Greetings Kindista community,

I’m finding myself questioning whether it makes sense for me to keep Kindista going. We need help. I’m asking you, the Kindista community, to step up and make sure Kindista continues to be a resource to support sharing and community in Eugene and beyond.

The purpose of Kindista is to enable and inspire stronger communities of interdependence, and to further CommonGoods Network’s mission:

”To foster networks of trust and facilitate the sharing of knowledge, abilities, and physical resources; to transform communities and engender a sustainable and harmonious world.”

When met with abundant support, individual and collective efforts towards giving can flourish with a sense of ease and joy. But I can’t do this on my own anymore.

This is a make-or-break time for Kindista. We will not have the personnel to continue beyond this year unless members of the community bring new energy and dedication to the organization.

I am proud of the impact Kindista has had in Eugene. It has facilitated the sharing of thousands of gifts since Nicholas Walker and I created it back in 2012-13, and people continue to use it every day.

Many of our world’s most pressing problems could be solved if we all learned how to share better. We currently have three times as many vacant homes in the U.S. as there are homeless people. And globally we throw away more than twice as much food as it would take to feed all of the world’s hungry. And of course, our impact on the Earth would be significantly less if we consumed and manufactured less by sharing more.

However I have to be honest with myself, the growth of Kindista’s usership hasn’t yet lived up to my dreams. I hoped it would spread into a global movement and enable a cultural shift towards sharing, kindness, and connection. Kindista has needed a solid team to make that happen. And though I devoted extraordinary effort to build such a team, I have thus far been unsuccessful.

And so today, after seven years, Kindista remains a niche sharing network in Eugene.

I’m willing to keep the site going as long as we have an active user base, a supportive board and executive director, enough money in the bank, and as long as maintaining the site doesn’t take an unsustainable amount of my energy. But without the support we need, Kindista may shut down at the end of the year.

If you want to seek Kindista continue, please consider joining our team. Our most basic needs in order for us to keep Kindista going are at least three additional Board Members and a new Executive Director for our non-profit, CommonGoods Network.

What’s your mission? Might CommonGoods Network be an organization you’d like to help shape?

In addition to Kindista, here are some of the projects CommonGoods Network has been working on over the past year:

• Puerto Rico Community Service
• Design & Prototype of Biochar Kilns
• Community support for San Clemente Village, Ecuador
• Domestic Violence Prevention in Ecuador
• Wiñaypaq School and PorEso! in Peru

I really want to see Kindista thrive. And for that to happen we need your help in filling the following volunteer roles:

• Kindista Program Director
• Volunteer Coordinator
• Event Organizer
• Grant Writer
• Community Outreach volunteers
• Member Support Specialist
• Communications and Social Media Guru
• Additional software engineers

If you don’t have time to get involved but you want Kindista to continue, please consider making a one-time or monthly donation. Smaller contributions will help pay for our server fees. Larger contributions will help us incentivize our volunteer roles.

With your help we can take Kindista to the next level and grow the culture of connection, sharing, and kindness.

In gratitude, Benjamin