We give language to what you feel about the climate crisis—and also what you might want to feel, feelings you can grow and cultivate. This supports your resilience and your mental health and wellbeing. We invite other experts to join us in our conversations, and we hope you can join us too.
Season 4, Episode 7: On Parenting, Elections, and Climate with Anya Kamenetz
Thomas and Panu had a wide ranging exchange with journalist Anya Kamenetz (The Stolen Year, The Golden Hour) on the intersections of climate change, parenting, and mental health – in the context of the recent US elections. They discuss the importance of having open conversations with children about difficult topics that are geared to children and teens’ emotional and intellectual development. Each reflected on how they create a sense of hope, meaning, and resilience in their own families. Anya also shared some of her personal story growing up on the Gulf Coast of the US, and her journey as a writer, activist and parent.
Film referenced in the episode: Roberto Benigni (1997, Director) Life Is Beautiful
Season 4, Episode 6: Surviving Climate Anxiety Book Preview with Thomas Doherty
Nov 08, 2024
Thomas and Panu discussed Thomas’ upcoming book Surviving Climate Anxiety: A Guide to Coping, Healing, and Thriving – a comprehensive resource for the general public that includes practical examples and stories drawn from people Thomas has worked with. Thomas shared insights about the book’s five part structure, which is designed to move readers from basic skills for coping with eco and climate stress, through developing environmental identity, healing from eco-anxiety and despair, finding happiness and flourishing using the arts and spirituality, and taking action on environmental problems. Panu reflected on the importance of addressing the dark and light aspects of climate feelings and having a survivor mission. Surviving Climate Anxiety will be published in 2025 by Little Brown Spark.
Season 4, Episode 5: Climate and Life Journeys with Andrew Bryant
Oct 25, 2024
Season 4, Episode 5: Climate and Life Journeys with Andrew Bryant
Thomas and Panu had a conversation with Seattle Washington therapist Andrew Bryant about the intersections of climate change and mental health therapy. Andrew reflected on his personal journey, the Climate and Mind website, and his experiences creating a community among therapists to explore climate issues in their lives and practices. Andrew described some of his methods of “professional and compassionate listening” that focus on creating community and holding space for feelings, especially for people who are isolated or not talking. The discussion also touched on the significance of outdoor therapy and how nature-based rite of passage experience can help individuals to navigate their paths in the face of climate distress.
Season 4, Episode 4: Ecological Grief in Religious and Spiritual Communities
Thomas and Panu discussed the intersection of spirituality and climate change. Specifically, Panu shared his work on the challenges faced by individuals who experience spiritual crises when their ecological fears or grief aren’t validated in their religious community, and who may feel isolated and unsupported. This may lead to feelings of combined ecological and spiritual grief. Faith leaders are in a key position regarding the validation of such feelings. Coping requires a holistic approach that recognizes the connections between spirituality and environmental values, finding support, and constructive engagement with climate emotions and with climate action in spiritual and religious communities.
Season 4, Episode 3: On Gen Z Climate Emotions with Filmmakers Tehya Jennett and Maxfield Biggs
In this episode of Climate Change and Happiness hosts Thomas and Panu engaged with filmmakers Tehya Jennett and Maxfield Biggs from Stranded Astronaut Productions. Tehya and Maxfield shared their personal journeys related to climate emotions. They reflected, together with Panu and Thomas, on the impact of food choices on climate awareness and ethics, and the need for intergenerational dialogue. The conversation also highlighted the importance of creativity as a coping mechanism. Most recently, Maxfield and Tehya were part of the team that produced the Healing Lahainadocumentary about the deadly Lahaina wildfire on Maui, premiering at the Hawai’i Int’l Film Festival. Tehya and Maxfield are also collaborating with Panu and Elin Kelsey to create new content on climate emotions. Join us in the quest of understanding how climate change is engaged with by young people.
Season 4, Episode 2: On the Psychological Roots of the Climate Crisis with Sally Weintrobe
Panu and Thomas had a warm chat with UK climate psychology theorist Sally Weintrobe, author of The Psychological Roots of the Climate Crisis and other books. Sally reflected on her childhood growing up in apartheid era South Africa and insights that led her to climate advocacy after years of providing psychoanalysis. She, Panu and Thomas spent time grappling with concepts like disavowal, group silencing, “active not caring” and “emotional privilege.” Listen in to a great episode for therapists, and also anyone interested in how these often unconscious processes manifest in our lives.
Sound Bites
"Indifference is a very, very active form of not caring."
"Privilege is to be spared all kinds of levels of suffering."
"Living our truth can be a dangerous place to be."
Season 4, Episode 1: On A Healthy Return from Your Holidays
Thomas and Panu reflected on the often overlooked process of re-entry into life after a holiday or vacation. They considered Thomas’s idea of the “half-life” of restorative experiences. That is, how long the mental benfits of the experience enhance your normal or usual existence, such through increased perspective or calm, and how to extend these positive effects. They also recognized how technology and consumerism have infiltrated into seasonal breaks and holidays. And the shadow impacts of guilt regarding travel impacts on the environment, and emotional risks of returning from a holiday to face unsatisfying aspects of life. Mindfulness and intention are important for bringing the gifts and perspectives gained from a trip back into your everyday life, whether from a simple, local holiday or an ambitious journey. We hope this episode will be inspiring for listeners returning from seasonal holidays in the Northern and Southern hemispheres.
Takeaways
Returning from a holiday or vacation can bring a fresh perspective and newness to one's life and work.
The half-life of experiences is often short, but there are ways to extend the positive effects and insights gained from a break.
Mindfulness and intention are key in bringing the gifts and perspectives from a trip back into everyday life.
Consumerism and the environmental impact of travel are important considerations when planning trips.
Embracing the emotional aspect of returning from a holiday, including feelings of joy and sadness, can enrich the experience.
Season 3, Episode 26: Listening to Young Researchers
Thomas and Panu spoke with three graduate student researchers from the The Development, Environment, & Wellness Lab at Columbia University Teachers College in New York: Paritosh Joshi, Rian Maxwell-Williams, and Danny DeBonis. All three are deeply engaged in environmental psychology and justice issues. They discussed their personal backgrounds, environmental identities, and the values and goals for their research. Join us for an inspiring conversation!
Sound Bites
"Research should not only report findings objectively but also advocate for marginalized communities and contribute to tangible policy outcomes and interventions."
"Having personal stories is essential in understanding the experiences of communities affected by climate change and environmental injustice."
"Building resilience and studying the factors that lead individuals to become activists are crucial in addressing climate change and environmental issues."
Season 3, Episode 25: Being a Therapist in a Time of Climate Breakdown with Judith Anderson & Tree Staunton
Thomas and Panu spoke with Judith Anderson and Tree Staunton, therapists and co-editors (along with Jenny O’Gorman and Caroline Hickman) of the recent collection Being a Therapist in a Time of Climate Breakdown. The foursome explored their experiences of mental health, research and healing work in the context of climate change and the psychological impacts of climate distress. Tree and Judith shared their personal journeys towards climate awareness. The episode included an overview of the structure and themes of the book, which includes chapters on climate science, mental health impacts, first person accounts, systemic understandings, and techniques to address climate distress (including a contribution about climate sorrow from Panu).
Takeaways
Therapists play a crucial role in addressing climate distress and supporting individuals dealing with the psychological impact of climate change.
Training in environmental awareness and systemic thinking is essential for therapists to effectively address climate distress in therapy.
Climate distress is not limited to anxiety and can manifest as confusion, fear, depression, guilt, and despair.
Addressing climate distress requires a nuanced approach that goes beyond simply encouraging action and considers the complex emotions and defense mechanisms involved.
Creating spaces for open dialogue and support, such as climate cafes and social dreaming, can help individuals process their climate distress.
Season 3, Episode 24: For Teachers: An Existential Tool Kit
This episode is dedicated to teachers and educators of all kinds. Thomas and Panu discussed the new Existential Toolkit for Climate Justice Educators and the emotional, political, personal and pedagogical challenges faced by teachers in the context of climate change. The conversation delved into the history of the Toolkit project, the lingering impact of COVID-19 on education, and the unacknowledged and inequitable impacts of climate and weather disasters on students, teachers and school systems, worldwide. Panu and Thomas reflected on their own schooling in Finland and the US, their personal teaching experiences, and advice on how to remain creative and to cope with fatigue and burnout.
Sound Bites
"Teachers are under a lot of stress to give accurate information to their students about the state of the world, which can be quite troubling."
"The existential toolkit fills the gap in providing emotional tools for teachers and educators dealing with difficult topics like climate change."
Season 3, Episode 23: On EcoWellness and Psychedelic Therapy with Ryan Reese
Thomas and Panu spoke with Ryan Reese, a psychologist from Bend, Oregon USA about his work developing eco-wellness theory in counseling and his recent integration of psychedelic therapy and outdoor therapy. Ryan shared his personal journey and how experiences with nature and rivers (including fly fishing for Steelhead trout) played a role in his healing and growth. Ryan, Panu and Thomas highlighted the parallels between eco-therapy and psychedelic therapy, including the importance of creating a safe setting, adopting a mindset of self-transcendence and opening to the process of expanding one's consciousness. Their talk concluded with a recognition of how Thomas and Ryan’s social connection provided needed support during challenging times in Thomas’s earlier career.
Takeaways
Nature and the more-than-human-world can have a significant impact on holistic wellness, including stress reduction and restoration of focus and attention.
Psychedelic therapy and eco-based work share similarities in promoting self-transcendence and expanding one's consciousness.
Creating a safe and supportive environment is crucial in both outdoor facilitation and psychedelic therapy.
Social connections and shared education are essential in addressing climate-related issues and maintaining positivity, hope, and optimism.
Season 3, Episode 22: On the Evolution of Outdoor Therapy with Will White
Thomas and Panu spoke with Will White, a long time outdoor and wilderness therapy practitioner, and a long time colleague of Thomas. They discussed the evolution of therapeutic camping and outdoor programs in the US dating to the 1800’s and current approaches (with parallels in places like Finland).They explored the role of emotions in outdoor therapy, including eco-anxiety and the impact of environmental change on treasured places. Their conversation highlighted the importance of slowing down and experiencing the pace of nature in a highly technological world.
Season 3, Episode 21:“The Art of Survival” – Art and Climate Emotions
In this episode, Thomas and Panu discussed the role of art in their emotional coping with climate stress and other environmental problems. They explored the creative tensions between art and entertainment and being mindful when we chose to challenge ourselves with taking on complex or troubling movies, photographic images, writings, and music. They shared several examples (including the 2017 film First Reformed and post-rock band Godspeed You! Black Emperor) and referenced their past podcast episodes with artists. Takeaways included the importance of being intentional about the nature and climate themed art you take in and not just being a passive consumer; and the need to unplug and engage in hands-on artistic experiences.
Notes / Links:
Finnish distinction: “Arts”(taide) and “Entertainment” (viihde)
Season 3, Episode 20: Behind the Scenes at the Montana Youth Climate Trial with Lise Van Susteren
Thomas and Panu talked with forensic psychiatrist Lise Van Susteren about her powerful experience as an expert witness at the historic Held v. Montana youth-sponsored climate trial in 2023. Lise spoke of her life and journey into politics and environmental and climate change advocacy, and her formative experience in the first cohort of Al Gore’s Climate Reality project. Lise, Thomas and Panu reflected on how mental health professions can begin to align their rhetoric about climate change and sustainability with their actions – such as addressing the carbon footprints of their own organizations and conferences. Join us for a behind the scenes view of the legal front on combating climate change.
Season 3, Episode 19: Healing from Moral Injury with Caroline Hickman
Thomas and Panu had a new dialogue with UK Climate Therapy expert Caroline Hickman to discuss the concept of moral injury in relation to climate distress and its impact on people’s sense of meaning and trust. The conversation delved into feelings that arise in situations where one’s values are compromised and the impacts to relationships (e.g., feeling let down, betrayed, or having feelings denied). Caroline emphasized the need to differentiate between toxic and healthy guilt, to “locate guilt where it belongs,” and the importance of reparation and saying sorry on the part of people in power (with the example of former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinta Arden). Panu noted that engaging in a survivor mission and taking action can provide a sense of purpose and contribute to addressing moral injury. Join us for reflections on responsibility and healing amidst a changing climate.
Takeaways
Moral injury is closely related to climate distress and involves the damage to an individual's values and morals.
Moral injury can lead to feelings of guilt, shame, and inadequacy, as well as a breakdown of trust in relationships.
It is important to differentiate between toxic and healthy guilt and to locate guilt where it belongs (e.g., with societal decision makers, and those in power).
Reparation and saying sorry can help in the healing process and the recovery of trust.
Season 3, Episode 18: Finding Your Place and Digging in
In this episode, Thomas and Panu discuss the importance of finding a place, digging in, and taking responsibility in the face of climate change and environmental issues. They explore the idea of being a creator or actor rather than a passive consumer and the significance of having short-term and long-term goals. Our missions take place in a web of relationships with humans and more-than-humans. Panu and Thomas also touch on the connection between climate change and death, and the need to engage with difficult topics. The conversation concludes with a discussion on the concept of non-action and the importance of mindfulness.
Takeaways
Don’t try to be everything. Be “good enough.”
Recognize that your mission will naturally change and evolve once you commit to action.
Be a creator or actor or worker inspired by climate change, in your own way.
Once you have your own thing to do, you don’t need to chase the news about every issue.
Soundbites:
“Find your place on the planet. Dig in, and take responsibility from there.” — Gary Snyder
"Climate change is like a red blinking light that reminds us of our own mortality."
"Don't just be a consumer, be a creator or actor."
Transcript
[The Climate Change and Happiness Transcript is on holiday.]
Season 3, Episode 17: On the Good Grief Network with LaUra Schmidt
Apr 12, 2024
Season 3, Episode 17: On the Good Grief Network with LaUra Schmidt
Thomas and Panu were joined by LaUra Schmidt, co- founder of the Good Grief Network and co-author of How to Live in a Chaotic Climate. Laura shared her journey of combining her background in biology and environmental studies with trauma healing and psychology to address the emotional toll of climate change. She, Panu and Thomas discussed how the 12-step inspired Good Grief program helps individuals process their grief and find resilience about climate breakdown in a safe and supportive environment. Along the way, they looked deeper at the process of steps like accepting the severity of the environmental predicament, being with uncertainty, and honoring mortality; and the importance of peer support, accountability, and finding one's unique way of taking action. Join us for an inspiring conversation!
Season 3, Episode 16: Nature in Your Life with Thomas and Panu
In this episode, Thomas and Panu discussed some real-world aspects of nature and our relationship with the natural world, including different values associated with nature and other species, such as scientific, ethical, relationship and experience-based values. Thomas illustrated a spectrum of nature settings, from virtual nature such as art and images in the home, to nearby nature in our communities, to wild and protected places – with opportunities to be a cosmopolitan traveler between these contexts. The conversation evolved into a recognition of nature (in Finnish luonto) as an infinite set of processes and relationships, with nature settings being a doorway or threshold into the interconnectedness and interdependence of all beings. Panu and Thomas also touched on the concept of the “more than human world” (inspired by eco philosopher David Abram) and the need for “recollective practices” (inspired by ecopsychology theorist Andy Fisher) to connect with nature and counteract the divisive aspects of modern technological society.
Takeaways
It is helpful to think of nature not as a thing, but rather a process and set of relationships that is constantly changing.
There are different values associated with nature, including cultural, ethical, and experience-based values.
The spectrum of nature settings ranges from virtual and indoor nature to wild nature, and each setting offers unique opportunities for connection.
Recognizing the essence of a place and its history in deep time can deepen our understanding and appreciation of nature.
Nature is interconnected and interdependent, and recognizing our place in the web of life is essential.
Recollective practices can help us connect with nature and cope with difficult emotions related to climate change.
Season 3, Episode 15: Radical Joy in the Midst of Environmental Grief with Trebbe Johnson
Mar 15, 2024
Season 3, Episode 15: Radical Joy in the Midst of Environmental Grief with Trebbe Johnson
Panu and Thomas had an inspiring dialog with vision quest facilitator Trebbe Johnson, founder of Radical Joy for Hard Times. They discussed the concept of radical joy in the face of environmental grief and the importance of acknowledging and confronting our sorrow for the natural world. Trebbe shared her personal journey of connecting with nature and how it led her to create an organization that focuses on finding joy and gratitude in damaged places. Panu and Trebbe also discussed their time together in Finland in November 2023 and the workshops they led.
Key Takeaways
Radical joy can be found in the midst of sorrow and grief for the natural world.
Acknowledging and confronting our grief for damaged places allows for a deeper connection and the possibility of transformation.
Engaging in rituals and practices that honor and give back to hurt places can bring about a sense of joy and gratitude.
Continuing bonds with nature, even in the face of loss and change, can help us navigate the ongoing challenges of climate change.
Season 3, Episode 14: Meaning in Life and Meaning of Life
In this episode, Panu and Thomas reflected on ways to find a sense of meaning during an era of climate breakdown and other stresses. This can include meaning in your life (such as values that guide you) and meanings of and about your life (your purpose and reasons for living, such as caring for family). Their conversation ranged over profound topics like figuring out a life path, dealing with changes and threats, and the importance of opening up and asking big questions about meaning and happiness. Join the conversation!
Transcript
[The Climate Change and Happiness Transcript is on holiday.]
Season 3, Episode 13: On the “Waking Up Syndrome” with Linda Buzzell
Feb 16, 2024
Season 3, Episode 13: On the “Waking Up Syndrome” with Linda Buzzell
Summary
In this wide-ranging dialog, ecotherapy pioneer Linda Buzzell looked back on her history including her early environmental awakening working with French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau, her training in Marriage and Family Therapy and systems thinking, and her local activism in Santa Barbara, California. Linda described the development of the “Waking Up Syndrome” concept of sudden ecological awareness with her colleague Sarah Edwards and creation of the Ecotherapy anthology with Craig Chalquist. She, Thomas and Panu also discussed the distinctions between human-centered and nature-centered ecotherapy perspectives and the need for community-level approaches.
Season 3, Episode 12: On Literature and Activism with Matthew Schneider-Mayerson
Thomas and Panu had a wide ranging and stimulating dialog with Matthew Schneider-Mayerson, an associate professor of English at Colby College whose work touches on the cultural and political dynamics of climate change with a focus on literature and climate justice. Matthew shared his environmental identity “origin story” including his early anti-sweatshop activism and discovering Elizabeth Kolbert’s classic climate change narrative Field Notes from a Catastrophe while waiting in his therapist's office. We discussed insights from his projects like the Ecotopian Lexicon and thoughts about helping his students create rituals together to show value for nature and the more-than human world.
Season 3, Episode 11: Panu’s New Research on Ecological Sorrow
What kinds of losses do we experience due to environmental problems, and how can we understand the unique feelings of grief and sorrow that can ensue? Panu talked about his recent research paper, Ecological Sorrow: Types of Grief and Loss in Ecological Grief, that applied general knowledge about grief to ecological sorrow with more nuance than has previously been attempted. Thomas shared his reactions and the duo discussed ways to cope with issues like invisible losses that are “disenfranchised” and not officially recognized by society, and situations when people are not allowed to openly express their grief and sorrow about nature. Panu’s work reveals how ecological losses can be hard to measure and seemingly never ending, which makes ideas like “nonfinite loss” and “chronic sorrow” very relevant. Thomas and Panu shared ways to face ecological loss and grief in a healthy way, and invited listeners to reflect on their own feelings and ways of expression.
Season 3, Episode 10: A World of Emotions Words with Tim Lomas
Thomas and Panu spoke with Tim Lomas, an emotions researcher and author of works like Translating Happiness: A Cross-Cultural Lexicon of Well-Being and The Positive Power of Negative Emotions, who has been influential on the field of positive psychology and on our podcast. It’s always enlightening to hear about a thinker’s background. Tim shared a bit of his story including an influential time spent in China at age 19 that exposed him to Buddhist and Daoist ideas that he continues to explore in his positive psychology research. The discussion touched on the benefits of the unique “granular,” that is specific and nuanced, nature of certain emotions words that can be complex and challenging to translate outside of their native language (such as Finnish sisu, Japanese wabi-sabi or Portuguese saudade). We can use a global palate of emotions to shine a light on our relationships with nature and the natural world, including our joys, hopes, and fears.
Season 3, Episode 9: Taking Stock at the End of the Year
Thomas and Panu took stock of their feelings about the world as 2023 came to a close, and invited listeners to do the same. Thomas reflected on two quotes that are important to him and changing ways he has interpreted their meaning over the years: “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities. In the expert’s mind there are few” (Shunryu Suzuki); and “Find your place on the planet. Dig in, and take responsibility from there” (Gary Snyder). Panu described a ritual he participated in for the International Remembrance Day for Lost Species, celebrated on November 30. He and Thomas contemplated the importance of rituals, ceremonies and the arts including the recent Future Landscapes project. The idea of taking stock at the end of the year is echoed in the recent COP 28 meeting and 1st Global Stocktake—a process for countries to see how they’re collectively making progress towards meeting the goals of the Paris Climate Change Agreement. We know global warming will not be limited to 1.5 degrees Celsius / 2.7 Fahrenheit. We need to adapt to a hotter world, take care of the most vulnerable, and keep working to cool the planet down as quickly and safely as possible.
Season 3, Episode 8: Supporting Young People with Caroline Hickman
Thomas and Panu were joined by UK therapist and researcher Caroline Hickman. Caroline reflected on her formerly separate backgrounds as an environmentalist and a psychotherapist and pivotal nature experiences she had in midlife as a diving instructor that brought “all the parts of her life together." Caroline, Panu and Thomas discussed their recent activities and collaborations including the groundbreaking 2021 Lancet global survey of young people's climate emotions in ten countries worldwide. This research was powerful, Caroline and Panu explained, as it revealed crucial underlying facets of climate anxiety in youth including a lack of faith in leaders and a sense of betrayal by adults. Caroline also told of her interview studies with children and the fact that kids often know and care more than adults notice. Join us for a candid conversation and an invitation to reflect on what climate feelings tell us about the needs of young people and adults around us.
Season 3, Episode 7: What To Do If You Are Feeling Bitter
Thomas and Panu reflected on varieties of the feeling of bitterness in response to the chronic stress of climate and environmental problems—ranging from Finnish concepts like epäreiluuden tunne (unfairness-feeling) to the “Cassandrafreude” described by climate scientists (the bitter pleasure of things going wrong in exactly the way you predicted, but no one believed you when it could have made a difference). As Panu observed, it is a psychological and ethical challenge to be proud (in a healthy way) of one’s own good actions, including “chosen losses” where a conscious decision is made to relinquish something, and to avoid (at least overly strong) bitterness. Thomas also referenced thinkers like Myisha Cherry and Audre Lorde who highlight the ethical reasons for not forgiving in the face of betrayals and injustice.
[The Climate Change and Happiness Transcript is on holiday.]
Season 3, Episode 6: A Climate Vocabulary with Herb Simmens
Nov 10, 2023
Season 3, Episode 6: A Climate Vocabulary with Herb Simmens
This episode found Thomas and Panu in dialogue with Herb Simmens, a long time advocate for addressing climate issues in local government, and author of the compendium of climate-related terms, A Climate Vocabulary of the Future. What kind of new words could be useful to make sense of living in the midst of climate change?
Finnish art project Utopedia. Inventing new words related to environmental futures (in Finnish)
Transcript
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, our podcast, the show for people around the world who are thinking and feeling deeply about global climate change and all the other environmental issues that we can be aware of, and that affect us in our personal lives, in our daily lives. And like we say, we're all emotions all the time. So we really try to make a place for all our different feelings and our thoughts, and maybe our actions as well. And we have a guest today with us:
Doherty: Yeah, so we're really … We've been chatting with Herb and we love words here at this podcast, feelings words, concepts, and Herb has a whole book of an incredible lexicon of climate words. And we know this is one broad approach that people do to make sense of this big issue is trying to get the vocabulary of it. And I personally, as a lover of words, appreciate exploring an area through its vocabulary. So we're going to talk about that today. And you listeners can think about how this is landing for you. And you might also check out Herb’s book as well as kind of a guide, as an accessible guide to a lot of different really interesting concepts about climate change. Panu, do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Herb, very glad to have you here. And we share a love also, for crafting words. I've done that mostly in the Finnish language, which functions so that we often put words together and of course, then you may also mix them a bit. And I see some similar things happening with English also in your book. And, but let us start with sort of roots and history. So could you share a bit about your own journey? What brought you to do this kind of creative, multifaceted work around climate issues?
Simmens: Well, thanks and I really appreciate the opportunity to be here today. I've really enjoyed the podcasts that I've listened to. I sort of grew up in the era and at least in the United States, when public policy and when government was looked at positively. Some of your listeners at a younger age may feel that … may be surprised to even hear that such an era existed. But, in the 1960s with then President John F. Kennedy [who said] “Ask not what your country can do for you,” you know, “what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country?” And as a result, I got involved in … I studied public policy, and worked in state and local government for many years. And I was actually the, the manager of a town in New Jersey, back in 1988, when Jim Hansen, the now famous climate scientist, appeared before Congress and said, “Global warming is real, and we have to pay attention to it.” And I remember, even back then discussing it with people in my town, what do we need to prepare for? And over the years, I continued to be involved in various ways, running a small nonprofit that was a consortium of New Jersey's colleges and universities focused on climate. I had the opportunity to help get the county that I live in right outside of Washington create or adopt the first climate emergency in the United States and the second in the world in 2017, and a whole bunch of other things that I won't take the time on now.
But you know, in the last … a few years ago, it struck me that, what's maybe sort of obvious to me and to some people, but it wasn't to everybody back then, was the climate affects everything. I mean, you could sort of do it like a parlor game and just pick a topic or a word and say, “How does climate connect to this?” you know, and sooner or later, you'd be able to figure out a connection. And so I thought, well, since climate affects everything and sadly not that we wanted to, climate being climate change, that it's important for us to label what's happening, both to educate people and to stimulate people to have their emotions activated, if you will, because it's so important to identify what's going on.
And plus, I just always have loved playing with words. So I basically wrote the first edition of the book, and in 2017, it had about 400 terms, half of which are original. And then I sort of put it aside, I didn't want to deal with words for years. I was like … and I dealt with other aspects. And then two years ago, I thought, it's time for an update. And to my amazement, I thought I would, you know, add 100 words. But I added another four or five hundred words and terms. And here we are today. And I guess the fact that I added so many terms, sadly, is an indication of how much more pressing and huge climate is as a problem.
Doherty: Yeah, so are you from New Jersey originally?
Simmens: From Philly [Philadelphia] across the river from Jersey.
Doherty: Yeah. So that one's one strand to talk about a little bit. It's just this background, because, you know, Philadelphia, broadly, New Jersey, you know … here I'm in Portland, Oregon, which is known as an environmental consciousness kind of town, but for whatever reason, New Jersey or Philadelphia might not necessarily be seen as environmental hotbeds. But, that's not really true, right? You've been aware. The point I'm trying to make is that there are people aware of climate change, and have been aware of climate change for many, many years, and in all parts of the country and all parts of the world. So you've seen climate change, as an issue in local city government, state government for decades and decades?
Simmens: Well, you know, I would like to be able to say that I agree with your statement, but I'm not sure I can say that, because it's mostly been a non-issue when it should have been an issue. And that's what I've seen is the level of indifference, minimization, denial, you know, name your word, speaking of words. And I'll just very briefly give you an example here in Montgomery County, Maryland, where our community literally declared an emergency and set the toughest greenhouse gas emission reduction target in the country, maybe the world of an 80% reduction countywide by 2027. And it has been an important issue in the county, but nowhere near an emergency. The distinction between another important issue, like taxes are important and good schools are important, you know, at that level, as opposed to, we've got to put this first because our future is in line. It hasn't happened here. And I haven't seen it happen pretty much anywhere in the country.
Doherty: Yeah, so it's both-and. I talk to young people a lot, and they think this issue is new, but like yourself, you've been living with this issue for years. It was almost 30 years between Hansen and when you all did the climate emergency. So I just want to just make sure that we shout out to listeners who have been working on this for years and just honor that. That's the piece I want to honor here.
Simmens: Absolutely. There's so many people that put their hearts and souls into this issue for, as you say, for years, if not decades. And you know, it's been lonely. It's been, you know, you could have a whole vocabulary and you maybe you have had shows about this, you know, the emotional price that one pays, when one is sort of looked at as a kind of Cassandra, or one is looked at as this Doomsayer. When you know … and then you never want to be in a position 5 or 10 or 15 years later saying, “You know, I was right. You know, things are … we did need to act 10 years ago, or 20 years ago, or 5 years ago, whatever.” So it's very emotionally draining to have been in that position. To honor, I mean, it's critically important to honor those folks as you suggest, and to recognize the price that many of us have paid.
Pihkala: Yeah, I think that's a very important point. And I've been working mostly in Finland publicly in this, ecological emotions, and especially ecoanxiety in the Finnish form, which is more like “environment-anxiety” (ympäristöahdistus). And that has led to some interesting discussions with people who have been aware of ecological issues and sometimes climate issues for decades. And now finding some validation because there are public discourses about psychological toll. Of course, there is also, you know, feelings of honor to be had when, you know, that you are trying to work for the right things. So there's always a complex mix of emotions and one of the new words in my Finnish book is “suojelijakiitollisuus,” which is quite technical, it literally means “gratitude about those who have participated in nature protection.” It's more of a pedagogical word, you know, drawing attention that it is a source of gratitude for me, and I know for many others, those people who had to work sometimes in much more difficult circumstances than now, psychosocially speaking. Of course, it's not easy still. And we have, in some places growing identity polarization around climate issues, for example, But anyway, just resonating with some of these things. And does this remind you of some of the concepts in your book?
Simmens: Well, I mean, there are many concepts in my book that span the whole range of, you know, sort of climate, climate emotions, if you will. I mean …maybe I can mention just a couple of the terms that I'm not sure, you know, I'm not sure how much on target they are with what you're saying, but they're sort of in the ballpark. One of the things is, because of the nature that those of us who are involved, essentially have a pretty good sense of what's going to come and maybe how bad it's going to be, but not necessarily when and how and where is the level of uncertainty. So I came up with the concept of an “antemortem,” where you're basically…mortem being death, essentially, you're in anticipation, you're sort of anticipating or analyzing what may happen, and sort of grieving in advance. You know, because today if you are where I am, it's a beautiful day. It's 80 degrees Fahrenheit, and you know, the world is wonderful. It's .. there's a kind of hidden, you know… Here's another one … the “false climate summit.” For those who are mountain climbers know that often in certain large mountains, you get up there, and you think you're at the summit, but you're not, there's another one behind it. So, I coined the term “false climate summit” that we know we've made a certain degree of progress, or we've gotten through this, [and we say] “Oh, my God, there's another one,” you know, “where am I then going to get the … candy bars and the energy bars and the emotional support to get to the next summit? You know, that kind of thing.
And another one is what I call “bifocal behavior,” the idea that climate almost requires the same way with people with certain kinds of glasses, to be able to look at the distance, and to look at what's now at the same time. We can't take our eyes off of the, you know, the sort of the future 30 years from now, or else we won't achieve it. But if that's all we look at, and we don't deal with the opportunities and the pain and the suffering and the grief and the confusion, then we will have failed or at least not succeeded. So anyway, those are a few terms I'll just throw out. You're going to have to stop me because I got 1000 In the book, and you only have a few minutes! But what you know is that, you know, those are a few that cover various dimensions of climate and, you know, sort of the emotional landscape.
Doherty: Yeah, … it's great. I have to make a note about this idea of [false summit]. As someone who's been a mountain climber, the idea of a false summit, I know what that is. We… we've been climbing for hours, like Mount Adams, near where I live is a big mountain we all can see. And it has a very notorious false summit when you're the first time climbing up there. But they tell you there is but you don't believe it until you see it. And when you get up to this … precipice, you think that must be the top, and then you get to this and then you see a whole other set of the mountain, and little tiny ants up on the side of the mountain, which are the other people that are far ahead of you.
