Feeling lonely?
5 Texas visionaries share how to find connection in 2023
2022 has not been easy. In a year of ongoing war and crippling inflation, raging wildfires and endless drought, it’s vital to cultivate faith and trust that things will get better in 2023. One way is what psychotherapist and stress researcher Elissa Epel calls “the long view.” It focuses on pursuing daily sources of joy, purpose and social connection, while taking time to acknowledge the pain, loss and disappointments of our world.
Though we seem to have overcome the worst of the pandemic days, social connection is still strained as we’re left to deal with the “loneliness epidemic” that remains, exacerbated by social media and sharper partisan polarization. Hope, though, is a wish guided by action. With that in mind, we asked Texas visionaries from different disciplines a simple question: How can we become a more connected, and less isolated, society?
Giving forward
When the COVID lockdown occurred, I had just founded a startup, now called Intention, that will make it possible for everyone to be a climate impact investor. The doom and gloom around climate change has a way of disempowering people, leaving them feeling helpless about a problem that seems too big for individuals to impact. The idea is that if each person could help fund development and deployment of climate technology, through their own small investments, we have a shot at accelerating action and allowing ordinary people to share in some of the expected profits.
The path from a good startup idea to success is tough, of course, and the lockdown didn’t help. I was learning how to build a relationship with a remote employee I hadn’t even met in real life. Family responsibilities increased as we struggled to keep our kids happy and engaged with online school.
There was a lot more home cooking, along with the planning and logistics for masked trips to the grocery store. So I reallocated my time to the most pressing set of responsibilities — family, my startup and not much else.
I had been an occasional Skype and Facetime user for many years, but once COVID normalized video conferencing, I developed a Zoom habit and found extraordinary freedom in networking without leaving my home. I talked to potential customers to do market research, connected with experts on strategy, pitched my startup to potential investors and built supportive relationships with other climate entrepreneurs, in geographies from Silicon Valley to Boston. However, despite communicating regularly with people all over the country, I still felt isolated. I chalked it up to being a founder, which is rather a lonely job, and I longed for the opportunity to meet people face-to-face again.
I eventually regained my sense of connection. But it wasn’t simply because of in-person physical interactions. The real key, as I discovered, was investing time and giving back. I brought snacks and volunteered to be a course monitor at my son’s cross-country meets, which connected me with fellow parents as he joined a new high school. I served as a mentor, virtually, for student teams going through the startup accelerator program at my alma mater. I made a major volunteer commitment by agreeing to serve on the board of Greentown Labs, the climatetech incubator that houses my startup. I had heartwarming fun while reading to elementary school kids during Houston Reads Day, an annual project of Literacy Now.
I found that giving back, and often “giving forward,” is the way to strengthen the communities that I participate in. And by doing so, I significantly increased my connectedness to what is important to me. If my startup succeeds in democratizing climate investment, it will be, in part, because of the ways I was sustained during the pandemic by these connections.
Nisha Desai is the founder of Intention, a climate financial technolog y startup.
Reading to explore, to act I have never been to Korea, but reading Juhea Kim’s “Beasts of a Little Land,” I saw the snowy mountains of Manchuria, smelled the perfume trailing behind elegant courtesans in 1920s Pyongyang. I grew up Tejana and Filipina in Uvalde — far from the Brooklyn Puerto Rican diaspora in Xochitl Gonzalez’s “Olga Dies Dreaming” — but now I know the sprawl of fruit stands and sneaker stores on Fifth Avenue in Sunset Park. Even a text or Instagram post connects me in surprising ways to friends and strangers at any given moment. Words can educate
and entertain; they can bind us. But they can also be the beginning. In 2023 I want to read about a place like South Korea, then I want to take another step. Research flights, look up recipes, find the translations for ‘hello, how are you?’ I want to see a text from that friend I’ve been meaning to call, then call.
And when I read about the latest horrific injustice — like the ones that have cut me deeply this year — I will first sit, weep, write. But then I want to rise. Box supplies and raise funds, link arms and march and vote. I hope we always turn to words to connect with others and the world. Read, learn, feel moved. Then look up. Reach out.
Kimberly Garza is the author of “The Last Karankawas.” She is assistant professor of creative
writing and literature at the University of Texas-San Antonio.
Finding one another in nature
Today, across America, folks like you are trekking across mountains, paddling lakes, meandering through prairies and hiking city parks. They are participating in First Day Hikes, a tradition to begin the New Year by spending time in nature. Why? Nature has an ability to heal, to inspire and to reconnect us to each other in an age of jangled nerves, polarizing ideology and multiplying uncertainty.
