51(ish) things you can actually do

If you're feeling helpless

Last weekend during our weekly Saturday dinner, we were sitting around the living room, eating chicken pot pie, watching the kids play/climb/scream, and chatting about everything, as one does.

“I read the news constantly and feel like I’ve never been more informed about the horrors” one of our guests said, “But I have no idea what to do about any of it. I just feel helpless.”

I’ve been thinking about that all week. I see sentiments like this online all the time, and often encounter it during my work meetings — a mix of deep sadness, paralysis around not knowing what they could possibly do to make a difference when everything feels so bad, and profound frustration at feeling like no one has any agency in a crisis.

I completely understand why someone might feel this way. Everything sucks. The world feels like it’s falling apart. The institutions and heroes we expected to stand up have instead flailed and hid, afraid of a bully that’s mostly bark, minimal bite.

But here’s the thing:

In the same way that is no one single moment that indicates fascism is here and no single root cause, there is no single solution.

There is not one action, one hero, one single donation or protest or even election day get us out of this. (in the same way there is no quick and easy fix for the Democratic Party.)

There is a quote that supposedly is from the Talmud or Pirke Avot, but seems to be a mashup of bunch of Rabbinic wisdom:

“Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.”

I love this sentiment: Just because we can’t fix everything doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try and fix one thing (or a few things.)

So to give you some direction, I put together a list of 51(ish) things that you can do that help make things a little bit better.

Some of things are political, some are about civic engagement, some require money, some require time, some are in service of building relationships that are strong, local, and deep so that when/if the shit hits the fan, you’ve got the community you need.

Some might make you want to throw up and some might feel more doable for you.

I’m not saying you need to do all or even most of these things. I’m just saying: Pick one (or a few) and tackle them.

51-ish things you can do to make a difference, in no particular order:

1. Go to a No Kings protest this weekend (or any protest, anytime)

2. Volunteer to watch kids so the grown-ups can go to a protest

3. Host people for a sign-making party beforehand, or for a meal after the protest to regroup

4. Vote in every election - all of them, the primaries, the generals, the specials, the local ones and the federal ones.

5. Post about voting! Especially about local candidates.

6. Volunteer for a local candidate. Knock doors, make calls, hand out lit, clean the office bathroom - whatever they need, do it. The more local, the better.

7. Run for office yourself. 😈😈😈

8. Ask a friend to run for office. Then help them do it.

9. Put together a local voting guide for your friends and send it to everyone you know. (My guide for NYC voters will come next week!)

10. Drop reminders to vote and registration deadlines in every group chat you’re in.

11. Ask your employer about paid time off to vote (especially on non-November elections) and maybe even volunteer. If you’re an employer, proactively give the time off.

12. Donate to campaigns that inspire you. Donate to local ones. Donate to organizations that do year-round community work. Donate to non-profits and help bolster bottom lines when the broader philanthropic space is contracting. Make those donations automatic and recurring.

13. Go to a local political party meeting — yes, it might be infuriating. It might be boring as hell or mostly old people or feel like a waste of time or all of the above. Go anyway and bring three friends next time.

14. Go to a school board (or city council, or community board, or county commission) meeting.

15. Or, again: Volunteer to take on childcare so someone else can go the meeting

16. Hell: Start a organized childcare co-op so that families can trade off the burden off caring for kids and parents can get a free break every once in a while

17. Share pics of being at the meetings and post about upcoming ones; invite people to come with you next time.

18. Get a library card and then actually use it to help libraries protect their funding

19. Subscribe to independent media — bonus points if it’s local independent media

20. Gift your friends subscriptions of local media

21. Buy banned books or check them out of the library (or show up at the school board meeting so that the books don’t get banned in the first place)

22. Find a local artist you like and buy their work. Share that art online.

23. Give money to a local arts non profit.

24. Did your university get tangled up with Trump? Check and see if you have some yelling to do.

25. Boycott companies that don’t share your values or that fold to Trump.

26. And the inverse: Spend money at companies that show bravery.

27. Vaccinate yourself and your kids.

28. Bring some food to someone who just had a baby, or lost a loved one, or just because.

29. Donate blood.

30. Donate clothes.

31. Start a neighborhood free fridge.

32. Join your local Buy Nothing group and give stuff away

33. Donate to a mutual aid group.

34. Give to a local abortion fund

35. Download these zines, print them out, hand them out

36. Send five emails to people you admire and tell them why you admire them

37. Find a writer or artist online you like and DM them to tell them what their work means to you

38. Join a union — maybe it’s one at work, maybe it’s a tenants union, maybe it’s something else. Start one!

39. Talk about the things you love on the internet. Yes, seriously. Enter fandom spaces. Those are networks you can leverage later if you need ‘em! (Also, it’s fun! And the right doesn’t have a monopoly on joy.)

