What I Learned About Love from a 7th Grade Science Fair Project

I don’t know if you have ever participated in a science fair project, either your own or helping one of your kids with theirs. I recall as a child one of the most difficult tasks was to come up with a topic. My science fair projects paled in comparison to some of the other kids who created elaborate things that moved or volcanos that blew up. This year I had the opportunity to participate in a 7th grade science fair project.

My fears of a lackluster topic choice loomed large. I found myself back in 7th grade all over again. It is interesting how we revisit our childhood as the kids we love explore theirs! Not having a clue where to begin, we both began scanning the internet for possible ideas. Then we came across a one sentence question that sparked our curiosity. Does music help plants grow?

Inspired by that idea, and wanting to make the experiment our own, we changed the topic a bit and set out to discover if talking to and loving a plant love could help it grow. Taking it a step further we decided to see if loving a plant could also impact the growth of the plant next to it, and if isolation had a negative impact on growth. We felt good about the choice we made and set to work. We purchased 5 plants. Same type. Same size.

We placed two plants of the plants side by side. They were to be our baseline. We isolated one plant so that it was completely separated from all the others, and placed the two experiment plants side by side. We choose one plant to talk to and give love to twice per day, once in the morning, and once in the evening. As the experiment went on, we touched the plant, told her we loved her and also invited her to love the plant next to her. We conducted the experiment over a four week period of time.

Here’s what happened: The plant we loved, never lost a leaf or flower, nor did the plant next to it. These plants began growing new leaves at a rate that exceeded the two baseline plants and the isolated one. Their leaves were green and healthy. They had an expanded type of growth, with their “arms” (stems) extending their reach. It was like they were stretching.

The baseline plants did well enough. They lost some of their flowers and leaves as would be expected. They grew at a decent rate, but their leaf “arms” were not expanding out in the same way as the experiment plants. The isolated plant had the most yellowing leaves, dropped some flowers, and grew the slowest. Its “arms” were not at all extended and remained very close to the center of the plant. All plants were given equal amounts of water and light.

There were two interesting factors: the plant we loved sprouted many new leaves, remained very green, stretched out and never lost a flower. The most interesting thing was the growth of the plant next to the one we loved (pictured on the righthand side above.) This plant’s growth was very similar to the plant we were loving, in fact, it’s growth was slightly more then the loved plant, sprouting more flowers and a few more leaves as well.

I began to reflect upon how much we don’t understand about the nature of how things work, especially love.

Here is another interesting side benefit: In the moments we focused on giving love to the plant, which entailed say, “I love you. You are beautiful. You are growing so much. Wow! Look at you. When I put you back outside, please give love to your friend,” I experienced an interesting side benefit. Each morning and evening after about a minute of focusing on loving the plant, I simply felt happier. I know it may sound strange, but I felt like I was being loved back. And somehow the loving given to this plant sparked even more growth in the plant right next to it. Somehow the love the first little plant assimilated and translated love into a plant language / energy that inspired its “friend” to grow. Just think of the implications here and the power the love we give inspires others to give, and so on, and so on.

Now I’m not saying that the plant understood the shared words, and I don’t pretend to know exactly how “energy” is transmitted from one being to another. Perhaps a genuinely expressed, “I love you,” touches something inside our own hearts. What I do know is this: for me, each morning and evening as I walked away from my few moments with the plant, I felt more loving and giving.

I realize it may sound strange to some to feel that the plant loves you back. All I can say is that each morning and evening I genuinely looked forward to my experience of plant loving.

I began to reflect upon how much we don’t understand about the nature of how things work, especially love. As far back as I can remember, I recall being curious about love. Even as a child I wondered what caused some parents to seem so in love and others, like my parents, seemed barely able to tolerate each other?

The scars of childhood woundings are like tattoos emblazoned upon our hearts.

So many of us were loved in ways that didn’t quite contribute to our optimal growth. That doesn’t mean our parents necessarily were “bad” people. Some of our parents weren’t well loved themselves. I believe people do the best they can based upon their life experience and what they know at the time. The scars of childhood woundings are like tattoos emblazoned upon our hearts. What if we make a conscious choice to be more aware of how we extend love?

Perhaps the great pandemic pause of 2020 has given each of us and opportunity to pause a bit and consider some of the ways we have allowed love to take a back seat to busy-ness. We live in a fast paced world. It is easy to get caught up in getting things done, and lose sight of the importance of setting aside quality time to connect with each other and with our environment. We have seen the world around us recover in so many beautiful ways as the people have slowed down and been spending more time at home.

We are seeing more videos posted on Social Media of creatures of land and sea, connecting with humans, and other species, demonstrating the healing power of love and connection.

What we are witnessing is far surpassing anything we could have ever imagined. For those who haven’t seen My Octopus Teacher, I strongly recommend that you watch this brilliantly amazing film on Netflix.

We are just beginning to scratch the surface on the connection between all living things on our planet and the amazingly adaptable brilliance of the natural world. As we each open up to more possibilities, we encourage those around us to do the same.

Think of the far reaching possibilities that can blossom when we choose to more consciously extend love.

It is my hope that our continued recovery from this world wide reset, compels us to enter into new ways of seeing and honoring the magic of the world in which we live, and helps spark our curiosity and brilliance to help solve some of the catastrophic environmental issues that are facing our planet today. There is so much we have yet to learn and explore. For me diving into this little plant experiment has provided a little more insight into my lifelong curiosity about love.

What I have witnessed is that Love Grows Love. Be that human, plant, or animal, the process of loving helps things blossom and grow.

Just think about it. If this small amount of loving can help a plant grow AND impact the growth of the plant right next to it, think of the far reaching possibilities that can blossom when we choose to more consciously extend love. It also highlights the ravages of isolation that keep us closed off and closed in, which are so detrimental to our own expansion and growth. If we have learned anything from the 2020 pandemic and this experiment, let it be this: We need each other. Love Begets Love.

What if we make it a daily practice to consider more consciously how we love? What if we wake up our kids daily with love in our hearts, and instead of rushing, we spend a few moments, first thing in the morning, we wake them up with a few extra, “I love you’s.” What if instead of allowing frustration to grow as we stand in a checkout line, we focus on extending love through a smile (from our eyes!)? What if we make the conscious choice to notice something positive about the people around us? “I like the color of your dress. What a cool mask. Love the sunshine. Have a great day.” Just a little love clearly goes a very long way.

And remember, as you extend love, it creates a chain reaction reaching the next person, and the person after that, and the person after that!