MARCH 2023

Genie Thoughtalini

March 2023

This month I have LOVE on the mind. What is LOVE? Philosophy claims there are three main kinds of love: Philia, Eros & Agape. Eros may be the most familiar to us in the modern West in terms of romantic love, but it's more related to passion and desire. This can certainly manifest outside of a romantic space and doesn't have to be strictly "erotic" in the way we understand that today.

Philia, the opposite of phobia, roughly translates to "feeling friendly toward". Aristotle believed in different types of friendship based on the motive behind them, including utility, pleasure and the good. I like this because it extends the idea of friendship beyond what we generally percieve now, reserved only for a few. He also claims that the object of philia, the other, is truly "another oneself" and therefore you must first experience self-philia, a love for the self. This does not, however suggest egoism, but instead a virtousness and compassion.

Lastly, often associated with Christianity, agape is a love that extends far behind Eros or Philia, and manifests as a sacrificial love, given regardless of circumstance, silmiar to Loving Kindness found in Buddhist thought. One aspect of agape that fascinates me is its ability to CREATE, to give such a pure love to another transfers such a great energy that it CREATES something within them, similar to a parents love for a child as they raise it INTO an adult.

How do you experience these different kinds of loves in your relationships? Are there other forms of love that you feel? It is such an amorphous emotional & physical experience, leading to joy, pain, regret, hope..... will science ever be able to show us the physical form of such emotions? I'd love to look at my heartbreak and desire under a microscope someday.

Community Update

I'm writing this in advance so that I can post the newsletter etc despite being on vacation. Hopefully by the time you're reading this I will have successfully streamed from Japan and will be on my way to South Korea! I am very excited to see how the international IRL streams are going to go~ I wonder what delicious food I will be eating and what sights & sounds will spark my curiosity. I am hoping this extended break will give me the spirit to continue working hard & improving the energies around me.

I plan for March to be another successful month of themes, goofing around, connecting to one another, perhaps even finishing THE CITY in the minecraft server? Every week is a new set of experiences and I'm so grateful for all of you that not only support me but participate in our little discord and twitchverse antics. 🥰 I am behind on the raffles, but this month will include a special surprise from Japan/Korea!!! Stay tuned~