Facing It

Eco-anxiety and climate grief are sometimes framed as “disorders,” but in fact these feelings typically arise from an accurate perception of our ecological crisis. It may be more appropriate to identify eco-anxiety as a “moral emotion” -- a sign of compassion, attachment to life, and desire for justice. And so paradoxically, we can take some encouragement from the global increase in eco-anxiety and climate grief, since that very existential discomfort affirms our desire to live in a more just and sustainable world.

Because the fight for climate solutions is filled with such contradictions, this episode explores some ways we are strengthened by challenging easy assumptions about climate distress. Our future remains unwritten, and by embracing the unknown we are better able to reframe our thinking in empowering ways. So-called “negative” feelings that arise in response to ecological disruption (grief, anxiety, anger) can be seen as signs of emotional health, while “undesirable” states like uncertainty are potential doorways to transformation. Climate anxiety might even be seen as a kind of superpower -- a signal that alerts us when something's wrong and needs to be addressed, especially while others are sleepwalking through the crisis because their alarm isn't tuned as well. As Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "the salvation of the world lies in the hands of the maladjusted." The time has come for the maladjusted to rise.

*This episode includes extended excerpts from Rebecca Solnit and Clarissa Pinkola Estés

“It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”

- Jiddu Krishnamurti

Written and narrated by Jennifer Atkinson

Music by Roberto David Rusconi

Produced by Intrasonus UK

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Dr. Jennifer Atkinson is a professor of environmental humanities at the University of Washington, where she leads seminars that help students cope with the despair, anger, and anxiety that arise from environmental loss and mass extinction. Her teaching and research have helped activists, scientists, and students build resilience to stay engaged in climate solutions and avoid burnout. She has also spoken to audiences across the U.S. about the global mental health crisis arising from climate disruption, and advocated for addressing emotional impacts in the fight for environmental justice. This episode introduces some of the experiences and insights behind that work, and explores how we can move the public to action by addressing the psychological roots of our unprecedented ecological loss.

Joseph Winters. Denial is out, alarm is in. Oct 13, 2020.  

Yale Program on Climate Communication. Global Warming’s Six Americas in 2020. Oct 10, 2020.

Elin Kelsey. Hope Matters. 2020.

Alex Steffan. The Politics of Optimism. Apr 28, 2015.

James Baldwin. The Price of the Ticket. 1985.

Rebecca Solnit. Hope in the Dark (2016) and The impossible has already happened: what coronavirus can teach us about hope. 2020

Emanuele Coccia. The Life of Plants: A Metaphysics of Mixture. 2018.

Kate Brown. The Pandemic Is Not a Natural Disaster. Apr 13, 2020.

Brooke Jarvis. The Teenagers at the End of the World. July 21, 2020.

Nyla Burton. Meet the young activists of color who are leading the charge against climate disaster. Oct 11, 2019.

Anna Lucente Sterling. This Teen Climate Activist is Fighting to Ensure Indigenous and Marginalized Voices are Being Heard. Sept 25, 2019.

Jillian Ambrose. 'Hijacked by anxiety': how climate dread is hindering climate action. Oct 8, 2020.

Panu Pinkala. Anxiety and the Ecological Crisis: An Analysis of Eco-Anxiety and Climate Anxiety. Aug 2020.

Clarissa Pinkola Estés. Letter to a Young Activist During Troubled Times

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Many consider Hope to be essential for sustaining social movements where change is slow, setbacks are frequent, and the odds aren't good. As Rebecca Solnit once wrote, "To hope is to give yourself to the future - and that commitment to the future is what makes the present inhabitable.” But when it comes to the existential threats of climate change and mass extinction, what if hope is part of the problem? What if it obscures the enormity of our crisis, or makes us complacent, allowing the public to defer responsibility onto other people or the future?