Yes, we love to do wordplay here. But you know, “False Climate Summit” is also a play on words about some of these meetings that we have, like the upcoming COP. I think a lot of people would think that's a “false summit,” in the sense of it's already sort of infiltrated by fossil fuel interests and
things like that.
Simmens: Oh, I don't know how you can say that, Thomas! [laughs] The fact that it's being led by the head of the oil company, the head of a Middle Eastern oil power, you know, oh, you're much too cynical!
Doherty: Yeah. So humor is our friend, if we can if we can find humor. But you know, so I'm curious of where you find your words. I imagine you're always on the hunt. There's some of your words that are very pop cultural, which I like. Like there's an entry called “So Holocene,” which is a great, great kind of pop culture term. So the idea that the Holocene is this traditional geological age that we've become accustomed to as humans, and now that's changing because of climate change to a different geological regime, you know, in the planet. That's the Holocene era that we're mourning the loss of. But to say something’s “So Holocene” that means it's kind of like “so yesterday.” It's “so 90s.” …It's so quaint that you're, you know, so when we make our summer plans, and we think we're going to do a certain thing. “Oh that it is ‘So Holocene’ that you think you're just going to make some plans, and there's not going to be wildfire smoke or a flood or something like that.” Do you know where you got that term “So Holocene” from?
Simmens: I think that one I found online somewhere, maybe Twitter, I don't know. You know, I distinguish in the book, I have a sort of a special dot or mark for those terms that, as far as I know, are original with me. At least when I do a Google search … they didn't show up as a climate term. And those that I basically …you know, taking out of the reading I do and whatever. But generally, I mean, most of what I've done is simply to, as I'm reading, if I'll read a paragraph in a book, and it may not even be about climate, and I think, you know, the author is taking a whole paragraph or a whole page to explain this concept. There should be a word or a term for this. And so that's what I'll do is sort of scribble on the side of the book and say, you know, maybe a couple of different terms.
And that's how I, and also, when I'm walking here, I'm not a mountain climber, but walking and hiking. You know, I basically, I guess, my experience is enriched by looking at the relationships between the plants and the animals and the birds and the sounds. And then, who knows where creativity or even if one would be so bold as to even call what I've written creative, but you know, sort of something will come to me. Like the idea of one of the terms I have is “biophonic discord.” Basically meaning, and this is a tragic term, where it represents something tragic, which is that, one of the many spheres of life on the planet is the soundsphere, the “sonosphere.” And that is being changed dramatically, as is everything else. As you know, as certain animals are more or less prevalent in an area, et cetera, and plants and all the rest of the ecological changes. And so we have a kind of “biophonic discord” that's out there. So anyway, that, you know, I don't know if that's a great answer to your question. But I guess the simple answer is they come from everywhere and nowhere and half the time they surprise me when they pop up in my head.
Pihkala: Yeah, that's definitely creative, in my opinion and mind. You have already hinted at some of these, but I'd like to ask even more explicitly about what has this project meant for you, this whole endeavor of coining these words? And whether you had some particular aims consciously, when doing the books? So, something about the impacts, and aims…
Simmens: A lot of my goal, and that's why I attempted, and only the reader can tell if I succeeded, I attempted to put some humor and lightness in the book at times as well. But in a way, it's sort of an attempt to give a reader the opportunity to learn not just about climate change, but about the connections between all the aspects of climate and life in a much more digestible way than, you know, sort of picking up a book that's 400 pages and, and reading and you have to read from page one linearly to the end, because the second chapter depends upon reading the first, whereas my book, you can, you know, pick it up any place, point your finger to a term and read it and get the benefit of that without having to, you know, be disciplined about everything.
So maybe it's sort of like a bite-sized effort at providing information that is not, as far as I know, not available, at least in this format in any other manner. And that was a lot of the motivation for me. And then the other is pure selfishness. It's been great fun to do it! And I, you know, I have one of the terms is “microguilt” in my book. I have a lot microguilt when I say that to you right now. It's like, how can I say something is great fun when we're talking about such a potentially tragic issue? And you know, one of the things I've learned, that I don't always practice years ago from a therapist, is the concept of instead of but-and to notice something could be fun and tragic, fun and onerous at the same time. It doesn't have to be one or the other. So it's really been it's been great fun for me, you know, I wrote about half the book sitting at a Starbucks on the beach in South beach in Miami Beach, in one of the most wonderful venues I could ever imagine. I was so excited there. I used to write love letters to the manager, I mean, about how great a venue they had!
Pihkala: So anyway, yeah, thanks for expanding on that. And I can personally resonate with much of that, especially in connection to my second Finnish book about eco emotions, which was a handbook. So it had some similar ideas. You know, you can open it from anywhere, and then different types of things which are given names, or little descriptions. And I ended up writing short, prosaic texts in between to sort of explore some aspects of eco emotions. And we've often in this podcast talked about the need to be open to both sadness and joy, for example. So there’s great dangers in this era, because it is so difficult and so much filled with suffering, that we sort of start to deny ourselves and others the possibility for joy, joy and laughter. And that's not something that even the people who live in varying conditions filled with suffering always do, quite the contrary. So there's something very human in the ability also to share things that produce gladness with others. And I don't want in any way to “brightside” suffering and very dark circumstances. But I really think that this idea of being open to creativity and humor and at the same time being open to very sad issues as you are also in the book, I think that's really crucial.
Doherty: Yeah. And we are again, being lovers of words, there is this idea of creating a kind of vocabulary, is done, you're probably familiar, you know… I'm going to call you Hank, I think, right, instead of Herb I think you might go by Hank for more casually. You know, Glenn Albrecht in Australia and has done a lot of work around his own lexicon and [new words like] “solastalgia.” And probably if he were here, Glenn would agree with some of this and have his own unique take on it. But it is this personal, creative, it's a creative response. And then the Bureau of Linguistic Reality, and … looking at some books on my shelf. But we've got other kinds of books.. I myself have coined, you know, my own terms like “climate hostage,” and various sorts of things. So there's this creative… So for the listeners, you know, there it is exactly as, as Hank says, it's “yes and.” And so we can feel this and that, and it's the 360 degree range of emotions. Our mind is primed to look at danger and threats. So we tend to focus on those first from a survival standpoint. But we have to work hard to bring those other emotions in. And so just honoring that.
I had a question. I mean, we've got the pop culture terms in the terms that you create, Hank yourself to kind of make sense. But then there's some other words. I noticed you have a lot of great testimonials in your book, you know, from people like [author] Kim Stanley Robinson, and some of the people that I admire. Kim Stanley Robinson, of course, has imagined whole, you know, worlds and future scenarios. And you have a word “World Climate Organization.” So that's the proposed organization that will be responsible for managing climate. So it's almost like the World Trade Organization, but we would have a world climate organization or a carbon reserve bank. So we would… so the World Bank would also, you know, work on this more directly. But those must be terms that people have been actually proposing in the real world. I would assume that you've heard about somewhere?
Simmens: In some cases, yes. In some cases, no. And actually, in the first edition of the book, I had a separate section with terms that I came up with or that were existing, that reflect policies, I mean, or actions as opposed to simply, you know, describing an emotion or an owner situation. And so that's where I had a whole section on things like the World Trade Organization, as you say,or the carbon Reserve Bank. Some of them were original to me, and others, you know, are sort of out there. Ironically, when you said, the World Climate Organization reminds me of the World Trade Organization, there is an international group that was established to attempt to come up with strategies to avoid overshooting the 1.5 [Celsius] targets. And there I have just been in touch with them two days ago. And they're trying to basically come up with a report in history and a strategy. And the guy who is head of that head of that is the former head of the World Trade Organization, just coincidentally.
But yes, those kinds of things are from my background in public policy. I mean, there's part of me that says, Oh, yes, here's this new entity, and here's this new organization. And here's this new group that we could create. You know, that go, you know, a world counseling group, where you, you're trained 1000s and 10s, of 1000s of peer counselors to support each other. I mean, you know, to me, the broader vision that I that I have and I tried to reflect it in the vision that I wrote is, is that there's so many new institutional arrangements that I think are not happening, that could really enrich our lives, no matter what the ultimate outcome, if there is one, will be of the climate crisis. And that certainly one of them is to have millions of people doing peer counseling with each other.
Doherty: Yeah. And I know, I've heard people talk about that. And folks who are working in transformational resilience and the Climate Psychology Alliance, and people doing climate cafes. [So that’s right.] So that's the other angle here, like, again, thinking of writers like Kim Stanley Robinson. It’s … there's an aspect of futurism where we kind of just lean a bit into the future, the near future, you know, predictions. It’s not science fiction. It's really just taking existing trends and just moving them forward, or also, realizing that there are things already happening, that I didn't realize, that I thought were going to happen in the future that already are happening [now]. So, I think there can be some pleasant surprises when we realize, “Oh, these things are already happening.” And some more things are happening in Finland, for example, that in the US might seem futuristic, but the Finns have been doing for a while.
Simmens: Well, you know, there's the book, I may have attempted to accomplish too much with the book, because the scenario that I write in the book for looking back from 2035, basically shows how the world can and I think absolutely it's a feasible if not probable future, can reverse climate change and restore a safe climate, through the careful knitting together of a lot of these institutions and ideas and concepts that aren't being given full attention by the world community. You know, that's a whole other podcast to go into all that.
But, I came up with a term that some groups that I'm working with to activate some changes at the international level are using the “climate triad,” which is basically currently, we have one of the terms that came up with ERA “emission reductions alone,” the current model of climate action is almost entirely focused on emission reductions, and of course, adaptation. But what a number of us are saying we need to broaden that, to give equal attention, and weight and action to removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and most controversial, and maybe some of your listeners will, you know, turn off when I say this right now, but some form of what we call “direct cooling of the climate,” others call geoengineering, which has enormous potential and yes, can be scary, to literally lower the world's thermostat in a matter of months, and prevent incredible amounts of suffering. And this 2035 scenario is sort of built around that concept.
Pihkala: Yeah, and that's fun. One part of the book, which we haven't discussed much yet is that it begins with these scenarios, which also then link to many of the words in the book. So that's an interesting way to provide links to some of the content but also, I liked the way that what you are trying to do, of course, is imaginative, but also sort of realistic at the same time, estimations of things that may go into the good direction and and things that seem to go to a bad direction. So I liked the nuances there. And a Finnish smaller scale version of inventing new words for the future was called the Utopedia (http://utopedia.fi/mika/). So that was also about futures, not just about utopia, but that's something that also came to mind when reading these scenarios that you've built. So there is an element of utopia, which I'm not interested about, you know, like that “we will all live under blossoming apple trees”. Not that kind of utopia, but more like being able to discern things in the future that would be important and desirable.
Doherty: Yeah, we're coming toward the end of our time. But this is just…I thought I was going to highlight a few key phrases and entries from your book, Hank, but I couldn't stop! So I've got too many highlights now. So I might just, you know, so it's climate vocabulary for the future. So it's a climate vocabulary really also for the present, obviously. But, I think for listeners who might not have time or bandwidth to read Kim Stanley Robinson's novels or really take a course in climate science and climate adaptation, or carbon capture, some of those neat science things, this is a great accessible entree into these concepts, and also how they fit together into a future scenario.
And I think, you know, what we describe of the future becomes the future. So it is … we do need to actively go into the future and create it, or else it happens to us. So I really appreciate Hank, that you've done this and shared it with people. Panu, do you want to finish us out with some thoughts here?
Pihkala: Yeah, we always try to finish with at least you know, being able to look more toward a tomorrow. Herb, is there any that kind of word that comes into your mind from your book, which is sort of related to the desire to live?
Simmens: Well, if I could, I thought maybe I would just read one brief paragraph, from this vision for the future that comes at the end, that follows what I said earlier about a vision that actually could restore a safe climate and not just avoid the worst. So this comes at the end of a 20 page narrative. So, it has to be looked at in the larger context. But basically, what I say is:
As of New Year 2035, the Triad based restoration movement was proving that it could succeed in achieving the unthinkable this century — restoring a healthy climate. To celebrate the success, revelers in 450 cities celebrated by cheering on as 450 carbon concentration clocks showed the first decline in CO2 concentrations since the industrial revolution from — you guessed it — 451 to 450 parts per million.
Restoration inspired billions to turn from social media, Kim Kar- dashian, fast fashion, drugged despair, enervating energy battles, and false fascist allures to the most exciting challenge of all — rebuilding a thriving healthy planet for all by meeting the One Generation Climate Challenge. We find ourselves finally on the path back to the sweet comfort of ecostasis — with harmony within and between the planet’s ecosystems and life.
So that's sort of how I end this scenario.
Doherty: Yeah, thanks. It's important for us to spend time with these visions, and you do a great job, you don't sugarcoat any of the problems, but you also, you know, you don't deny any of the solutions, either. And the possibilities. So that's that, “yes-and.
Simmens: That's right. And I think it's just the concept that we have one generation, roughly one generation where if the world comes together, or mostly together, to do the right thing, it would motivate you know, literally hundreds of millions of young people and whatever. And that's I guess, that's my larger sort of mega goal is the hope that that the words and the concepts in this book and play a tiny role in in motivating people to get beyond, to certainly acknowledge the despair and the grief and everything we legitimately feel, but to transcend that, or do at the same time build a future that we have to do right now or it'll be too late.
Pihkala: One thanks for joining us. It's been truly delightful, and I look forward to spending even more time with the climate vocabulary.
Simmens: Thank you so much. It was really great to chat with you guys and you, you do a wonderful job and I really feel honored to be on your program.
Doherty: Yeah, thanks. I'll be sharing this book with some of the people that I work with. And we'll have some show notes here that will describe Hanks’s and maybe some other references that Hank thinks are helpful. So this is climate change and happiness.com. You can find us at that address, climatechangeandhappiness.com and please support us through our website or through our Patreon to keep bringing you these very interesting shows and great guests. And Hank and Panu. you have a good rest of your day. Take care.
Pihkala: Thanks Thomas. Take Care.
The Climate Change and Happiness podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com
Season 3, Episode 5: The Climate Emotions Wheel
Oct 27, 2023
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Doherty: Hi, this is Thomas Doherty …
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. This is our podcast. Panu and I have been working on this podcast for a couple of years now. It came from our own personal dialogues, and we thought we'd open this up and share this with the public and with our, you know, bringing in our colleagues. This is a podcast for people around the globe who are thinking, and most importantly, feeling a lot of interesting, deep things about climate change and other environmental issues. And so in this particular podcast, we talk about the emotional aspects. Panu has been doing a lot of research and writing on this. I'm working with people on this and also doing my own writing and work. And so this is a place for the emotions, all emotions all the time. The emotions are in our bodies, they're physiological, we can measure those, the feelings, of course, are infinite, because it's our language and our words and all around the world are all kinds of different feelings words we use to describe our emotions. So, Panu, speaking of emotions, I know you've been working on this for years now, recently, someone adapted some of your work into an emotions wheel. A Wheel of different kinds of emotions that think about in terms of climate change. And I thought we would touch in on that, see what you see what you think about that, and how that how that flows out of your work. And we'll go from there.
Pihkala: Yes, thanks, Thomas. This climate emotion wheel has now been shared pretty heavily in social media. And the visualization and the selection of the words was made by the organization, the Climate and Mental Health Network. And they asked me to comment on the project also. So, I did some of some of that. And there's been interesting developments. For example, it's been on a Times Square advertisement in New York for him for a while. And so it really seems to resonate with many, many people. And myself, when I started to dig deeper into emotion studies, I remember that visualizations were very helpful—in addition to all this text that we have about emotions. Robert Plutchik has this famous emotions wheel and there are several versions available online. And as you Thomas well know, emotion researchers have debates between them as all researchers do. So there's no standard emotion wheel that would be accepted by everyone, I really think that these are practically useful. But of course, they also have their limits. And there are always simplifying things. So there's pros and cons in using this. But I'm very happy that my work has been useful in the creation of this wheel.
Doherty: Yes! You can go on Amazon and find a climate emotions wheel pillow and a climate emotions wheel … therapists use these in their work. And there's posters. And any mental health person will be familiar with this stuff. It's helpful to have some sort of guide to all different kinds of emotions. So there's two things that we're talking about in this podcast for people in the know. For researchers, there's all the backstory of how people empirically study this. And it's quite interesting. And then there's just our own need of it. Because we cannot be alive without having emotions, all living things have some sort of emotional response to the environment. And then of course, as humans, we have these nuanced, potentially nuanced feelings. So it's nice to have, like anything else, a guide, a taxonomy, as you say, a list of words. And the wheel is just putting that into a graphic form. And so I think it's helpful. Do you think, you know, as someone who gets deep into this. Obviously, I believe you think it's helpful for people to look at these kinds of wheels and I'm so impressed that it's in Times Square, I didn't know that. I think that's great. Is there any downsides of putting this onto a wheel?
Pihkala: Well, there's all always potential dangers. And also in relation to the old emotion wheels, people have been wary of the possibility that folks would think that the emotions in the middle somehow are really the most important and primary ones. That's a big debate in emotion research, whether there are sort of basic emotions or universal emotions shared by people worldwide. [Yeah.] So that's one possible misconception is that, you know, these four, emotional words in the middle, that they would be the only real overall candidate categories. But then then again, that is not what know what the wheel and the people are saying. So, the makers of the climate emotion wheel, they didn't intend that this would have all the relevant emotion words, they just wanted to provide many useful emotion words, so that people can think about what they may be feeling and what others may be feeling. So this may be validating both for people themselves and in relation to others. And we know from science, that if we have names for emotions, even roughly pointing to the right direction, then it's easier for us to engage with that, with those emotional energies. And I know Thomas that this is a very commonplace thing for you as a therapist, you know, helping people to name and recognize what they are actually feeling.
But this brings us to a very important another point, which is that there's lots of different emotional energies often in our body-mind, by body-mind I mean that our body and mind are connected, and I liked the word even though it's a bit technical. And that's also something which sometimes doesn't come up in climate emotions research or public discussions. For example, people may sort of have the presupposition, that, you know, should I feel just anger? Or is somebody just feeling anxiety or sadness or just hope? And it's not so, people are feeling many kinds of emotions and feelings and sometimes there can be interesting clusters of emotions, or interlaced emotions, you know, emotions which are somehow tied to each other in the person's experience or the group's experience. And that's something I think Thomas we haven't talked about yet in the podcast, even though we have been talking a lot about climate emotions. But I'm interested about these emotions that go together for some people in certain situations.
Doherty: Yeah. When I see the climate wheel (and we'll put a link to this—you can google “climate emotions wheel” and you'll find this and you'll find other famous wheel models of emotion.) I think of the color wheel, you know, when people are doing art and design, when we're mixing colors to get different shades. I haven't seen that, you might have seen that talked about, but you know, these primary colors, you know, primary emotions. Obviously, humans like to categorize things so we're always sort of seeing what box and so they categorize emotions they're always looking for, for more simpler sets of emotions. But the color wheel I think is a helpful analogy. Because feeling blue, whichever emotion you want to categorize for blue, and then of course, feeling yellow emotions, you know, creates green emotions. So we can run with that metaphorically. People who are feeling sad about the environment and also love and curiosity might lead them to some deeper connection with the environment. You know, I don't know. So, I love playing with the metaphors. But yes, and just for the public. I mean, we're … we've, you know, read too many pieces and too much stuff about climate emotions. We're kind of deep into this. But just keeping in mind like Panu was saying, people have researched emotions for forever going back to you know, Aristotle or whatever, and tried to make different categories and different things.
And there's some famous researchers out there that have studied people's facial expressions and how emotions are physical things in our bodies and we have the physical posture or facial expression that causes us to feel certain things. So the bi-directional aspect. Psychologist used to be a debate about what came first—a thought or a feeling you know—which was faster? That's an interesting area and, of course, more recently, people have been like yourself, talking about climate emotions and really trying to figure out what people are feeling about all these issues. And that's, that's newer. And that's really interesting.
And then we have different even different views on that, right? We know people use regular emotions words like loneliness or loss. You know, Glenn Albrecht is a thinker that has created a whole special vocabulary of climate words to kind of, I think, give justice to these unique kind of … and I think that speaks a little bit to those special feeling mixes that you're talking about. But, you know, “solastalgia” is a well-known word that that a lot of people have heard that was came out of that work, this combination of being nostalgic, but feeling lost for an area that you're actually haven't left, it's idea that the world is leaving you versus you leaving the world. And we're, that's a very interesting, nuanced emotion that's really touched a chord for people. But it's important for people not to get confused about this. These are just diverse, interesting ways, you know, that people are talking about emotions. Right? Is that a fair statement, Panu?
Pihkala: Yes, I think definitely, so. And I love the color metaphor that you are using Thomas and I have sometimes been thinking about shapes and colors. So if a person, like many Finns are, is feeling, climate, guilt, and sadness, and hope, at the same time, or next to each other, what kind of form and color a visualization could depict that? And this is something of course, which can sometimes be done in self-reflection or in workshops for it, for example. And it's not scientific, but it's helpful. And that's the most important thing. And Glenn Albrecht work has been highly influential for my own book and solastalgia for example, is in this taxonomy of climate emotions paper. It didn't end up in the wheel, but it's, it's there, broadly. Earth emotions, as Glenn calls them. There's lots of very important shades that are coming out.
Two big things that are also related here is one that you hinted at Thomas, which is sort of the length or intensity of emotion. So there may be sort of short-lived emotions or feelings and tentatively, maybe longer time, affective phenomena, for example, mood. And this is something which is important in relation to climate emotions, also. And I know that many people have generally a bit like sad moods and you know, then hopefulness may pop up at times. And if you have a tendency towards sad mood, that doesn't mean that you wouldn't ever experience joy, for example. And this is one of the richnesses of our emotional lives. And especially when they are healthy, when we are able to feel these different emotions, then our capacity to feel all kinds of emotions is larger. And this is a long road for any of us.
I know that personally, for example, it's a continuous learning process to be open to various emotional energies. Of course, one needs to also do some regulation about it. And in social situations, we can't just always let all emotion out. That would be very problematic. But it's also very problematic if we do too much suppression or repression. And finally, before, I want to ask what you think about this issue, the “about-ness” of emotions, so climate emotions, some of them are about climate change in general, but then some are about certain aspects of it. And for example, joy, it's very difficult to feel joy about the existence of the climate crisis. But it's very often that I feel joy because of the large number of climate activists, for example.
Doherty: I was thinking about some of the research, but the last … What was the last part about climate activists? So I didn't quite follow that piece. The last part of your statement there.
Pihkala: Yeah. Well, what I mean, is that some of the so-called positive emotions, may be much easier to feel in relation to, for example, climate action. Yes. Yeah. Then to climate change in general?
Doherty: Yes, exactly! I was watching some film recording of the recent climate march in New York City. And I saw a little bit of the speech of Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, you know, and it was very uplifting and it was, you know, you could … I could sense the energy of the crowd there. And so I think that's one of the one of the aspects, one of the many is like, we don't feel them [emotions] only in isolation, they're social, you know, social things that happen within groups of people. So that's, that's one angle here. And what is, there's a saying, you might know it, I think it's a Swedish saying about being together cuts our grief and half, but it doubles our joy, you know, something like that. So, being together with people is both helpful for sad feelings. It helps to bear the weight of sad feelings, we're sharing them, but like, being together and sharing them positively kind of multiplies, … I mean, we could do a whole podcast on emotions. We do! But we could do a whole other podcast just on the science of emotion. And the social aspect and the neuropsychological, brain aspect of it, and the philosophical, social justice aspects of this kind of stuff. It's just fascinating.
Pihkala: Yeah, I think that's a great, great point Thomas and very relevant for climate emotions. Because some of them are so heavily intertwined with our social relations. And that's why, for example, I didn't just apply any theory of basic or universal emotions, because those are more related to, you know, “what did we get in evolution type of thing,” and what sort of emotional energies we need, for example, if we live in a forest or jungle, but then amidst other members of our tribes, and also contemporarily, there's all these dynamics about guilt, and honor, for example, social approval or disapproval, and feelings related to sharing life, but also social hierarchies and so on. So many of our climate emotions, are heavily moderated by the social dynamics. And that's, I think, an important aspect.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So there's a saying, you know, all models are wrong, some are useful. So all these different models are limited in some way. They, they obscure something. And that's why we have different thinkers. And that's why I have people with different models, because they show things that that are lost. So a wheel image captures some things, but a list captures another process. You know, I mean, one way to moderate our climate emotions, and is go to different groups of people. I mean, that's one way to categorize climate subcultures like what is their dominant feeling? Well, I know if I go to this meeting, it's going to be dominantly fear and anxiety of this particular group. I know that this one is going to be curiosity. You know, if I know this one, it might be if I go to the Climate March, I imagine the feelings are going to be righteous indignation and camaraderie. And so we can we can put ourselves where we want to get the feelings, you know, it's, we're social beings, you know, we're group animals. And so that's one way of coping, coping with this stuff.
And like I talk about being a climate cosmopolitan, like, I can go and hang out with the people that are creating new interesting language words and see what that's like. And I can go to the scientists and see what they have to say. And I can go to the march and see what they have to say. And it's the right tool for the job. I think practically, when you're, if someone's trying to make change in their organization, or in their school or in their job … this is the classic with any kind of change. You have to understand your audience and you have to understand how they typically speak. I know if I bring in ideas like solastalgia or “terrafurie” is another great word. I love that—sort of like anger about the climate and environmental issues. You know, it's anger, like we all know, but “terrafurie” has this special tone to it. Now with some groups, they would love to hear that and it really is helpful. But if I am at the hospital, at Mass General Hospital, and I'm talking about working with the patients and the researchers, and I say, we have to channel our terrafurie, well, they might say, “Okay, that sounds like environmentalism. That's not going to fit here in our hospital.” So, if I talk about emotions, and that our clients are struggling with difficult emotions, and that, you know, so it's using the right emotional language for the right subculture and for what you're trying to do. So there's always this practical side. I imagine you've seen that as well in your work.
Pihkala: Yes, definitely. Definitely so. My public work in Finland has taken me to many kinds of audiences and it's quite different if you work with an environmental NGO, or then a network of car sales persons who have become interested about climate matters. So just to mention a couple of couple of examples. Our episode with Renee Lertzman some months ago was closely related to this, because she's one of the persons who has been studying and observing emotions which are under the surface. And that's a yet another complication, that there may be climate emotions that people are not aware of themselves for complex reasons. For example, it may feel intuitively too painful to allow all the sadness to come to the surface, for example, or people, including myself, often might want to repress some of the guilt. So, for communication and education, that's another layer of trying to be aware that there may be things under the surface. And for me, following the guidance of Susan Moser and others, one key takeaway has been to not be threatening in communication because there is so much fear underneath the surface in people, even those who don't claim themselves to be environmentalist in any way. So, all kinds of threatening imagery, for example, can just block people more. So that's something that I do in my public work, that I really try to make those safe spaces and allow for different kinds of emotional responses, including sometimes frustration towards environmental matters in general. Then sort of recognizing and validating that can be a way forward in the conversation. Instead of presupposing that everybody should be right away keen about this matter for sure.
Doherty: Sure. When you brought in repression, then that opened up a whole another window around emotions that brought I mean, if, if we could bring Sigmund Freud back, or Melanie Klein, or one of the great psychoanalysts, you know, they would, of course, have a whole very rich take on all of how we feel emotions, what's conscious or unconscious, I'm always pragmatic about this. So it's like, you know, certain things we express, like, we share, certain things we suppress, like, we don't share for various reasons, because I'm not going to talk about this feeling in this particular audience, or in this particular situation, or, “Hey, I'm in a crisis, I can't afford to break down right now I need to keep on my game face and get things done.” So I'm going to suppress this emotion in service of getting things done.
And then of course, the idea of repression, where we shove these under the surface somehow and forget that they're there, or unconsciously channel them, that's a whole another rich area that, you know, some listeners are going to respond to. So that's a whole another, and just broadly, like you say, the therapeutic process, because it's a process, you know, it's like, like anything else these some, like, I've talked about this before. But you know, when I work with people, I say, well, there's, there's both what do you feel? And you can use a wheel for that or whatever? And then what do you want to feel? So there's, there's this kind of going toward, like, What feelings do I want to grow and cultivate? That turns this into a personal growth project. And then of course, from that there are some feelings that are frankly, a stretch. Like I don't know if I'm going to be able to get to, you know, empowerment. That seems like a stretch at a given moment when I'm feeling loss and depression. But I can stretch toward it.
And because feelings are wild, and you know, things happen. And I go to that … I can guarantee if you're depressed, but you went to that climate march and, and you listened to some of those speeches, you might lo and behold, feel empowered. So it happens. So there's those stretch feelings. And then then there's some feelings [that] are really scary, tender feelings that people don't want to go to. And we have to be very respectful of that and kind of kind of sneak up on those feelings and become comfortable. So it's a whole process, right? I guess that's the therapeutic process, whether you're in therapy yourself or, or just your own life, you know, your own daily struggle. So, really rich.
Pihkala: Yeah, I think Thomas that's very helpful for us all and a great, brief definition of suppression and repression. And that's those kinds of things. You know, pumping up the energy in a certain emotion is one option and then sort of pumping it down. I'm not sure if this is the best metaphor in English, but anyway, there's more technical terms, for example, in emotion-focused counseling, which I find very interesting, and that's something I've been trying to learn myself also in relation to emotional energy is that sometimes, you know, consciously sort of increasing it a bit or allowing it to grow a bit more, if the situation so demands, and then sometimes, you know, trying to lessen it often because the situation doesn't allow more of that. And those situations in my life are often related to public facilitation or speaking. And it's terrible if you are having a presentation or workshop about ecoanxiety and then the facilitator breaks down. So that's going to be quite a situation when the group then has to carry the facilitator and that’s human and may happen to certain degrees. But for safety, it's important that there's enough of that. But I wonder whether you, Thomas, how much do you use this with your clients? You know, these skills of sort of bumping up or down the energy of emotions?
Doherty: Oh, yeah. I mean, it's at the heart, I think, of almost any therapeutic work, I mean, in my sort of approach, and the manuscript I'm working on, you know, it's basically chapter two of this manuscript, you know, how to feel or how do you want to feel? The first chapter is how to think, so it's starting to just be aware that we have all these models, and we have different lenses we look through and there's diverse ways to look at the world. I think that's a good place to start. But then yeah, how do you feel? I mean, I've always thought there's three main tasks in environmental work: how do we feel about the situation? How do we describe it, what do we think about it? And what should we do? And so much of our all our education and academia and science and climate change, reports in the news is all about the description and how do we think about it and all the data and all the info. And then of course, what should we do this policy or that policy? But the “how to feel” is always underneath all of that.
And that's why … part of my theory on how why ecoanxiety is so prevalent, because it's bubbling up, because people's feelings aren't really honored. And then we know just in science in general, scientists are taught not to share their personal feelings and policy laws are very dispassionate. Right? That's the ideal being dispassionate. But where those feelings go? So, yeah, so I think it's just huge. And, yeah, sometimes we want to, we want to fake it till we make it and pump up some positive emotions, just like coaching a team of young people in a sport or something like that, or coaching ourselves, running over a hill when we're running our race, or getting through our day. And then sometimes, yeah, we want to take time to just “feel all the feels” like, you know, Britt Wray has a section in her book about, you know, feeling all the feels, all of them, you know. So yeah, so giving permission, giving permission about that.
Where do you think you're going? Where are you going with some of your work? Like, what, what kind of projects are you working on now? Or what's the next step for this for you?
