current.
And the older I get, the more I believe this:
Community work is not about fighting currents.
It is about learning how to stand inside them.
The Tao talks about acting without forcing.
Not because force is bad.
But because force is often wasted on things that were never meant to be stopped.
The Truth
As I prepared to leave the park that day, the kind man bowed to me and thanked me for waiting and sharing. I returned the bow and thanked him for the gift.
Today I now realize, that day, I was gifted more than a mere text, I was given a path to courage.
Not strength. Not dominance. Learning how to focus. Learning how to center. Learning how to breathe into your chest and your diaphragm when everything in you wants to tighten.
Learning how to clear your mind.
How to stay calm. How to sit calm.
Even when the situation itself is not calm at all, and when it is that Massive force of strength lay right in front, preparing to put you in your place.
The Share
So if you’re curious about this frame of thought, and are preparing to wander through your community filled with the large heavy and daunting challenges, I’d start here.
Read the Tao Te Ching.
Read a few short chapters at a time.
Let it be slow.
Then, if you find yourself wanting something more playful, more human, more strange and beautiful…
I later found the Zhuangzi.
It’s full of stories. Absurd little truths. Gentle rebellion against being trapped by roles and labels.
And if you’re someone who likes to feel ideas in your body, not just your head…
These Tai Chi foundational texts are where philosophy becomes posture. Where listening comes before action.
Where four ounces, can actually redirect a thousand pounds.
I don’t think community development is actually about programs. Its not even about housing, or money.
It’s about movement.
Of trust.
Of courage.
Of imagination.
Of people deciding, quietly, that they’re allowed to step forward.
Not learning how to push harder.
But learning how to yield with purpose.
How to turn gently and focus your actions, Focus that will prepare you to have the courage to stand before 1000 pounds and not back down.
How to let the river keep being a river, and still help people cross.
Thank you for reading and for the great work you are doing in your own community.
This codex, is part of a larger work that will be embodied in my first text which is seeking to help move all our communities forward together.
The Garden Regions of Tomorrow: Reviving our Civic Imagination, is scheduled for released June 1, 2026.