When you look at the scale of our climate emergency and the inadequacy of society's response, hope can feel like a throwaway term, a cheap neon sign we dutifully switch on at the end of climate rallies. But those reservations about hope are not the whole story. Research shows that environmental discourse has long fueled public hopelessness by perpetuating apocalyptic narratives and the sense that it's already "too late" to act. That hopelessness becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy as those who believe we're already doomed -- or that solutions don't exist -- chose *not* to act, thus ensuring the very outcome they imagined. Episode 5 explores the complicated role of hope in the fight for a livable planet, and the different forms it takes in environmental debates: hope as complacency or "cruel optimism" (a secular religion that keeps the public in line), as well as more subversive versions like "active hope," "intrinsic hope," and "critical hope."

“Hope is not a lottery ticket you can sit on the sofa and clutch, feeling lucky. Hope is an axe you break down doors with in an emergency." 

― Rebecca Solnit

Written and narrated by Jennifer Atkinson

Music by Roberto David Rusconi

Produced by Intrasonus UK

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Dr. Jennifer Atkinson is a professor of environmental humanities at the University of Washington, where she leads seminars that help students cope with the despair, anger, and anxiety that arise from environmental loss and mass extinction. Her teaching and research have helped activists, scientists, and students build resilience to stay engaged in climate solutions and avoid burnout. She has also spoken to audiences across the U.S. about the global mental health crisis arising from climate disruption, and advocated for addressing emotional impacts in the fight for environmental justice. This episode introduces some of the experiences and insights behind that work, and explores how we can move the public to action by addressing the psychological roots of our unprecedented ecological loss.

Jason Box tweet: If We Release a Small Fraction of Arctic Carbon, 'We're Fucked': Climatologist. Vice, August 1, 2014.

What caused Earth's biggest mass extinction? Stanford Earth, Dec 06, 2018.

Martin Luther King Jr. A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches.

Emily Dickinson. “Hope” is the thing with feathers - (314)

Mary Heglar. Home is always worth it. Sept 2019.

Greta Thunberg. "Our house is on fire." Jan 25, 2019.

Lauren Berlant. Cruel Optimism. 2011.

Hua Hsu. Affect Theory and the New Age of Anxiety: How Lauren Berlant’s cultural criticism predicted the Trumping of politics. Mar 25, 2019.

Tommy Lynch. Why Hope Is Dangerous When It Comes to Climate Change. July 25, 2017.

Derrick Jensen. "Beyond Hope." 2006.

Michael Nelson. "To a Future Without Hope." 2010.

Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone. Active Hope. 2012.

Lin Yutang. In Visions from Earth, 2004.

Lisa Kretz. "Hope in Environmental Philosophy." 2012.

Elin Kelsey. "Propagating Collective Hope in the Midst of Environmental Doom and Gloom." 2016.

Rainer Maria Rilke. “Go to the Limits of Your Longing.”

Elin Kelsey. Climate Change: A Crisis of Hope. June 2020

Emily Johnson. Loving a vanishing world. May 9, 2019

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With the urgency of our climate crisis increasing by the day, many scientists and climate leaders are calling for global action on the scale of World-War II mobilizations. Yet in the face of this daunting task and the existential threat of climate disruption (both present and future) many find themselves paralyzed by fear, hopelessness or cynicism.

Luckily, there are steps we can all take to overcome despair and start contributing to solutions. This episode outlines 4 basic strategies to beat the climate blues and become an agent of change. 

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

- The Talmud

Written and narrated by Jennifer Atkinson

Music by Roberto David Rusconi

Produced by Intrasonus UK

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Dr. Jennifer Atkinson is a professor of environmental humanities at the University of Washington, where she leads seminars that help students cope with the despair, anger, and anxiety that arise from environmental loss and mass extinction. Her teaching and research have helped activists, scientists, and students build resilience to stay engaged in climate solutions and avoid burnout. She has also spoken to audiences across the U.S. about the global mental health crisis arising from climate disruption, and advocated for addressing emotional impacts in the fight for environmental justice. This episode introduces some of the experiences and insights behind that work, and explores how we can move the public to action by addressing the psychological roots of our unprecedented ecological loss.