The pandemic revealed what nature can do to help reduce grinding stress. Millions of us flocked to national, state and local parks. We looked to open spaces for safety, reprogramming life outside in order to be together. We did this almost instinctively as COVID-19 amplified another powerful threat to our society. Increasing feelings of isolation and disconnection contribute to the growing scourge of loneliness — a precursor to many chronic mental and physical illnesses. Recent research has shown that spending time outdoors, even alone, dramatically decreases feelings of loneliness. When visiting nature-rich civic spaces with others, individual feelings of loneliness plummet even further. This suggests that the need to be better connected to other people and to other species is hardwired in us, and nature is the perfect matchmaker.
Nature is a great equalizer and connector — our literal common ground. And she has the power to bring together unlikely allies. Consider the common cause of hunters and birdwatchers protecting wild spaces that support the animals and experiences they treasure.
Nature can also build community at a time where we will sink or swim together. Houston is facing more flooding, blistering heat and poor air and water quality. The inequities that come with these shocks and stresses cause great suffering and supercharge our divisions. When we ponder what our next “moonshot” might be, let’s work together for this. Let’s transform our home into a Garden City.
Jaime González is the Houston Healthy Cities program director of the Nature Conservancy in Texas.
Getting to know Houston
When COVID hit, the bar I own closed for 13 months because it was a difficult time to operate. We had a truck that would deliver drinks to people. The community welcomed us. When I won a James Beard award in 2022, I remembered the love we received from Houston. This city welcomed my family when we immigrated here and it sustained my business during a hard time.
Even for those of us who came out OK, we must allow ourselves some grace and recognize that the world is still healing from a pandemic which isolated everyone. So it’s not a unique problem to our city — it’s one that belongs to every city. Our desire to be connected won’t be replaced by things like social media or technology because they truly don’t fill the tank. As we live more on our phones, live in a city that has no zoning and is far from friendly to pedestrians, the No. 1 thing we must remember is that Houstonians are eager to connect.
We go to great lengths to be connected with others. So, I invite you to get to know Houston again. Go to the Menil Collection, meditate by the Rothko Chapel, keep an eye on Hermann Park’s 26acre development, and check out the programming for Discovery Green. Eat at your favorite restaurant or bar (shameless plug), but don’t just settle for the Instagram photos and liking them. The beauty of the city is still found in the charm and kindness of the people who live in it.
Alba Huerta is the owner of the James Beard-winning cocktail bar, Julep.
Appreciating diverse art
During Hispanic Heritage Month 2022, Houstonians organized over 100 events showcasing Latino art and culture. I’m the chair of the Community Engagement Committee of Advocates of a Latino Museum of Cultural and Visual Arts & Archive Complex in Houston (ALMAAHH). We quantified these events with our 2022 Latino Arts Calendar which demonstrates that there is both a boom in Latino art and that there is a disconnect between our community and the rest of the city. Most folks can’t name even a handful of the events that took place. And that is tragic because art is one of the most profound ways to get to know each other.
Folks might imagine that these events took place in only a few parts of town that are associated with Latino history, such as the East End or Denver Harbor or Magnolia. The events took place all over Houston and surrounding counties stretching from Galveston to Conroe to Baytown to Katy.
Latino artists are creating the works, but non-Latinos might not know where to find these visual artists, writers or actors. Latino arts nonprofits and collectives wonder why more non-Latinos don’t attend or support their events. That is about to change.
We artists, community organizers and activists are uniting with philanthropy to create the language to address this and spark dialogue to devise answers.
As board members of ALMAAHH, visual artist Geraldina Wise and I cowrote a grant for a study and plan that would convey how and where to build a state-ofthe-art Latino Art Complex and its satellites that would serve the needs and dreams of Latinos. Houston Endowment awarded us $1 million to complete the study. We have completed the first year of work, which includes our research from the Latino Arts Calendar, and our board will complete our findings at the end of 2023.
The disconnect between Latinos and the rest of the city is going to change. Only art can save us.
Writer and activist Tony Díaz, El Librotraficante, is the founder and director of Nuestra Palabra: Latino Writers Having Their Say and author of “The Tip of the Pyramid: Cultivating Community Cultural Capital.” He was the first Chicano to earn a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Houston Creative Writing Program.