Sweet nothings
Helping Friendly Newsletter, 04.18.25
Every other Friday, I share 5 things to consider. On the Fridays between, I mix things up. This is a Friday between.
GM! ☕️
Just 1 thing today…
How do you love a planet?
What does it look like to lavish attention and care on a river, a warbler, or a walrus? To call the earth not only home, or mother, but also beloved?
This may sound poetic, but it’s also practical.
I want to know, what is the work? The craft, the technique, the daily practice? If loving the planet became our central mission, how would our minds and muscles engage?1
“Love is an action, never simply a feeling.”
There is no single, simple answer. Though we’re in this together, the embodiment of love looks entirely unique for each individual. That diversity is beautiful and necessary.
To ask “How do I love?” is to inquire “Who am I?”
and to know that every honest answer is valid.
More than valid. Every answer is essential.
You are essential.
Not an improved or perfected version of you. Not an idealized good person who lives in the future, or a memory of you who thrived in the past. Certainly not a superhero, who always feels strong and never needs sleep. None of that.
Just you.
Right here, right now.
You, today, are essential.
Together, we could love this place whole.
“To love is good, too, for love is difficult…that is perhaps the most difficult thing required of us, the utmost and final test, the work for which all other work is but a preparation. With our whole being, with all the strength we have gathered, we must learn to love. This learning is ever a committed and enduring process.”
Peep my journal
Here’s a vision of loving the planet that I sketched for myself:
This is a brainstorm and an invitation, not a resume or a to-do list.
(Nor is it a prescription, though you’re welcome to steal what you like.)
It’s a dream job, and I can see myself in it. And some of this is happening, albeit slowly. Most of all, I can trace a glimmer of focus, which is very, very welcome.
The mind-map framework was helpful here, and I do recommend it for gathering disparate ideas. It’s also simple to make: write a question in the middle of a piece of paper, draw a circle around it, and follow your stream of thought.
Easy peasy.
Case study
When a musician loves the planet, it sounds something like this:
ICYMI, in my last issue I shared 5 Things to Consider: staggered breathing, a challenging read, trust, friendship, and belonging.
Thank you for reading! This newsletter is a labor of love. 💌 To support it, you can upgrade to a paid subscription, share this post, or engage my services. You can learn more about my work at jenniferlphillips.com.
Happy Passover, Happy Easter, and Happy Earth Day to all who observe!
Peace,
Jenny
P.S. they really do 👇
Expanding on the succinct bell hooks quote above: “To begin by always thinking of love as an action rather than a feeling is one way in which anyone using the word in this manner automatically assumes accountability and responsibility. We are often taught we have no control over our ‘feelings.’ Yet most of us accept that we choose our actions, that intention and will inform what we do. We also accept that our actions have consequences. To think of actions shaping feelings is one way we rid ourselves of conventionally accepted assumptions such as that parents love their children, or that one simply ‘falls’ in love without exercising will or choice, that there are such things as "crimes of passion," i.e. he killed her because he loved her so much. If we were constantly remembering that love is as love does, we would not use the word in a manner that devalues and degrades its meaning.” (bell hooks, All About Love)