Mike Pearl. 'Climate Despair' Is Making People Give Up on Life. Vice. Jul 11, 2019

Zhiwa Woodbury. "Climate Trauma: Toward a New Taxonomy of Trauma." Ecopsychology. January 2019

Emily Johnston. Loving a vanishing world. Medium. May 9, 2019.

"Columbia University experiment": J. M. Darley & B. Latané. "Bystander intervention in emergencies: Diffusion of responsibility". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 8: 377–383 (1968)

Julia Rosen. "Feeling distressed about climate change? Here’s how to manage it." Los Angeles Times. Jan. 11, 2020

Leslie Davenport, Emotional Resiliency in the Era of Climate Change. Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2017.

Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. Climate Change in the American Mind: April 2020. May 19, 2020

George Marshall. Don't Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change. Bloomsbury, 2015

Reene Lertzman. How Can We Talk About Global Warming? Sierra, Jul 19 2017

Florence Williams. The Nature Fix: Why Nature Makes Us Happier, Healthier, and More Creative. 2017

Nutsford, Pearson, and Kingham. An Ecological Study Investigating the Association Between Access to Urban Green Space and Mental Health. Public Health. Vol 127; 11 (2013)

Audre Lorde, A Burst of Light. 1988

Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone. Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We're in without Going Crazy. 2012

Vaclav Havel. Disturbing the Peace: A Conversation with Karel Huizdala. Vintage, 1991.

Donatella Meadows. Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System. The Sustainability Institute, 1999.

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If you suffer from climate grief, you know what it's like to feel hopeless, alone, or bewildered by society's business-as-usual response to our existential threat. Wanting those feelings to go away is normal, but grief can lead to awareness and compassion in ways that actually advance political action and climate solutions. Paradoxically, grief can also provide a kind of strength and clarity when conventional hopes are shaken. As climate activist Tim DeChristopher once said, “In happy times the weight of despair is oppressive, but in stormy times that weight is an anchor that can get you through.” This episode explores the value of grief as a way to overcome collective denial as we move into an uncertain climate future. While most environmentalists are urging us to focus on hope, Dr. Jennifer Atkinson points out that grief and hope aren't mutually exclusive, and for many, grief may even be our best ally in an age of climate crisis

"Many of us spend our whole lives running from feeling with the mistaken belief that you cannot bear the pain. But you have already borne the pain. What you have not done is feel you are beyond that pain."

—Kahlil Gibran

Written and narrated by Jennifer Atkinson

Music by Roberto David Rusconi

Produced by Intrasonus UK

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Dr. Jennifer Atkinson is a professor of environmental humanities at the University of Washington, where she leads seminars that help students cope with the despair, anger, and anxiety that arise from environmental loss and mass extinction. Her teaching and research have helped activists, scientists, and students build resilience to stay engaged in climate solutions and avoid burnout. She has also spoken to audiences across the U.S. about the global mental health crisis arising from climate disruption, and advocated for addressing emotional impacts in the fight for environmental justice. This episode introduces some of the experiences and insights behind that work, and explores how we can move the public to action by addressing the psychological roots of our unprecedented ecological loss.

Jalal al-Din Rumi. The Essential Rumi. HarperOne; Reprint edition, May, 2004

Carl Zimmer. Birds Are Vanishing From North America. New York Times, Sept. 19, 2019

Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Nature’s Dangerous Decline ‘Unprecedented’; Species Extinction Rates ‘Accelerating.’ May 6, 2019

Kulp, S.A., Strauss, B.H. New elevation data triple estimates of global vulnerability to sea-level rise and coastal flooding. Nature Communications 10, 4844 (2019).

Emily Atkin. The Blood-Dimmed Tide: Climate change is poised to alter the face of global conflict. The New Republic, September 16, 2019.

Brad Plumer. Carbon Dioxide Emissions Hit a Record in 2019, Even as Coal Fades. New York Times, Dec 3, 2019.