Pihkala: Thanks. Thanks for asking. Since the completion of the process model of ecoanxiety and grief, which we discussed at an earlier episode, I've been working heavily on theories of grief and bereavement, not to be gloomy, but bring out nuances related to how much change there is around us and in us, and the sort of perceived need to be able to name those kinds of nuances. Like you know, changes and losses related to identity and roles, in addition to the very visible changes in our so called natural environments. So that's hopefully going to be finished quite soon. The first quite long, regrettably, again, long article about theories of grief and bereavement as applied to ecological grief. And the sort of practical next step is what I've been drafting was just like a sort of questionnaire or self-reflection sheet about ecological sadness and grief. So if somebody wants to do that kind of work, either as in a work or with others, then there's sort of practical application of, of doing reflection about what things are changing, and that should also include, I think, those kinds of changes which have many sides, there may be both personnel growth and loss at the same time, for example. So those kinds of things. And I'm eagerly awaiting your forthcoming book, Thomas. Also, I know that's a long distance run but it’s in the process.
Doherty: Yeah. And it's, you know, I mean, I shared a milestone, I shared the first chapter with my, you know, my book agent person I'm working with and so that's been a personal milestone for me this week, to keep moving forward, you know, into this process. But you're speaking to a final thing here, I think we can end on, which is, you know, on the emotions, whatever, model you want to use, whether it's a vocabulary list, or [making up ] new words, or the emotions wheel, there's one thing to talk about it from a distance. And it's another thing to, like, if we're like a dart and we throw ourselves at the emotional wheel, we land, boom! in sadness, or, you know, we land in depression, and we, okay, we're sitting in that. And that's a whole, that's a process, that's part of the, you know, we're in that and oh, okay, I have to open myself up to this loss and depression.
And of course, loss is a part of life. So many, many losses related to just general life and letting go of things. And, of course, from a Buddhist perspective, you know, life is suffering, because we're attached, and we have to let go. So just being aware, at any given moment, you're going to be sitting, we're going to be sitting in a in a section, I can also be in a section that's has empathy. Okay, I'm empathizing with myself, and that. So we can, we can kind of move our peg around the wheel. When we're in a slot, we're in a slot and we have to feel that so that's the job, I think. So we can nudge ourselves to sort of different sections, if we want, we will find ourselves in different sections. Is there anything you're looking forward to for the rest of the evening Panu as we and as you wrap up your long day, Panu?
Pihkala: Autumn is coming in Finland, so the sun is already setting. So if there may be a chance to get a bit of sun, sunlight, or when going out. And how is your starting day looking like?
Doherty: Well, yeah, I know, you're really a student of the seasons, and I am as well. And so there's the seasons of emotions. And so yes, I was actually thinking about autumn as well, because we're in early, early autumn coming into October here, and the leaves haven't really changed yet. But the weather has clearly changed. And it's cooler and wetter. And for me personally, that moves me more into the purple part of the [climate emotions] wheel there where I'm more likely to, to naturally feel some loss and melancholy as the year is ending. So yes, but I'm frankly looking forward to after this, I'll be with my therapy training group. And I have people coming in from around the world this season, from India, from Italy, from England, from Hawaii. And so in a few minutes, I'm going to jump in with that group. And they're, you know, they're really interested in this stuff. And we'll get we'll get to talk about this stuff. And it's generally pretty much like this podcast, very uplifting for me. It gives me hope, gratitude, empathy, inspiration, empowerment, interest, it keeps me in that blue positive section of the wheel. So that's all good.
And you know, I have I've spent some time in the overwhelm section this week! My daughter has been home from school because she's been ill and I've been working on my manuscript, you know. So yes, we can get overwhelmed. So listeners, just be aware you're in all these different feelings. Some of you are experts on certain news areas, both as scientists or as humans. So be well and Panu you have a great evening and listeners, take care.
Pihkala: Take care.
Season 3, Episode 4: An Australian Climate and Emotions Perspective with Dr. Joëlle Gergis
Oct 13, 2023
Season 3, Episode 4: An Australian Climate and Emotions Perspective with Dr. Joëlle Gergis
Joëlle Gergis is an award-winning climate scientist and writer from the Australian National University. Joëlle was a lead author on the IPCC 6th Assessment report: Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis. As the southern hemisphere summer approaches, Joëlle Gergis spoke with Panu and Thomas about her most recent book Humanity's Moment: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope and the unique emotional challenges of confronting the human and wildlife toll of climate disasters in Australia. As Joelle noted, Australia is one of the world’s most vulnerable developed nations in terms of climate disruptions as well as a leader in fossil fuel production. So, Australians’ efforts at coping and making change are important learning for others around the globe.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to climate change and happiness, our podcast. This is a show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change and other environmental issues. And as we say, we're all climate change emotions all the time. That's what we're focused on here. Even though people are more open to talk about their feelings and thoughts about climate change, it's still not common to have open conversations about these things, particularly about the emotional level. So it's what we do here. And today we are very honored to have a guest.
Joëlle Gergis: So, I'm Dr. Joëlle Gergis. I'm a climate scientist and writer from the Australian National University.
Doherty: And we've heard of Joelle. I've got a copy of her book here Humanity's Moment and Joelle is, if you're in the know about the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and how this group comes together across the world and meets, and Joelle is one of the scientists that's involved with the IPCC. We'll talk a little bit about her journey and her background. And Joelle is our first guest from Australia. So, this is a great opportunity for us to think about the continent of Australia, and all the unique experiences that are happening for people there. I know we have listeners in Australia, so this will be nice. And Panu do you want to get us started off in our dialogue?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Joelle, very pleased to meet you. And there's been very interesting conversations between Australian people around climate emotions and all the strong contradictions around them, also related to governmental policies and physical impacts. And I've personally benefited from quite pioneering work by the Australian Psychological Society and a great organization called Psychology for a Safe Climate. So there's some great material for constructive encounters with climate emotions. And that's something very notable in your work, Joelle. I think that you are so open about speaking of climate emotions, as a scientist, and there's some research going on internationally about the emotions of climate scientists. That's one topic we might touch upon here. But firstly, we'd like to ask you a bit about your journey. How did you become so heavily involved with global climate change and end up being a writer and researcher who is open about various sides of the issue?
Gergis: Yeah, thanks for having me. Firstly, on the podcast, it's a real pleasure to be here. And it's also quite an interesting thing to be the first Australian to speak to you guys. So, I guess as a young person growing up in Australia, you know, we have such a ferocious climate. And I remember a particular time in my childhood in 1994, when there was a really severe bushfire season, and there was ash falling all throughout my neighborhood. There was a thick smoke. And I wondered to myself, well, what is it that makes Australia's climate so erratic and so extreme? And that led me to wanting to study environmental science and climatology at university.
And I guess it's been a 25 year journey, really, for me in terms of teaching, researching and writing about climate change. And then that journey led me eventually to be selected as a lead author on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Sixth Assessment Report. And for me, I suppose that was a real turning point in my career, where all of a sudden, I could see what was happening at home in my own country of Australia. And Australia, as you probably know, is often seen on the news in very dramatic ways, whether it's a wildfire or it's a flood or a very severe drought. So, in many ways, Australia is a bit of a poster child for climate change in terms of some of the real world impacts. And we're actually considered the most vulnerable nation in the developed world when it comes to climate change. So, it's a really interesting perspective to be both, you know, researching climate variability and climate change in a country like Australia, but also thinking about different ways of communicating our science.
And so for me, that opportunity to really think about what is it that is getting in the way of emotionally engaging the average person and a topic like climate change, because it can be so overwhelming, and so soul destroying, in many ways for a lot of people, because of the enormity of the challenge we face is huge. And, sometimes people feel very powerless in the face of that. And of course, you would know also in Australia, we're the largest exporter of coal and liquefied natural gas. So, there's been a very entrenched resistance, if you like, to actually implementing climate policy that is meaningful in any sort of scientific terms. But also just thinking about what it is to be, I guess, an Australian at this moment and how we show up on the global stage.
So really, my work has led me deep into the heart of the IPCC. And as I was working on the IPCC, there were all sorts of extreme events unfolding. You might have recalled the "Black Summer" wildfire season that we had in 2019-2020, in that summer period, and that basically saw around 25% of Australia's forests burned in a single bushfire season. In an extreme year, you might get 2%. So to get 25%, it was a global record in terms of the sheer enormity of the blazes. And now the koala is actually considered an endangered species along the east coast of this country. And that's not something I ever thought I'd experienced in my lifetime.
So, as an Australian involved in a United Nations process, I realized I had quite a unique perspective on the climate crisis. And it made me want to write about it. I realized that I could join the dots between the different things that I was saying, and I wanted to help people who don't have a scientific background really follow the conversation to understand the profound moment that we find ourselves in right now.
Doherty: Yeah, I mean, Joelle it is interesting, because for someone like myself in the United States, I see similarities to the US political situation in terms of entrenched fossil fuel interests that are deeply—this is not unique to the US or Australia, either—it's deeply woven into the fabric of society and the economy and people's identities. And then also, yes, Australia being the kind of canary in the coal mine so to speak, even going back to my early environmental work regarding ozone depletion, and chlorofluorocarbons back in the 1990s. You know, one of the things we talk about in our show is environmental identity, our identity in relation to nature in the natural world. And I think the pathway to being a scientist, to really be empirical and really study, is a certain kind of environmental identity [and a] certain set of values. So, I was wondering if you could say a little bit about that. There must have been something that drew you in the science direction, to the measurement, to really understanding, including ancient patterns and things like that. I'm curious about that
Gergis: Yeah, I guess for me, My motivation for being a scientist is driven by my love of the natural world. And, and I guess that extends into understanding it in all of its intricacy. And I guess I really enjoyed and responded to learning about science at university and also throughout high school. And so I guess, for me, that scientific understanding is just another way of knowing and understanding the world. And I was drawn to it because I quite liked the way it could be quantified and measured, and then compared in different parts of the world in a comparable way. So science gives us sort of universal tools that we can use to compare across different regions. And I think that's very powerful. While it is important to have a local subjective understanding of things, I also kind of responded to the idea which is, is embedded in science, which is that it provides us with a global framework to understand the world and I think that's really, really powerful. So for me, I was drawn into wanting to understand science from that empirical perspective. But my motivation for being a scientist comes from a very deep personal place, which is really wanting to protect and understand what it is that we are experiencing right now. So I guess it was sort of the joining of two different worlds for me.
Pihkala: Thanks for sharing all that. In your writings, you're also very open about vulnerability and many people have different kinds of experiences, and sometimes also traumatic ones in our past, and you've been exemplary in being open about the impacts of those kinds of experiences. So that's something I highly appreciate. And in the global networks around climate emotion, or eco emotions -- and that's, of course, something we very often discuss. So how to, on one hand, share our vulnerability and build strength out of inner vulnerability. But then, of course, also to protect people -- that one can't be open about all the things in all places. And, sometimes, we need to have different kinds of protective layers, either social or psychological, or combinations of this. And, as mentioned earlier, you have been very open about various climate emotions you have as a scientist, and since we've been talking about science, could you share a bit about that part of your journey? How was it to start engaging more with emotions as a scientist, because Western science has this history of, of, you know, reason over emotional analysis?
Gergis: Yeah. And I actually think it's a little bit of an outdated idea, because I believe that you can be professional and rational and logical, but still have an emotional response to your work. And as I was working on the IPCC report, there were just so many extreme events playing out in my country that I could no longer ignore the emotional response that was coming up in me, and to pretend like I was cold and detached around that was disingenuous. So for me, I felt I couldn't help it, I had to be real about it. But I don't think that compromises in any way, my ability to be professional.
And so for instance, one example was that we are home to the Great Barrier Reef, and the Great Barrier Reef is the largest living organism on the planet. And since 2015, we've seen 50% of a die-off from repeated mass coral bleaching. So, we're actually seeing large scale ecosystem collapse right now in real time. And we're all bearing witness to this. And for me, that is something that became increasingly hard to not speak out, because as a scientist, I understand the cause of that. And that's the increase in our ocean temperatures. And so for me, it was something that became something I couldn't walk past.
And then I also mentioned the wildfires of 2019 - 2020, where we saw about 3 billion animals either killed or displaced in a single bushfire season. Again, we're talking about extraordinary levels of destruction. And our ecosystems are still recovering from that time and may never recover in some areas. So, in our subtropical rainforest ecosystems, which are World Heritage listed, so they're of universal scientific and cultural value, we were seeing areas that are usually lush and moist areas that are, you know, waterfalls and mosses and ferns, actually ignite, just to give you an idea of how dry and hot it was. So watching the areas that I love disappear before my very eyes, and literally working on the IPCC report, as these events are unfolding, it became basically unbearable, to be a witness and to not say something.
And so that's really where I feel I started to become more vocal as a commentator and started to speak out more, I guess, in a personal way. And because I think a lot of scientists feel afraid of the very thing that you said, Panu, which is that people will consider us to be irrational or unprofessional, or this sort of thing. But, then when you speak to these people, at conferences, over a cup of tea, they'll tell you how they really feel about it. And so, with my writing, I've actually found that I've had quite a few colleagues contact me and say, Thank you. Thank you for actually doing the work that you're doing and being brave enough to share your emotional response because I feel that too.
And you know, maybe it's also a gendered thing in terms of this. Science is very dominated by men. And as women, there's about, for example, in IPCC in the working group I was involved in, about 25% of us were women. So it is a very male dominated area. And I'm not passing judgment around that. All I'm saying is that there are different ways of relating, and I guess women can sometimes be a bit more open about their emotional response.
And so, for me, it feels like a really important part of an authentic conversation that we need to have and that were having anyway behind closed doors, in terms of whether people are going off to see therapists or talking to their friends and colleagues. And the truth is, when you speak to people who are on the front line of say, recording ecological changes in our landscapes, they're coming back from their field trips and weeping in their offices, because they're realizing that they're seeing changes that are a one way street, that they see it, there are some areas that will not recover. And we're seeing that in parts of Australia already right now. So I think I've just shone a light on something that already exists, it's there. And I'm just trying to give some voice to that. And to provide us with a language to be able to speak about it. Again, we're talking about science being this sort of universal language.
But it's also sometimes when we're talking about the realm of emotions, that's usually the realm of, I guess, psychologists, social scientists, people who aren't really involved in the physical sciences. And so I've been very inspired by some of that literature. And also just people I know from those areas who try and think about ways to bridge that gap. Because I feel like it's the missing link, to be honest. Because unless we have an emotional response to the changes that we're seeing in the world, then that's not going to drive any kind of personal action, or inspire anyone to get political or to change their consumer or their voting behavior. And so we have to care about this. And that's so I term it in my book “connecting the head and the heart.” Yeah. So actually having an emotional response to the very real and frightening reality of climate change. And all the statistics that you'll often hear.
Doherty: Yeah, this echoes very strongly what Susanne Moser, one of our guests, talked about. [She is a] pioneering kind of climate communications person and had the same story—that people would come up to her and say, you know, “How do you cope? How do you make it” and basically hearing it from behind the scenes. So, it's really glad that people like you and Susi are able to bear witness and speak out. So you've got this book, and you pulled this together And you took a risk with it. And it's out there in the world. Now, you've been speaking: what's been your journey since then? So this must have been a rite of passage for you. You know, have there been any surprises or any insights as you've shared this message around?
Gergis: To be honest, I've been really blown away by the positive response. And also from people I usually wouldn't expect to hear from. So you mentioned earlier, the Psychology for a Safe Climate Group here in Australia. The founder reached out to me and I actually did an event for them recently, which was very well attended. And it was just really heartening to see a group of professional psychologists wanting to engage in this topic, and ask me questions and try to find a shared understanding of how we move forward. So for me it's just really inspiring to feel like, once we get our professional psychologists and other people who understand, I guess, the human condition, much better than scientists like me -- because as a scientist, my skill runs out pretty quickly at that point. And we need to use the full diversity of our communities and all those different knowledge bases, and sort of rise to the challenge in their collective way. So for me, I've been really thrilled that psychologists have been reaching out to me, which is really fantastic.
But all sorts of people… in my book, I also speak a lot about trying to rehumanize the conversation and I make a special call out to creatives. So the art sector, to really think about ways that they can use their platforms, as musicians, as writers, as you know, visual artists, or filmmakers to try and help people make those emotional connections because sometimes it might be an artwork, a photograph, a song that helps shift someone's idea about something. If you think about the Vietnam War, it was that image of that napalm bombing with the young girl running burnt, that really galvanized public opinion about taking an anti-war stance. And that was a very powerful image. So all of the conversation and words that had been spoken up until that point didn't matter. What mattered was really people having an emotional response to then take to the streets. And that resulted, I guess, in the social license being removed for the continued aggression and all that sort of thing happening.
So, I feel a similar thing in terms of the creative arts sector having a really, really important role to play right now, which is helping people connect with their emotional selves and thinking about ways to help us connect in a deeper way. Because I believe that once we do make that connection and understand that climate change isn't about the numbers on a graph, it's about the people and places we love, and protecting those places, I think everything shifts. And so I think art is really well placed to do that, because art is where we reflect, where we find ourselves, where we make sense of where we've come from. It helps us contextualize our history, our presence. And that's where we go to process. And so I really feel there's a very strong role for the artistic community, alongside the usual suspects of policymakers and all those other people that we already talk about, or renewable energy experts.
But I really wanted to, in this book, open the conversation up to many different types of people. So it isn't the usual suspects having the usual conversation. And you know, talking about renewable energy policy isn't particularly inspiring for a lot of people. It's really important. But people want to talk about cultural aspects of what it is to be human at this moment. And we are holding a global grief collectively right now. And what does that mean? What does that mean to be living through the most profound moment in human history? I think there's endless answers to that question. But these are things that we need to talk about. And we need to talk about them in nuanced ways that bring in lots of different voices to help us understand this moment.
Pihkala: Thanks a lot for that, that's very profound … more and more, my own research work this spring has been orienting around ecological grief and climate grief, continuing some of the earlier work and thinking about local and regional manifestations, the relationship between those and the global dimensions. So I think it's very complicated as you say that, when people encounter local or regional ecological losses, there is a resonance with the global situation.
There is one study about reef grief, as they put it, around the Great Barrier Barrier Ree. But, the role of arts, as you say, I think is very, very profound and, and also, as an effort to engage with complex emotions, like guilt, for example, or various kinds of kinds of sadness. And there's a lot of scholarship in Environmental Humanities and communication about what kinds of images would be useful for different people in different places. And sometimes, guilt inducing images can also be used for not so ethical purposes. And sometimes they can lead people to become more active and it all seems quite complicated, indeed.
But the basic idea of different people working together and the creative arts, that I think is very important, echoes some of our conversations with Daniela Molnar, for example in an earlier episode. But how about yourself? Would you like to share something about the methods you use to cope yourself? I know that that's something people need to develop in order to stay with the trouble and these difficult subjects.
Gergis: Yes, sure. So for me, as I mentioned earlier, my love for the natural world is what drove me to be a scientist. So when everything starts to get very difficult and hard for me, I step back, I try and take time off work, and I go into nature. So whether that's along the coastline where I live, where I've got beautiful access to beautiful beaches and the ocean, that's really a calming place for me. And I also love the subtropical rainforests near where I live. So I try and get out into nature, go camping. And just remember that I'm just another creature on the planet at this particular moment in time. And try and enjoy just being a human in a body. Because sometimes in the work that I do, you can become very cerebral, very locked up in your mind. And I think it's important to physically get back in your body. So for me that is either swimming in the ocean, it's going on a long trek, or some kind of hiking or anything to just remind myself of the fundamentals. That really, that I'm a part of nature, and it's a part of me.
And also, I guess it's also putting myself in the way of beauty and that is going to an art gallery or listening to beautiful music or reading poetry or just literature and reminding myself that humans are really capable of beautiful things as well. And so oftentimes, when we talk about climate change, it's often a very, it can be a dark and doom and gloom conversation and a bit of a degenerative narrative rather than this regenerative moment that we also face, which is an opportunity that is here is that we can finally learn to live sustainably on the planet, if we choose to remove the social license for the continued exploitation of fossil fuels. And that has to be done everywhere, but I do believe that it's happening. It is happening around the world. It's not happening quite fast enough. But, the social movement we need does exist. So whether it's Greta Thunberg, and her school strikers, and the millions of people around the world who care about this. You can't say that it's just an environmental issue for a particular interest group. It's all of humanity.
And this concept of global citizenry is something that I really had the lived experience of when I was working as an IPCC author, whereas literally sitting at the table, and there's someone there from Pakistan and Mexico, and Colombia, and Israel, and France and the US. It was such a diverse group of people. And to be there representing my country of Australia, it was a real privilege, but it's also realizing that people care about this everywhere around the world. And there is a very altruistic element in humanity that exists. Sometimes we can get overly focused on the dark and the negative, but there's also a force that is pushing back against those darker forces. And that is all of those people around the world who have woken up and want to create a better future. And I think when you do connect with that, that becomes inspiring for me. So sometimes I'll find it in literature. Other times I find it in music, I find it in all sorts of different places. But I think I need to remind myself that there's still goodness in humanity.
I sometimes think about my IPCC colleagues or I think about the nurses and doctors in our COVID-19 wards all around the world who were trying to keep society open and people alive. And all the people that go out and fight wildfires in really ferocious conditions. And these are people you know …you can't say there isn't goodness in humanity. It's just that it coexists. The dark and the light coexist. And I guess it's this moment that we find ourselves in where we either choose which side of history you want to be on. And so when I step back, I can see that but when I'm sometimes deep in it, it's hard to see. And so I think perspective really helps. And so for me, it's about sometimes stepping back and thinking about myself as a human in a broader context outside of my professional identity as a scientist.
Doherty: Yeah. So listeners can take this, and this is a theme that has come up before. It's a paradox. Immersing in some of these difficult, troubling issues also brings us together with like-minded people. And it reminds us that we're not alone. And that's what I've heard from other people on the IPCC: that camaraderie and that sense of special global fellowship that comes with this work, I think, is really powerful. If only we could get the public into those rooms temporarily to feel it. I think that would be really neat. It doesn't unfortunately come across in the IPCC reports. What we need is something like a documentarian would do behind the scenes, kind of, you know, a really nice artistic story of that. But it is something for all for listeners to take in. Like, just because you open yourself up to this, there's a lot of unexpected things that will buoy us and strengthen us, that camaraderie and things like that.
And then I just want to do one quick thing. I think a key part of your mission is this idea of, I guess, changing the social license, the term “social license” is probably not something listeners are familiar with. So I have an idea of what you mean, but it might be helpful for you to briefly just define that, because I think part of your mission is, is evolving that or changing that.
Gergis: Yeah, that's a good question. So, I guess the people that we elect to represent us whether it's at the local level, or the state level or the federal level, in some way need to reflect our values. And so for instance, as Australians – I’ll use an Australian example, if we care about the continued destruction of the Great Barrier Reef, then we need to actually say to our politicians and people in power, who have the potential to do something about this, that this is no longer socially acceptable for us. So really, it's really saying that we no longer approve. We can't actually stand back and bear witness to that and be okay with that. So for me, it's really thinking about this sort of collective values. And collectively, whether we vote in or out particular representation at that political level, makes all the difference.
And in Australia, we had our federal election last where we actually had a landslide in terms of a progressive government that basically showed that people want to do things differently. So, although we had been a real outcast in the global community in terms of our very weak Paris Agreement targets and our commitment to reducing our emissions, a lot of Australian said that is not good enough. So that's what I mean when I say social license is basically the green light or not, to allow our politicians to behave in a certain way. And so that's basically how I suppose social tipping points happen.
So when enough of a critical mass actually cares about something you can actually change the course of history in that way. And it turns out, you only really need about 25% of a population to do that. It doesn't need, like 80%, or some other really high number. So when I came across that research, which I do talk about in my book, Humanity’s Moment, it's one of those things that made me feel like this is actually achievable. So once you get your 25%, you get your critical mass, and the rest of the society will go with the progressive element. And so that's true of anything. And it's no, it's not to say that these victories are a done deal, and that they are set in stone. Just like civil rights and gender equality, sometimes it's three steps forward, and two steps back, but we're inching our way towards something that is better than the past. And I think that is true of the sustainability or the climate crisis we find ourselves in right now. It's the same idea that we're going to have imperfect victories along the way, but that shouldn't stop us from disengaging or zoning out and saying, “Well, what I'm doing is not making a difference” or anything like that. Because it's that collective, you know, accumulated impact that will really make a difference. And when we have people standing up all over the world, which we are seeing, then I think that's how the world changes.
And that's why I think that we will look back at the 2020s as a really profound moment in our history, I consider it the most profound moment, because it's really in terms of the carbon budget, we have to reduce emissions by 50% by 2030, to be able to avert the worst aspects of climate change. So what happens now really matters. And so the people alive today are really going to determine the course of the future of humanity. And that's a huge thing to say. But it's also, I hope, a galvanizing thing to think about, because what you do really matters. At this moment, every single person around the world, it really, really matters.
And so from a scientific perspective, what the IPCC is saying is that we want to avert the worst aspects of climate change. And, in fact, we can do it. So I just talked about the 50% reduction, we can do that with existing technologies that exist today and deploy them. And so it's achievable. So when we hear these really negative narratives coming from vested interests, this is where people start to get confused, or they start getting overwhelmed.
And for me, it's one of those things that I really hope that if we start thinking about a more regenerative narrative and a positive frame for the future --that's not to say, it's all going to be fantastic, it's going to get worse before it gets better 100%. But it's still worth fighting for, and there is so much worth saving. And so from my perspective, every fraction of a degree of global warming that we avoid, is really, really vital. And that is really the take home message of the IPCC’s work is that we want to try and minimize the amount of warming to minimize the amount of damage and so it's a profound moment. It's a huge moment.
Doherty: Well said, I feel inspired listening to you! This is why I enjoy the podcast because we have these conversations. I get to meet inspiring people like you too also, it's really great. Well, we're coming to the end of our time. Obviously, we could always do more. But this has been a great introduction into your work. Panu, do you want to think about some closing comments or ideas here?
Pihkala: Yes, warm thanks, Joelle for all that and that points towards many important climate emotions or attitudes and virtues. Moral outrage, for example, something which is sometimes called Climate Anger, but it may not capture the whole breadth of having this sense of injustice and the determination which can come with it. And that's something I see happening in Australia also that people are understandably fed up with certain policies. And so that kind of climate moral outrage seems to be operating and that's very important. Emotional energy as we have been talking about in this podcast also. But once more warm thanks for joining us and all the best for the very complex and multifaceted work you are doing.
Gergis: Thanks very much. It's been my pleasure.
Doherty: Yeah. So the emotions, also elevation, I feel this emotion of elevation. I'm inspired. I mean, I am lucky that I have this podcast and things that I'm doing. So I get some wind in my sails. And I know others are still finding their pathway. But, that's okay. You know, like Joelle says, there are all the answers and all the tools are available. They're here for us. So we're going to wrap it up. We have our lives. It's late evening for me here in Portland. So I'll take care of my daughter and get her ready for school in the morning and all that sort of stuff. Panu, what’s your day look like for you? You've got the early morning.
Pihkala: Yes, this is one reason why we haven't had Australian guests before because the time zones make it slightly tricky. But as with many complex problems, they are not impossible. So now I have the day ahead of me. The kids are leaving for school right now. And I'm going to work with climate emotion research. And how about you Joelle? What's the rest of the day like for you?
Gergis: It's nearly 3 pm here. So I'm finishing up just a little project I was working on. So just some paperwork on that. No, but thanks, guys for making the time to include me in your important ongoing discussion. And it's nice to have an Australian voice. I think sometimes we just hear from the same people. And so thank you for the opportunity.
And this is a little taste of what it's like to try and do an IPCC meeting. So imagine now 15 People from all over the world. So often sometimes it'd be two am for me or six in the morning, and all that sort of stuff. So it's really difficult when we try and do these international collaborations, but I hope it is fruitful and worthwhile.
Doherty: Me too. I think it is. Well, Joelle, keep up your good work. And I wish you best of luck on your book tour and future work and we'll put some links to your writings on our show notes. And you all listeners, take care of yourselves. You can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. You can see all our past episodes. You can support our podcast through our Patreon. And all of you and listeners be well and take care.
The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 3, Episode 3: Oppenheimer and Nuclear Anxiety
Sep 29, 2023
Season 3, Episode 3: Oppenheimer and Nuclear-Anxiety
Thomas and Panu reflected on the recent Oppenheimer film, and how cold war-era fear and anxiety about global nuclear armageddon compares with contemporary fear and anxiety about the threats global climate change poses to society and the livability on our planet. Thomas spoke to the challenge of weighing the benefits of nuclear power as a strategy to help combat the climate crisis against the environmental dangers, ongoing dangers of nuclear conflict, and the still toxic legacy of radioactive waste from the construction of atomic weapons. Panu reflected on various forms of anxiety and other feelings these dilemmas inspire in us, including the “anxiety of responsibility” we feel about making decisions about them.
Season 3, Episode 2: On Walk and Talk Therapy with Jennifer Udler
In a session devoted to the healing aspects of walking outdoors, Thomas and Panu spoke with social worker Jennifer Udler, author of the new book Walk and Talk Therapy: A Clinician’s Guide to Incorporating Movement and Nature into Your Practice. Their discussion touched on the practicalities of walking therapy as a modality, philosophical and transformative aspects of walking in terms of metaphors and pilgrimages, and the recognition that walking opens us both to the wonder of the natural world, and also dark aspects, including lack of safe spaces for some, and a new normal in which we all cannot separate our walking from climate change effects like heat and wildfire smoke. A key takeaway was the importance of developing a consistent relationship with a specific place, across seasons, times and weathers.
Season 3, Episode 1: Coping with “Unnatural Disasters”
Panu and Thomas offered listeners advice with how to cope with the new class of “unnatural disasters” that have beset the globe in past weeks and months—horrific damage from wildfires that are supercharged or that arise in places we don’t expect them, coping with simultaneous earthquakes and hurricanes—in Greece, Canada, Los Angeles, Lahaina and beyond. Thomas explained key differences in how varied types of disasters are experienced and understood. He reflected on how the loss of a treasured place like Lahaina touches both Hawaiian natives and the many visitors who have had special life experiences there (with echoes of New Orleans and the Katrina disaster). Panu shared insights from his research and the recognition that coping calls for “skills in grief,” and when appropriate, “skills in joy.” Thomas introduced the concept of “disaster subcultures”: recognizing how groups see and react to the same disasters quite differently, for example, government officials, professional first responders, and the general public—and the resulting “disaster diversity” we need to respect. What are the pros and cons of concepts like “Polycrisis” for our coping? Either as a technical description of simultaneous catastrophic events or a blanket term for a sense of global breakdown? Join us and share your thoughts.
“After visiting the wreckage of Lahaina, Hawaii’s governor, Josh Green, called the Maui fires the “largest natural disaster Hawaii has ever experienced.” In fact, the fires would more accurately be labeled an ‘unnatural disaster.’ As David Beilman, a professor of geography and environment at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, recently pointed out, for most of Hawaii’s history fire simply wasn’t part of the islands’ ecology. “This Maui situation is an Anthropocene phenomenon,” he told USA Today.” (2023, Aug 20, The New Yorker)
“There is ‘a’ polycrisis and ‘the’ polycrisis. That is, on the one hand, people are trying to find a clear working definition of a polycrisis, to define its key characteristics, in order to forge a research concept with which to examine a diverse range of concatenations of events . . . On the other hand, ‘polycrisis’ is understood not as a common noun but as a proper noun, denoting this particular stage of world history. There is only one polycrisis: this historical epoch, when humanity has created a world interconnected and interdependent to an unprecedented degree, combining vast material wealth with radical inequality and teetering on the threshold of ecological collapse.”
Transcript
[The Climate Change and Happiness Transcript is on holiday.]
Season 2, Episode 26: “Breathing the Sky” — Climate Coping for Children and Adults with Leslie Davenport
Aug 18, 2023
Season 2, Episode 26: “Breathing the Sky” — Climate Coping for Children and Adults with Leslie Davenport
Panu and Thomas were joined by Leslie Davenport who discussed her 2017 book Emotional Resiliency in the Era of Climate Change, and recent All the Feelings Under the Sun designed for children. Leslie reflected on her background in dance and as a member of an interdisciplinary medical team and how this contributed to her focus on the body and creative visualization in her ecotherapy work.
