“We passed beneath a flowering lilac, its purple cones drooping low enough to graze my cheek like cool, velvety fingers. The sweet, crisp scent lingered in my nose even as we rode on." -- Sarah J. Maas

On a zoom call yesterday, I was asked to show an object that represented something I valued. I shared the lilac that demanded our attention with it's scent and value of nature. This week's blog is full of lilac infusion and zoom a-has.

Acknowledge Earth Is Our Home

LILACS!

My absolute favorite flower.

They left an imprint on me from an early age.

On the farm I grew up on in rural Minnesota, we had a whole row along between the gravel road and our house.

2 stories tall.

Excellent winter wind break.

And some say, each one was planted over an old outhouse hole when it got full and needed to move it.

No matter what fertilized it, I remember picking them with absolute delight.

Creating very unorganized boquets.

Putting them in vases.

Smelling them in deeply.

Their deep fragrance lures me in (100% willingly) every spring.

And by the time returned from 2 weeks in Atlanta, they were in full bloom here in Portland.

I've gone on walks each day just to sniff around the neighborhood.

Taking in each moment even as they start to wither already for the season.

Discover Your Earth Archetype

A conversation that I am having a lot these days and in fact just had on Tuesday on a zoom call...

"I feel like I am all 5 of them at some point," I heard from a new friend as I explained the 5 Earth Archetypes.

"Absolutely!" I replied.

"The intent is never to put anyone in a box. In the realm of education, we talk about scaffolding. It's a way to provide structure for people learning something from the first time. Kinda like learning the rules and then breaking them to create something new."

"Just like Love Languages, we may cycle through all 5 in any given day. But also just like the Love Languages, they help us define a spectrum and see ourselves with tendencies towards 1 or 2. Plus, for anyone learning for the first time that we love in different ways, the Love Languages give us a great starting point. Same with the Earth Archetypes. If the idea that we are in a relationship with the climate is new to you, the types provide a great introduction to a spectrum. And now that these "rules" are so well known, people "break" them all the time. Arianna Grande wrote a song about them. My niece says that our family's love language is sarcasm. With the basic concept known, we can play with it."

"There's also this thing called the 5 Erotic Blueprints. These help us see a spectrum of ways we experience turn on. Two of them are seen as the common ones -- ones that we expect based on how the erotic is taught to us. But for all the people that experience the other 3, it's can be such a delight to learn more about them, feel validates, and further inhabit them."

"The Earth Archetypes are similar. YES! We need the science and the tech (Molecules), but we also need the systems thinkers (Network), organizers (Weavers), artists (Metaphors), and mystics (Embodiment)."

"And as a huge bonus, the 5 Earth Archetypes make great characters to put in different combinations and scenarios. They can be you. They can be your friends. And friendships are the #1 way to create climate action."

What's YOUR Earth Archetype?

Work Together in Community

I got another great insight on this this week during yet another zoom call.

But this time it's about when we work together even with people who have the same Earth Archetypes.

Me and this lovely human who feels Embodiment and Metaphor fit her were getting deep into the types and what they represent.

She was very much aligned with the concept that climate is a relationship. In fact, she's preparing a workshop with a photographer to highlight how he experiences this and then opening it up to the audience to explore.

So we bantered ideas back and forth. She asked tons of great questions.

And then I shared a new page I've added to my pitch deck for "How on Earth?" that gives demographic descriptors and photos for both the audience and the protagonists (that way the audience sees themselves in the people onscreen).

And she got a bit stuck on one of the descriptors. "Bed rot."

Now for those of you who haven't heard, it's a term that came about via TikTok a couple years ago but has skyrocketed recently -- even officially being added to dictionaries. Even coaches selling online say things like, "If you are doing more than 1 day of bed rot a week...."

It's a thing.

Now, we all can certainly benefit from a good "mental health day." I remember planning for these all the way back to when I was a public school teacher. The Monday after we opened a play, you could be certain, I'd have a substitute.

But that was before cell phones (GASP!). And I often found myself in nature.

Nowadays, I too enjoy a good bed rot.

And the person I was having the zoom call with had a good point, some people with different health issues, may have several of these days.

But where the convo continued is what intrigues me.

I said, "Absolutely!"

And she emphasized that we need empathy/sympathy for all.

Then here's the kicker! This compassion is how she found her way to climate as a relationship.

And the a-ha happened for me. Origin stories for those who create things often have a big effect on their creations. In fact, these stories are well known marketing tools -- to show that we've been there too and here is how we found our way out.

Me on the other hand? My upbringing was pretty intense. I joined a second family as a teen. And as a result, a key aspect to my personality is that I'm pretty blunt about how I see things.

For example, part of the reason I loved teaching middle school when most people don't is because I accept 1 fact above all else. They are whacked. Everything they knew is changing -- bodies, brains, friends, responsibilities. How could they NOT be whacked. But for some people this feels harsh to express it this way.

And it seemed to be the case with this person -- despite my attempts to express how wonderful it is that we are both working in this realm of climate = relationship. Of the millions (perhaps even billions) of people that need to hear the message, some will need to hear it with her compassion and some from my no-BS method. And yet even more with need another pathway.

However, I don't think she ever quite got a sense of what I was saying.

What do you think? Do you see how both (and more!) are needed? How would you have expressed it?