Paola Rosa-Aquino. The life-altering, world-ending topic they’re still not teaching you about in school. Grist. June 4, 2019.

David Corn. It’s the End of the World as They Know It: The distinct burden of being a climate scientist. Mother Jones, July 8, 2019.

Head, Lesley, & Harada, T. Keeping the heart a long way from the brain: The emotional labour of climate scientists. Emotion, Space & Society, 24, 34–41 (2017).

Livia Albeck-Ripka. Why Lost Ice Means Lost Hope for an Inuit Village. New York Times, Nov. 25, 2017

Indigenous Peoples, Lands, & Resources. Bennett, T. M., Maynard, S., Cochran, P., Gough, R., Lynn, K., Maldonado, J., Voggesser, G. Wotkyns, S., & Cozzetto, K. Climate Change Impacts in the United States: The Third National Climate Assessment (297- 317). U.S. Global Change Research Program. 2014.

Cunsolo, Ashlee. "Climate Change as the Work of Mourning." Mourning Nature: Hope at the Heart of Ecological Loss & Grief. Ed Cunsolo & Landman. McGill-Queen's University Press, 2017.

Scaramutti, Carolina, Vos, S., Salas-Wright, C., & Schwartz, S. "The Mental Health Impact of Hurricane Maria on Puerto Ricans in Puerto Rico & Florida." Disaster Medicine & Public Health Preparedness. Nov 2018.

Ron Reed and Kari Norgaard. Emotional impacts of environmental decline: What can Native cosmologies teach sociology about emotions & environmental justice? Theory & Society 46 (463–495) November 2017.

Good Greif Network

Climate Psychology Alliance

Stephen Running, The 5 Stages of Climate Grief. Numerical Terradynamic Simulation Group Publications. 173. 2007

Douglas Burton-Christie. The Gift of Tears: Loss, Mourning, and the Work of Ecological Restoration. Worldviews 15.1 (29–46) 2011.

Martín Prechtel.

The Smell of Rain on Dust: Grief and Praise. North Atlantic Books. April 14, 2015.

Chris Jordan. This Image Shows the Tragedy of Mass Consumption – But Change is Possible HuffPost, April 1, 2018.

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Is reason or emotion more important in driving climate action? Will solutions to mass extinction come from the head or the heart? Or are these binaries themselves part of the problem? While some climate activists argue that we should focus on facts instead of feelings, others know that our intense emotional response to climate chaos is far from irrational. Moreover, feelings like anger, hope, anxiety, and fear profoundly shape our perceptions of the world, and can motivate us to act or shut down and retreat. To better understand how those mental and emotional states relate to environmental crisis and public perceptions of risk, this episode explores why emotions matter in the climate battle.

This segment also looks at the work of Rachel Carson to explore how narrative can rouse the public to action, and draws on insights from evolutionary psychology to examine the ancient relation between mind and environment as expressed in feelings of love and wonder toward the natural world.

"It is not half so important to know as to feel."

- Rachel Carson

Written and narrated by Jennifer Atkinson

Music by Roberto David Rusconi

Produced by Intrasonus UK

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Dr. Jennifer Atkinson is a professor of environmental humanities at the University of Washington, where she leads seminars that help students cope with the despair, anger, and anxiety that arise from environmental loss and mass extinction. Her teaching and research have helped activists, scientists, and students build resilience to stay engaged in climate solutions and avoid burnout. She has also spoken to audiences across the U.S. about the global mental health crisis arising from climate disruption, and advocated for addressing emotional impacts in the fight for environmental justice. This episode introduces some of the experiences and insights behind that work, and explores how we can move the public to action by addressing the psychological roots of our unprecedented ecological loss.

Katherine Long. Feeling it: UW Bothell class helps students face emotional impact of a warming planet. Seattle Times, March 13, 2018

Jennifer Atkinson, Addressing climate grief makes you a badass, not a snowflake. High Country News. May 29, 2018.

