Walking in Broad Ripple this Saturday evening, I noticed several work vehicles, U-Hauls in driveways with people preparing to either move in or out of their homes; renovation signs in front yards; children playing football in the street. I enjoy seeing people connecting with each other and creating together: working side-by-side, weeding gardens, roofing projects, renovating houses. It's my experience that creating and collaborating brings a deeper connection within ourselves individually, in our families, within our communities, the nation, and the world.

Growing up in a family with six children, there were several projects in progress and a good dose of conflict on a daily basis. My mother often said "Can you just get along?"; this was a question that I often pondered as I examined the relationships of my friends and their siblings for clues or confirmation that it wasn't possible. Ultimately, I found myself simply carving out my own space in my bedroom literally by laying tape across the floor to mark my territory. No one was allowed to cross the taped line without consequence.

"Can you just get along?" changed to "How can we get along", then to "How do we truly connect with one another?" I worked at a company with a husband and wife co-owner team at the time and wondered how they could spend so much time with one another? How were they able to build a successful company together and spend nearly every moment together? I was determined to find the recipe for this success because I knew, even then, that prosperity and fulfillment comes from figuratively pulling the tape off the floor, thus removing the borders that separate one from another.

People working together successfully to accomplish a common goal like what I saw on Saturday night, requires a generosity of spirit and the willingness to reach for deeper levels of relating. Whenever conflict arises in the journey toward the goal, it signals the need for deeper understanding of the self; of the others. It is through the experience of working through conflict that greater levels of harmony and peace can be discovered.

A powerful key to deeper connection is one that I learned as a brand new student in the School of Metaphysics. It's a concept called Self-Respect. Many think, as I did, that self-respect is another word for dignity, or self-esteem, or self-value. I learned that self-respect means to look at the self again. The "spect" in "re-spect" means "to look" and "re" means again. Because we see each other through the lens of our own eyes, the first step to connecting more deeply with another is not to attempt to change the other, it's to see ourselves within the mirror of another. It's a calling to look within ourselves; to renovate and improve our own thinking. It's a calling to become the change we're wishing to see in the other. By causing the change within ourselves, the world around us begins to change. It's magical then how our dignity, self-esteem and self-value increases as we do.

So, for example, when I'm in the company of someone who never listens to what I say, and I'm bothered by this, it's at this time that I'm reminded to be a good listener and perhaps even improve upon the skill of listening. I can be what I want the other person to be, and then the relationship changes.

When we take on projects, whether they be renovating a house, or coming together to build a secure and prosperous future, we are creating something greater within ourselves, our families, our communities. It is in being willing to give to a greater degree, and to nurture change within ourselves, that we begin to erase the borders that separate us and greater fulfillment is discovered.