40. If you run a company or a team: Do a pass thru your company policies and see how you can give people a little more of their humanity back.

41. Make a list of everyone you know in a 30 minute radius of you (or whatever amount of time feels reasonable) - literally, make a list on a piece of paper or in your notes app. Then go down the list and reach out to every single one and make a plan to see them IRL. Maybe it’s having them over for dinner, maybe it’s for a play date at the park, maybe it’s to run errands together or grab a drink or see a movie - you know best what might make sense. You might get rejected or ignored. It might make you uncomfortable. Suck it up. Creating community ties requires vulnerability and extending bids for connection — you’ve got to risk something to gain something.

42. Make the same kind of list of everyone you know who lives out of town. Make a plan for checking in — send the text on their birthday, plot out when to see them if you travel. Solidify your ties!

43. Start a neighborhood group chat (consider flyers with QR codes! go knock on people’s doors! leave notes on people’s cars!) or join the neighborhood group chat or Facebook group and actually participate in it. Yes, sometimes these are annoying. People are sometimes annoying! When the shit hits the fan, you’ll be glad you know your neighbors.

44. Host a block party.

45. Host a potluck.

46. Host a Halloween get together, or a holiday gathering, or a book club, or any other event that brings people in your neighborhood together. Use that groupchat you made!

47. Less silly but more urgent: Organize an ICE watch.

48. Those community things you’ve always written as “for other people”? The trivia nights or the school fall festival or the co-ed soccer league or the reading at the community center? Go to one of them. Even if it makes you a little uncomfortable.

49. Go on MeetUp or a similar type site and find a free group to join - maybe it’s virtual, maybe it’s IRL

50. Got kids? Volunteer in their classroom. Take initiative and use the WhatsApp or ClassDojo (or whatever app your school uses) and put together the class directory so that everyone has contact info for everyone else’s family.

51. Commit to doing one of these things every week, or every month, or every quarter. Put it on your calendar. Make it as important as any other habit.

None of these things alone are enough. That’s okay. We need lots of people doing lots of different things, all the time.

I am an optimist. (I’ve said it before: It’s what makes my career in politics sustainable: at my very core, I fundamentally believe better things are possible.)

I sometimes worry about veering into toxic positivity, or into whitewashing how horrific shit is. Shit is really horrific! People are getting kidnapped. The press and institutions are being silenced or bullied. The federal government is shut down. Hospitals will start closing. Health care is getting more expensive, women are being pushed out of the work force, kids (and our seniors!) are getting their brains pickled by the internet. We’ve basically given up on the war on cancer. Things are really fucking bad.

And/but/also: This will end, one way or another. All we can do to make that possible is anything we can.

Got other ideas for things that people can do? Leave ‘em in the comments.

---

A bunch of book recs this week:

• The Second Chance Cinema by Thea Weiss - Ellie and Drake are engaged to be married; on a late night walk they encounter a magical movie theater that shows them 10 movies, each featuring memories of their lives. The past unveils secrets maybe they weren’t ready to share! A little sweet, a little sad, a little bit magical. I enjoyed this.

• Cover Story by Mhairi McFarlane - Fake dating and enemies to lovers from one of my favorite British rom-com writers. Occasionally LOL funny.

• The Lost Story of Eva Fuentes - Historical fiction across three timelines: 1900 Boston where aspiring author Eva Fuentes traveled from Cuba to teach for a summer and maybe finds love; Havana in 1966 where Pilar’s husband has been imprisoned for working against Castro and she too is hiding books the regime doesn’t want read; and London in 2024, where Margo is hired to find a mysterious book written by aforementioned Eva Fuentes and maybe has to work with a man from her past. Engrossing and ties together nicely!

• It’s Different This Time by Joss Richard - A nostalgic second-chance romance about actress June and chef Adam who broke up years ago and now are reunited because the West Village brownstone they once shared is now theirs after the landlord died. I love a NYC real estate story. This is a good autumnal romance.

---

Looking for more practical advice? You can pick up a copy of When We’re in Charge in any format you’d like — hardcover, e-book, or audio book (narrated by yours truly) anywhere you get books, including Amazon or Bookshop.org or literally anywhere else. If you have Spotify Premium, you can listen to for free right this very minute.

Another option: Get your book along with an excellent I DO NOT DREAM OF LABOR tote bag at the Crooked Media shop.