Season 2, Episode 25: Flight Guilt and other Emotions about Travel
In this episode, Thomas and Panu focused on the emotional aspects of travel, particularly air travel, and all the competing thoughts and feelings we have about this. Our journeys to see the world and our far flung loved ones are a central part of our lives. But, in this age of climate crisis, air travel—whether through privilege or as a sacrifice and necessity–opens us up to troubling ethical issues about our own contributions to climate problems and being trapped in an earth-damaging system of inequality and destructive tourism. Panu brought his usual wise perspective on climate emotions. Thomas shared the “UR3OK” model he uses to help people make environmentally-responsible decisions (Understand, Reduce-Reuse-Resist…, Offset, and be Kind to ourselves and others in the process).
Reynolds (2023) Should we feel guilty about flying? [Puts individual flights in perspective. For example, only about 2% to 4% of the global population fly internationally and 1% of the world population emits 50% of CO2 from commercial aviation.]
Season 2, Episode 24:Revisiting the Myth of Climate Apathy with Renée Lertzman
People have many kinds of feelings about climate and ecological crises, and many remain hidden under the surface, either because people are unsure about these or talking about them does not feel safe. In this episode, Thomas and Panu had a dialogue with Renée Lertzman, a pioneer in research and practical work about environmental feelings from a psychoanalytic perspective. Renée told of her work exposing “the myth of apathy” about climate change (people are generally not uncaring or indifferent to this issue, but lack tools to express and people who will take time to listen). Renée also explained her “Three A’s” method (helping people share their anxiety, ambivalence – mixed feelings – and their aspirations about eco and climate issues).
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Doherty: Hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Renée Lertzman: Hello, good to see you. I'm Renée Lertzman.
Doherty: And Renée is an old time colleague and friend of ours, who's yet another one of these innovators in this whole area of climate and emotions. And so we're looking forward to talking with Renée who's coming in from the Bay Area. And Panu, do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Yes, very good to see you, Renée. Again. We have met live once in Finland. A major Finnish company invited you to give a keynote speech. And I had already been reading many of your influential writings. It's really helped me with these nuanced dynamics of environmental attitudes and emotions and behavior. You're involved in a lot of things. But perhaps we could start from the journey itself. How was it for you? Would you like to share something about how you became so interested in these complex dynamics of environmental issues?
Doherty: Yeah.
Lertzman: Oh, well, that's a good question. So basically, first off, thanks for having me. I know both of you. And love both of you. So I'm really excited about our conversation. I started this journey. I found it when I was quite young. When I was a teenager. And I grew up in the San Francisco Bay area. I was exposed here and there to some information about what was going on with the environment. But it wasn't until I went to college. And I was planning to be a psychologist. And that was always very clear. Because I myself had benefited from psychotherapy when I was in high school. When I was around 15 and 16. And I knew I was going to be a psychologist. So I went to university. And while I was in training, as a psych major, I took a variety of classes. And one of them happened to be an environmental studies 101 kind of introductory course. And as I tell this story, in a variety of places, including the TED talk, I ended up giving.
That experience really derailed me. It was so unexpected. The impact it had on me psychologically, emotionally, you know, existentially. And at the time, it was the late 1980s. There wasn't really a lot of discussion about what all this means for us. And so it was a very solitary journey. I was, you know, in therapy and all of that. But no one at the time was really talking about what it means to process ecological crises, including climate change. So at the time, it wasn't specific to climate change for me. It was the whole confluence of the headline as humans have, you know, irreparably altered and damaged our beautiful, amazing planet. So that was the big takeaway from the class. And that's a lot to process. And then it was like, well, what do I do with this. You know, so, you know, that kind of started everything off for me.
Doherty: Yeah. So listeners, you know, that's the thing. Students, listeners. It is exactly what happens. And People are a little more aware today. I've I noticed teachers and students are aware. But really it is. Yes, the planet is irrevocably changed. We have 30 years or else we're doomed. The bell rings. And then we carry our books to the next class, you know. So it's this real, this kind of odd feeling we're supposed to carry this and walk around. So that leads to the whole. I mean, I think, Renée, one thing that you're known for. At that time anyway, was just realizing, hey, there's a whole school of thought about this. Like these psychoanalytic folks have thought about all this. And the idea of splitting. And all this sort of stuff. Is that kind of, can we talk about that a little bit? And how you found that helpful and led to your early research and your book and things?
Lertzman: Yeah, definitely. So I am and was and am in love with psychoanalytic clinical studies, research and perspectives. And by that I mean, work that's written by people who work with people in clinical settings, around, you know, healing, and trauma and anxiety and all of that. And so I've been immersed in that world for a long time. But for me, when I encounter that work, specifically around, how do we, as humans, process really difficult, challenging information? How do we work through guilt? You know, how do we work through shame? How do we work through conflict? You know, where we are pulled in different directions. It's been very hard for me to encounter that work, and not immediately think about our ecological and climate crisis. And connect the dots. Even if a lot of that work isn't speaking about that explicitly. And I'm talking about going back to whether it's Freud, or whether it's Melanie Klein, or whether it's Bion or whether it's, you know, a whole variety of very thoughtful, deep thinkers and practitioners. They're not necessarily writing about ecological crises or climate change. But my experience is it's a rich treasure trove of perspectives, tools and insights.
And so I've been basically, since that time in the late 80s, really connecting those dots. And seeing how we apply this in a way that isn't simple, simple. Like, you know, it's not apples to apples. It's like, well, how do we take this and make this meaningful, and useful for the human condition right now, as we enter into this, you know, Anthropocene moment. And to me, the concept of even where we are right now as a human species. And that we are actually having to come to terms with what we've done, is itself an unprecedented kind of existential situation. That I think we need all hands on deck as far as the human sciences. And, you know, cultural studies. And, you know, we need all of it. But I really feel like at the heart of it, is the psychological. And that has been missing for so many years, for reasons that I think both are confounding to me, and make total sense. Because if we take what we know about humans, and how we have this capacity to sort of disavow or kind of split off. Then yeah, we avoid talking about emotion and feeling and the messier stuff because it's hard.
But now we're at a moment where it's really clear with this conversation, your work, you know, we're in a very different place now. Yeah. So that's kind of my fundamental orientation. And then, you know, that led to my spending many years doing research, to try to deepen this perspective. And really see how I could make sense of what we think of as apathy, you know. What we, I'm using we, in quotes. Like, people working in the environmental and climate space have been in the grip of a lot of, I think, myths about and assumptions about humans that are frankly, not grounded in psychology at all. So in a way, what I'm trying to do is an intervention and say, you know what, like, we need to stop saying things like people are apathetic. We need to stop saying, oh, how do I get other people to care about these issues. That's actually completely backwards. Completely. And yet, it's really taken hold, you know, for a lot of people. Like, oh, I gotta make you care about this. Well, that's just not the case.
Pihkala: Yeah. Warm thanks for dwelling on that, Renée. In a recent interview, you also referred to the strange dissociation you noticed in the society at the same time when you heard these very worrisome facts about the ecological crisis in classrooms. And that's very deep. Dissociation, I think, is one of the reasons why the psychoanalytic and psychodynamic tradition was so important in the early 2000s, for example, in providing more understanding about the deeper dynamics. I think that any, you know, just simple coping theory is unable to explain that.
Because the discrepancies are so strong. And one of the things that I was drawn to in Thomas's early work was also an effort to integrate coping theory and defense theory, for example. So there's some influences from psychodynamic dynamics there also.
And Renée, you were part of this very influential book called Engaging with Climate Change, edited by Sally Weintrobe, which provided a lot of insights from the psychodynamic dynamic and analytic traditions. And for those listeners who may have heard very critical things about the psychoanalytic tradition, I want to mention that in her research Renée is very careful in that application. And utilizes very critical research methods there. So there's a lot in there. For your data, you did years of empirical research. And that might be a logical path to go from here. And it actually links with Thomas's personal history also and Great Lakes, also related to this “myth of apathy”. So would you like to speak a bit more about that?
Lertzman: Sure. So I ended up going on to do various graduate programs. I first focused on environmental communication. Did a master's in communication studies. And then went on to really want to just talk with people. And listen and work, you know, really conduct qualitative research in a community. And so I ended up, it's a long story, but I ended up my research was sponsored by an organization based in the Great Lakes. The Wege Foundation. And they were generous. Well, it was actually a specific individual, Jonathan Wege, who sponsored my research with the one requirement that it relate to the Great Lakes in some way. And so I ended up becoming a fellow with an organization in Madison, Wisconsin. And was connected with a community in the region.
And I ended up spending time in Green Bay, Wisconsin. And for me, at the time, that was like the equivalent of going to, you know, Sub Saharan Africa or something. Because, you know, I'm from California. I've lived in the East Coast, the West Coast, but being in the Midwest was really new and different for me. And I absolutely loved every minute of it. I embedded myself in this community in Green Bay that welcomed me in. And I spent time listening and talking with people who. I had a market research firm, who very generously, it's kind of amazing to think about it, now sent out a survey to their database of 1000s of people in the region. And I designed the survey very carefully, to show me who, from an environmentalist perspective, would appear to be not engaged and end quote, apathetic. Who would be normally written off by an environmental organization, you know, like, oh, they don't read anything about this. They don't watch anything about this. They don't talk about this with their friends and family. And I decided to hone in and do in depth interviews and conversations with a subset of those people who I would have been like, well, why would I talk to them? Because they're not engaged. So it was pretty edgy and scary for me to do that. And I designed these interviews very inspired by psychodynamic and psychoanalytic research.
And all that means is that there's a lot of listening. There's a lot of presence. I'm asking a lot of questions. And I'm not using a script. So this was a very different way of conducting social science research.
You know, I have a PhD in social science from Cardiff University. You know, it's pretty traditional. But I went and did this methodology that's referred to as psychosocial research. And I found the experience just fundamentally changed me. You know, I came out, in the middle of doing the research in Green Bay, I came up with this concept of the myth of apathy. And then I pitched a piece about that to a magazine. And wrote it quickly. It ran. And that piece led to maybe 10 speaking engagements around the world because it just struck a chord. And the argument, which you can still find online. It was published by the ecologist. It's still out there. 2008. Where I argue that, you know, it's really not that people are apathetic, there's so much else going on. But we have to listen. We have to show up differently. We have to show up with compassion, with empathy. And to really appreciate it. Like, some of these people I interviewed knew more about what's going on with the ecology of the Great Lakes. The water quality. The air quality.
Than most people. Think about that. The people I interviewed knew more about it than most people and yet, would have been written off and had been written off by the environmental community.
Doherty: So you know, Renée, I'm thinking about this growing up in Buffalo, myself. Buffalo, New York. And on the shores of the Great Lakes. Lake Erie. Lake Ontario. And just the reality, even myself growing up in the 70s, you know, with the lakes being part of the culture. My parents grew up swimming in lakes. By the time I was a child, Lake Erie was seen as, you know, poisoned and polluted. And then we have the weather that comes off the lakes with the snow and the lake effect snow. So it's a big part of people's reality. And so you are tapping into that whole thing. This is before all the really obvious polarization about climate change, too. And just people's basic thinking about this. So it's really nice to go back in time a little bit to see what this was like. And you had this whole myth of apathy.
For listeners, that means it's a myth. It's not that people don't care. As Renée was saying, they know a lot. It's just that they might either feel powerless about an issue. Or it's a taboo topic for their community. Or they don't have a way to plug in. And so for their own mental health, they package this care away. You know, they put it away, because they can't do anything about it. And I think you revealed that. And then you talked about these three A's, you know. And I think you do that even now with your work in corporations. You have people talk about what they're anxious about. And their ambivalence. Their different kinds of feelings. And then what they aspire to. Which I really think is inspiring. Do you want to talk about the three A's and how that worked out there?
Lertzman: Yeah, sure. So that was a very clear, helpful reframe of what you just offered. So thank you. That's exactly what the myth of apathy is about. Which is that we go around making assumptions and reading into people's behavior, and making interpretations. And we project a lack of care or concern. Which I find deeply problematic and inaccurate. It puts it back on us to try to tune in and understand what's actually going on. So the three A's is a shorthand that I came out of that research with. That I designed. It took a long time to get to the three A's. And I am very proud, because to be honest, what happened was, after my research, I got a position at Portland State University. And I was teaching a class on the psychology of climate change, believe it or not, in 2010. It was the first class offered on this topic. And I was experimenting. And I had my students keep a journal. And the journal was, you know, to keep track of when you see climate change in your life. You know, it could be a poster. It could be a news article. It could be a conversation. And just kind of pay attention. And so I had all these journals. I was sitting in my place in Portland, looking through these journals. And one of my students had written this little story, where she said, I just saw a book called, you know, 50, whatever it was 50 Places to See Before They Disappear.
And she said, my initial reaction was, wow, you know, like, what is this world coming to that we even have a book about places that are disappearing. And then she said, my next thought was, I better go out and see these amazing places before they're gone. And then she said, then I realized if I did that, I would be contributing to the very problem, right? I'd be part of the problem.
And so I had this almost like a flash of insight where I realized that it captures it all in one kind of simple cycle. So anxiety. I'm feeling deeply anxious about what's happening with the world. Ambivalence. I want to go out and continue my life as a person. Like I want to do these things that give me a lot of pleasure. You know, flying and traveling and whatever that might be, that we now know, you know, are problematic. But I want to. So that's the concept of ambivalence. Is where we are literally in conflict within ourselves. And then aspiration is, but I don't want to be part of the problem. I want to be part of the solution. And so I came up with the shorthand of the three A's as a way to kind of help us tune in to it's never just one thing. It's never just anxiety. It's never just overwhelming. It's really very complex. And I designed the three A's very specifically to use with my organizational clients.
So I do not work privately with people. I work with organizations. Companies. Nonprofits. Government foundations. I kind of work across any sector. But what matters is I partner with people who are in those organizations who are trying to make some change happen. And the way I use the three A's is actually more to help them and us be attuned to what's happening with the people we're wanting to engage and bring along with us. And that for a lot of people is a huge revelation.
You know, to really step into the shoes of others to think well, what might be anxiety producing about this? Where might there be ambivalence? And where is the aspiration? And that work eventually led to my creating a really cool resource that, you know, you can find online called Project Inside Out. And the project inside out the website is, you find it at projectinsideout.net. And it was started with a grant from the KR Foundation, who basically asked me to come up with sort of a fantasy project. And I thought, well, what if I take some of this work and package it up a little bit more, so that it can be used by people working on change.
Doherty: And we're gonna put the link to Project Inside Out in our show notes. Projectinsideout.net. And some of the other early writing pieces that Renée talked about the myth of apathy. Again, which is still a kind of a classic reference for, you know, students and thinkers in this area. Yeah. I'm reminded of Janet Lewis, our recent guest who talked about climate dialectics. This idea of, we have these competing ideas. And we have to find some sort of pathway through. So that's I think, Renée was illustrating the whole dialectical piece there. I totally identify with that young person. And by that I mean, I call it extinction tourism. It's like if before this world goes you know, I'm gonna. It's a FOMO. Eco FOMO which we've talked about, you know, fear of missing out. Which goes in a lot of directions. Missing out on the world. Or missing out on doing enough. So I totally identify with that. As in my 20s I felt very similar as an outdoor guide and river rafting guide. But Panu, what are you thinking about over there?
Pihkala: Yeah, I think this is very rich. And so [are] the complexities of the affective dimensions around ecological issues, which, after all, are socio-ecological issues these days. And that's one reason why I think the psychosocial research tradition is so important. There can be conflicting emotions and desires. Like the desire to see fantastic places and the sort of anticipation of guilt, if one would do so. And this book by Renée, Environmental Melancholia, features discussion of many emotional tones which are not so often discussed yet. I did some explorations of that in a Finnish book and in this English article called “Toward a Taxonomy of Climate Emotions”. And some of those tones like disappointment, feeling betrayed etc.. But also an urge to do something good. These all have links to Renée's research, also.
And reparation is one big part of Renée's book. And we actually explored that in a Finnish national survey about climate emotions (Sitra, 2019). Asking about the Finnish emotion term “hyvittämisen halu”. Which might be translated as desire to make amends. The sociologist was a bit surprised that I proposed that we add that there but they accepted it. And over 30% of the respondents did say that they have felt this. Of course, it's their self-reflection. We can't know all the dynamics. But I still think it's significant. Renée, you saw lots of this desire for reparation dynamics. Would you like to speak a bit about that? And perhaps open up the concept of reparation for the listeners?
Lertzman: Yeah, thank you. I'm so glad you introduced that concept because it's central to really all of this. For me, the guiding question is always, what are the conditions that enable and cultivate our capacity to want to make amends. To want to heal. To want to make something better. And my inspiration for this is from the Jewish teaching, that's called Tikkun Olam. Which is translated as, you know, to repair the world. And I was raised with this, you know, orientation. You know, it's just, it's very much in the Jewish tradition to want to make it better. But where I'm at is, if I really want to know, how do we foster the conditions collectively? Not, you know, on an individual level, per se. But I'm way more interested in the collective social context. So what are the conditions that help wake that up? Wake up that part of ourselves. Because I strongly believe that it's there. And it's not just my belief. It's like now, we've got a lot of research, you know.
Thankfully, we have a lot of research on whether it's, you know, whatever we want to call it. You know, whether it's the science of empathy. Or whether it's altruism. Or, you know, incredible work in the future. What it means to be a good ancestor, you know. And all of this, there's just a ton of evidence that supports that humans have this capacity deep down, but there are very specific conditions that we need. And that's where I think we should be focusing all of our attention right now. Like, literally, I think we're spending way too much time talking about pushing solutions on people, like cheerleaders. Or we're shouting. So we're either educating, cheerleading or writing, you know. RIGHT. We're not really guiding. We're not really like thinking about what we need. What do you need, that will enable you to feel safe enough to feel contained enough to feel like you can go there, and really want to make things better. And instead, we tend to focus on the symptoms. Which is, oh, overwhelm, you know. Paralysis and despair, you know. I think all have this sort of, it's there.
But really, we know a lot about those conditions for repair. And that has to do with, you know, the things I think we all know. The three of us are familiar with which, you know, people need to feel like they matter. They need to feel like their actions are going to have some sort of impact. We need to feel like we have agency. We need to feel like we can have a full life, frankly, you know. To be involved with climate doesn't mean we're giving up. We're not throwing our life away in terms of a quality of life, you know. And so it's finding that balance of what these factors are. And acknowledging that they're going to be unique for each person. There's not a formula. But, you know, what I would invite people listening to reflect on is, what are the conditions that you need to support you in your ability to be able to make repairs in a healthy, grounded way? And to consider what are the conditions that others need? And coming from that place is a very different place, so I'm going to try to convince you why this is an important issue. And why you should take action on it. It's a very different energy. It's a different orientation entirely.
Doherty: Yeah, that's really well said. Yeah, so listeners, that's something just for us to take a breath. And to take in. We don't have to answer it today. But again, it's often just asking the right question. And so as the old poets say, you know, these are questions to be lived. To live out. So what do you need to support you to have an impact, to have a full life? What do you need? And then also that other question, What do others need? So it does kind of put us into other people's shoes. Panu and I were just recording an episode for the future on families, and couples and all of the different, you know. We have to do that in our own families. We have to put ourselves in the shoes of our parents. Or into our children. Or our brothers or sisters or our significant others. Renée, have you done any? Well, we have a few minutes left. So we can go in a few directions here. But I was going to ask you about couples and families. But maybe this dynamic also comes out in your work with or, you know, companies and organizations? I don't know, how would you want to? How would you want to go Renée, right now?
Lertzman: Well, I work only with organizations, I do not work with individuals, couples or families. So that's not my orientation. I partner with amazing clinicians, for whom that is the focus. And that's very rich, because, you know, we all have our relationships, we're navigating. You know, our friends, family, co-workers. And everyone's kind of in a different place in their journey. And I think there's not enough attention to really looking at how to navigate that skillfully. Because, you know, a lot of times people are within a family system. Or let's just say, in a team.
Let's say a team and an organization are in a very different place. You know, where someone is maybe having a hard time going there. And, and feeling very resistant. And very even hostile. And then there, you've got other people who are like, wait a minute, this feeling is really the most urgent thing in my life. And I don't know how to deal with this. This is very frustrating.
And so a lot of what I do that I have found to be extremely impactful is frankly, I work with these teams and leaders to create a culture. A team culture, organizational culture where it's okay, you know, to talk about these things. And it's okay to be in a different place. That it's not like trying to get everyone to, you know, feel the same way about something. But really celebrate the diversity of perspective. The fact that people come to this from very different places is important. We need that. We need to be able to learn and listen to, okay, like for you, this is maybe not the biggest priority. I want to learn more. That's hard for me. But I want to learn more about that, because frankly, we all need to figure out how to come together around these issues. And move into a productive way of having dialogue and interaction.
Pihkala: What Renée has shared here, has both the individual and collective dimension. So I think that's a very important joining together of these two. And in a way it leads organizational cultures and teams towards more shared vulnerability. Kind of inter-vulnerability. But then people can very quickly, also get the feeling that this actually makes them stronger. And that's one of the sorts of things that people may think of as a paradoxical thing. But that can happen if there is enough containment and leadership and companionship. And this would be a very rich topic to discuss even more. But we probably have to start wrapping things up for this episode. And it would be totally marvelous if we could have you as a guest sometime again, Renée. And one of the emotions around these issues is gratitude also. And that's part of my affective landscape. I'm very grateful for the work that different people like you two are doing around these issues.
Lertzman: Thank you. And I feel grateful as well for you all. And holding space for these conversations is really, really important. And part of the work of repair is having these interactions where we can talk about these topics. And so I'm very, very appreciative of both of you as well. And I thank you for inviting me to be with you.
Doherty: Yeah. I mean there's no way to do this work, but to do it. And so even with this podcast, we just create these spaces to talk about things. You know, and I really liked what you're talking about Renée. I mean, so all of us live in organizations. And we work in different places so the listeners can think about, you know. I mean, I feel for people because of course we do have the freedom to get into this deeply and really really be honest and transparent and share. And it's so rare. And even in the corporate world in general to share anything really personal because it's so political at different levels. But so think about creating a culture. We can talk about these things. And I think the subtext there, Renée, is, even if we don't feel the same thing, or even if we disagree right?
Lertzman: Yeah, exactly. It's so important.
Doherty: So maybe we can, maybe we can close on that note with some anecdote or some idea, Renée from you. Or advice for us. Because I think that's kind of where people maybe will stop. Because well, I don't really want to open up this thing. Or I know, my colleague is going to disagree. We know people. We know what they're going to say. And so how has it worked? Have you seen any good stories or just a takeaway about how it works? Even when people disagree, they move through that little doorway?
Lertzman: Absolutely. So it's a much bigger conversation, but what I will just say is actually simple. Which is, it's really about being present. And coming from a place of curiosity, and listening to others. So, you know, if there's one thing people can do, coming out of this, it's one, you know, practicing self awareness of your own activation triggers emotions. But doing whatever you can to practice being truly present to others. Especially when there's a different perspective. I think that's where the rubber meets the road in this work. And it's where I see a lot of people struggle.
So it's really that straightforward. It's like listening, and asking evocative questions. You know, there's a short video by the way that I helped produce with the Alliance for Climate Education. And it's nicknamed the secret to talking about climate change. But it's got a lot of wisdom in there. And really, what it's about is not talking about climate change. It's about asking questions. It's about asking people really open ended questions and then giving your presence and listening to what comes from that. That's the most powerful and impactful thing we could do right now.
Doherty: That's well said. So we'll find that and put a link to that. It's a great title there. But it is about yeah, I think human human connection ultimately. Yeah, this is really great, Renée thanks so much. People will have a doorway now into the variety of all your contributions. And so we'll spread that word around. And we're going to wrap it up. I'll get into my, well Renée and I are both I think I'm pacific time so we're getting into our days here. Our weekdays. Renée, what's your life like today?
Lertzman: Oh, gosh, well, I'm heading over to Google. Where I've been working for a few years. So yeah, I work very closely with a team over there. Love them. And that's my day. So.
Doherty: That's great. Yeah, like some of the other climate work as we've talked about therapists, they'll go into their sessions and you're going into your work.
Lertzman: Exactly. That's my version of it.
Doherty: Yeah. And I'll go into my version of that, which will also include seeing clients. And writing and various things. Panu, what's left for you this evening, Panu?
Pihkala: Well it's the end of the thinking part of the day. And moving towards spending time with the boys. And once more warm thanks Renée for finding the time to join us. I'm really looking forward to future discussions. And dear listeners you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. You can also find us on Patreon. We appreciate any support. There's a lot of wisdom to be drawn from Renée's input here. So do take time with it and to take care. Thank you for listening.
Doherty: Yes, listeners, Renée, and Panu all. Take care. Thank you. The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 23: Climate Emotions in the Family
Jul 07, 2023
How does climate change impact family relationships? In this follow-up to their recent talk about couples, Thomas and Panu discussed how expressing feelings about climate change and other environmental problems is intertwined with family dynamics in many ways. Depending on the values and communication style of your family of origin, taking a stand on climate can make you a “hero” or a “black sheep.” Fear of bringing new children into an overheated world also affects those who would be grandparents. Simplistic messages that portray young people as ecologically aware and elders as being in denial are not supported by research. Alarm, concern and caution about global warming are shared by a majority in every generation in the US. While your and my family are different, we are all more together than we think.
Season 2, Episode 22: Children and Nature with Louise Chawla
Jun 23, 2023
Season 2, Episode 22: Children and Nature with Louise Chawla
In this episode we look at the question “What makes for a healthy relationship between children and nature?” and by extension for all of us. To help with this, Panu and Thomas met with Louise Chawla, one of the eminent researchers of environmental psychology and child development in relation to nature. Louise described her own youth and sense of nature being “an eternal world” and how she has listened to children around the world describe their own beliefs and increasingly “fearful imaginings.” She, Panu, and Thomas discussed how to support children, share in their curiosity, and enlist them as collaborators as we all cope with losses and strive to make our lives better.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast, the show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change and other environmental issues. And this is a place where we do allow ourselves to be with our thoughts and our feelings and our emotions. And today, we have a special guest. Someone that I've been able to work with in the past that I have not met for about a decade.
Louise Chawla: Hello, I'm Louise Chawla. I'm a professor emerita at the University of Colorado in Boulder. And I'm part of the program in environmental design there. And now that I'm retired I work with their community engagement design and research center primarily. I have a workplace there. And I helped create the center. So I'm very much involved in how do you bring research and design, which means really, the entire physical world out there, including the natural world together on big environmental and social topics of our time. And I came to that from a background initially in child development. Then my master's in education. And then as I discovered, what I'm really interested about is what children learn outside the classroom, when they are out and about in their communities. Both socially, culturally, and about the natural world and their cities.
And so I did a doctorate in environmental psychology, where we focus on people's relationships with the physical world out there. And it's a discipline that's been around since the 1970s. I entered it in 1980. So that is my focus: What are our relationships with the world beyond ourselves and our immediate human societies?
Doherty: Yeah, that's great. And Louise is a pioneer in this research of children's experience of nature. And a lot of what we know in terms of healthy child development and people's environmental identities and the role of mentors comes out of Louise's work. And she's a bridge between the original environmental psychology people that were studying built places and design, and the more recent focus on mental health and identity and environmental behaviors that we have now. So it's really great to have Louise. And we'll be talking about a lot. Panu, do you want to get us started in our conversation?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Louise, also from my part. We have been exchanging some emails online. And I of course know your work from environmental education research. Many Finns have also been curious about studies of children's natural experiences and nature connection. This theme of having significant experiences in natural environments is just one part of that. And speaking of that, would you like to share with us some of your own earlier journey? You described some parts of your professional journey, but do you see some developments in your own childhood and youth and adolescence which led you towards this part of life and research?
Chawla: Well, absolutely. That's why I'm doing what I'm doing. I was very fortunate to have a childhood where I lived kind of between two places. One was an old suburb of New York City. Where the back border of our home was a brook. And that went up to a marsh. And then beyond the marsh was a woods. And there was an old orchard and woodlots and so forth. And so I had all of that. Which is where I spent just countless hours growing up as a child. But I also had family in New York City. So it was still a generation, where I just had to show up for dinner. And I was able to roam around initially, Greenwich Village. And then when the family moved to the edge of Chinatown, and Brooklyn Bridge. That part of lower Manhattan. So I've never really drawn a distinction between nature and cities and nature and towns. Because at their best, even our densely inhabited places, have nature in them.
Certainly when you're a child, they have child sized nature in them. And of course, New York City has great parks. It had the rivers. And so that was so important to me that when I discovered there is a field of environmental psychology when I was a master's student doing a degree in child development and education, I realized immediately that's what I want to spend my career doing. How can we create places and cultures where every child in the world has an opportunity to have those kinds of opportunities to discover the natural world and the cultural world together? And, you know, of course I'm not going to achieve that. But I think it's like our goal of living in harmony with nature, as Rachel Carson said. You know, it's the horizon we work toward. And having that horizon keeps us going. And will we perfectly achieve it, maybe not, but it still keeps us going.
Doherty: Yeah, there's so much I'm thinking for listeners who are parents who are thinking about how they might want to be the best parents they can for their children. Or for all of us we're thinking about our own childhoods, you know, I grew up in Buffalo, New York. And had a certain view of nature based on that. Panu, of course, has his view. And all the listeners all have their own places. But since you've been doing this for a while, I wonder if we can just help people to see the larger trends first. And then we can drill down to some really specific, you know, concepts and things.
But Louise, you must have seen a lot because, like you say you yourself are of an age where you were lucky to have safe access to nature. And the urban rural divide wasn't so black and white. And then, of course, over the last few decades, we've had this whole child and nature movement. And the work of Richard Louv. And this “Last Child in the Woods” kind of insight that, you know, life has changed for people in the modern world – being much more technological. And nature and the outdoors not being seen as safe. And people must be much more concerned about liability. And different views on parks. And I'm also thinking of David Sobel's work and other people. What do you see as the broad trend that brings us to the present day? Like what do you think, how would you land us now, you know, given what you've seen over the last couple of decades?
Chawla: Well, you're entirely correct, Thomas, in saying within a generation, and now moving into another second generation, there's been a transformation in terms of children's freedom to autonomously explore the world around them. The world around them has been changing, as you said. More densely built. More traffic. More crime. You know, a side of my work has been that. For 10 years, I coordinated the Growing up in Cities project for UNESCO, where we worked with children generally around 10 to 14 in low income communities around the world. And I was reviving a project that the urban planner and designer Kevin Lynch had created with UNESCO in the 1970s. So one generation later and already we could track between his work and the work we were doing. We started this in the mid 1990s. I coordinated it for 10 years.
And now we have a local version of it that I helped create with others called Growing up Boulder, since we live in Boulder, Colorado. But we could already over that generation see, you know, that cities were more crime. And not just children's perception, that's certainly what data showed as well. And, of course, more traffic, and more ethnic tensions. And of course, in part that was because certainly in the United States, we had a whole system to keep people in their place. But, you know, by the mid 1990s, there was more immigration around the world. I mean, a new wave of immigration. We are a nation of immigrants, mostly. But new waves of immigration and the tensions created within communities. So we could really see those changes happening. And yes, and then screens, you know. TVs changed from a little gray thing when I was a child to all of their enticements. And on smartphones and computers and iPods and all kinds of screens. And so that's been a dramatic change, of course, in children's lives. Really dramatic.
But on a personal note, what I need to say is that, you know, when I was a child playing up in the marsh, or in the old woodlot, or up in the woods, in the brook, I just assumed that was an eternal world. That the world of nature was eternal. And, of course, I hadn't taken any classes in ecology or evolutionary history yet. But that was just a feeling as a child. But, of course, we know it's not eternal. But when I was talking to a friend, the artist Patricia Johansson. Who works with water in the landscape. So very connected to the landscape. And she was saying the same thing, you know, out in the woods, it's just that this is an eternal place. And that was part of, I think, why it was magical, and comforting, as well. But her grandchildren don't have that perspective at all. So, on a personal note, I never expected I would be writing about and researching how to help young people cope with a very rapidly changing planet.
