Personal and community sustainability

Many community members reduce their community involvements as they move through midlife. This may be true for community psychologists as well. Yet research evidence suggests that-intellectually, at least-we can function at or near peak levels through our 80s and 90s. How then might we best sustain ourselves and our work through our entire lives? Answers may lie in full exercise of all capacities, in strong support networks, and in actions that meet one's deeper needs, ''the needs of the soul.'' These same principles may sustain community life as well, for some key principles of personal and community sustainability may be similar Applications of these ideas to communities and to community psychology are discussed.