What Makes Community Therapeutic? Themes from our 5K & Reunion Weekend

Weekend race-goers enjoying the cows whose pasture abuts the finish line and refreshment area.

Months of confirming sponsors, checking spreadsheets, and sending invitations came down to one busy morning. After placing the final orange traffic cones, laying out trays of bagels, and folding piles of t-shirts, we were ready. On May 31st, we welcomed over 200 visitors to the Gould Farm campus for our 12th annual 5k Walk-Run event!

Gould Farm kids, Henry and Maddie, stretching before the race.

Participants included former and current guests, former and current staff and their family members, board members, and many local supporters – including former Gould Farmers who participated in the race remotely from around the world!

What’s more is that this weekend also included a special reunion of former staff and volunteers from every decade since the 1970s. Reunion events included attendance at our Friday night art gallery show, a special dinner at Phil Morrison’s home (Phil is a board member and former staff), breakfast by the brook (a longstanding Gould Farm tradition), and of course the race on Sunday! The weekend was a beautiful expression of the community that has sustained Gould Farm for more than a century.

We all found ourselves sharing the same spaces, conversations and meals, reliving memories of celebrations from times past. And as I looked around throughout the weekend, I found myself reflecting on a question that sits at the heart of our work: What makes community therapeutic?

Cultivation

Writer, speaker, and activist Parker Palmer writes that, "We must all become gardeners of community…". This weekend reminded me why that matters. Community does not simply happen. It is cultivated over time through shared work, shared experiences, shared meals, shared challenges, and shared celebrations. At Gould Farm, we see every day that healing often grows in the soil of connection.

Reunion gathering for former Gould Farm staff and volunteers at Phil Morrison's home.

Time

What makes community therapeutic? Part of the answer is also connection over time. There is something powerful about relationships that endure across years and even decades. Throughout the weekend, I watched people reconnect with former coworkers, friends, mentors, and fellow community members. Stories from the past were shared, memories were revisited, and new connections were formed.

The word reunion literally means "to become one again," and I was struck by how many people were experiencing exactly that. They were reconnecting not only with one another, but also with parts of themselves and their own stories that were shaped here. People remembered not only where they had been, but who had helped them along the way.

Mutuality

Another part of the answer is shared experience. At Gould Farm, people arrive from different backgrounds, different professions, different parts of the country, and with different life experiences. Some come as guests seeking recovery. Others come as staff, volunteers, family members, or supporters. What brings us together is not a diagnosis or job title. It is the experience of participating in a community built around meaningful work, mutual support, and the belief that every person has gifts to contribute.

Belonging

And finally, there is the importance of place. Gould Farm is much more than a campus. For many people, it is a place that has touched and shaped their lives. Walking the roads, gathering in Main House, sharing breakfast by the brook, and looking out over the fields and mountains reconnects people not only to memories but to a sense of belonging and a sense of place in the world. The landscape itself becomes part of the community's story.

The 5k Walk-Run weekend was filled with wonderful events—the reunion gathering, community art gallery in the Price Community Center, breakfast by the brook, and our annual race . But what made it memorable was not any one of those single events. It was the experience of community itself.

In a world where the social burdens of isolation and disconnection are increasingly common, weekends like this remind me that healing happens through and in relationships. It happens when people feel known. It happens when people find purpose alongside others. It happens when we all become part of something larger than ourselves.

That is what I experienced this weekend.

And it is what Gould Farm has been nurturing for more than a century.

— Lisanne Finston