Doherty: Yeah.
Chawla: So that's been a personal trajectory for me.
Pihkala: Thanks for sharing all that. And that brings us to the close connections between some of my research and your research. And I've greatly enjoyed your article from a couple of years back, called Childhood Nature Connection and Constructive Hope, with a subtitle A Review of Research on Connecting with Nature and Coping with Environmental Loss. And this latter part, as you hinted at now, that's been more rare in environmental education scholarship, for complex reasons I think. And I really appreciate this wide ranging review that you did, and which highlights the point that it's all based on caring and connection. Because we hurt where we care, as Thomas has a habit of saying. So both the empathy and the feelings of loss and grief and various fear and anxiety and worry -related feelings. They are related to the same fundamental point, but would you like to say something about these interconnections and that paper?
Chawla: Yeah, well, where that paper comes from specifically is that I was part of a, actually a three year project with North American Association for Environmental Education was the Center for Children in Nature Network. A cluster of universities. To look at how connection to nature was being measured. And so I was there with Thomas Berry, who is in Sweden as a researcher. At that time, he was at the University of Minnesota. And we recognize that we have to make sure that measures for children are part of this effort. The goal was to produce a practitioners guide to assessing connection to nature, which is now freely available on the North American Association for Environmental Education website. But in the process of getting there we had all these different measures for, you know, mostly older children and adults. And as a group, we were reviewing them. We met in workshops. And to try to select the ones that would be really most accessible and useful for people in the environmental education field. And first, you know, Thomas and I noticed, there's very little here for younger children. So we made sure that early childhood measures are included in that.
But in the process, yeah, I noticed these are all positive measures. I mean, the assumption is that connecting with nature is always a happy experience. And yet, I was aware, you know, I've been since the 1990s, I've been following studies that would ask children just really open ended questions like, what do you think the world will be like in 50? years? Or what do you think it'll be like in 100 years? Or what do you think you'll be like when you're raising your own children? And most of the responses from different countries, you know, just different interview approaches, drawing approaches. They were mostly dystopian. Like really dystopian. And dystopian, especially in terms of what was going to happen to the environment. And yet, you know, the children responding to these very open-ended questions were, certainly, in my view, expressing connection with the natural world too. That's why they were so upset. That's why they had such fearful imaginings for the future. And then I had a doctoral student Susie Stryfe, who did a study of the meaning of nature in the daily lives of children in a nearby city called Commerce City. Industrial city. Huge oil and gas refinery. And loads of warehouses. Idling trucks, et cetera. Gangs. A number of Superfund sites. And yet, nature was very important to them wherever they could find it. I mean, it might be an overgrown ditch. It might be the big, weedy overgrown corner of a, you know, basketball court. But it might be the strip of trees. But it was really important to them, where they found it. Where they could find it.
And then simultaneously, she was doing all the same methods with children in a very economically upscale suburb of Denver, not far apart. They tend to think of nature as the exotic vacations we go on. To go as a family. But either way, she asked him this very open ended question, do you have any environmental concerns, and about 80% in both communities. It didn't matter which one. Had these, you know, expressed themselves in ways that hit me in the stomach. I mean, they said things like, I'm really sad because my grandson, or my great nephew is going to have to experience the end of the world. Or I'm really sad because all the animals are going to die. And, I mean, these really powerful statements to me. That was definitely part of their connection to nature. And so that's where I took these two literature reviews. Connection to nature. And all the good things it's about which it is and how it's being measured. And then this other research on children's fears and worries and sadness about what is happening to our planet. And brought them together to say, there's this, you know, difficult side of society of connecting to nature too. And, you know, given that one of the things that comes out of coping with environmental loss literature is the importance of opening in a space to feel you can freely express your emotions. In which I know has been a very important part of your work, Thomas and Panu.
I see it's a very important part of your thinking about this as well. And, yet, my friend Maria Ojala who I brought over here for a while. And, you know, in her work in Sweden she said she thinks maybe Swedish children feel they have to be cool all the time. If you're cool you can't let anybody know you're worried about anything. And children talking about, you know, if they bring up concern about what's going on with the planet. Being told, you know, we don't have time for that in the classroom. Or actually being laughed at by their peers. And you know, we have a culture which tends to put authentic emotions under wraps. And so it's just put me on my current path where I'm really thinking about what are the different opportunities we can create for young people to feel they can, you know, acknowledge and be open about this difficult side of being connected to nature. And how can we help them with that process?
Doherty: Yeah, I just want to speak to the listeners as you're listening. We've been doing this podcast for over a year, but this is one of the first times we've got into this particular area of child development. And just so listeners know, there's, there's people that have been studying this for years. People like Louise. And people like David Sobel, Peter Kahn, Carol Saunders. And, you know, so there's a whole, like, academic literature that's been recognizing this. But it is all of our task right? Every time we bring up children in nature. And any conversation, we ended up having to go through this mini rite of passage. Even in the conversation where we have to then confront, okay, we're in this world. And we have all this stuff, and climate change. And it is daunting, everything.
And, you know, as John Muir said, everything is linked together, when you pull on one thing, and the universe is hitched to everything else. So we don't have the luxury of just talking about children in a meadow with butterflies only. W9e have to realize, well, there's different social classes and different access and different places in the world. And kids are smart. They're very smart. And they see all the news. And they have their own thoughts and ideas about it. So, you know, I love the fact that Louise, you're just listening to kids. You know, it's this brave listening of research where we're just like, let's just see what's actually happening out there. But that's takeaway for parents. So if we want to bring this larger. We don't want to get stuck in this world conversation because people start spinning. And then they become disempowered. So how does this come back down to actual parenting and how we live our lives. Could you say a little bit - the idea that I think about as a parent, I find helpful coming out of a lot of this research is this idea of joint attention. The idea of an adult and a young person looking at nature together. At any age, from infancy to adult peers. And, you know, how that plays out in zoos and different natural places. And how that's helpful for our emotional development. Could you say a little bit about that, Louise? Because I know some of these things are a big part of your work.
Chawla: Yeah. So, you know, I think all of this does tie in with what you were saying earlier, Thomas, about kids being physically separated from nature now by rules about safety. And always being supervised. And there's not so much of it around. although, again, those kids in Commerce City, were able to find it wherever it was when they were free to move around outside. Um, but another piece of my research has been significant life experiences. And that started the area of research and environmental education that started in 1980 with someone named Tom Tanner. Who said, well, if our goal as environmental educators, and I hoped this would be the goal of parents as well as to, you know, produce children. People who really know and care about the natural world, then, you know, what were the formative experiences in people who were exemplars of that kind of caring? And it started with really interviewing and surveying people who were examples. Which makes sense. So staff in leading conservation organizations, environmental educators, people who would become professionals in learning about and caring about the natural world.
And so, again, my question was, what if we kind of can push that? And what if I went out there and I talked to the widest group of people I could. You know, people who were young and old. And men and women. And working class as well as professionals. And high school education. As well as PhDs. And doing very different kinds of activism, including defending their community from yet one more, you know, incinerator being put next door. And so I did that. And I did that research, I did it all around the state of Kentucky, where I lived at the time. And then I did it around Norway, when I was a Fulbright Scholar there.
And what this research shows is that what comes out the most often in terms of formative experiences is a time to kind of mess around out there in the natural world, as a child. Just, you know, free play, free exploration. But also important people. And that's what gets to the joint attention in your question, Thomas. Which meant parents, grandparents, favorite uncle. Whoever it might be, who, you know, went out in nature with you. And looked at things together. That joint attention. And it's so mundane. I mean, we do it all the time. How profound it is, I think, just escapes most people's awareness. It starts around nine months old. And there's really, if you think of any environment, there's kind of an infinite number of things in it in most places that we could pay attention to. I mean, I'm in my study now. I've got hundreds of books there. I could pay attention to any one of them. I could pay attention to the pattern in the wood on the floor. But so we have to learn to selectively pay attention. And we learned that with other people, you know, the other people around us kind of indicate what's important to notice. And when people talked about their relationships with these important people in their lives when they were children. Usually family members. Rarely teachers, but sometimes teachers. But usually family members. That's what they were doing. You know, they were noticing things in nature together. They were taking time to slow down and notice things appreciatively.
On the other hand, of course, we can be taught very early not to notice. I love the story of Bill Crane, a developmental psychologist who would watch little kids and their caretakers in public parks in New York. And he said, usually this is the scenario he would see. Something like this. A toddler sees a pigeon. It gets all excited about the pigeon. It's trotting after the pigeon. And it's caretaker grabs him and says leave that dirty bird. Or come on, you know, we have to get home. No time for this. Unfortunately he said that's what he mostly saw. So joint attention. And then as people get older it can be the fabulous teacher who takes you on field trips. It can become your best buddy who you go exploring with. It can become, you know, your outdoor camping leaders. But those processes of joint attention of showing. Of coming with us. Both getting excited about what excites us and inviting us to get excited about what excites them outdoors in nature are really fundamental. And then when we get to the other side of it noticing harm. Noticing loss. Noticing a wildfire that just burned out in your community. Very real to me living on the edge of the woods. And how do we deal with that together too? I think that those qualities of attention. And how we respond to what we see really is a fundamental mental part of the whole process of relating with the world around us.
Pihkala: Thanks a lot for that, Louise. That's very rich. And also reminds us of the episode we did with the poet Kim Stafford where we talked about Rachel Carson's Sense of wonder, for example. The great little book. And the general topic of retaining the ability to experience wonder, but also the ability to experience sorrow, or sadness. And that's one part of the creative work nowadays in environmental education. Trying to think about encounters with sadness and loss, like the death of a small animal, which is a very common experience that children experience sometimes. So how can the adults be with the child in a way, which builds up skills of encountering grief constructively. So also, for the listeners, that's one sort of practical example. And it requires also from the adults, you know, sort of resistance to the desire to move away from sometimes either difficult or boring subjects. So much comes up. Much goes back to certain quite fundamental basics in education and patience seems to be one of them. And I've really enjoyed this conversation. Our time is running out. And we have to wrap up soon. But what's on your mind, Thomas at this point?
Doherty: Yeah, as it often happens, I want to talk more and more because we've opened up such a rich thing. So we can go maybe a little bit longer today, because it's such a great topic. But it's the best of times in the worst of times here. Because in these times of fraught relationships with nature and climate change it does help us to remember what is important. And come back to the basics of what healthy parenting is. You know, we're all I think. Are you a parent, Louise, I don't know your background, yourself, do you? Are you a parent yourself?
Chawla: Yes, I have a grown daughter.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah. So we're all parents here. And all of us have had this experience. So I think of the challenge of being a parent and well, let me rephrase that I was about to say something that kind of has a blind spot, because I was gonna say, the experience of parents today is that we have to hold all this negative stuff, and all the joy and the wonder. But as we know, and as you know, Louise, that's always been the case, depending on the neighborhood you're researching, right. So that's another big piece, as we understand globally, people have always struggled with environmental degradation and threats. And also found a sense of wonder. And that's one of the great resilience of children is they will find nature and wonder, no matter where they live, anywhere.
And all of us will find a pocket of nature and play and magic, and things like that. So as the listeners think about this, just realizing that we, you know, kids are actually quite resilient. And that's developmentally part of their lives. Like they actually can talk about death. They just reason about it in their own ways. So just opening, you know, as families, we need to all kind of open up to these things. And then listen to each other. Like one of my sayings is validate, elevate, create. So it's like validating what the person is talking about whatever it happens to be elevated. Put it on a pedestal. Let's look at this. And then let's get creative about it. How do you know about it? What should we do about it? And things like that.
Chawla: Yeah, yeah. I would just like to say that, of course, they say it's always been the best of times, and the worst of times, at least in our Western society. But, we have to face our relations with the planet now. There's not going to be any way out. And I think that yes, that calls on great creativity from parents, teachers or institutions or children. Children like creative challenges, in my experience. It really gets back to opening up a space to discuss feelings. That's going to have to be part of it. And I think that is at the center and moving from there. And parents can share their own ambivalence and their own, you know, sense of confusion. And children can understand that. They are very familiar with confusion and ambivalence. But I think a critical piece is that the things we're asked to do are actually, that are good for the planet and are good for us too. And I think one very important piece is helping families and helping children recognize that the changes we need to make in our lives, some of them can actually make our lives better. We improve the quality of our lives. And, you know, choosing lives of voluntary simplicity for the planet's part. Choosing to invest some of our time and finding projects where we can all work to care for our local worlds together. Those make our lives better. So the paths we need to take are actually good for us as well as good for the larger world.
Doherty: Yeah, co-benefits. Yeah there's all kinds of co-benefits to all these sustainability things that we talk about. Yeah. Panu, what are you thinking about as we wrap up here?
Pihkala: Well, I think that's a very important and also nice point to end this very fascinating discussion, which could go on for a long time. And think with Thomas, whether we get the chance to talk with you again sometime. That would be lovely.
Doherty: Yeah. As we close, we're gonna put some links to some of Louise's work, and her research that's available online and some of the stuff that she's doing in Boulder, Colorado. You know, reminding listeners about the episode we had recently with Susan Bodner. The psychologist in New York City, who is working on a very parallel path about people's attachment to nature. And they're using the psychological concept of attachment to natural places. And she's listening to people in New York. Just listening to what they say. And my insight. And, Louise, you can tell me what you think. I mean this is extending out of the research. But the classic takeaway of unhealthy attachment is that if a child has at least one caregiver of any kind, whether it be an aunt or a grandparent. It doesn't have to be a parent. If you have one healthy relationship that usually leads to resilience in someone's life. And so I think if we have just at least one healthy mentor. Or one healthy nature mentor, I think that will be enough to give you a healthy connection with nature. I don't know if those two things are exactly similar.
Chawla: I think they totally get together, Thomas. Because all the things we were talking about in terms of going out and noticing things in the natural world and encouraging a sense of kinship. And bonding with it. And taking action to care for it. Those all are done in the spirit of companionship. Respect for the child's interests and feelings. Acknowledgement of the adults interests and feelings. And they're being in that kind of positive, very interactive relationship that's respectful of both sides. And respectful of the natural world. And that is at the very center of what you're talking about in terms of secure attachment theory.
Doherty: Great. Well, that's a good takeaway. We'll wrap it up for today. But, Louise, I know you're busy with, you know, even though you say you're retired, it sounds like you're actually quite active. And doing a lot of neat stuff. So I really am impressed. And I've learned so much from you. I wouldn't be doing the work I'm doing without the work that you have done in the past. I think Panu can say the same. So I really appreciate having time to chat with you. And that you're still in the game here just as much or more than ever. So thank you very much. And you both have - Louise you have a good you have a good rest of the day. And Panu, you have a really good evening. The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 21: Tools for Couples Relationships in an Era of Climate Change
Jun 09, 2023
Season 2, Episode 21: Tools for Couples Relationships in an Era of Climate Change
In the first of a series of conversations on families and relationships, Thomas and Panu focused on the dynamics of couples relationships in an era of climate crisis. They discussed “eco-couples issues” ranging from small disagreements about daily acts to deal-breaker choices like whether to have children. Panu suggested that these were not simply “lifestyle choices” but rather “life-constituting choices.” Thomas shared his way of combining couples therapy techniques with his expertise about people’s environmental identity and values. As Thomas noted:
“... when we're debating with our significant other about some ecological behavior or political stance, we're really arguing about how we're showing love to ourselves and to the planet… So my love for nature is conflicting with your love for nature in some way. And then it starts to conflict with my love for you and your love for me…”
Listen to learn tools to maintain a secure connection with your partner while also working through the healthy tensions brought on by being two people trying to live ethically in an often unsustainable world.
“Fiction, in other words, can help us visualize how to better love during a crisis. And when that fiction unfolds in speculative futures, it’s the love stories that make our bodies feel like we are there and, in the process, motivate us to fight for a better world back home.”
Transcript
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, our podcast. This is a podcast for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change and other environmental issues. And this is a place to be with our personal side. The personal side of these issues for us, our emotional responses. And Panu and I support each other as we talk about our own lives, and things that we're doing. And so these podcast episodes are a little window into our conversations.
And we've been talking about family, couples, relationships. Our own lives. Our own families. Our own couples relationships. And there's been a lot in the news lately about “eco couples issues.” You know, couples having debates and conflicts about their sustainability behaviors. And it gets into all kinds of issues about how we live and our lifestyle and whether we have children or not. So we're going to talk about this. We have a plan to talk about couples issues, and then also at some point about family dynamics. So all of you listening here are in some sort of family dynamic in your life. And many of you are also in couples. So I hope you find this helpful. And we're coming at this from a therapeutic perspective. And a real [life] perspective. And a philosophical perspective. So Panu, you know, what's top of mind for you, as we jump into this idea of, you know, if we want to call this eco couples conversation? What's top of mind for you?
Pihkala: Yes, in places like Finland, we already have some physical impacts of climate change. And some people are more impacted by this, like the Sámi people in northern Finland. And some fishers, for example, in south Finland, and so on. But where we really already see climate change impacts is in human relations and social dynamics. And increasingly so. Over the years, I've been concerned about how to respond to the impacts of climate change on our human relationships. And I sometimes lead workshops, or discussion groups. Mostly I do research and advisory reports and talks and that sort of thing.
But in the groups, I've heard from young people that there are often some disputes between them and some of their older relatives in relation to environmental politics and climate politics. And this clearly is a factor which affects their well being. They are sad about the disputes in their relationships. But of course, they don't want either to give up their climate values, so to speak. And generally, it seems that in our communities and societies, we would need much more social talk about how to deal with these issues, which come to our living rooms and kitchen tables. But I know, Thomas, that you meet people in person, much more than I do. And I've got the impression that there's lots of different kinds of impacts of climate change on human relationships. So what's on top of your mind when thinking about this issue?
Doherty: Yeah, thanks, Panu. I think today, we can focus on the couples. The one to one relationship with our significant other. And then also realize that that takes place in the context of our family as well. You know, for young people, they're doing double duty. They're teens, adolescent teenagers, young adults, and early 20s. They're finding their own way in the world. Their own environmental identity might be different from their family of origin and the values and the behaviors. So in the best of times, we get along well with our family. And our family shares similar values. And we, in fact, are supported and loved by our family. And we all deal with these things together.
But then sometimes our knowledge and what we see in the world, diverts us from our typical family style practically in terms of the decisions we make about food we eat, and where we live, and politics. And all this sort of stuff. And we know we live in a polarized time. So, because of that our significant relationship is really important for us. We need to be with someone that shares our values. That we can be safe and secure with. And puts a lot of pressure on our personal relationships. Whether we're in a teen relationship. A young relationship. Whether we're in a just easy romantic relationship. Or whether we're committing to each other or getting married or thinking about long term or children. That's a lot of pressure. And the short story is that people don't have the tools. They don't have a lot of tools and concepts to talk about this. So they assume they know about their partner, but they have misunderstandings. And so there's been great stories in the media recently. Kasha Patel had a story in the Washington Post on Valentine's Day. You know, about partners worrying about climate change. [See show notes.] And Alison Kaplan had a story in the New York Times about a couple. The modern love column is about a couple disputing over the kerosene lamp that the male of this couple had on his sailboat. And whether they should have an LED lamp. [See show notes.] And it's a small thing, but it stood for all kinds of other stuff. So I think that's one territory that couples relationship dynamics.
Pihkala: Yeah, I definitely think so. And couples are, of course, people of various ages, as you say, Thomas. And some pretty fundamental decisions are made by couples, between 20 and 40 years, roughly speaking. For example, where to live and how to live and what will be the professions. And will they try to have children or adopt children? And in all of these areas of life, climate change is starting to have an effect. And people can have different takes on what would be the desired form of life. So also discussing with Finnish family therapists and social workers, who meet families and couples, they say that couples do sometimes end up in even strong disputes because of differences in climate values and desires.
Doherty: Yeah. So, you know, the tools that we've talked about in the podcast, you know, the idea that I have an environmental identity. A sense of my identity in relation to nature and the natural world. And it's built by my life experiences and where I grew up, and, you know, my family of origin. And where we lived. And my education. And where we traveled and our social class and our experiences. And some families have really ecological values. Other families have more utilitarian values about using nature. Some families are conservative. Some families are progressive. And so I find when you give couples of any age. It could be teenagers. It could be any age. If you give couples some tools to talk about each member of the couple, it doesn't matter. It could be gay or straight. Or different cultural backgrounds, different diverse couples. If you give them some tools, like even just okay, there's three kinds of eco values basically, for people. Your personal concerns about yourself. Concerns about other people. So altruistic values. And then ecological values. Concerns about the natural world and the web of life, right? Those are three different kinds of values. And like, for any given issue, you're talking about, what's the dominant value for you in relation to that issue?
Like in Allison Kaplan's essay in the New York Times about the couple arguing about the kerosene lamp, the young woman is really coming at it from an ecological and altruistic value about other people. And the guy is saying, well, I like this. We like this lamp. It's very, you know, it's very helpful for us. It's nostalgic. And so coming at it from more egocentric. And the woman realizes, yes, I like the lamp too. It's really pretty. It reminds us of the old days, when we're in the sailboat. And we love this. But you know, how do they sort out the different values because, of course, kerosene is a dirty fuel. And it would be better to transition to an LED lamp. But once you give them some tools, then they don't personalize it. Because otherwise it's like you're either with me or you're against me. You don't support me. I mean, this is an insight from couples therapy. And this is good for all of us to hear and remind ourselves. But whenever couples are talking, it's like watching a movie with subtitles. And the subtitles underneath whatever their conversation is along the lines of, do you love me? Do you care about me? Can I trust you? Do I feel safe with you? Every couple's communication has that as a subtext. And we forget that. And we argue about, you know, whether kerosene is better than some other fuel. And we intellectualize the whole thing. And we miss the core of our connection. So, anyway, so once you start giving people some insights to that, it goes a lot better.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks for sharing all that. And I really liked the subtitles idea. Subtexts. Speaking in codes. There might be different metaphors used here. And one part of our condition as a kind of “climate hostage,” as you have said, Thomas, is that we have to try to negotiate between individual responsibility and the need for structural reform. And this is something we discussed at an earlier episode of this podcast about ecological guilt, for example. But it has surfaced in many episodes. And it's tricky. In many ways, there's different public discourses and social norms about it.
And also, in this very interesting story about the kerosene lamp, that dimension was also present. The male character was more like saying that, you know, we have to put things in perspective. And it can't be that we have to get rid of this lamp. There's so much bigger things going on. And actually also, the man had quite strong ecological values in the end, when there was discussion about what he was doing for a profession and during free time, and so on. So these psychological and psychosocial dynamics about individual responsibility and dynamics of ecological guilt, I think that's something which might be also very helpful for people, if they get more tools about how to think about those dynamics. And how to communicate about them. Otherwise, it can easily become that people start blaming others for not reacting the same way to this dilemma as one does, himself or herself.
Doherty: Yeah. I mean, it's a good point because often, it's kind of common sense. But we tend to connect and partner with people that have similar values to us. So part of it is reminding the couple that, oh, you actually share all these values. And you're mostly on the same team. But, again, we have different priorities at different moments. And there's many different kinds of environmental values. And we may agree on our experiential values about wanting to be in nature and go camping or go sailing. We might agree on animal rights and different political things. But we might disagree, disagree on a technological point about what strategy we think is better.
You know, the stereotype is the male oriented person in the group is more technological and more logical and wants to focus on science. And the female oriented person is more emotional and relational. And that holds up in relationships across different genders and sexual orientations. But it isn't always like that. And that's a microcosm of the larger environmental debate in our society. Because environmentalists debate all the time about, you know, like, should Germany stop its nuclear reactors, or not. It's in the middle of stopping its nuclear reactors. A lot of people think that's the worst thing to do right now. We need nuclear power in terms of the transition. But, you know, people are super passionate on both sides of that issue. And so, there's no right answer there. It's a real pragmatic question. But that in a microcosm happens in our relationship, whether we're deciding whether we want to recycle plastic bags or use kerosene in the lantern when we're on our sailing trip.
Pihkala: Exactly. Exactly and these basic emotion communication and value communication skills of saying sometimes things out loud, of course, can be helpful. Saying like, I really appreciate that you care for the environment. And I know that we have differing opinions about this particular issue at hand. But I want to say to you that I'm not, you know, blaming you for being totally wrong here. I just want to discuss this thing, which is important for me. Now, this is very, very roughly speaking out loud but you know, making these things audible. And not just presuming that the other knows what you are thinking.
Doherty: Exactly. This is kind of basic couples health, right? You know, people can't read your mind. So you do need to let them know what you're thinking and feeling and you need to compliment them. And it's much easier to get someone to change or align with you if you compliment them first. and focus on the positive. Just in any kind of, you know, social program. Even in your relationship with your significant other. What I find is some of the couples therapy ideas that are already out there are just perfectly useful to apply in an eco context.
One of the things I do when I work with couples is have this kind of protocol when they're trying to make plans for the future. Like maybe on your anniversary, you might want to plan your next year of life together. And so actually like a client made this up and when I help them with it, and I've used it since. But, you know, it starts with celebration. What's working well? What are we happy about in our relationship? Visioning is the next step. Where do we see going in the future? Like what would be happening in the future. And then commitment is like, okay, what part of our visions can we actually commit to. Like, you have a vision, you want to do this thing. I have a vision. Can we commit to some piece? We can't do everything we want to do, but can I commit to some of your vision, or my vision. Like whether we're going to travel or make a life decision. And then contract. You write it down. You have to write it down. Because if you don't write it down, people will remember things differently. And that will lead to conflicts later. And that works really well with couples in all kinds of contexts. Start with the positive. It gets people feeling good, their vision is quite creative. The commitment is more practical. It's like, well, you want to travel around the world in a sailboat. I don't know if I can commit to that in my life right now. So what can we do, you know, that we can commit to. And then we have to write it down. So six months later, we don't remember it differently. Where I said, I thought sailing might be nice, sometime in the future. And you heard me say, we are going to go sailing next summer, you know. So, you know, so anyway, the writing down but you don't start with the writing down. Because that's too limited. The writing down just comes as kind of a record. But very much applies to what we want to do in our lives, you know.
Pihkala: Yeah, that's great. And reminds me of many things I was part of when I was younger. Including some counseling sometimes with couples. I'm not a professional counselor. And some of these communication skills courses for couples we went to when we were young with my wife. And we've been married over 20 years. So that's a long time since now. But it reminds me of the peer group impact, which is of course, a very universal phenomenon. But perhaps that would be something also in demand for climate and ecological matters. Having more of these peer group realizations that “hey, we are not actually the only couple who are finding it difficult to make decisions about whether we should have a second car or no car at all. And what are we gonna do with traveling by plane when one of us is much more sensitive about climate emotions or flying than the other is?” So perhaps peer group information might be helpful.
Doherty: I think it totally is. And, you know, listeners can think about that. Talking to their larger partner groups. But you do need some tools and you need some rules of engagement. Because otherwise, the polarized energy comes into the room. And our own insecurity comes up. A couple of things you had mentioned earlier in our conversations I wanted to get to Panu. I mean, recognizing that, you know, some of these behaviors like turning off lights and recycling and physical things, they're defenses. They're psychological defenses. We do these things to help manage our anxiety so they really are important for us to do. And when we're prevented from doing those we don't feel good. And then when our partner doesn't honor those, we don't feel good. You know, if we're sharing a space with someone.
But there is an emotional piece to this. And I like this idea that lifestyle choices isn't the right word. It's too small. But I think you said these are life-constituting choices. Like these are choices that build our life. You know, help us to embody our meaning and our sense of ourselves. So these things are I don't know that I like that word life-constituting versus lifestyle. Because lifestyle just sounds like consumeristic product stuff. But life constitutes more than no, I'm building a healthy life for myself.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks for observing Thomas. That came to my mind several times when there was some writing about couples. And especially the reproduction issue. If that is described as a lifestyle choice. I don't think that it does any justice to the magnitude of those issues and decisions. So there are also other issues, which can be seen as life-constituting. But that's definitely one. And something we discussed in this podcast, with Jade Sasser at an earlier episode. And I would recommend listeners to return to that or find that if that's new for you. And, of course, there's huge loads on that question, both for the couple, but also for their extended families and their social surroundings. So still, we human beings have this tribe orientation quite deep down I think. And the decisions of whether or not to try to have kids, evoke quite strong emotions and also unconscious processes, I think.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. So the decision about whether to have a baby is the ultimate life-constituting decision, right? Because we're actually creating a whole new life that's going to want to, you know, constitute itself as we go here. And yeah, that's a huge one. Yeah, we recommend listeners go back to our episode with Britt Wray. And then with Jade Sasser because we got into having child decisions quite deeply. And it really is a decision. It's not only just a yes or no, but it's also a why. And how, and if we did it, what would it look like. And so it's a multifaceted decision. So yeah, we have all of these behaviors.
One of the things that's also helpful even with little behaviors, small ones, is that I, you know, they're ceremonial behaviors. So this is a thing that I've talked about with people. And they find it helpful. So if I go to Starbucks and get a coffee, or a latte, and then I have this disposable cup, you know, when I do that, I always have a rule of trying to use the cup, again, sometime. I like to reuse things. And not just use them once and throw them away. And that's just a little ceremony that I have. I mean, it doesn't necessarily change the world, for me to reuse that cup, or wash up plastic bags and reuse them. Or just any of these, these things that we do, you know, might not change the world. But it's important for me. It's a ritual. It's a ceremony. It stands for my values. And I like to, you know, give myself permission to do that. Even if other people aren't doing it. So, it's helpful for couples to realize that their partner might have a ceremony. A thing that they do. That isn't necessarily as important to us, but I'll do the ceremony with them. Because it's a way for us to be connected together. It doesn't hurt to reuse things. It's not a big thing to do that. And then if we can be flexible, and realize we are hostages in this situation, and we can't control. So sometimes we can't do the ceremony that we want. We can't live the life that we want. I mean, that's the dilemma of all of us.
70% of the population of the planet cannot live the life they want. Based on what we know people want. And what the government's and what people in power are allowing us to do. We cannot live the life that we want. And that is just an existential dilemma of the modern world. Because certain people are stopping us from doing that there's a lot of oppression in the world. But anyway, realizing that, you know, having some shared rituals that help us to constitute our values and realizing that partner A might focus on this part of sustainability. And Partner B might focus on this. And then we become a team. So you use your strengths. And I use mine. You know, if we want to travel on a vacation. And you can figure out the sustainability and the carbon footprint. And I'll figure out some of the personal interactions in our health. You know, for our diet. For lifestyle choices. Where we live. We can divide and conquer. And kind of work as a team with our different values and strengths. That's a better place to go than clashing and fighting.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. Appreciating the other so that he or she feels supported. And there's a joint project. And rituals are a very interesting topic. And it would be lovely to do an episode on that topic on its own. And there's certainly many kinds of ceremonialistic and ritualistic behavior in our everyday lives. And also in our environmental behavior. Recycling, for example, is a very common thing that people talk about in relation to their environmental behavior. And as you say, Thomas, it can be important for people as also an anxiety management tool. And I agree with what you say. And of course, then when one looks at the big picture, sometimes we have to be careful about only using recycling as a sort of single action bias. Or a tokenistic thing to do, so that we disregard other more impactful choices in our lives.
So that's what happens in Finland, at least sometimes. Also, people try to go behind the fact that, you know, “I'm recycling so well, but please don't criticize any other aspects of my life” in relation to the environmental impact. So just as a side note, this theme of recycling. But the very fact that it's an embodied thing to do, I think, has a lot to do with its significance. And many things related to environmental impacts are pretty abstract. So I think there's a clear impact. So I think there's a clear need for these embodied things. And I guess one could draw a link to couples here also. That there's a need for embodiment of things. You know, flowers, rings, and cups of coffee. And these things which every person who is in a relationship knows that they can be much more important than what their actual size is.
