October 2024 Community Update!

Dear Community,

How is it that October is already here?! The fall always seems to fly by for me.

I have been thinking about our community a lot. It was spurred by our response to winning the leadership excellence award. I could feel our collective pride in winning it. Like, hey we are working hard and doing a good job here and some experts noticed!

We’ve been quietly at work in our corner of the Internet. Laying down one brick after another. Leaning in when someone is struggling. Lifting them up and in turn being lifted up when we are struggling. Brick by brick we are building a safe haven. The old saying ‘Actions speak louder than words’ keeps cropping up in my thinking. We are not big talkers, we are big doers. We show up, roll up our sleeves, and get to work. 

And I think that is what people feel / sense about us when they join our community. It is our collective essence or the animating spirit that drives us forward. You can see it in our values, you can see it in the thousands of people listened to each day, or a forum post, but underlying all of these expressions is a strong community filled with compassion. The behaviors are an expression of that heart.

I’m still working on finding the right words to point to what I’m trying to articulate here. It is a bit slippery. I hope you get the sense of where I’m pointing to or what I’m trying to highlight.

More clearly, I’m incredibly proud of all of you and the work we’ve done. We have collectively built a great culture that brings healing and growth to millions. How beautiful! And shout out to @evelynerose for 11 years of dedicated service to our community!

H

Happy October (my favorite month)! I hope yours will bring you all the goodness and triumphs you’re anticipating!

We're actively looking for Verified Listeners to help support our brand-new members 1:1 with personalized greetings. Think of it like a 24/7 virtual concierge service providing coverage to ensure every newbie is seen and guided into our community. If this sounds interesting please consider joining our Welcome Committee and making a real impact (all the info here).

If you’re a member looking for a new listener or a listener looking for new members to support, I’d like to direct you to our Listener Classifieds post! Listeners, please leave your information in the thread for members to find you. I will be making a fresh new post each month to stay current on support availability.

And lastly, for the teen side, the Kahoots Team is looking for dedicated individuals to ensure Hosts follow all team protocols and guidelines during sessions. The Kahoot Sessions Team Supervisor plays a key role in ensuring everything runs smoothly! Find the details here.

Laiba

In academy news, we introduced a new elective and honors option across all academy programs. The purpose of doing so is to create more external content that can educate people outside 7 Cups about the opportunities available at 7 Cups Academy. Now all academy trainees/interns can choose to write about their program if interested. You can read more here

On the forum workshop series front, our Conquering Your Goals series has come to a wrap! You have until October 6 to complete participation. You can learn more here. After fulfilling all requirements, all those who submit the form on or before Oct 6 will receive a certificate for the series. 

Our academy polls continue in academy sub-coms. You can join the tag list to be tagged in the master post! 

Lastly we updated our academy notion pages for Internship, LDP and QLP. You can find them here. 

Obs

In September, Group support organized Gratitude Week and I am thankful to the community for practicing gratitude. It is an essential aspect of our well-being. Join the “ThankYouChain” and take a moment to be grateful for all we have.  Also, we made a few changes to the Exploration Garden sessions to promote a more focused exploration environment. 

We also released the Teen Transition FAQs that cover the most common questions and their responses. If you know someone about to transition or transition as an adult, this resource will be helpful for them.

And, lastly, I appreciate all the participants for their support and empowerment in the Loneliness Guided Discussions. Loneliness Support Chat is open for support every Monday and Tuesday. 

SoulfullyAButterfly

September involved great content for self-care awareness month. Our “Be Well Bingo” game is a great way to challenge yourself to explore daily ways to practice self-care. We also published an expert article featuring a guide on self-care.  

I am also thrilled to announce our biweekly newsletter called Empathy Express - you can sign up here. This newsletter will include content by the community, for the community.

Lastly, our Wellness Accountability Huddles have gotten great interest and will be launched during the first week of October. Closed groups and connections hold good experiences and wellbeing progress and we hope to announce them for several other topics.

Evelyne

We have been doing exciting things on the quality front. 

Safety Team: Hosted 3 discussions, 7 new SP team members, 1 new SO team member, and 59 safety outreaches were conducted. They announced a new discussions schedule, so quite a busy and eventful month! 

Listener Coaching Team has been doing great this month. We exceeded our monthly goal, a Trainee graduated, a new Teen Trainee just started their training month.

Anna has been working on the QM team. We've onboarded 6 new QMs, she’s got a new PA (@Fueschin) and focused on check-ins with our QM's.

The Care Team has been continuously growing! We have welcomed back @ChillingRain and welcomed our newest teen member, @izzyy528 to the team! The team has continued to stay ✨refreshed✨ by completing a refresher quiz and we are planning on hosting a meeting and some fun activities soon! We are also working on setting up a monthly meeting for Care Team to increase communication and team building! Please reach out to @Snowtabby or @LittleBirdie30 if you have any questions or if you're interested in joining the team!

Interested in getting involved? Contact @annasilverberg for QM information. 

CheeryMango

We are currently looking for new additions to join our Communities Leadership Team as Project Agents. There are currently four focuses available for you to choose from: Events, Engagement, Community Building and Leadership. The application form and full details of what we are looking for can be found here. 

A friendly reminder for all forum supporters, community mentors and community mentor leaders are asked to fill out the Subcommunity Leadership Check-In Form for the month of September  so we can keep updated on what’s going on in your team and roles and see how we can offer our assistance. 

Lastly, if you notice or experience any difficulties while using the forums, please help us to track and report any bugs in this thread. A gentle reminder when reporting bugs or issues, please give as much detail like time and location as to where it was experienced and include screenshots or any error codes so we can properly investigate it. Thank you for your continued support and here’s to what the new month brings.