Deepening Our Capacity to Support Belonging Research and social innovation are deep in the DNA of Skills Society. Our commitment to curiosity, discovery, and challenging the status quo enhances our capacity to support the people we serve. Since Skills’ inception, we have been part of building and sharing knowledge that has made the lives of the people we serve better. Our long history as a learning organization that tries things, learns, adapts, and seeks to continuously improve, supports this knowledge building.
Deep belonging is about being a part of the fabric of community life.
One wicked question Skills has been exploring since the beginning is:
Being Seen and Known By Others To be known is to feel welcomed and accepted for who you are, as you are. This requires looking beyond disability labels and being able to recognize, acknowledge, and value a person’s strengths, gifts, passions, interests, and needs.
How do we support deep belonging in the lives of the people we serve?
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Deep Belonging
Belonging is about‌. Feeling Valued To be valued is to feel needed, important, and respected; to have your presence desired by others; to be recognized as an indispensable part of the group; and to have your absence noticed.
Reciprocity Belonging involves an exchange of feelings, beliefs, experiences, or understandings between the person and the group they seek belonging to. To belong is to both offer something and to receive something in return.