Social support - team up with someone to achieve a goal

I just read about an interesting idea, to find someone (can be online, if you don't have a real life person) to check in on each other in order to achieve a goal. It's best if goals of both people are somewhat similar, but not necessarily. Someone commented on this idea, that it helps to nurture deep friendships between adults, as they support each other through hard times.
I imagine we could do something like that here on permies?
For example, I have a rather soonish writing goal to do (I need to finish something till the end of January) which is overwhelmingly huge, and of course reality isn't helping by throwing random unexpected stuff at me just now.
Also, I have a different, much more pleasant goal which I have been planning for years but never got around to doing it - to make a personalized, handmade calendar. I know I have to start in January or so, to finish it by December ;) so if I do it this year, it would be a calendar for 2023.
Cool thing about it is that such person doesn't have to be geographically close, and getting the support from someone real instead of an app is so much more human.

Year before last I lost most of my garden area to 'zone enforcement' from the county. I have a neighbor down the street who loves to garden but sprays weed killer regularly. The garden there was slowly dying. We had found years ago that we have very different political opinions among many others and basically stopped talking to one another.

So I went outside of my comfort zone last year and presented an offer. The garden there needs to be brought back to life. I need a place to put my wonderful compost I had made. We both want a place to plant seeds that actually works and makes things better in general.

The garden now is full of plants in an all year rotation. No more weed killer needs to be sprayed. The wonder of life has been brought back for us all to enjoy. Bees , birds, butterflies, worms and even bugs on the plants have returned. But it all brought a chance for us to see that working together through diversity is what makes life flourish. The next yard over has chickens now and I have a beehive I plan to populate this spring.

Even if we come to a problem from different ways we usually want to achieve the same goals. We need each other to do these things.

I once helped an ex friends sister open a book store after she lost her husband. The family had lost the grandfather the year before. They were falling apart from loss of guidance perhaps. Once we set the goal of opening the store front it brought the kids focus to doing something useful. They could see the importance of their place in the family. Their community came out to support them and i think they all learned a lot about working together and the rewards of effort.

So, while life throws stuff at us to deal with...  how can we support one another here ?
We can broadcast our plans for others to hear (read) even if we don't know who's receiving.
We can then perhaps report our progress along the way as we make steps towards our goals.
We can be open to and listen for others who are working towards their things and maybe even find alignment with one another.
We can even share unexpected findings along the way. It might help someone in what their doing.  

Flora Eerschay wrote:I just read about an interesting idea, to find someone (can be online, if you don't have a real life person) to check in on each other in order to achieve a goal. It's best if goals of both people are somewhat similar, but not necessarily.

Someone commented on this idea, that it helps to nurture deep friendships between adults, as they support each other through hard times.

I imagine we could do something like that here on permies?  

In a way, I feel that this is what the forum is all about.

Your topic reminded me of this thread:

https://permies.com/t/172553/skills-inherit-property/SKIP-Club-BB-Week

Maybe your topic might be a good place to start doing something like this or even start a new topic for a Support Club or Support Team.

Anne Miller wrote:
In a way, I feel that this is what the forum is all about.

I agree. There is encouragement, idea sharing, problem solving, and inspiration here, things that keep me moving my life towards my goals in an upward spiral. Just hanging out for a while and reading other Permies' conversations each morning gives me plenty to think about for the rest of the day.

This topic on social support reminds me of the post I was guided to about networking with "Accountability Partners" for achieving your Permaculture goals for your property, based on the Building Your Permaculture Property book:  https://permies.com/t/161707/permaculture-projects/Building-Permaculture-Property-Accountability-Group

It's often hard to share our attempts (especially when they don't succeed the way we had hoped) with others whom we might fear are judging our imperfections and/or idiosyncratic ways of doing things. This has kept me from trying to find a new Accountability Partner, after my first choice a few weeks ago didn't work out. But I must try again. Anyone cheering us on as we work on our goals will, of course, think and do things differently than we do--but that is a benefit for us, really.  So I will try again, and see if anyone else in Appalachia/7b needs someone for personalized social support!  

i am dreaming of and started a foodforest here in South Texas zone 10. I am renting 3 acres with a hudge pond or cut off part of the Rio Grande. Nice weather in winter, things grow fast here. Also have land in Central California where i planted more than 400 trees and a strawbale greenhouse cause it freezes there most nights 25 F. So i would like people who would come and visit and participate. There is a nice house and room for a camper or trailer or yurt or dome?. one third of the land is forest where could hide a trailer or so in there. A banana circle shower is one thing i saw my friends have and i would love that as i find out with my first banana trees that they need to be watered 3 times a week and the feel of showering in there is great. Like sleeping in my strawbale greenhouse for my friends who slept in there was what they so much wanted and had fun with. So a small community of creative permies would fit here. we have wifi and electricity and central heating and cooling and nice shower here in the house. For now i feel like a migrating gardener planting trees  in 2 climates. I am reading up on cooking with cassava, Acerola cherries, guava etc. Planting mango and papaya etc. If you like that sort of thing please repond. I have been a licensed acupuncturist for 30 years and believe people in need of healing are helped by being in nature.

I had an accountability partner for building my tiny house for a number of months. And I have number of spiritual partners. All these people are on the phone, and I've never met them in person. It's important that we be on the same page about what we are looking for from a partner. For instance, some people want advice, or comments on their situation, and others do not. And sometimes I do and sometimes I do not. A common phrase that we use is - thank you for sharing, you were heard. If we want to comment on someone's share, we ask if we can cross talk, or we ask if they would like any advice. Not letting cross talk and advice giving be regular features of a share allows me to get anything I want to off my chest - fears, anxieties, worry about doing things wrong, worry about judgment, etc.

My building accountability partner and I spoke 20 or 30 minutes in the morning for a number of months. Then, her building had to stop due to contractor and weather issues and she no longer wanted to talk on a regular basis. Perhaps in part because my project is going just fine, though slowly, and she is feeling very down about her situation.

I would love to have a weekly permaculture partner. I've got many possible projects that I would enjoy discussing or running by someone else who is into permaculture in a large landscape. For example, at the moment I've got cedar trees to cut down and I'm debating what to do with the larger ones. As with any new endeavor, I find it helpful to have a cheerleader, especially if they're taking similar steps or have done such things themselves. Feel free to purple moosage me if you want to explore the possibility of being permaculture phone partners.

Great thread - thanks!