The Plant Coach

I love my job because I get to make the world greener one plant at a time.

As a full time plant coach, urban farmer, landscaper and “plantrepreneur” my mission is to give people the knowledge and confidence they need to create their own green spaces; all in the pursuit of environmental and social change.

To be honest, I never thought in a million years that my profession would be plants. I picked up gardening as a hobby after graduating from college, but I spent those first six years working in Corporate America for two of the top companies in the world. But two years ago I took the plant plunge and left it all to play in the dirt for a living (you can imagine my family’s reaction at Thanksgiving dinner when I told them the news). Although this corporate lifestyle had many benefits, which my parents never failed to remind me of, it never provided me the sense of purpose that plants did.

Learning to grow my own food, build indoor jungles of houseplants, and design living landscapes are incredibly empowering skills, and I’ve found a tremendous amount of peace and fulfillment by working with plants. No matter who my client is, they all learn to appreciate plants and nature in ways they never thought possible, and it is my theory that if I can convince them to care about the small plant on their desk, they will begin to care about the BIG plant we all live on. I’m essentially an environmentalist disguised as a plant guy, and we need to see, touch and experience plants more often if we are ever going to overcome climate change. I’ve reached this point of acceptance, and I am grateful for the opportunity to see my client’s experience the same reality check. Here’s an example:

One of my first and favorite clients was a fashion designer and influencer in New York City. I was still pretty new to Instagram in those days and the fact that she had hundreds of thousands of followers and ran a successful fashion brand was intimidating to say the least. She had heard of my services from a friend and had reached out asking if I could take her plant shopping. I obliged and we set a date.

She arrived at the plant shop dressed far better than my simple jeans and sweater. Black leather jacket with the pants to match and a pair of black wayfarer sunglasses adorned on her head. She even brought her personal photographer to capture the experience. At first I thought she wasn’t going to respond well to the plants and my nerdy anecdotes, but she was engrossed in the green. She was drawn to them as if she was discovering plants for the first time and I had never seen someone take to the plants as quickly as she did that day. She walked through the shop in awe, touching each leaf as she went by and bending down to inspect them more closely. She absorbed my knowledge as fast as hungry roots, and her fascination was blooming for the first time right in front of me. She was hooked.

We made our purchases and loaded her plants into a taxi. Most were packed away in the trunk but she kept a smaller plant on her lap in the backseat. She quickly gave the plant a name and was talking to it lovingly, and if you hadn’t already seen a plant there, you would have assumed she was carrying a young child. And then she did something that will forever be chiseled in my memory.

She sniffed the soil. Not, a casual sniff either. She literally put her face into the plant’s soil and breathed it all in. She lifted her head up, looked me in the eye and said,

“I can’t remember the last time I touched the earth”.

I was dumbfounded. Stifling a smile, I was trying to play it cool, but at the same time I couldn't help but think how concurrently validating and depressing this moment was. Here you had this beautiful woman, living a luxurious lifestyle and traveling to places like Miami, London, Paris and Los Angeles for exclusive events, seemingly fulfilled every way you could imagine, sticking her face in the dirt of a potted plant because she’d been deprived of nature for so long. Was she happy? In many ways I’m sure she was, but still there was something missing from her life that the city lifestyle simply could not provide. She wasn’t satisfied.

After we unloaded her green babies into her apartment and said our goodbyes, one thing remained abundantly clear. Humans need plants in their lives. No matter how many followers we have on Instagram, how much money we make, how many things we have, we cannot ignore our instincts and the signs from the natural world. For our own health and preservation, we must learn to live in concert with nature and respect the laws of biophilia.

I know this may be a controversial take, but I believe the relationships we build with our plants are not so different from the ones we build with humans. (Cue the stampede of botanists and plant scientists warning me against the dangers of anthropomorphizing plants.) If naming plants, talking to them, and treating them like a conscious living organism helps humans become better plant parents and build empathy for the environment, then we should do it. It’s all about finding a plant rhythm and balance, and it takes time to get to know plants and understand their needs and wants. Like any successful relationship, it’s all about listening and communication.

As a pant coach, I am but a humble steward of the earth sent to preach the green gospel. I think of myself as a botanical middleman; straddling the line between the world of plant science, human psychology and everyday life and translating the information in a way that can be understood and applied. My goal has always been to be a plant man for the people, and if I’m going to do that for the masses, I need to demonstrate how plants can fit seamlessly into our lives. Plant fear and anxiety is real and believe me when I say some of my clients need professional help coping with their plant trauma, but that shouldn’t deter them from taking the plant plunge. With the right coaching, we can all enjoy the beauty and benefits of plants inside and outside of our homes while developing a healthy relationship with the nature around us.