Rachel Carson. Silent Spring. The New Yorker, 1962.

David Roberts. "Does hope inspire more action on climate change than fear? We don’t know." Vox, Dec 2017.

Michael B. Smith "Silence, Miss Carson!" Science, Gender, and the Reception of "Silent Spring"

Feminist Studies. Vol. 27, No. 3 (Autumn, 2001), pp. 733-752

Eliza Griswold. How ‘Silent Spring’ Ignited the Environmental Movement. New York Times, Sept. 21, 2012

Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. Nature’s Dangerous Decline ‘Unprecedented’; Species Extinction Rates ‘Accelerating.’ May 6, 2019

Michael McCarthy. The Moth Snowstorm: Nature and Joy. New York Review Books

2016

Walt Whitman. When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer.

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The age of climate crisis is upon us, and grief and anxiety are on the rise. Our pilot episode introduces the emotional burden of climate change, and why despair leaves so many people unable to respond to this existential threat. Overcoming that paralysis is the first step in moving to action, and yet official climate strategies rarely address this emotional toll. Meanwhile, frontline communities — particularly people of color, indigenous communities, and other historically-marginalized groups — are experiencing the heaviest mental health impacts of climate disruption and displacement.

"To be numb to the world is another form of suicide."

 -Terry Tempest Williams

Written and narrated by Jennifer Atkinson

Music by Roberto David Rusconi

Produced by Intrasonus UK

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Dr. Jennifer Atkinson is a professor of environmental humanities at the University of Washington, where she leads seminars that help students cope with the despair, anger, and anxiety that arise from environmental loss and mass extinction. Her teaching and research have helped activists, scientists, and students build resilience to stay engaged in climate solutions and avoid burnout. She has also spoken to audiences across the U.S. about the global mental health crisis arising from climate disruption, and advocated for addressing emotional impacts in the fight for environmental justice. This episode introduces some of the experiences and insights behind that work, and explores how we can move the public to action by addressing the psychological roots of our unprecedented ecological loss.

American Psychological Association, Climate Change's Toll On Mental Health. 2017 

Making the Connection: Climate Changes Mental Health. Mollie Marti, PhD, JD, Susan Clayton, PhD, MS, and Lise Van Susteren, MD. American Public Health Association. 2019

The Impacts of Climate Change on Human Health in the United States: A Scientific Assessment. U.S. Global Change Research Program. GlobalChange.Gov, 2016

Susan Clayton. Mental health risk and resilience among climate scientists. Nature Climate Change 8, 260–261 (2018).

Susan Saulny. A Legacy of the Storm: Depression and Suicide. New York Times. June 21, 2006

Alison C. McLeish and Kevin S. Del Ben. Symptoms of depression and posttraumatic stress disorder in an outpatient population before and after Hurricane Katrina. October 29, 2007

Ashlee Cunsolo and N. Ellis. Hope and Mourning in the Anthropocene: Understanding Ecological Grief. The Conversation. 2018

Ashlee Cunsolo and N. Ellis. Ecological Grief as a Mental Health Response to Climate Change-related Loss. Nature Climate Change, 8:275–281. 2018

Kristina Dahl. Feeling Blue About Climate Change? You’re Not Alone. Union of Concerned Scientists. EcoWatch. 2018

Clayton Aldern. How climate change is messing with your mind. Crosscut. August 28, 2018.

Livia Albeck-Ripka. Why Lost Ice Means Lost Hope for an Inuit Village. New York Times, Nov. 25, 2017.

Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). UN Report: Nature’s Dangerous Decline ‘Unprecedented’; Species Extinction Rates ‘Accelerating’ 2019.

Glenn Albrecht. "The age of solastalgia." The Conversation. Aug 2012.

Ciara O'Rourke. Climate Change’s Hidden Victim: Your Mental Health. Medium, Jan 2019.

Heather Hansman. The 4 Stages of Climate Grief. Outside, Nov 8, 2019.

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