'Community' means something very different these days. It used to mean the people you saw in person every week, like your neighbours or the regulars at your local. Now it's just as likely to mean a Facebook group with 40,000 members, most of whom will never know your name.
That shift is changing how we feel. We now compare ourselves to thousands of people instead of a few dozen neighbours, and loneliness has become one of the biggest problems of modern life. Around one in 14 adults in England often feel lonely, and young people feel it most. Humans evolved to live in villages of around 150 people, and we believe we should get closer to living like villagers again.
Your brain is built for a village of 150
Humans can only really maintain around 150 meaningful relationships at once. This is known as Dunbar's number, after Oxford anthropologist Robin Dunbar, who found that the bigger a species' brain, the bigger its social group. Every relationship takes brainpower to keep going, because you're not only remembering who someone is but how they feel about you and how they get on with everyone else you know. Our brains can handle that for about 150 people. Past that, we can recognise faces and names, but we struggle to keep up a real relationship with them.
There are layers of friendship within that 150. Your inner circle is around 5 people, usually your best friends or closest family. Then come about 15 good friends and 50 people you'd happily socialise with. The rest of the 150 are people you know by name and would stop for a chat with, like your neighbours or the person who runs your local café. In a village, the outer layers took care of themselves. You saw the same people every week, you knew who to ask for help and they knew they could ask you.
Why is it so hard to live like a villager now?
Modern life spreads us out. We move away for university, then again for work, and more of us work from home than ever before. Around half of Brits don't know their neighbours' names, and one in 20 have never spoken to them at all.
We also need each other a lot less than we used to. Supermarkets and same-day delivery mean you can get almost anything without speaking to anyone - there's no reason to knock next door for a cup of sugar anymore. We've also become a lot more focused on ourselves. We're told to be the main character and optimise everything from our sleep to our morning routine. Even our downtime has gone solo. We used to watch the same news and the same shows. Now we each scroll a feed built just for us. Two people on the same sofa can be watching completely different things.
And the big one... social media. It sold us connection at scale, and it's brilliant for staying up to date with friends in different places. But it also means we know what's happening in the lives of thousands of strangers, from their holidays to their kitchen renovations, and we measure ourselves against all of them when our brains are built to compare with a village of 150. It takes up our time too. UK adults now spend around four and a half hours online every day, and that's time we're not spending with the real people around us.
What actually makes us feel like we belong?
Time spent with people in real life, mostly. One study found it takes around 50 hours for someone to go from acquaintance to casual friend, 90 hours to become friends and over 200 hours to become close friends. Proper quality time with people, in person, is where deep connection is built, and it matters more than almost anything else. Harvard's study of adult development, which has followed people since 1938, found that close relationships were the strongest predictor of a long and healthy life, ahead of money or fame.
The people on the edge of your circle matter too. One study found that people who chatted to their barista left in a better mood and felt more like they belonged than people who just ordered and left. So even if you think you hate small talk, it isn't a waste of time.
Being kind and helping others also boosts a sense of belonging. Doing something for someone else takes your mind off your own worries and reminds you that you're part of something bigger than yourself. It's one of the most reliable mood boosts there is, and research backs it up. People who spend money on others, for example, end up happier than people who spend it on themselves. Belonging isn't only about who shows up for you, it's also about who you show up for.
How to be a villager
Many of us live in large towns or cities, but you don't necessarily need to live in a village to be more 'villager'. You can still build a village-sized circle wherever you live, whether that's a flat in a big city or a new town where you don't know anyone yet. It starts with small, regular habits that put you in front of the same people more often and give you reasons to help each other.
- Join something that repeats Pick one weekly thing, like a running club, a choir, a pub quiz or a pottery class, and stick with it. Seeing the same people every week is the easiest way to build strong new relationships.
- Ask for a favour Borrow a ladder or ask a neighbour to take in a parcel. People are usually very willing to help others, but many of us don't even ask.
- Chat to the regulars Learn the names of your barista and the dog walker you pass every morning. Ask them one more question than you normally would and see where the conversation goes. Be curious. Many people have amazing stories to tell.
- Offer help without being asked Take round leftovers or check in on an older neighbour when the weather turns. You'll get as much out of it as they do.
- Learn your neighbours' names If it's been years and it feels too late to ask, put a note through the door to introduce yourself or invite the street round for a drink. Someone has to go first.
- Turn a group chat into a regular plan Pick the chat you message most and set a standing date, like the first Sunday of the month at the same pub. If it's already in the diary, nobody has to organise it.
- Give your closest people your full attention Spend quality time with your inner circle. Plan time together with your phones away, whether that's a board game night or three nights in a cabin.
Living like a villager doesn't mean ditching your phone or moving to the middle of nowhere. It means giving a bit more of your time to the people you can actually see, and a bit less to the thousands you can't. Start with one name or one regular plan, and build from there.
