What Do We Do Now That We’re Here? is a newsletter that asks how to live a meaningful life in a chaotic and unstable world.
It’s a Substack-featured publication and a Substack Bestseller. It’s also been mentioned in the New York Times, Outside Magazine, and New York Magazine.
Through interviews and essays, it touches on themes including the climate crisis, society’s meta-crisis, personal development, spirituality, mental health, connection to the natural world, physical embodiment, recovering from overachievement, and more. But on a deeper level, it’s about an idea that connects all those themes: Most of the things we need to do to heal the planet and our society are the same things that would heal ourselves.
Burnout, loneliness, inequality, divisiveness, struggling to make ends meet in a hyper-individualist culture, anxiety and depression on a scale we haven’t seen before. These things feel like they’ve become the hallmarks of modern life, not the exceptions on the margins. The mistake lies in seeing all those problems — the climate crisis and the crises in our own personal lives — as separate. The value system that is failing the planet is the same one that is failing us.
Therein lies a hopeful message. Rather than seeing a slower, less convenient, more sustainable life as the price we must pay to preserve our planet’s future, we should see it as a welcome invitation. Because as it turns out, what’s good for the planet is good for us, too.
About me
I’m Rosie J Spinks, a writer based in the UK. For ten years I was a journalist whose work was published in places like The Guardian, Quartz, VICE, NPR, Sierra, Outside magazine, Wall Street Journal, Pacific Standard, Lucky Peach and others. My reporting career was varied: I aggressively covered the lack of regulation in the cruise industry; questioned the impacts of “live like a local” travel; chronicled gentrification in east London; covered the weird world of wellness, from Instagram life coaches to “all natural” birth control — and lots more. One of the most popular stories I’ve ever written (and my personal favorite) is about why we don’t squat more.
I started this newsletter in 2016 as a form of self promotion for my journalism work. Over time, it’s because something else entirely—and the primary home for my personal writing. I hope you enjoy it.
If you’d like to hire me for writing, ghostwriting, editing, or editorial consulting, please visit: rojospinks.com or email rosiespinks [at] gmail [dot] com.
