I have permission to hype her, so obviously I’m going to. 😂❤️ Just over a week ago, @Lisa Vanderveen opened the doors to Kingdom Peace & Prosperity. If you’ve been following along, you know Lisa has been BUILDING. 😂 She’s been experimenting, changing things, following ideas, having conversations, and creating something that feels very much like HER. And today... SOMEONE PAID TO BE IN THE ROOM!!! 🎉🥳❤️ KPP officially has its first paying member. Lisa, I know you have BIG dreams for what you’re building, but I hope you stop and enjoy this one. Because there’s only ever ONE first paying member. ❤️ Someone saw what you’re creating and said... Yep. I want in. THAT deserves a celebration. Congratulations, Lisa!!! 🎉❤️🥳

They found the trail. They made it inside. Now think about the early experience of a new member. What is the first thing you hope happens for them that makes joining feel worthwhile? And then take one more step: What in your community helps make that happen? Maybe you know because you've actually seen it happen. Maybe you're realizing you're not quite sure yet. Either answer is useful. Still building? Think about the first meaningful experience you want to create for your future members. What do you notice? 🔬🐼

There's a bamboo that spends years doing what looks like nothing. You plant it, you water it, you tend it, and for a long time, the surface stays empty. No stem. No height. Nothing you can point to. If you didn't know better, you'd swear it was failing. And then, in a single season, it shoots up dozens of feet. Fast, tall, unmistakable. Here's what most people miss, though. It wasn't doing nothing all those quiet years. It was going down before it ever went up, building a root system so deep and so wide that when the growth finally came, the plant could handle it. It could shoot up that fast and stand that tall precisely because of the years nobody clapped. The invisible work was the whole point. Fast growth with no roots topples. Slow growth with deep roots lasts. Here's what I keep wondering. What if the same thing is true of a community? What if the slow build isn't the lesser version of growth, but the richer one? Think about what happens underground when a community grows slowly. People actually get to know each other. Trust has time to form. Members grow into real leaders instead of just early numbers. The foundation gets strong before the weight arrives. I've watched it happen in this space. Members connecting deeply, staying through the slow stretches, still learning, and asking and helping, not building alone. That's not the sad version of slow growth. That's roots forming. The kind you cannot rush and cannot fake. Take a look at your own community for a second, especially if it feels slow right now. What if the quiet isn't the absence of growth, but the location of it? What if, under the surface where you can't see, the roots are going deep enough to hold everything that's coming? The members who are quietly becoming loyal, the trust forming one honest conversation at a time. So here's what I'll leave you to ponder. What roots do you think are forming in your community right now, in the quiet, that you won't see the full worth of until much later?

I shared a shorter version of this somewhere else this morning, but I kept thinking about it. Because I realized something. Some of the most valuable things you’ve shared with us haven’t been polished wins. They’ve been things like... “I tried this. It didn’t work.” “I thought I wanted this, but now I’m not so sure.” “Here’s what my members are actually doing.” “Something feels off, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.” And occasionally... “I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing next.” 😂 I’m also grateful for the quieter people here, too. The ones reading. Watching. Thinking. Trying something in their own community. Taking what they need and leaving what they don’t. Maybe you rarely comment. Maybe we have no idea what you’re experimenting with behind the scenes. You’re part of this, too. ❤️ Participation doesn’t always look like posting. And the conversations we DO get to have have changed some of our thinking, too. There are things Todd and I were pretty sure about when we started Skoolology that we see differently now. Things we’ve changed. Things we’ve simplified. Things we thought mattered that turned out not to matter nearly as much as something else. And I’m quite sure there are still things we’re wrong about. 😂🤫🔬 Maybe that’s one of the things I love most about treating Skoolology as a research lab. We can have hypotheses. We can bring our experience. We can study what seems to work. But then real people enter the room. And we have to pay attention. Building WITH people doesn’t mean doing everything everyone asks. It means letting what we learn from people influence what we build next. That requires us to listen. To notice. To question our assumptions. And sometimes to say, “Well... apparently THAT wasn’t it.” 😂 So today I’m grateful for all of you. The people who share the messy middle. The people who ask the awkward questions. The people who challenge an idea or tell us when something isn’t working. The people who let us peek behind their builds.

You don't have to own the community to help build it. Today we're celebrating someone who helped us remember that. @Kathy Adams ❤️ If you've been around Skoolology for a while, you've probably encountered Kathy. Maybe she welcomed you when you first arrived. Maybe she left a thoughtful comment on something you shared. Maybe she celebrated one of your wins. Or maybe she simply showed up at the right moment and reminded you that somebody was paying attention. Kathy doesn't currently own a community. But make no mistake. Kathy is a community builder. When I asked her what she hopes people feel because she was part of their community experience, she said: “I hope people feel like they have come away a bit more hopeful or at least knowing that they have someone else who believes in them.” And I thought... Yep. That's Kathy. ❤️ Because she doesn't just say that's what she wants people to feel. We've watched her do it. Again and again. Kathy shared something else with me while we were preparing her spotlight. In 2004, her youngest son, Gregory, was given a fourth-grade Mother's Day assignment. The essays were submitted to their local newspaper, and his was one of ten chosen for publication. His word for his mom? PASSIONATE. He wrote that she cared about animals, people, and all living things. And if somebody had a problem, his mom knew the answer. Kathy framed that little newspaper clipping. Twenty-two years later, it still hangs in her living room. I love that. Because all those years ago, her son noticed something about his mom that we're still seeing today. She cares about people. And today, the woman who is so often busy noticing everybody else gets to be the one we notice. 🌟 When I first asked Kathy to be a Headliner, she wasn't sure she was the right person for the “assignment.” Kathy, you were exactly the right person. Because you helped us put words around something important: Community isn't built by the owner alone.