🎈I Led 50 Strangers Into the Woods...
Torrential rains. Bumpy roads. Countless cancellations.
Nothing stopped me from hosting my first summer camp this weekend. It was an experiment, and the results are in. Here’s the scientific report from my laboratory.
Over the past 10 years of planning and attending events, I’ve realized that most play it safe and don’t meet my standards. They don’t apply social neuroscience, don’t invite people out of their comfort zone, and don’t experiment. So, I decided to design my dream event — JoyCamp.
In June, JoyCamp went viral on Instagram and sold out. People from all over the United States booked their flights and were excited about what I was creating. It was tremendous pressure.
On Thursday, campers drove up a bumpy, winding logging road and set up camp for four days in the wilderness. By the end of those four days, the most common adjective used to describe the event was “profound.”
I want to share my insights from a community-builder’s perspective. If you’re a community-builder, buckle up. Let’s go!
Normalize Interdependence and Sharing
From the start, we all helped each other set up camp. We built a communal kitchen, cooked for each other, shared supplies, and supported campers with wet socks. We became a unit! This sense of togetherness was encouraged from the beginning, starting with carpooling and extending to a registration form that asked what supplies campers could share.
In addition, our interdependence was cultivated by the community-building activities I led and the terrible weather. Surprisingly, the adversity deepened the experience for many of us.
Shared Adversity Brings People Together
During my workshop, The Science of Interpersonal Joy, the rain was so loud that people couldn’t hear me. But it wasn’t all bad. The rain brought us together. It challenged us to ask for help and made us more interdependent.
Now I understand why military training involves intentional pain and suffering — it causes group members to depend on one another, to give support, and to ask for help. According to Brené Brown, asking for help is an essential behavior for building trust. Adversity naturally encourages people to offer and seek help. There are also activities that can be done to foster these behaviors.
Lead with Authority, But Be Receptive and Flexible
The schedule quickly fell apart, literally. So, there was less structure than I had planned. Instead of sticking to the script, I tuned in to what the group needed. Did they need rest? Did they want to move their bodies? Stimulate their minds?
There were times when I allowed the group to influence my decisions and other times when I took charge and rallied everyone around my choice. Getting real-time feedback from the group helps you adapt to their needs. But if you take this too far, you’re no longer shaping the experience — it becomes random.
Being authoritative means guiding the group with a firm hand while delivering the experience you designed. I did this during the opening ceremony and the morning routines. In the evenings, I allowed more flexibility. This is the sweet spot: being authoritative, receptive, and flexible.
Incorporate Journaling and Integration Exercises
If there’s one practice I can recommend for steadily increasing happiness, it’s journaling. Journaling ensures you don’t forget what you’ve learned. I incorporated journaling into the camp, but not enough. Every morning, there was an invitation to journal, but most campers didn’t bring one.
The closing ceremony featured a dance party, a discussion about death, and oath-giving. However, this didn’t help campers ‘capture and document’ their lessons to take home. Thoughts stored in your head are much more fragile than those written on a page. Next year, I’ll tell campers to keep a journal with them at all times and incorporate journaling breaks throughout the day.
This will ensure the insights are not forgotten.
Leverage the Power of Laughter Yoga
This was the first event where I led laughter yoga exercises every day, and they were powerful. I was blown away.
Did you know that laughter is physical exercise? It raises your heart rate and boosts positive emotions, both of which increase alertness. One of my favorite laughter yoga games was the ‘electric shock.’ Participants would poke each other as if zapping one another, and they’d pretend the zap caused them to burst into laughter. I would occasionally take a step back and watch campers laugh, it brought me so much joy! Take a look.
Pass the Mic
Giving people a chance to share their wisdom — now that’s community building. At JoyCamp, participants took the mic and led the group. Overall, it was a great success. I didn’t officially sign off on anything; I just trusted, and it worked out. We even had a death doula lead a workshop on mortality. Tears were shared.
Only one suggestion: if you invite someone to take the mic, give them guidelines beforehand. This takes work, but it will ensure a better experience for everyone. When you guide speakers on how to offer the most value to attendees, they’ll be more prepared, concise, and impactful. Guidelines should encourage speakers to prepare in advance, limit their lecture periods to five minutes each, and provide practical takeaways.