Doherty: Yeah we're getting at the classic couples therapy material here with the whole love languages, right? That's the whole piece here. Anybody who's done couples counseling may have come across that whole concept of the love languages. Whether I do, you know, words were positive words of affirmation to my partner or acts of service or quality time or touch and sexuality, gifts and tokens. And, you know, cards. And to be in a couple, you need to be able to understand and speak your partner's love language. And how they show and receive love. And then that overlaps with our eco language, right? Our environmental identity. That's why I keep telling the therapists I'm training, you know, eco couples counseling is a big area. Really a lot of people need help in this area. So a lot we're gonna put some there's a lot of nice writing.
Erica Berry is another one of our guests that we spoke with regarding her book Wolfish and about her ideas about women and nature. And she's written very eloquently about relationships. And again, some of these news stories that came out around the Valentine's Day, Earth Day news cycle. We'll get at this. I saw just the other day I really nice short film, through the New Yorker short film program. Pella Kågerman, I'm not pronouncing her name right, is a Swedish filmmaker. A short film about a very young adolescent relationship. [See show notes.] A couple that are trying to work through a breakup in the context of a dystopian, you know, climate change future world. And it spoke to the challenges of, you know, the teenagers and the young young people out there. That is just hey, these are the first relationships I've ever had in my life. And I'm still trying to figure out how to be in a relationship with another person. Which is hard. And we get our hearts broken. And we don't know how to communicate. And we get with the wrong partners that hurt us. And things like that. And then we're also concerned about this, whether we're going to be live and a decade kind of thing. And so that film helped to capture I think a little bit of that too. Us as old people, you know, older people, we've been through a lot of this already. But we forget what it's like just to have our first relationships with people. There's a whole, you know, sequence of this for our listeners that are listening in.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for the tip. Pella Kågerman's film is new for me even though she comes from the neighboring country of Sweden. And there's a great history of Swedish cinema from Ingmar Bergman to other directors. And some great stuff of human relations and couples relations depicted in those films. And now it also extends to ecological conditions and dystopias or utopias. And one of Erica Berry's great writings deals with how we also need climate fiction love stories. [See show notes.] So this brings us to the basic fuel of couples' love, this kind of basic theme that we have ended many episodes on. And we need some things to live for. And amidst all the things that are going on in the world, we do have the possibility for love in our relationships. And if we can believe in the possibility of love also in various possible futures, that will be highly motivating. That's one of Erica's great points in that essay and brings us to some fundamentals about couples.
Doherty: Yeah. So that's a good note to end on. You know, so when we're debating with our significant other about some ecological behavior or political stance, we're really arguing about how we're showing love to ourselves and to the planet. So we're really arguing about our love for nature. And my love for nature is coming out differently than yours. If we can stay with that it is super helpful. So my love for nature is conflicting with your love for nature in some way. And then it starts to conflict with my love for you and your love for me, as well. So all we need is love as they say. But yes. It's what's most important at the end of the day. And if we can keep that we're going to be much better off. So listeners, I know some of you find this helpful because we're human. And so we'd love to hear from you. Couples and things that are helpful for you. Please send us a message you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And you can send us messages and ideas. Find our Patreon there and support us. Thank you very much. Good luck with your relationships. Panu, have a good evening.
Pihkala: Take care everyone. Thanks again for the discussion.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 20: On Women, Fear and Nature with Erica Berry
May 26, 2023
Season 2, Episode 20: On Women, Fear and Nature with Erica Berry
Panu and Thomas spoke with Erica Berry, author of the recent memoir and natural history Wolfish. Join us as Erica eloquently discusses the relationships between womens’ fears and empowerment and the stories we tell about nature and predators, wild and human. Meta-themes included how we can face our fears and rewire our instincts about global threats like climate change and how we can see other species as beings in their own right, not just as symbols or repositories for our fears and dreams.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. The show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change and environmental issues. We talk about our feelings. We talk about our emotions. We talk about our private lives, our relationships, our families. And today, we're very excited to have a guest with us.
Erica Berry: My name is Erica Berry. And I'm a writer and teacher based in my hometown of Portland, Oregon. My first book Wolfish: Wolf self and the Stories We Tell About Fear was recently released in the US and the UK.
Doherty: Yes. And I'm very lucky to share a hometown with Erica. And I've got a chance to meet Erica, and have some really nice conversations, and some walking with her in the forest. (Which recently turned into a story that Erica did for Outside Magazine.) So really glad to have her here. And a lot of neat themes. Erica's writing is - I highly recommend it. And she writes about relationships and gender. And being a woman in the wilderness. And about wolves and all kinds of things that are close to our hearts. And Panu, of course, coming from Finland has a lot of connections with wolves and the wilderness and from the Northern European context. So Panu, do you want to get us started with this conversation today?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Erica also, on my behalf, delighted to meet you. And as Thomas hinted, wolves are a hot topic in Finland also. And we have a very limited number of them. And no other predator encounters as much hatred as the wolves do in Finland. And I'm taking part in some research projects where we try to understand this better also from a more humanistic and critical theory viewpoint. And feminist perspectives have been part of them. But before going into that, would you like to share something, Erica about your journey towards this subject matter all together? You know, emotions and our relations with the more than human world?
Berry: Thank you. I think that now I realized that I became sort of interested in wolves, both real and symbolic around the same time. And I think it came from this sort of larger coming of age question of how do - what are the stories we tell about the things that scare us? And how do we live with that uncertainty? And I suppose I was always an anxious child, in a sense. But also one very full of curiosity and wonder. And I think, you know, a young wolf is born, afraid. And I recently was talking to a biologist who said, if a wolf hears something under a tree, they might be afraid, but they'll go investigate it. And I think, you know, I was very lucky to have that sort of childhood where I was, like, pushing out and wandering around in the forest. And my grandparents, both live rurally. And so I spent a lot of time in those spaces. And cared for them sort of deeply. And felt, personally, kind of my own sense of calm or peace that I found there was what was at threat, as sort of wildfires would come or these other sorts of environmental things that then brought me anxiety.
And so, you know, I think this question, when I started thinking about the presence of the wolf, both in our landscape and in our psyches, it felt like a more personal one where I was trying to reconcile a sort of hyper vigilance that had come over me. And I feel like that was both environmental. Quite anxious about climate change. And felt very swamped with a sort of grief about that. And at the same time, in day to day, human interactions, I had had some experiences as a woman that had made me pretty unsure how to move my body through the world. And that sense of uncertainty. I didn't know the limits of it, either in my body or sort of externally. And so became so many of the stories about the wolf, and the sort of idioms about the wolf we've inherited. This idea of the wolf at the door. Or throughout different countries, there's different stories that parents would tell their children that are basically about ‘here's what the wolf has to tell us about how to stay alive.’ How to survive. And I became interested in those stories because I felt so afraid for my life and the people around me. Somewhat irrationally, in a sort of hyper vigilant sense. And, yeah, so I guess anxiety and wonder were sort of two doors that led me to this.
Doherty: “Anxiety and wonder. Two doors.” That's great. Yeah, so many things we could talk about today. Before our conversation formally started, we were brainstorming about all the different directions we can go. And wolves have such a deep, you know, mythical history particularly in northern European, Anglo and Celtic and Finnish cultures and things like that. One of the things that came up with us, Erica, was just and I think you speak of this really eloquently, kind of knowing, I don't know, treading the difference, or knowing the difference between our own personal feelings and these global things. And, you know, that's one of the things I think comes up at ecotherapy. Kind of like the “Capital I” issues. Like the big things we're working on. And the lowercase I [personal] issues, you know. You seem to have insights about that, do you. Would you say a little bit more about that? Like, it's almost like a chicken and egg thing? What came first: my own temperamental anxiety or climate anxiety? Have you thought about that a little bit?
Berry: Yeah, I mean, I think, at some point when this sort of modern conception of what to do, if you're afraid, is to grow out of your fears. That was what I thought. That was, I felt like what the self help books were telling me. But I was more interested in how we grow into those fears. And the idea that we inherit, and are sort of sold these narratives often benefiting someone or an institution or something in power. And often also, there's a cost of carrying those narratives. And so I began to sort of question, you know, thinking of my brain as this vessel that had been filled with things without my sort of wanting to. Growing up you just inherit sort of imbibing these narratives and picking each of them up and sort of questioning them.
And I think, for example, with the wolf, I was thinking, like, when did this idea of the wolf, and this sort of violent man. This metaphor. There's a conflation there. And when did that start. And I sort of was looking linguistically. And you have ancient Norse, Sanskrit, Russian and Iranian. There are words for wolf that are also the words for robber or evil doer. And so you'd have these sorts of legacies, even in the very language that goes back so far. And I became interested then. And, you know, from my personal interaction, I didn't feel afraid of wolves when I was hiking. But I was thinking about the relationship between if I'm a woman walking alone, you know, my grandfather's farm, there has been a cougar, that was you'll sort of sometimes you're walking, and it's the cougar prints are in your prints afterwards. You know, and I was thinking about that feeling of being in a space sort of intimately with a wild predator.
And then my experiences, you know, I'd had an experience on the sidewalk where I'd been grabbed by a stranger, I didn't know. And that rewrote my experience of walking through these sorts of city landscapes. And I, at the same time, was very aware that I'd inherited this sort of Little Red Riding Hood story that told me I would be attacked there. And told me that to be a young woman is to potentially, you know, be prey. And I was really uncomfortable with that narrative. So I feel like at a certain time, I would sort of try to talk myself out of it on a very internal level. But ultimately realized, well, I have to like, take apart the wiring of these social narratives, that both do say, who can be predator, who can be prey. What it means to exist in those spaces. I didn't trust them. And I would say that, you know, this work is a balance of asking yourself these internal questions. When am I holding something? When am I sort of reacting to and trusting those gut instincts? But also felt like my gut instincts were sort of shaped by a world that had a lot of prejudice. And I didn't really trust my gut instincts. And I don't know, I guess that, you know, maybe this comes up in this sort of therapy world, like I felt like when it came to fear, I didn't trust what I should be afraid of. Because the stories that told me seem sort of bunk.
Doherty: Yeah. Well, I'll say one thing, and then I'll turn it over to Panu. But I do think that one thing that does happen in therapy paradoxically is that we learn not to trust our gut. Or we learn to test our gut because we think, you know, the real wisdom is always trust your gut. But if you had some negative wiring through your family, or a lot of people just have no understanding of animals and other species. It's all just abstract because they didn't grow up around wolves or coyotes or anything. And so there's a whole environmental identity piece. So some of our gut instincts are totally wrong. And we have to let them go and rewire. So.
Berry: I'm curious about how to sort of refind that instinct. You know, I feel like going back to some of these sort of archetypal or old stories, I felt like I was trying to excavate, what are my sort of gut self protective instincts that aren't going to be harmful or rooted and misapprehension? I guess that's just a larger, you know, the larger question or work is figuring out those instincts.
Pihkala: Very inspiring and fascinating. And I find this very important, also. The price of curiosity is anxiety. Would be a sort of paraphrasing of some of the work that Joanna Macy and others do at this work that reconnects things. And that was a helpful lesson for me sometimes, you know. Realizing that even though anxiety and worry and fear about what's going on in the world can be painful, it's also a sort of necessity, if you want to keep your sense of curiosity and wonder alive. So just echoing and commenting on some of the things you said quite early. There's a great book by a woman therapist, Miriam Greenspan. We've mentioned this at some very early episode called Healing Through the Dark Emotions: The Wisdom of Grief, Fear, and Despair.
And I find myself thinking a lot about that book when listening to you. And a book about the so-called negative emotions. Which are not negative in the value laden sense. And sometimes one hears phrases like, we should be fearless in the face of the climate crisis, for example. And I partly understand what you mean. But that's not the whole point. We should be courageous. And, you know, learn to feel fear, roughly the right amount at the right place. So, wisdom in fear is one of the themes that Greenspan very eloquently explores. And her book also features much of the discussion about this troubling power dynamics where women and the more than human will often end up suffering from sort of toxic forms of male aggression. So that's something I wanted to bring up.
Berry: Yeah, that's really interesting. And I think about this question of how to do fear, both in myself. And then I'm sort of imagining I don't have children, but I was thinking about the stories I'd inherit as a child. And the children I work with or teacher, if I do have children, like what are the stories that you give them to sort of the right amount of fear to stay alive or just to thrive. But also not to make your world too small, right. And I think that does tie to wolves, right? We need to have some both wolves. But wolves need to feel some fear of humans, just like humans need to feel some fear of wolves. And like that fear can be some respect. And maybe it's not fear of attack, but like where reverence and awe tip into fear. And, you know, I think that's true, too. Socially, I was very resistant to relating to the Little Red Riding Hood narrative growing up as a teenager. Like, I really did not want to be this idea of the victim. And I think only later, when I'd sort of had some of these encounters did I realize that I needed to have some fear, actually. I tried to live completely fearlessly.
And I'd sort of grown up in this very sort of empowered girl power era of the late 90s. And actually, I needed to, like, rewire some of that. And I do think there's a crossover. I mean, I think that the threat that an animal and human poses are totally different. And wolves. You know, I need to say that, like, I don't think. There's a great quote by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson.
Yeah, it says something like the cruelty that a predator does, it's not cruelty what a predator does to a prey animal, right? It's instinct. And that's why metaphors about wolves will fall flat, right? At the same time, there is something about learning to walk among other bodies, that you don't know what they will do. And you can't anticipate. That is true. We're just animals. And, you know, we're an animal among animals. And I feel like part of my work into fear has just been thinking about the fear responses on an animal level. And I talked to a biologist who said, you know, fear is not an emotion in my lab, it's a set of responses. Sort of like these dominoes that affect our behavior. And a plant will be a different plant after it experiences chronic stress and an animal will and a person will. And it was sort of helpful for me to rationalize, like, oh, this is on a biological level. I've experienced something. And that's changing my body. And I can talk about that, but I guess the relationship between our sort of biological and psychological conceptions of fear.
Doherty: Yeah. I was just searching for a quote as we were talking that I gathered recently from Pema Chondron: “fear is a natural reaction of moving closer to the truth.” One of her quotes. And so all of this has a meta level of climate change. And societally we're working out. We're dosing our fear so that. We don't even really have to get into that too much, but that's a backdrop for a lot of our talk today is climate change.
Berry: Well and I think realizing that fear. I at some point realized, like, being afraid is being in love with things, right? The more afraid I am, the more I don't want to lose something. I felt most sort of afraid of flying on airplanes, when I was working on this book project. And I really wanted to finish it. And for some reason, that made me like, I can't. I've never really felt afraid of flying. And I felt extra, that sense of protectiveness. And so understanding that there's sort of the opposite on the color wheel of love and fear. And same with grief. And, you know, yeah, that very much ties to climate and sort of investing in the world around you, or recognizing the environmental world is tied to that.
Pihkala: Yeah, great stuff. And also guilt, I think. So it's interesting that many of these very common climate emotions and eco emotions, have their basis in love and care actually. Or our deepest values. You know, wanting to have something very important done. Echoing what you say about finishing the book. I've had the same feeling sometimes when working for a very long time with a book or a long article. And this like errr I need to get this finished. And that ties with sort of very deep themes around what might be called death anxiety or wrestling with knowledge of mortality. And I've noticed over the years also that I don't have very high levels of death anxiety, but when you are in those kinds of situations where you would like something to happen, that's a slight increase in at least my death anxiety. It doesn't limit my everyday functioning, but it speaks I think that this dynamic is here now. That's again, one topic, I think, very closely related to wolves, as you have hinted at yourself.
Berry: When I was doing the eco therapy sessions to write about for the magazine with Thomas, he mentioned, like that idea of playing out sort of this worst case scenario. Or like, sitting with that. And I've thought about that a lot since. And sort of the word fear has roots in the Latin word for ambush. And this idea that we fear the thing that we can't anticipate. And I've thought a lot, you know, like worry becomes a form of a sort of a prayer for something to happen, right? It's a fantasy place in a way. You're living in a projection. And what can sort of be defamed by just living it through. Going there. Imagining it, as you say. Death attacks something. And then sort of sitting with that. And okay, I've played it out. And now maybe I'm sort of free of it. And yeah, I guess I've thought about that in different contexts since our walk.
Doherty: Yeah. As people are listening out there, our listeners, just a lot of things were touching on. I think, just to kind of ground us in a kind of a map of what we're talking about. I mean, some of what we're talking about is just personal, how our nervous systems work, right? So our nervous systems get used to being a certain way. And we get afraid of things. And we want to avoid them. And so what Erica was just talking about is kind of what the therapist would call exposure. You know, graduated exposure, where we kind of bring these things into our minds. And sit with them. And that allows our body to our heart rate to settle on our blood pressure to settle. And we realize oh, okay, I can be with this. So that's a kind of a therapy thing.
And then it's all insight about ourselves. And how we grew up. Oh, this is how I operate in the world. And one of the things that I don't know if that's true for you, Erica, but this was true for me when I was younger was being counterphobic. So I like to purposely do things that are scary. And pushed myself almost just compulsively, you know. And kind of to get away from my family, in a way because my mother was quite fearful of the world. She was not an outdoors person at all. And she almost drowned when she was a teenager in the Niagara River. You know, with her father fishing. And she would always tell us the story of how she almost drowned. In a working class Polish family. And you know, she was all huddled on the bus going home in a blanket. And that was our introduction to water and swimming. You know, so for me, it was always well, I have to jump off a cliff then. And get into the water. And then realizing that's limited too. Because we're kind of white knuckling it. We're not actually really living our lives. We're just pushing ourselves into things.
But anyways, all great insight. And Erica, all your writings really are so insightful. But we got the mind body. We've got therapy. And then this whole environmental identity piece too. Because you grew up, you had some actual familiarity with coyotes and animals. A lot of people, it's totally abstract. So they have no. It's like two cultures. This is a bit off track, but I was watching the anniversary of the Iraq invasion, in the news. And people talking about the US going into Iraq. And just seeing images of these poor National Guard soldiers going around Baghdad. And totally being out of their element. And such a lack of any understanding of that culture. And then of course, if you don't understand something, it's very scary. And then if you have a bunch of firearms, you're going to kill it. And so many people do not understand the culture of wolves. And, you know, whereas native people would coexist. So there's a whole cultural piece about us not really understanding the ways of animals. So cougars or owls are whales they become, oddly, you know, anthropomorphized. But, you know, all the wildlife biology people in the audience are shaking their hands because these people don't understand. So there's a lot of levels, just to kind of situate us in the conversation.
Berry: Yeah. My relatives. My grandfather had a sheep farm. And I think he was also his brother who had been the head of the Sierra Club. A big organization doing a lot of environmental sort of landmark legislation in the 70s when he was the president. And so I sort of inherited this legacy of conservation. And thinking about protecting these wild spaces. And at the same time, because he was taking care of sheep, and sometimes the sheep would get attacked by the coyote. And he would bring them in and have to stitch them up. Or, you know, we'd be feeding a lamb in the bathtub. And, you know, understanding there's a story that he told that I had forgotten where essentially, I had cried wolf on his farm. And I'd said, oh, Grandpa, there's a wolf here. And I'd been quite afraid. And I don't remember this. I was probably three years old. And it was a coyote, but he trapped it. And he could hold somehow, as a, you know, he was a conservationist and a hiker. And yet also on the farm, he was this tender. And he was trapping a coyote. I tried to ask him for more details. And he's passed away now. You know, it was sort of towards the end of his life that he was telling me this story. But he said, You were convinced it was a wolf. And you were afraid. And I thought, it's because I'd heard so many stories about the wolf being the threat. And I loved the lambs in that context.
And, you know, that feeling that even I had “cried wolf.” As someone who was very primed to this. You know, I think we all cry wolf, sometimes when we mean to cry other things, right? Which is, there's an animal here. And it's in a trap. And it's scary. And I'm scared. And I don't know what that experience is as a toddler, right? And I don't know, I think about so many of the wolf stories that I encountered. You know, it's really hard to give language to some of these other emotions. And so we sort of make it animal as a way of trying to make it legible to ourselves. But behind that, you know, it's scarier to peel back like, what else was I seeing? At that moment, I saw an animal that was probably dying. That my grandfather was killing. And that's harder for me to confront, you know, to really think about that is almost more painful.
Pihkala: Yeah, this is [a] profound discussion. I find myself thinking about vulnerability. There's of course much dynamics of control and power. And in these discourses about predators. And how much they can be hated. It's difficult not to see elements of so-called human dominion thinking. And it's a threat when some creature still can show some power. But another theme related to this, which you hinted at, our pre discussion is scapegoating. Which I've been thinking about a lot lately because we've had in Finland, one another media attack on Greta Thunberg. The Swedish young climate activist. And the way she is treated as a prime example of what can be called scapegoat ecology. People trying to escape a difficult, ethical question where they have some complicity in by attacking the messenger. Or then, you know, loading an enormous amount of things and emotions and whatever into one creature.
And that happens, sadly, for Greta. But it often seems to happen for wolves also. And then it's quite clear that people are also projecting perhaps hidden parts of themselves into wolves. This is a very large topic. And I'm really looking forward to reading your book. But I still want to lift this up. And I think that one of the key elements is sorting together with others. Accepting vulnerability. Which is basically what you do when you hike. There is that element, but then if you are real about it, it's much more dangerous to go driving in a car than it is to go walking into the forest, in relation to predators, for example.
Berry: I love that. And I think, you know, it makes me think of a line Thomas from the paper that you've shared. Thomas had worked on a paper about carnivore sort of the actual risks of predation. And saying that, like, in a world, where we are living beside these creatures, we have to take some responsibility. Which is maybe supervising some young children or dogs. Or be sort of mindful when we're walking or biking. And that is implying not that we think we will be attacked, but that we understand that we're sharing the land, right? And having to act in different ways. And I think that we're sort of resistant to that idea in this very anthropomorphic way. Like I am the one in control of this space. I should be able to run or jog or do whatever I want here without this encroachment.
And at the same time, I think, as a woman, I've been doing that for so long. Like, of course, I'm not going to run in certain places. And, you know, it's been interesting with the book out, I get emails from men who say, oh, I've never really thought about this. I hike everywhere. And I love hiking. And I've never thought about the ways that you wouldn't hike somewhere. And I'm thinking like, really? This has always been part of my experience. And so many people, you know, maybe there is a relationship there again, with how do we be mindful of our vulnerability and also the power? You know, I studied mother wolves at one point. Stories about mother wolves. And the idea that they're so fierce. And they can be the fiercest sort of, they have so much to the stakes are high, right? So much to protect. And yet also there's this vulnerability and the ferocity are intertwined in ways that we don't always culturally see, right? We see them as two separate things. But in fact, yeah, there's an intimate link there.
Doherty: Yeah. So many levels of awareness. You know, yeah men just being aware of not even being aware that they are the Alpha predator, typically. So they don't have to worry about anything. And then, even if you're not when you're a young man being killed by an animal's glorious way to die, so why not? There's no loss either way.
But in our last part, Erica, you've hinted at this already with some of the letters you've gotten, but you know, you've been traveling the country, I guess. Sharing this really interesting book, right? Which is going to pull on city people and pull on rural people. And bring in young women, perhaps, that are building their ability to go on a solo hike. And then bringing in ranchers or environmentalists. Or even just city people who are just curious about this. So what are any interesting anecdotes or just insights you've got after doing these public talks and seeing people. I'm curious what people come up to you and say.
Berry: It was really interesting, because I just had a call with one of the ranchers who I talked to in the book. And he left me a message and he said, I'm halfway through your book. And it's very sociological. It's not just about real wolves. Which I sort of tried to explain, but it's a tricky concept of a book to explain to people. And so I called him back later. And he said, you know, I'm thinking about how I was a wolf when I was young. And he's had a livestock producer who's lost almost more livestock than most producers in Oregon to wolves. But what was really catching him was not the sort of the biological wolf, but like his own story. And he started talking about the sort of violence that women in his family had experienced. Processing almost in a sort of therapy-like way with me, on the phone.
And I think that is a sort of, that is a theme right now of people sharing stories of, especially women. Maybe there's this whole gray area of incidents where you don't know if you're technically at risk. I think that is one of the things that I became interested in is, you know, there are these encounters where you know, your life is in danger. But there are other encounters like this one where I had where I was grabbed on the street, where somebody else intervened. and you don't really know what it would have been like if there hadn't been that intervention. And so I didn't know how to narrate it. I didn't totally trust my fear. There were reasons why I felt bad for the man. He was inebriated, he was sort of crying as he was kind of attacking me. And, you know, I didn't have a language for that. And I think those are the moments that other people are also sort of saying, I have all these moments too, that are kind of like this.
And, you know, early on, I'd had a sort of advisor say, well, this moment in the book, in an early draft, is sort of a normal assault. I've thought about those two words together quite a lot since then. And the ways that what becomes normal. What becomes normalized. What sorts of violence become normalized. And so yeah, it's quite interesting to hear. I was troubled by that, of course. And wanted to sort of be able to shine a light on these more quotidian moments of violence or unrest or “unsafeness” that maybe we feel or internalize and carry with us. And so, yeah, a number of people sharing those with me, which I think, you know, is a gift that it's giving them space to think it through. And also, you know, there's a sadness to understanding how many people move through the world with this sort of awareness.
Doherty: Yeah. We're coming toward the end of our time. And I think listeners are taking this in all different directions. We have a number of really juicy, you know, items to put in our show notes. Links to some excerpts from Erica's book and some of her other writings. and some stuff that Panu has. And some things that I have even about just basic research about animal tax. So there's a lot of directions to go with this. And we'll want to keep in touch. Keep in touch Erica. You kind of put yourself as this cultural therapist here, in your book readings here. Yeah, let's wrap it up, Panu, Erica. Where do we want to go as we take it away? Or what messages do you want to leave with the listeners,
Berry: I think one thing that I've just thought about, again, is this idea that fear is not necessarily a bad thing, you know. And I go back to research I did with some ecology of fear biologists who sort of study these landscapes of fear. And the sort of psychological topographies of fear. And I've really started thinking about that in human contexts. And, you know, this idea of moving through the world without fear, again. Go back to maybe what brought me into this is also what brings me out of it. Which is like the relationship between curiosity and inquiry and uncertainty. And those things, you know, as the writing I do is grounded in not knowing. And feeling somewhat provoked often. And that becomes a gateway to something generative.
And so I think the generative impulses behind this. And, at the same time, I'm a much less fearful person after doing this work. And thinking really deeply about the stories I'd inherited about wolves, both real and symbolic. And sort of the legacy and lineage around this predator. Which is code for something else. And so much of the sort of Western culture I'd inherited. I am less afraid. And so I guess I would encourage other people who might be in a similar spot of hypervigilance. Or whatever that I really felt like I was quite steeped in, to think about that idea of sort of like unplugging the wiring. And thinking about how did your parents teach you about fear? What were the stories that you believed about what would happen to your body in the wilderness? Or who you would encounter there. And sort of that has been so generative for me. And ultimately, not a way of making my world smaller, but making it bigger.
Pihkala: Thanks for that, also. This has been a delightful conversation. And it leaves many images and words. I've been thinking and musing about how one level would be a united approach of staying with the animals as symbols in combination with them as real others. Partly unknown others, and also symbols. And I really look forward to thinking more about that when reading your book. And I think this idea of encountering our wolf side. Both light and shadow are terribly important for contemporary times. Most of all, thanks for the great conversation.
Berry: Thank you so much for having me here. It's such a pleasure.
Doherty: Yes. Thank you so much, Erica. I look forward to more connections. And so yes, listeners, we have another episode with Susan Bodner, where she was talking about New York City, her perspective on the outdoors, which will pair well with our conversation. And you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And please support us at our Patreon. And all of us, you all and listeners, you all have a good rest of your day. Take care.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 19: Considering Happiness and What It Should Mean for You
May 12, 2023
Season 2, Episode 19: Considering Happiness and What It Should Mean for You
What is happiness? And how to live it? These ancient questions are discussed by Thomas and Panu, especially as related to living with the climate and ecological crisis. Listen to a dialog on happiness — as a “wild” emotion, as a result of contact with the natural world, and as a feeling we can only know in the context of the other feelings we experience. Panu and Thomas plumbed the cultural connotations of happiness as a form of luck, an experience of joy or pleasure, and a sense of honor, an outcome of a life well lived. Carpe Diem (Seize the Day!) and learn tools to develop your own potential for happiness at this time.
Links
Thomas and Panu referenced the concept of “carpe diem” as showcased in the classic film Dead Poets Society. (Note the phrase is more accurately translated as “plucking the day” evoking plucking and gathering ripening fruits or flowers, and enjoying a moment rooted in the sensory experience of nature.)
To appreciate different conceptions of happiness from around the world, Thomas recommends The Atlas of Happiness by Helen Russell.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And Panu and I welcome you to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. This is a show for people around the globe, who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change and many other environmental issues. And so here we focus on our emotional responses. Issues like today, our topic of happiness, other issues like eco anxiety, and things that are plaguing people. You can learn about us at climatechangeandhappiness.com and see many early episodes where we talk about various parts of happiness, and various ways to think about being happy. And you can support us at our donation page as well.
And so, going back to our mission, when we created this podcast, it was a couple of things: Panu is a researcher of emotions and environmental emotions. And I'm interested in that, and I've worked in that area [as a psychologist and therapist]. So we really wanted to get into these climate and environmental emotions. And then there's this larger question of what does it mean to be happy? You know, “climate change and happiness?” How do those terms go together? What does it mean to be happy in this modern world? And so it's a question we all have to decide every morning, every day and in our lives. So we wanted to come back to our mission. And we're working on a writing project for The Happiness Encyclopedia [Elgar Encyclopedia on Happiness, Quality of Life and Subjective Well-being; ed. by Roger Fernandez-Urbano & Hilke Brockmann, forthcoming 2023.], that Panu can talk about in a moment. And part of our job is writing about eco anxiety and happiness, which is interesting and challenging. So that's where we're at today, folks. And we're going to try to keep this real to our lives, to our personal lives and your personal life as well. So, think about things in terms of your own life and your own happiness. So Panu, this is a big area. We talk about “the elephant,” the blind men and the elephant and people touching on different parts of a big area. So where in this big elephant of happiness would you like to start?
Pihkala: Hmm, perhaps the trunk or the foot. But yes, the issue of languages is, again, interesting here. And one of our passions in this podcast has been to think about things in different languages. And the word for happiness in [the] Finnish language is onnellisuus. A short form would be onni. Which is etymologically also connected to luck. In some languages, happiness and being lucky are closely connected, and in some other languages not. We don't necessarily think of luck when we think about happiness in Finland and in Finnish, but it's a close connection.
And it's not exactly the same, this Finnish concept of onnellisuus and the English happiness. And many listeners know there's been a very long discussion in North America about pursuing happiness. And how to define happiness and the things around that. And so there's plenty to discuss here. I think linking to the major theme of our podcast, the climate crisis and ecological crisis, is how that challenges some forms of happiness or so called happiness. And then the task of how to live a good life or meaningful life which are important parts of what people are talking about. At least some people when they are talking about happiness. So those things are gonna be on the table today. But what does happiness mean to you, Thomas? How do you see it?
Doherty: That's a great question. I was afraid you were gonna ask me that Panu? Because it's a tough one. You know, I'm just thinking about this idea of luck. And the onni in Finnish. We're kind of students of happiness words. There's a great book out there called The Atlas of Happiness by a writer named Helen Russell. And she went around the world and found different interesting words for happiness in different cultures. And I thought about luck. There's a word, Xingfu, in Chinese. A state of being happy. But it's a combination of luck and having just enough of what you need. [See Xingfu entry in the The Atlas of Happiness by Helen Russell.]
So, I think a lot of cultures have realized that happiness kind of comes and goes, And sometimes there's a luckiness factor to feeling happy. And then, of course, having just enough of what you need is another part of this right? And that's a concept that's shared around the world as well. Lagom, you know, having just enough. You know, one way I approach this, when I'm working with people in myself, I might start with the opposite. What does being not happy look like? And then sometimes that helps me a little bit. You know, what am I missing, and then it gives me a clue to what I need to be happy. And I know, I'm a parent, and this morning, my daughter, it's early morning, here from me. And my 15 year old daughter had a struggling morning to get to school. And get to the bus and feeling overwhelmed about her schoolwork. And she was really not feeling happy. And being distraught, like teenagers will be at times. Or all of us will be at times. And then I as a parent, being the solo parent on the job, was not happy either, because I had to help her. So happiness does include, you know, feeling safe in the moment. I think if we want to keep our happiness in terms of our climate and environmental context, I think there's a peace and happiness about feeling safe or feeling secure. And if we don't have that, sometimes it's really hard to feel happy. To be in the moment enough to enjoy our moments, without this big weight of all these other things over our head. This eco anxiety and “meta-insecurity” that kind of, you know, drains our ability to be happy. So I think that's a place. So it's being in the moment and feeling secure. And that's a place I would start.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks. That's very profound, I think. And reminds me of this movie, The Dead Poets Society (1989), [featuring] Robin Williams, and others. And I haven't thought about that for quite some time, actually. But I remember when we were at the upper levels of comprehensive school, you know, like 13, or 14, me and many of my friends actually liked the movie a lot. We didn't watch these kinds of a bit arty, serious movies very much during then. It was more, you know, action movies, and that's that type of thing. But that movie caught our attention. And I think it succeeded in encountering this basic issue of Carpe Diem. You know, seize the moment. It's closely related to happiness that one would be able to appreciate the everyday moments of existence. And of course, that may not always be joyful, or delightful as an emotional state. But if one is connected to the sort of most meaningful things, then that's related to happiness in the sense of a good life or meaningful life. So some reflections that came to mind when listening to you.
Doherty: Yeah, and it reminds us that art is very important in our happiness. I mean, so the listeners can think about this. I mean, one of our metaphors, again, is the blind man and the elephant. And, you know, with climate change, and all these kinds of big global issues. So people look at different parts of the issue. And they argue about it. But we, you know, don't argue about happiness. That's one takeaway. Think about different ways that people need to be happy. And if someone with you is unhappy, try to be curious about what they need. And it might not be the same thing that you need at the moment. You know, my daughter, you know, my well meaning parenting advice this morning about don't waste your time by being distraught because it actually makes you even more late for your bus. You know, that kind of logical stuff she wasn't open to at the moment. But you know, I needed a hug and needed some actual help. And also just some patience. Just let her be because, again, you know, on really more profound terms with climate change. These issues like the East Palestine train derailment in the US that we talked about in our recent recording, and that's going to come out here soon. There's a lot of thieves that will steal our happiness. trying to steal our happiness.
So we do have to be vigilant. Feelings are wild though. Feelings of happiness will arise. Feelings of, you know, because positive things will happen. Last night before I was going to bed, my window was slightly open because I like some fresh air in the evening and I heard an owl. I thought I heard an owl. And we don't typically have owls around where I live. And then I went and sat by the window and opened the window and listened into the night. And sure enough, there was an owl, you know. And then I double checked it with my bird app on my phone that has bird calls. A merlin in this app, you know, where you can turn it on and it'll listen. And it'll tell you what the bird sound is. It's good for birders that don't know the birds. And sure enough, it confirmed it was a Barred Owl And that was a really unexpected moment of happiness for me. In the evening. Before I went to bed. Just a little connection with the natural world. And Barred Owls are probably migrating here because of the season through our urban neighborhood. So that's wild. You know, that's a wild thing. And I was meeting with a young person yesterday talking about their own climate anxiety. And we were talking about a lot of things. But after a while, she said she felt excited about some of the things we were talking about. And that was a wild feeling we agreed. Because she hadn't prepared to feel excited. So at least these positive feelings will happen if we can stay in the moment and be aware of them. That's the dilemma.
Pihkala: Yeah, I totally, totally agree. And in my Finnish work, part of that was a book about various emotions and feelings that people may experience in relation to ecology [Mieli maassa? Ympäristötunteet, 2019], and environmental issues and other things like that. And then I did a lot of thinking about various nuances of feeling good or feeling happy. And that's, I think, a very important topic. Also, I might leave it to another moment in this episode, because I still want to talk about one thing in the movie. I'm linking to one thing you said also, which is, in this old movie, Dead Poets Society, there's some young man who really would like to be an actor, but his parents definitely don't like the idea. They would like him to continue studying very hard and being able to get a job, which would pay well. And a classic situation where there's lots of dreams by the parents and the younger generation might not agree with all of them.
But it raises up this whole issue of professions and work life and what are we striving for. And that's, of course, very closely connected to the ecological crisis also. Because some things that some people have regarded or learned to regard as signs of happiness and well being, like having a huge amount of riches. Then that's generally speaking, of course, not possible for the whole population of this planet. To put it mildly. And we know that people are different. You know, there are wealthy people who are doing great stuff, ethically speaking, and living a good and meaningful life by working towards the common good. But on average, this structure of “let's all get more material possessions”, so that's detrimental for the happiness of creatures on this planet. So I just wanted to bring that link between happiness and ecological crisis. And partly also eco anxiety or climate anxiety.
Doherty: Yeah, you're right. I mean, there's a political aspect to this, obviously, right? I mean, what drives our happiness and what our policies are about. What people are supposed to be happy about. Potentially a huge impact on the planet and other species. And of course, social justice issues where certain people are subjugated. And so that other people can somehow be happy. And so, yeah, that gets us to the anger, you know. Anger another emotion that comes up here. Which it joins with happiness. If you are from another planet, and you came here and you dropped into us. And try to understand the culture by watching the mainstream media. You would think that happiness was sufficient if you had a new car and a new phone, some fast food and some sort of wealth management program. You know, it's very superficial. And we know that that system is driving the planet into ruin. And everyone knows that. So it's an open secret. So I think there is this, as in many areas, there's a crisis of what it means to be happy. But happiness is much more simple and much more.
You know, we talk about these fancy words. These words that researchers use, like intrinsic versus extrinsic. You know, so intrinsic happiness is things that just mean something to us. Doesn't require possessions. It doesn't require, you know, a lot of money and super wealth. It is just intrinsic things, again, security, safety, family, friends, social support. You know, a lot of people are unhappy these days, because they feel isolated in their eco concerns. Partly why we do this podcast, so people don't feel as isolated. Because when you're lonely, that's another feeling that lives with happiness. And it kind of makes it more difficult to be happy. So yes, each listener can find their own piece that they need to work on. Some people want, you know, to be angry and to work on change to make them happy. It makes them feel good.
Lately, the model that I've been using with helping people with emotions and my own self is, you know, it's not eliminating emotions. It's just adding other emotions to join whatever emotion that we're trying to work with. So if I'm feeling lonely, like I say, you know, if it was a party. And I had a party. And my only guest was loneliness, then that would be everything we would sort of focus on at the party. But if curiosity shows up, you know, that emotion shows up. Then you're lonely, but then you're also curious. Or patience shows up that I also can wait and sort of hold on. Or courage shows up, you know. Or anger shows up and says, well, you shouldn't stand for this. We should do something about this, right? So lonely it is still there. But it's supported by these other emotions. And a lot of people have an insight with that. Because they think they need to, you know, eliminate a bad emotion. And it's impossible. It's natural. And it's normal. And it's healthy to feel lonely if we are isolated. But we can make lonely, less lonely as a feeling if we add other feelings to it. And anyway, that's a metaphor I've been using. So people can think about that with happiness as well. Yeah, our happiness exists, but it feels lonely. And if we can bring in some other emotions, that happiness can be stronger. Does that make sense?
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. That reminds me of the emotion coach, Karla McLaren’s work. And she uses the metaphor of the village. You know, in every village, there's different kinds of people. There might be quite big differences between them also, but still, they belong there. And then that's a metaphor for various emotions. And also that can be linked with various skills. You know, different persons are good at different things. And in the village of our self, or our psyche, we need all those emotions, guys and gals, so to speak. So that makes us capable of responding to various kinds of situations.
And personally, I'm very much for the view that emotions and feelings also have intrinsic value. So it's not just the instrumental value. There is definitely that also. Sometimes you need anger to fight some injustice, for example. But then, emotions are also related to just being alive. And feeling joy or feeling sadness, that's related to their intrinsic value of being alive, also. So not just the instrumental, emotions have a lot of that intrinsic value, also.
Doherty: Yeah. And so let's do a little teaching for the listeners. So yeah, there's these terms that we use that are really useful. So instrumental value. If I'm following you, I mean, it's a useful value. Like it's instrumental. It's useful. It has a practical use to it. That's what you mean about that, right?
Pihkala: Roughly. Yeah. You know, if you have an ax, that's going to be of great instrumental value if you need to chop some firewood.
Doherty: Yes, yeah. Yeah.
Pihkala: But then, if you have an ax that you have inherited from your great grandfather, it may be that you never chop any wood with that, but it still has great value for you because it's a family artifact.
Doherty: Yeah. And environmental groups and environmentalists think about this because, you know, they think about the instrumental values of things. If people do care about nature and care about it, they're going to change their behavior. And so there's a piece where we harness and use emotions to help make social change. And that gets into the whole idea of advertising and marketing and social marketing. And of course, advertisers who are trying to sell consumer products also try to make this instrumental so they get people to buy things. And all this sort of stuff. So again, we can put on our philosopher hats.
And, you know, people over the millennia have thought about, you know, feeling good in terms of hedonism and just feeling happy in the moment. Kind of more epicurean, kind of just enjoying the beauty of life and food and drink and people and pleasure and the arts and music. And then the more I guess, “eudaimonic” would be the term, which is really a life well lived, where we feel good about our life. We feel when we look back on our life, we feel like we were our best self. We did good work. We helped other people. We lived up to our values, right? That's the other. That's that other piece of happiness, right? And listeners we all struggle with, like, are we living up to our values? Are we being our best self? And that guilt and shame that people have sometimes of not living up to their values really kind of impacts our happiness.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. Some people use the word existential guilt. In this sense, you know, it's related to who you are, and the fundamentals of life. And if you feel that you haven't been nearly what you feel you should have been. So that goes near this existential guilt. And in this podcast, we've often talked about how important it is not to let feelings of inadequacy rule our lives. Because these structural problems are bigger than any of us. So it's no use if we just constantly feel bad and inadequate.
But of course, we also need the abilities of guilt and shame so that we can know this, when we are individually or collectively headed in the wrong direction. Or if we have done something which is not as good as it should have been. So it can be a very tricky balance. It's not easy. I totally echo […] . And this idea of living a good and meaningful life. So some people may not even feel it themselves. Like Mother Teresa, for example. The famous helper of poor people. Who apparently quite often felt quite miserable and anxious. But when evaluated from an ethical standpoint, she ended up living a very, very meaningful life. And in the ethical sense, a very good life. So sometimes, it may not even feel good for the person himself or herself. But it may be related to very important things that still are going on.
Doherty: Yeah. That's a really neat point too. So yeah, we talked about we have issues and we have issues. We have our big capital issues we're going to work on in the world. And we have our lowercase I issues. Our feelings. Our baggage. I mean, there's a lot we can talk about here. I mean, we know from the research that people have a sort of a happiness set point. People have a general disposition and temperament. And some people are more naturally upbeat and happier than others. Some people are more melancholic. I tend to be more melancholic myself at times. And that's just part of our personality and our style. We got to make the most of what we have. And then yes, there's this other piece of engaging with these wicked problems in the world. These problems are all a big tangle of problems. Like poverty, like environmental injustice, like climate change, like natural disasters, like the economy, capitalism, corporate propaganda. You know, all these things, this is a big tangle of things. And we can't fix this, like directly. But we can engage with it. And be doing something. I was talking to some people about this the other day. And you know, as long as we're doing something that we feel like we have some expertise in.
I was talking to someone who works in Portland here with the transportation department. But specifically around bike lanes and moving people around. And it's a really tough job in cities because we've got the crush of traffic. And then the problem of unhoused people on the streets and the economy and climate change. But if you're doing something and you have some expertise, you can spend your day working on it. You're engaged. And ultimately it feels good even if you don't solve the problems. You know you've shown up and put a good day's work into it. So we talked about, you know, we need to increase that engagement. So the catchphrase was, increase and make peace. So increase your engagement and make peace with everything that you can't do.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. Inner peace. Which may be related to outer peace. And in many cultures, a sense of honor—
Doherty: Honor.
Pihkala: —has been very closely related to views about the good life and meaningful life. And I think that's a very important aspect of our lives in the ecological crisis also. So when we know in our bodies and in our hearts, that we have at least tried to do something with the resources we have. And in the contexts in which we live, which are very different. Some people have much more options than others. So if we are able to be in that position, then we regain or have some sense of honor which is very important for us human beings, I think.
Doherty: It's really great, Panu. Honor. I actually have never. I've never linked honor with this area. I don't think I've ever quite thought about that. I've never seen it also linked anywhere in anything I've written or I've read. So yeah, a sense of honor. That's just something just to let us sit with and do you know, I mean. I feel a sense of honor by talking with you on this podcast. And doing some of the things that I do. So that's an interesting, you know, thing to think about. People talk about, metaphorically, what would I, what would I tell my grandchildren, you know, when they asked me or when people in the future would ask me, what did you do during this time? You know, I think if we say that we took some action, we can have a sense of honor about that. That's really neat. I'm gonna think more about that.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. We might come back to that, in some episode. It would be very interesting. And all this is related to what can be called practical eco anxiety. You know, the eco anxiety and the engaged life. This sensitivity to the troubles in the world and the motivation to do something about that. And that's one of the points in our happiness encyclopedia article with Thomas. That eco anxiety can be linked with meaningful life and getting engaged also. And sometimes that can result in so-called positive emotions. There can be a lot of joy with others, when people are working for the common good. That happens a lot. When people start doing things, of course, there may be feelings of disappointment, also heavily.
And it's not just happy, happy, joy, joy. But there is joy also. And lately, some psychologists and researchers have started to lift that theme up, also more. Like Joseph Dodds, for example, in a recent piece (“Dancing at the end of the world?”), where he argues that it might be very important that we also allow ourselves and others to be more often joyful. And that's another theme we have touched upon this podcast. And I think something nice to talk about as we are getting close to the end of this episode. This permission to feel joy (ilolupa as my Finnish concept). And I think that's not the same as happiness. But of course, it's profoundly connected to this ability to feel various emotions in one's life.
Doherty: Yeah, this is all really great. We try to end these episodes on a sort of an uplifting note for the listener for the rest of their day. You know, I think one side of this crisis of happiness is that it's a really creative time. People are being creative about what happiness means. And some of these old definitions are. I mean, in our lives, that's part of our change and our growth. We let go of old definitions of happiness that no longer serve us. That is superficial or immature. Or we've grown out of. And so we've got, you know, writers like Rebecca Solnit, who I like to write about, you know, visions of hope and Paradise built in hell, you know. About, you know, what actually happens when people rise above during disasters and things like that. Joseph Dodds, as you say. Glenn Albrecht has a whole lexicon of climate emotions and states that he's created kind of like a philosophical art gallery of different states and feelings and things like that. Which are inspiring to people. And so over the years, there's been people being creative and holding space for happiness in various ways.
So yeah, so it's again, joy. Our engaged life leads to what I would say moments of joy. It doesn't lead to permanent joy, but it leads to literal genuine moments of joy. So essentially, in our emotional party, our diligence and our patience and our, you know, our fatigue and our weariness, joy shows up to the party from time to time as well. Presence. Happiness. You know, it becomes a guest if we just move forward. So I invite the listeners to think about, you know, that feelings are wild. Just be aware. We all don't like it when an unexpected guest shows up to our party that's grief or despair, or guilt or shame, or embarrassment. But we also need to be aware when special guests come in. Like joy and presence or wonder, awe. All these things as well come around. So that's what I'm thinking about Panu, as I get into my day. And start my day here on a Monday. That's a good way for me to start actually thinking about these positive feelings. How about yourself? Where are you heading for the rest of your evening?
Pihkala: It's Monday evening here. And the boys are starting to return home. So I think one activity will be a very Finnish important thing related to happiness, which is the sauna. So yeah, that's one example of people, you know, very literally, stripping away status and wealth and that sort of thing. So it's just a connection with the steam and the warmth and other people and water.
Doherty: That sounds really nice.
Pihkala: That's gonna be a happy moment this evening.
Doherty: Well, good. You deserve it. You've worked a long day there and been a parent with your boys. And so enjoy. And listeners, you all take care of yourselves. And we will pick it up again next time. And you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And please support our websites so we can bring more guests and more good topics to you. Be well.
Pihkala: Take care.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 18: Holding Space for Climate Emotions and Possibilities with Psychiatrist Janet Lewis
Apr 28, 2023
Season 2, Episode 18: Holding Space for Climate Emotions and Possibilities with Psychiatrist Janet Lewis
Join Panu and Thomas for a thought provoking conversation with Janet Lewis, a founding member of the Climate Psychiatry Alliance. Janet reflected on her experiences of living through disasters and what this has taught her. She explained the therapy concept of “containment”—the ability to experience and hold space for strong emotional expressions in ourselves and others—and how this applies to climate coping and resilience. We have many options for creating a sense of containment: intellectually, emotionally, within supportive relationships and through engaging and taking action. Janet observed that in this time “We are either within or between disasters” and it is important to hold open this creative space. It is the ethical responsibility of those of us not in disaster to work on climate mitigation and adaptation. Janet also spoke of finding solace in the nature of complex systems and possibility of emergence of new forms and ideas.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. The show for people around the world around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about issues like climate change, and the environmental crisis in nature. And all these things that revolve around these big topics. And, again, we focus on the emotions and our feelings, among other things. And today, we are really excited to have a guest with us.
Janet Lewis: Hi, I'm Janet Lewis. I'm a psychiatrist in central New York State. And I'm a founding member of the Climate Psychiatry Alliance. And I do a lot of teaching about mental health effects of climate change.
Doherty: Yes. And we're so glad to have Janet with us. Janet lives in part of the country in the US near where I grew up in western New York State or central New York State. And like other guests that we've had on this podcast, Janet has been doing this work for a while and is one of the pathfinders, one of the innovators that have helped to build knowledge of climate psychology. Particularly climate therapy and climate psychiatry. So we're really glad to have a discussion. I know Panu and I have both seen Janet's work over the years. And it's really nice to meet someone. And it's really validating for us, I think, to [meet] with [a] kindred spirit. Panu, do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Yes, warmly welcome Janet. Very pleased to meet you online. And you've been engaged with this topic for a long time. But would you like to share a bit about your background story? So how did you end up becoming a climate aware psychological professional?
Lewis: Well, I know different people come to this in different ways. I'm one of the people who sort of had an awakening in a particular moment. I think I'd been primed for it because I've known some disasters in my life. I've had my house burned down, not from anything climate change related. But I've also been in a hurricane. And I've been in some flooding situations. But I had a moment, when I was at a conference. It was the Integral Theory Conference in California. And that's a group, a movement that's spiritually oriented and nd also very intellectually open. Interested in fitting together as much as possible. In ways of thinking about life and the world. And I was at this conference. There was a lot of talk about climate change. And most of the people of the conference were in a state of a fair amount of equanimity a lot of the time. As I say, it's a sort of spiritually oriented movement. But my suitemate was talking to me in a very agitated way about climate change. And she looked me in the eye, and she said, “the bottom line, Janet, is that we may be able to adapt to two degrees, but right now we're on track for over four degrees. And that will create an earth we would not recognize.”
And I'd heard things like that before, you know, of course. But for some reason, in that moment, the information really penetrated for me. And it was just clear for me right away, okay, this is the most important thing going on. This is what I have to work on. And I, in very short order, knew the sorts of things I was good at and set about finding like minded colleagues. That's how I kind of threw myself to the front, like many others have, of climate mental health. And that experience made me very interested in the whole phenomenon of containment. You know, because what happened for me that the information was able to penetrate? And I could think so clearly about what to do. What allowed that to happen? And I think I was in an extremely containing environment, with, as I say, it being a very open, supportive and also spiritually-oriented conference there. And this whole notion of containment, I find, really, really important in relation to climate change. And I know that this podcast is about emotions. So, intellectualization is my go to defense. So feel free to stop me and get at what the emotions are. But emotionally, there's an emotional valence to clarity that's alivening. And so that's where I was at. And I, as I say, I've been very interested in the topic of containment. It's a very specific term in the psychoanalytic literature.
The theorists [Wilfred] Bion or bye-on, different people who pronounce it differently, talked about it in very specific terms. As what happens between a parent and an infant that helps the infant to be with an experience that's difficult to bear. So the infant will cry. And then the caretaker or parent doesn't just cry back at the infant. Instead, the caretaker takes in the communication and metabolizes it in a sense. And then voluntarily gives something new back, that's tolerable for the infant. And in that way, the infant learns how to metabolize experience in a bearable way themselves. Because they've been given this larger space of the relationship with the parent. So then, in a more general way, containment has to do with all of the things that help us to bear what's difficult to bear. That helps us to get to a larger space. From which we can have perspective and within which we can find meaning. You know, the kind of clarity that, as I say, can be so enlivening. You know, not that I'm there all the time. I mean, like anybody, I cycle through all sorts of feelings in relation to climate change. But this is an important touchstone for me, you know, ways to get to larger space.
Pihkala: Thank you. That's very interesting and profound to hear. And this topic of awakening, or having an epiphany, or conversion moment, it's actually often discussed in these terms. Which are closely related to religion and spirituality, even in environmental research. So there's interesting stuff going on there. And [I'm] very fascinated [by] what you say about containment. But how about you, Thomas? What does this spark in you?
Doherty: No, it's really helpful. And I'm glad, Janet, that you define a term for the listeners. Yeah. So I mean, what I think of containment. I think another way to think of it is holding space. Holding a space for someone, you know, so when our friend tells us a story, or someone's needing help, you know, we hold space for them. We listen. We validate. We make it clear to them that we believe them. We think their concerns are valid. So, you know, in many ways this whole podcast is its role, right? Is a containment, right? That's part of our mission in the podcast is to create a container, a space to talk about these emotions and various climate experiences that just don't typically have a container in people's lives. Because we know that people don't talk about this stuff. And it's politically charged and all this other stuff. Even therapists, of course, will really appreciate this. Particularly therapists that are psychoanalytic or psychodynamic because that's a big part of their work is this kind of understanding how our early experiences, you know, affect our modern life and all this sort of stuff. So, yes, Janet, a couple of things…
But you personally, I know from talking to you, and knowing you a little bit you personally, you know, suffered through disasters. You know, flooding that destroys your property or losing your home. And you know what it's like to be in shock and bereft in that disaster mental health space where you just need to figure out the next step. And so one of the things I find interesting is another concept that's a little bit more deeper for the listener. But this idea of dialectics, right? One of the therapeutic things is to hold different sides of an issue. And not just collapse it in a simple way. And so, one of the dialectics I think that you talk about in your chapter is that we're kind of either in a disaster or not. Like all of us, either have been in a disaster, will be in a disaster or are not in a disaster. And inside of this continuum that we're in and, you know, not collapsing that, but sort of like, what I understand from your writing is that the people who are not actively in a disaster, it's their job to do some of this climate behavior change and adaptation mitigation to hold space for the people that are literally suffering suffering through the disaster. Who don't have time for that, because they're just surviving. Right. And I don't think you would have come to that without knowing what it's like to be in a disaster.
Lewis: I think you're right. I think you're right. Yeah. And this is, when I think of different forms of containment, thinking about our changed relationship to disaster. For me, this is cognitively contained, you know. Because I think most people have at the back of their minds, well, wait a minute, how on earth are we going to deal with this? So, you know, these increasing disasters? What's going to happen? Well, when we accept that we're in a new relationship with disaster, now, you know, disasters, no longer an outlier event. And none of us are immune from disasters. Although many people are on the frontlines experiencing much more than other people. You know, there are communities that are suffering and are at much greater risk. Butstill, with climate change, no one is immune. And so it makes sense for us to think about, okay, what's this new relationship with disaster.
And as you were saying, Thomas, I think we're either within or between disasters. And that's an important mindset to have. We're either within or between disasters, because that has important implications. The people who are within disasters or in the immediate aftermath of disasters, they're in no position to be working on large programs of mitigation and adaptation, right? If you're wringing muddy water out of your clothes, you're focusing on rebuilding your life. That's what you ought to be doing. So there is also going to be and will be even more, this sort of fluid exchange of roles. Where some people are in disasters or immediate aftermath of disasters, other people are between disasters. And so we know some broad strokes of what the future is going to have to look like in order to work. And one of the broad strokes is this, it's going to have to be more prosocial where the people who are between disasters are helping those who are within disasters. And the people who are between disasters are working on the larger programs of mitigation and adaptation. As I say, this is one broad stroke of what the future needs to look like to work, of course. And another broad stroke has to do with getting to carbon neutrality.
But another thing that's so very cognitively containing for me that I talk a lot about is emergence. You know, that's this characteristic of complex systems. I'm sure many listeners probably have heard about emergence. This characteristic of complex systems where the whole system can get to new ways of operating that can work. But we can't know ahead of time what all the features of those new patterns are going to be. That's part of the character of how complex systems work. So we can know these broad strokes. I think about the patterns in the future that can work. But we can't know for sure exactly what it's gonna look like and how to get there. And that uncertainty has to be accepted.
Pihkala: Yeah, yes. Thanks for opening all that up. And systems thinking has been referred to in this podcast. We haven't gone deep in it. But of course, one of the founding figures of any work on emotions caused by global problems is Joanna Macy. Who was very keen on systems thinking. And there's that legacy around. And you're also referring to this central concept of uncertainty, which is, of course, very intimately linked with anxiety in various ways. And one of the texts of yours that I very much liked was an article about climate dialectics. So would you like to say a bit about that? And perhaps open up the concept of dialectical thinking for the listener?
Lewis: Sure, sure. Well, a characteristic of this complexity, you know, climates a complex system. And now it's completely intertwined with human technology, human systems, human psychology, and human culture. And within complex systems, there's no way to understand everything that's going on. And climate gets called the hyper object. As I'm sure some listeners have heard. Where it's so distributed through space and time, that it's impossible to completely get a grip on it. To completely feel like you understand it. Because we're also inside of it. And with that complexity, as well as with the emotional challenges of climate change being such a threat, the mind naturally kind of divides things up. You know, we can't hold on to all of it at the same time. And no one can know it all at the same time. And so we'll often get presented with things that are seemingly opposed, that are actually both true. Or are both important anyway. Like a sense of hope and a sense of hopelessness.
I mean, it's important not to simplistically side with either one. But instead be willing to explore them both. And discover the space between them. Kind of keep enough space there to be able to reflect. And out of that reflection, new forms of hope have emerged. You know, there's a lot of talk and writing in the climate mental health literature about kinds of hope. Like realistic hope or radical hope that emerge from this grappling with important dialectics. Other important dialectics are individual agency and collective agency or nature as solace and nature as threat. And I mean, also, I think an overarching one that wasn't in that paper, but I'm seeing is even more overarching, has to do with focus on focus on the web of life, The biosphere, and focus on humanity. You know, actually, both are important. Because we're humans, and it has turned out that we're extremely influential. It is important to be able to focus on us too, as well as it is now being recognized that we have to have a focus on the entire web of life. These things are not mutually exclusive. That's what's really important with dialectical thinking is not allowing yourself to think in mutually exclusive terms. But instead, holding both things. And seeing what emerges as both are held.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. I'm looking back at our podcast episodes. And often what we do in this podcast is we open up this kind of area. And then we hold .You know, one of our first episodes was on holding space. And then we had the episode on cynicism, you know, eco anxiety. So we open up these things. We had an episode on, you know, nature being, like you say, a solace, but also fear and dread that comes now into nature because of the change of seasons and things like that. So, it's a good reminder that we have to stay open to these things. And try to be as big as the world. You know, in the sense of holding a lot of these things. We can't hold everything but we strive for it. I guess. What should people do when they collapse and they can't hold it anymore? Then what happens?
Lewis: Well, okay. Well, first to recognize that's okay. I mean, as I said, you know, I cycle through. I think probably like most people every conceivable sort of feeling and state. And in relating to our realities and in coming more and more to terms with the extent of our realities. You know, in addition to climate change, you know, we're also dealing with what gets called a meta crisis or multi crisis or poly crisis. And, you know, I have a cognitive understanding that this is all sort of one crisis. It's about our current ways of coming up against their limitations. And it's good for us to be recognizing that. But also, it's pretty clear that we're in for a very rocky road as well as having to deal with so much suffering and tragedy. And so it's important that that be validated, you know, and accepted. We have to accept where we are in order to change. This is this sort of paradox in all psychotherapy. Also work at opening the space. You know, so, if someone finds themselves kind of collapsed, okay, what kinds of containment can be brought in? I mean, you mentioned Joanna Macy's work Panu.
And I think one enormous contribution of hers is the sort of narrative containment that she brings in with saying, okay, we're in a huge transition. This is a great turning point. Bringing in the story that someone can identify with. That helps to open the space. Leaning on spiritual practice, you know. As I mentioned earlier, it can open the space. The relationships with other people and with nature, can open up space for us. Being involved “agentically.” Just working on things is a kind of containment too. And then there are these forms of cognitive containment, you know. Knowing that, okay, we're part of this complex system, we can't see it all. But the fact that it's so complex, actually means that no matter what direction someone is coming from, no matter what their particular heartbreaks, or talents, or spheres of influence are, there's a role. There's an important role to be played, you know. Because no one can hold this all ,we're forced to work with each other. I mean, we're actually forced to grow up in a way. Forced to accept uncertainty. Forced to work with other people.
Doherty: Yeah, thanks. Thanks. Let me just add just for the listener, because just make sure. Just to simplify this a little bit, because I want this to come across to people. So this container we can choose different containers, depending on how we're feeling on a given day. What's useful for us? So like, for some people, I need to be able to tell a story, and someone to hear it and share my story. That's how I contain it. For some people, it's, I need to kind of make sense of it. So I need to intellectually get a mental model that helps me to make sense of this. And then there's the relationship. I need to be in a relationship with someone. I can't be isolated, right. So even just relationships of any kind form the container. And then taking some action, whatever, it's small scale, that's that agentic, right. So my action becomes a container, right? And then spiritual container, which is my larger sense of meaning and things bigger than myself, that becomes a container.
So we have essentially several containers that we should have sort of in our tool belt of coping. And then as you say, I think, you know, different things are going to be what an individual most effectively leans on. But yeah, there are all sorts of means of containment. Ways to bear what's difficult to bear. And to have enough space. Containment also provides space, to be able to think clearly about what to do and to make choices.
Doherty: So physical containment, like breathing and relaxing our body. But what are you thinking about, Panu? I know you have a lot of interest in this area.
Pihkala: Yeah, there's a lot here. The spaciousness of uncertainty. For whoever used that phrase. But there's more space there. And of course, the often mentioned Joanna Macy also wrote about this. And that's one possible form. Cognitive reframing. You know, trying to think about things in a new light. So, uncertainty can be very painful, but it also gives more space. But what I'm most thinking of here is the pendulum And these movements. That's closely integrated into the process model of eco anxiety and ecological grief that I've worked a lot on in the previous years. And emphasizing the importance of fluctuation and mood changes. Here, you do also Janet. and I don't think that the movement is very often regular as in the pendulum of a clock. But I like the visual metaphor that there is movement. And that's part of life. And trying to accept the movements instead of going into binary thinking. So I think that's very important for coping also.
Lewis: Yeah, that's so important. You know, we each contain multitudes. You know, we have all these different states of mind. And, I mean, it's sort of like the larger reality, that there's no way to get a completely coherent grip on how it all works. It's just too complex. That's the way it is with the mind too. And so these different states, you know, just like we have to accept that okay, different people are going to be doing different things. And I won't be able to be in touch with all of it. Well, we also have to accept that we have these different states of mind. And, you know, be willing to explore them without feeling as though no, I have to have some overarching thing that works all the time. You know, that's just not the way it is. A part of how we're moving forward is because of all the internal dialectical processes as the different states we're in at different times are kind of in relation to each other. And we figure more out.
Doherty: Yeah. Pendulum. Kind of the waves we talked about. I know in our episode we talk about riding the waves. On some days we're up in terms of inspiration, taking action, being with a group of people that we like. We're contained. Some days were really contained. And we feel good. And we got some wind in our sails. And other days, you know, we got the upside down pyramid. And everything's impinging on us. And we don't have any containers. We feel very small and insecure and inadequate. And so we ride those waves. Yeah.
Lewis: That's to be accepted too.
Doherty: Yeah, there's a great article in just today's New York Times on this idea of a protopia. It's neither a dystopia... It's very fitting for our discussion, because it's neither a utopia where everything is all taken care of, nor is it a dystopia where everything is terrible. A protopia is a place where there's gradual, progressive change, progress, and prototypes. And it's kind of bringing out an idea that was written about over a decade ago in a technology book. But it's neat how some of these ideas come out a little early. And we don't quite see the benefit of these ideas. And then later on, it comes through.
So a lot of this work, even the work that you've written, Janet, like the dialectic stuff. When you wrote it, people were like, oh, this is kind of interesting. You know, but now people really know exactly what you're talking about because they're living it, you know. So it's really neat. I know what I struggle with. And I think a lot of people struggle with and one of the dialectics here is between this kind of ethical, well being that you talk about. This is pro social, and then the kind of let's build the wall. The kind of authoritarianism. This kind of really dark, harsh political movement that's happening around the world as well. I think that's a larger dialectic we're all living through now. And there's no one answer there. But we try to chart our path through that.
Lewis: Right. We have to, as you say, just chart our path through it. At the same time, there is a cognitive container in understanding that in a huge transition like this, there are regressions. There are people doubling down on things that no longer completely serve us. And it can look, you know, in addition to it being so destructive, it can look really absurd. There's a cultural psychiatrist, Charles Johnston, who has written a lot about this. So there can be this larger cognitive container for understanding. Okay, of course, this is happening, right? Of course, this is happening. We're in such a big transition, that there are going to be regressions, breakdowns. And you know, it's incredibly sad. There's suffering. There's tragedy. But it also makes sense, given the extent of the enormous transition that we're in, that's not just about carbon. I mean, it means having to rework so many systems. And as I said, coming to more pro social ways of being. So it's huge.
Doherty: Yeah. And then I'll say one more thing, and I'll leave it to Panu to wrap us up. But, you know, I think it also depends on how close we're looking at the present. Because as we zoom out, we see this larger trend of change. But when we get really close, it's much more erratic. So you know, we're decarbonizing our economy and our world while at the same time now we see they're still, you know, drilling new wells in Alaska. But it's part of this larger trend. And that's, I think, another I'm not sure if it's a dialectic or what it would be, but it's the ability to zoom out to see the larger trend. That's why I think it is intellectually helpful.
Lewis: It's helpful. Without sugarcoating the suffering and the tragedy, that's the part where, you know, we have to work at holding both aspects of the dialectic. And not collapsing into either one.
Pihkala: Sometimes it all comes together. That's another dialectical thought, for example, right? The medieval philosopher Nicholas of Cusa used the image that, you know, a circle and a straight line seem to be completely opposites. But if you zoom in long enough for the … circle, you can actually see a straight line if you go near, near enough to the circle. So that was one way to illustrate this idea that sometimes things that seem opposites to us, can actually be profoundly interlinked. That could lead us to quite complex philosophical discussions about non-duality. And let's not go there at this time. But I've greatly enjoyed talking with you.
Lewis: Another time, Panu!
Pihkala: Exactly, exactly. So it's been a pleasure. And thanks for reminding both us and the listeners of the possible coexistence of many things in life, including both joy and sadness, you know, amidst all these conditions.
Lewis: Yes.
Doherty: Thanks so much, Janet. I think, you know, this episode is going to be great for therapists who really know a lot of the concepts and see how you use these concepts in a climate context. And it's also just good for all of us listeners, to think about these new tools for our own life. So we're going to wrap up. I've got to go into my day. Beginning my day here, which includes more work along these lines. I know Panu, you've got the end of your evening and a full day you've already worked. So you're going to hopefully move towards some time with your family. Janet, what's the rest of your day hold for you?
Lewis: I've got a work afternoon with patients.
Doherty: Okay, so you're going to be in the trenches with people. So I wish you well. And we'd love to chat with you again. I think we could easily go a lot longer. But this is a great start. So you both are well. And listeners you take care of yourselves.
Lewis: Bye bye.
Pihkala: Bye bye. Take care.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com
Season 2, Episode 17: On Trees and Forest Protectors
Apr 14, 2023
Season 2, Episode 17: On Trees and Forest Protectors
Thomas and Panu took time to speak about trees, beings great and small with whom we share the planet, and the disenfranchised grief that we suffer when we witness the loss of trees and forests, in our own neighborhoods and across the world. Join us to listen in on the conversation, and let us know what you feel about this issue.
Robert Sommer – “Trees and Human Identity” see on p. 79 among many other useful references in Clayton & Opotow (2003) (Eds) , Identity and the Natural Environment
On the Finnish as Tree People, see books by Ritva Kovalainen & Sanni Seppo (e.g. Metsänhoidollisia toimenpiteitä, 2006; Pohjoistuulen metsä, 2023), https://www.ritvakovalainen.com/treepeople
Transcript
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Thomas Doherty: Please support the climate change and happiness podcast see the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Doherty: Well, hello, I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. This is a show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change. We focus a lot on our emotional responses to this issue. And our feelings. And all the many things that are connected to this in the world. And one of the beautiful things that's connected to our feelings about nature and the environment, and our environmental identity is another class of beings that we share the planet with trees. Trees.
And today our episode is about trees. And we're going to go in many directions with this. But both Panu and I both know a lot about the research about trees and human health and human identity and mental health. And, of course, I'm in the Pacific Northwest, which has its own unique cultural associations with the big trees of North America. And Panu is in Finland, which, of course, has its own association with northern forests and trees. And you all have your own associations with trees of various kinds. Including trees you know personally. So that's where we're going today. And this episode will touch on many other things that we've talked about over the last year. Panu, do you want to get us started off on this really rich topic?
Pihkala: Yes, greetings from the land of tree people! Because the Finno-Ugric people, of whom the Finns are one part and [others are] Estonians and Hungarians and then several smaller tribes in the current Russian area, they are known for the importance of trees for their whole worldview and ancient religion. And in Finland, the relationship with trees is both profound and complex. Because also, it's a major national industry thing. Things one does with the trees. But then also very locally, in various places, towns and cities, there are these important trees. And sometimes also conflicts about what to do with them. And I know Thomas, that you had a sort of profound experience related to this. So would you like to share a bit about that?
Doherty: Yeah, thanks, Panu. So many incredible directions to go with this topic. Yeah, and I'm unfortunately going to start out with a sad story that really is close to home to get us going. It doesn't limit our discussion today. But it is a sad story to start. So listeners can be prepared for that. But anyway, where I live in the City of Portland in the state of Oregon in the US, you know, and my neighborhood is what's called Northeast Portland. You know, it's a residential neighborhood. But there used to be a big, you know, primeval forest here. Sometimes there are conflicts between large trees and landowners and debates about whether to save trees or not. And we lost a huge tree here in the neighborhood. And it was a long story. And I'm just going to read a paragraph that gives a summary of this. That I shared with people here last December. December 2022. And it'll just give you a sense of the complexity of this issue. So I'll just read what I wrote because it captured my thoughts and feelings on that morning, December 6 2022. You know, I wrote.
I watched a 100+ foot giant sequoia tree being cut down and removed in my neighborhood today, just a block from my house. The tree had grown up close between two residential houses and undermined one of the house's foundations, leaving it derelict. The other homeowners, a couple, waged a long battle to save the tree. They garnered international support through a petition and a GoFundMe drive. Tragically, just as they found a developer to take on the property and guarantee keeping the tree, some unknown person drilled into the tree and poisoned it, mortally wounding the tree and sabotaging the deal. Over the past year, the tree's canopy has browned and died off. The couple was so demoralized that they moved from the state. This tree was about 100 years old and sequoias can live for thousands of years. The industrial scale removal was remarkably efficient, huge pieces of the trunk lowered down by crane and many of the limbs, even the large ones, immediately fed into a wood chipper. There was no neighborhood notice and through the day people stopped to watch and take pictures. I contacted some local news agencies as they previously covered the story, but none arrived as far as I know. It was very hard to concentrate or get any work done today. Such a real world example of disenfranchised loss and grief. I had offered my support and coping tips to the folks that tried to save the tree, and I had donated to the cause. But like others I am sure, I have the question of whether I could have done more.
I share this as a way to bear witness and move against the isolation these events breed. And because I know many of you will understand.
That's my story of the Sequoia. An example that came home to me personally. And just how bizarre and absurd it seemed that I do this environmental work. And I was powerless to really do anything about, you know, to do more with this tree. And then the bystanders syndrome that happens. And then just watching the tree literally from my front porch. I can see the canopy and see it browning and just worrying. And then when I noticed the big crane trucks that morning, I knew that the end had come. So anyway, I share that just to give listeners a sense of how this manifests. And I know listeners have similar stories to this. That's the whole point of our episode that we think of trees, you know, philosophically and intellectually forests. You know, forests being the lungs of the Earth.
But we also know individual trees and places that become part of our environmental identity. Part of our relationships. Our lifeline. So that's where this topic goes. It gets really personal. And that's normal, very normal for people for it to be personal. So what's coming up for you, Panu, as I describe this. I know you've got a lot of different ways that you might think about this as a philosopher and as a researcher, and as a Finn.
Pihkala: Yes, thanks, Thomas for sharing that. And, of course, it evokes sadness and compassion. It's got to do with emotional attachments and values. And partly, I think, with worldviews, also. And I'm a person who is very fond of trees myself. So I can resonate with some examples in personal history also. In the neighborhood, where I'm living in eastern Helsinki, there's an old manor and some of the trees nearby are from that period. So one very conspicuous one is a poplar, which is not a native tree in Finland. At least not for a long time. When there was a warmer period in climate history, then there might have been some; at least there were more oaks during that time. But anyway.
So I also remembered today, when I saw that people are starting to do something with it. So there is a sort of shock element in it. There's lots of elements of a grief process. And there's the dynamics of whether the loss is recognized by others. And whether you have been able to prepare for it. There's this possibility for feelings of helplessness and powerlessness, which you also also described. There's the dynamics around responsibilities, and a sort of negotiation with possible guilt. Which then, again, is a common feature in all kinds of loss and grief processes. It's very human to ask: could I have done something to prevent this? Or could I have done something more? That's, again, very close to what I've been doing in my research work lately. Where I've been looking at the intersections of grief and bereavement theory with ecological emotions. So this touches on many of those things. So I can resonate with this both on a personal level and as a researcher. And I know, Thomas, that you've been thinking about these emotional attachments that people have with trees also. So would you like to say something more about how you see that one?
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's important to, you know, to breeze through this topic. We started out with a really troubling narrative about the loss of the sequoia tree. Which is really sad. And it could bring tears to your eyes to tell these stories. And I've heard many people share similar narratives that were really influential on their life. All around the world. I've heard these stories. We can also just come back and orientate ourselves in a positive way about this. I mean, obviously, our grief and connections with trees are not officially recognized in economics and science and in law. So when we lose these trees, our grief is not recognized officially. That's what that term disenfranchised grief means, right? So it's like, we lose it and it breeds that isolation that often happens. And then we have to band together almost in a revolutionary way to share our grief.
But there's a famous chapter in conservation psychology by the late researcher Robert Summer, Trees and Human Identity. And he just does such a great job describing how the many, many ways that trees influence our human identity across the lifespan from being children to being elders. And, you know, understanding how our relationship with trees influences our physical health, our mental health, and our identity. And all the metaphors that come from trees. The roots of the trees. The branch of the trees. The world's tree. You know, it's woven into religion and philosophy and art. You know, evolutionary theory looks at how, you know, humans are related, you know, to trees. I mean, the human hand is shaped the way it is because it evolved to climb. And, you know, was, so when you grab a branch on a tree, and it feels really natural to hold onto, that's not an accident. That's why our hand is made that way. And when we feel good, in the trees or in a place where we can look from trees, that's woven into our psyches, and our minds and bodies in a very deep way. And so these, like, we talk about different words, like, you know, I think it's called “komorebi” in Japanese. You know, the idea of light filtering through the leaves. Dappling through the tree. So there's different words in different languages that capture trees.
And of course, we have traditions, like forest bathing. You know, in Asian countries where people bathe in the [air and setting of the] forest. And the smells of the forest and the fields of the forest, and the idea of “forest therapy.” Which is a term that would be used in Finland. Not so much in the US. We talk about “wilderness therapy,” or “outdoor therapy.” But in other countries in Europe it would be called forest therapy. You know, and the idea of healing in the forest. So there's a ton of positive things. And I guarantee every one of us. Everyone is listening. When we look at our environmental identity timeline. And all the experiences that we've had, over our lives, regarding nature and the natural world, there are trees involved there. People know what it's like to climb trees as a child and to play in trees. And people cultivate trees in their homes. And they visit trees. They make journeys to see the Redwoods in California. And to see the old trees around the world. So there's just so much positive stuff, too.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. Totally resonating with that, also. And I think it's very important to give children the opportunity to climb trees, if only they are up to it in any way. And that's a classic theme in environmental education also, nowadays, because this culture around security has good sides, but also bad sides. And one of the bad sides is that some people think that children shouldn't climb trees anymore, because they may fall from them. There was one study in Britain awhile ago, where they looked at statistics and found out that many more children went to the hospital because they had fallen out of their bed than from trees. So home is a very dangerous place if you put it this way and look at the accidents. But yeah, hopefully, as many people as possible have a safe home. But you know, this statistical point. But even in research on climate emotions, people may start talking about close affinities with trees. And that sort of testifies to these interconnections between topics. And, for me, about the great, both physical and psychological and symbolic significance of trees for people.
And I was very glad to read the article Thomas mentioned. It's a great overview of the many connections that people may have. But there is a link now, even between climate issues and this topic. And of course, if we look at the larger developments, then global warming is changing trees and forests. And for example, in Finland, we've had geographical lines, you know, the most northern places where certain tree species grow. We are very high in the north, actually. And it's just the Gulf Stream coming from the Atlantic, which gives us enough warmth that we can do much more farming than in Alaska even though we are quite close as far north. So the three species are moving more north in Finland. And that's causing ecosystem change. So there's, you know, changes and possible feelings of loss, both in relation to single trees and large scale changes in forests. And, of course, there may be positive developments, also. Having more nice trees through which to experience komorebi. That's also becoming more possible in Finland. But then lots of ecosystem changes have many threatening aspects also, like the spread of certain insects. And so on.
Doherty: Yeah. I mean, again, this is an ecological topic. As we talk about, “when you pick on one thing in the universe you find it hitched to everything else” [John Muir]. And when you pick on the leaf of one tree, one branch, you know, one twig, you find it hitched to so many things. Climate change. Tree cover in neighborhoods. It's, you know, when we talk about our environmental identity. It's intersectional, with all kinds of other forms of identity and with social justice. That's one direction here to go. I mean, climate change is making it really warm, particularly in urban areas, particularly in poor marginalized neighborhoods. So people are much more aware now of the idea of the urban heat effect with heat waves. And how dire it can be in neighborhoods that are denuded of trees. So trees are becoming a social justice issue for neighborhoods. It's a marker of privilege to have trees even.
And it's very, very obvious in my city. My neighborhood is traditionally a lower income neighborhood. And so these trees like Sequoia are very rare. Whereas if you go just just a quarter of a mile south to, you know, another neighborhood that's more privileged, there's these huge, beautiful trees. Maple trees line the avenues. It's very shady. So it's an absolute mark of socio-cultural privilege and social justice trees. Obviously, a rich, long tradition of forest protectors. People trying to save and protect the trees around the world. in all areas, and all countries and all nations. Beginning with, you know, indigenous people that are still innately involved with trees in the forest.
Here in the US, obviously, this brings us up to the recent issue in Atlanta, with the Atlanta Public training facility in the shooting of Manuel Tehran. Tortuguita, The environmental activist, and forest protector who was shot by the Georgia State Patrol. And the controversy around that. So that's a great example where climate change is turning up the volume on this. Turning up the temperature, you could say. Where that forest in Atlanta is being seen not just as a forest to protect, but also part of history. Part of the local history with racism and slavery and policing. And of course, urban heat. And, you know, traditionally black neighborhoods. And trying to protect that forest. So it falls into line with all of these other big issues. There's a logic of appropriateness now. Where it's like, it's not appropriate to do these things. People won't stand for it, you know. And so these projects that would have been pushed through in the past, people are standing against them for a number of reasons. So this gets into literature with books like The Overstory, as you know. And then I know, your favorite and mine. JRR Tolkien has interesting traditions regarding trees. Do you want to say a little bit about your Tolkien connection?
Pihkala: Yes. I'd love to come back to that a bit later. But just staying with the intersectional dimension for a while. So that really seems global, as you say, and so many things converge. Both, you know, trying to keep the rain forests also for climate and carbon reasons. And just the biodiversity dimension. Maybe there's also justice dimensions in many places as you mentioned. There's some very famous cases in Europe, also about trying very courageously to protect old growth forests [for example, in the Hambach forest in Germany]. There's very little of them left in Europe. So, for example, in Finland, if you look at the aerial pictures, you'll see a lot of green. But we don't have many old growth forests anymore. Most of them have been cut down at least once with biodiversity impacts. But there's great people protecting and trying to protect those forests. And there's many very inspiring cases of that.
In literature, Tolkien is one of the world's most famous writers, I think, not the least because of many movies by Peter Jackson and colleagues in the 2000s. So he was a person who was very fond of trees. And one of the great places to check this out if somebody is interested in the book Letters of JRR Tolkien. Meticulously edited by an editor [Humphrey Carpenter], and also with the help of his son [Christopher Tolkien]. And there he is, writing sometimes quite directly, how he also wanted to create fiction where, at least once, the trees could stand up for themselves. So that's one dimension in this Lord of the Rings mythology. But of course, there's a lot more than that to Tolkien's relationship with trees and various kinds of things.
Doherty: Yeah. Many people are aware of emotional connection with the Ents. The species of beings in Middle Earth that kind of resemble trees. They're like moving trees. And that word comes from an old English word for giants. So trees often have this sense of giantess. I mean, there's so many fascinating directions to go with this. One of my early books that I read years ago, Landscape and Memory by historian Simon Schama. It was an environmental history book. [It] talked about the sacred groves of northern Europe, and the Celts. And how churches, you know, were essentially groves. And even the great cathedrals, like the Gothic cathedrals of Notre Dame and Chartres cathedral were actually meant to evoke tall, overarching trees. Which I never realized. And so in terms of my environmental identity as someone from the Northern European cultures, it was really helpful for me to see that connection between trees and religion. Woven into the ancient cultures there. And even just see the environmental justice issues going far back. One of the strategies the Romans had, when they were overtaking the Celtic countries, was to cut down the sacred groves of trees. You know, to take over power from the people.
So that same story, of course, played out in North America. You know, in terms of colonizers taking over people's places. So it's a very fraught issue because I know in the Pacific Northwest, many people, families traditionally, as you know, within Finland as well. Their families grow up working in the forestry industry. In the forest products industry. and it's a huge part of the economy in these places. and all over the Pacific Northwest every town essentially began as a logging town. Everyone. Everyone. It always goes back. The main street Burnside in Portland used to be the skid road where they would slide the logs down from the hills down to the ships, right? So it's woven into our culture here. And so it's another form of disenfranchised grief because we haven't balanced out the need for trees and the need for people's ability to have a livelihood and the loss and grief. So it's kind of a tragic situation that we're still trying to muddle through.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. It can be very, very tricky. And some folks in Finland like the photography artists Ritva Kovalainen and Sanni Seppo have done great things in doing books, where they have not only included photos of different forests, but also stories of people who relate to the forest in different ways. So there are nature protectors, but also different kinds of forest owners and to bring out the scope and scale of foreign relations. And that doesn't of course, remove all the tensions but that's one way forward to try to understand a bit more about the various perspectives that people have. That being said, these people have also been very important proponents of making “forest grief,” or whatever one wants to call it, as a publicly recognized thing. And I've also sometimes used my public voice for the same purpose. And even in those cases, where the democratic decision then would be to cut down the tree or the forest, even then the grief and losses should be recognized. And this is a tricky subject also, because one can easily see a possibility for misusing this, you know. Providing therapeutic services to people so that they don't stand up so much for the trees that we are going to lose. But I believe that there might be some balances found. So that's defending moral standing, could be combined with also necessarily sometimes then facing grief together.
Doherty: Yeah. We'll have several really interesting links in this podcast to different stories and films. There's so many to name these trees, Sequoia, Redwood, the Wollemia Pine in Australia. The Baobab in Madagascar. The oaks of Ireland, you know, the Doherty clan, my last name, you know, one origin of the name comes from the oak in Derry there. Thich is the name you know, oak in Celtic language there. So, if listeners have examples of these rituals, please let us know. I really do think it should just be part of our culture to have some rituals. I know native Native people, indigenous people understand this. And do have rituals that are intact for you know, for millennia, 1000s of years.
But we need modern rituals. Because we do need to cut down trees that Sequoia that I mentioned early on, was in a tough spot. Someone could argue that it was dangerous in that position. And it could fall and injure people in a storm. Trees do fall. Ice storms and recent climate change weather patterns have changed what trees are used to experiencing. And so we are getting extreme loss of trees for various reasons because of temperature, because of invasive species, because of ice storms. So we are going to lose trees and it can be dangerous. But it's that our building codes and our urban laws don't recognize primal realities for people's connections with nature. That's the problem. So it isn't that we won't cut down trees ever. I don't think that's what trees want. We can live in connection with trees. And using trees and helping them help us to live it's just really a question of having more of a reality about this that honors our emotional life. So if people have thoughts about this, please let us know.
We've got a nice trend coming with our episodes here. We have an episode coming up regarding wolves. We have episodes around children in nature coming up. So there's a lot of mixed nuanced feelings here. So making room for the sadness and the loss. But also the joy, exhilaration. I can remember even now as a child, the exhilaration of really climbing a tree. Really tall, really getting up there. Farther out of your comfort zone. Way up in a tall tree. Building a treehouse for my daughter which I never had as a child so of course I built her a tree house. And we spent a lot of time with that. And have had images of building another tree house very tall in a tree that I have near my house. And I haven't been able to have the time to finish it. But there's something so beautiful and primal about being in the trees. So yeah, we're almost time to wrap up here Panu, but I'm really glad we were able to finally get to this topic. It makes me feel good to be able to talk about it. You want to lead us out with any other ideas for your evening and my day here?
Pihkala: Yeah, it's been great to talk about trees. And all the importance they have. And we'll share some links to some research also about collective action on the behalf of trees. But also collectively, lamenting or mourning trees. So there's many sides to this but perhaps to bring us to close I'd like to quote John Muir who of course is a famous tree loving person. And in one of his books, he tells of climbing a very tall tree, in quite stormy, windy weather. And then sort of wavering there in the wind to get to the top of the tree. And he has this quote:
“We all travel the Milky Way together, trees and men; but it never occurred to me until this storm-day, while swinging in the wind, that trees are travelers in the ordinary sense. They make many journeys, not extensive ones, it is true; but our own little journeys, away and back again, are only little more than tree-wavings — many of them not so much.”
from Mountains of California, 1894; by John Muir, naturalist, explorer, and writer (1838-1914)
So this from John Muir in the beginning of the 20th century or the late 19th. And referring of course, to all human beings, not just men.
Doherty: Yeah, beautiful. Just reminds me of the research on people climbing the great Redwood trees. Hyperion. The great Redwood tree in California. And swaying in the branches there. So listeners can really think about this. One of the quotes that I saw in my reading was from an organizer that said, you know, we're not sure if we organize communities to plant trees or plant trees to organize communities. Right? So it's woven in together here. So think about how trees play into your lives. And let us know what this all means for you. And know that you're not alone in your feelings about trees. There are many, many, many, many, many of us around the world that really love trees. And feel nothing wrong with hugging a tree. And breathing into the tree. And really feeling with that being. And the trees are on the move as you know, as Panu says they are migrating slowly.
Anyway, this is Climate Change and Happiness. You can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. See all these episodes and show notes and various things that you can't find on your podcast platform. And you can also support us at our Patreon at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And we really do need some support to keep going and making these episodes. So thank you very much and everyone be well
Pihkala: Take care. Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com
Season 2, Episode 16: Our Emotional Attachment to Nature with Susan Bodnar
Mar 31, 2023
Season 2, Episode 16: Our Emotional Attachment to Nature with Susan Bodnar
Panu and Thomas spoke with Susan Bodnar, a clinical psychologist who practices in New York City and does teaching and research at Columbia University’s Teachers College. The trio discussed Susan’s earlier pathfinding papers like “Wasted and Bombed; Clinical Enactments of a changing relationship to the Earth.” And also her current studies that link the concept of psychological attachment—long studied in terms of the dynamics of close human relationships—to people’s close connections with natural places. In a stimulating dialog, Susan described important ecological insights she gained observing bears in Alaska, and the social and media phenomena of Flaco the owl living newly wild in New York City. Of her current research, Susan recounted:
And we started with the simplest of questions. “Think of a place, what does it mean to you?” And our first pass through the study, we were amazed at the similarity of the response. People were describing relationships… And then later, when asked, “What does it remind you of?” people said, “mother, father, mentor, best friend, sibling.” Those were the words that people used. “If this place were no longer here, how would you feel?” “Devastated.” …“what else devastates you?” I mean, we know right? The loss of someone you love.
Join us for a validating discussion of emotional attachment to nature and “emotional biodiversity” that you can apply to your own life. And support us at our Patreon.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast, the show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change and other environmental issues. So here, we focus on many things. But really, we try to come back to our emotions and our feelings and our personal experience and our coping. And we're really excited to have a guest with us today.
Susan Bodnar: Hi, I'm Susan Bodnar. And I am a clinical psychologist in full time, private practice here in New York City. And I also am a faculty member at Teachers College, Columbia University, where in addition to teaching a class on psychology, climate, and development, I'm also running a research project on the human relationship to ecosystems.
Doherty: Susan, it's so great to have you. Panu and I have been talking about our episode. We both are aware of you and your work. And you're one of those people that has been thinking about this topic and ahead of the game. And has published in this area around people's connections with nature and the natural world. And it's really exciting the work you've done around people's attachment to place. So we're gonna get into all that kind of stuff today. And listeners, I think you're gonna find this episode really interesting. Panu, you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Susan. Also, for my part. We’ve met a couple of times online, never live. And I've mentioned that when I started doing research on so-called eco anxiety and other difficult emotions, there wasn't much empirical source material, then in the mid 2010's. Your articles were very important for me. And also, they have a depth dimension, which hasn't been very often explored. Namely, how interconnected our inner worlds and the so-called outer world are. So we're gonna talk about that today at some point. But I'd like to start by asking you, could you share something about your own journey to become a clinical psychologist who has such a deep interest in the more than human world? That's not very typical, especially during those times when you went to training. So would you like to share something of your personal journey?
Bodnar: I was born in a very small town in Pennsylvania. In a coal mining area. In I guess would be close to the Poconos. People know that area. And I was influenced by a grandparent generation who were very close to their immigrant identities. And they had not yet really fully adapted to the modern world. And I had a great grandmother who refused to allow electricity into her home. She thought it was evil or something. And everything was done in a wood burning stove. And my grandfather had been a farmer. And my grandmother ultimately was, I think, the first family psychologist. Because when they were no longer able to keep the farm, they went to work at the family market. Like a very small little market for this town of, you know, 1200 people. And she used to listen to people's problems in the checkout. She was the checkout person. And they always did everything outside. Family gatherings were outside. We went for picnics. My grandfather took me deer hunting, which was without a gun, to just observe nature. To observe the deer. He was proud of the land that he lived in. And that was because my father had that tradition as well. And took me camping. And all over the place, the highest peaks. And those experiences were profound, I think.
And when I first started writing about this, it was because I had been in analytic training. I had been in private practice. I felt something was really missing. I was seeing so many people with regulatory disorders, roughly. And I kept saying, why, why, why? Why are there so many of these? And I started to really notice how few people had any kind of relationship to their environments. Physical spaces. And I thought, this is not a coincidence. And so I started to dive into it a little bit more deeply. And then I was in Alaska. In Denali National Park with Ranger Bailey. Ranger Greg Bailey, if you're out there, I will never forget you! Because he gave me an understanding of the dynamics of landscapes that was so incredible. Because he was really trying to talk to me about the human bear ecosystem interface. And just the simple knowledge that you can be safe from bears if you understand how much food is available. To me, it was wow, that's amazing. But it started to make sense that this whole ecology that everything was integrated. And when I started to see that, I could never unsee it. And I took that back to my work. And began to start to understand it.
Doherty: That's really beautiful. That was like an epiphany, it sounds like for you. An ecological epiphany there regarding the bears.
Bodnar: Well, he taught it to me. When he said, look, this is how much food there is. This is how much food a bear needs. And how they behave toward you, as a human is proportional to the availability of that food in a given area. That's what you need to start thinking about when you want to interact with bears. And I thought that was amazing. It was such a simple thing. And it explains so much of what people have been seeing with, you know, bear intrusions. All we have to do is think about that, and you can solve the problem. But it's a thought process we don't really know how to have because this whole relationship to our physical spaces isn't something that's validated as important and meaningful in the culture we're part of.
Doherty: Yeah so it's ecological. A basic ecological intelligence and it's also like relational intelligence. So you have to understand the bear as a being. As a sentient being. And that's the other piece I think you're hinting at, right? Is the lack of the relation. You know, the person to person entity to entity relationship with the bears or the place. Right? That gets us to our attachment stuff. What do you think? Yeah, yeah. What do you think about Panu?
Pihkala: Yeah, I'm very fascinated by the examples of profound moments and dynamics in childhood and youth. We often in this podcast talk about environmental identity. Some people use the ecological identity term. And these foundational influences are, of course, very important for us. And it definitely sounds like there's many of them coming from the place and relatives and the various things you described. And then later on what you say about the profession during the time that you went to training and went to practice. So I guess that's a sort of sign of the times and dynamics that even psychological professionals tend to be so out of touch with the significance of the more than human world.
Doherty: Yeah. And brings us up to today. Susan, you were telling us about your—do you want to tell us a little more about what you're experiencing, where you practice in New York? And also some of this really exciting research on attachment.
Bodnar: So where I practice in New York City, there are lots of things to think about. Let's start with Flaco. The owl, who, in February, somebody vandalized his mesh enclosure at the zoo. He escaped and is now an international star because people are attaching to the story of this bird who had lived in captivity all 13 years of his life. He was a Eurasian eagle owl. Raised in captivity. He escapes. The zoos and other wildlife officials, he'll never survive, they say. They're trying to catch him. Desperately trying to get him back. And he eludes them every time. And then it turns out, he can hunt and he can fly. Where it came from? Where was it inside of him? I don't know, but it emerged. And now he is a free owl. And they've given up trying to capture him. And he now lives as a, you know, social media celebrity. And I'm looking at the narrative about Flaco the owl. And I'm thinking, I think that's how everybody's relating. The story they're telling about the wild inside, I think is really important to our discussion about attachment to places and to object relations. What we carry inside and how it influences us.
And I, because of my work, and I work with people, and I listen to people all the time. I've been hearing this agitation about this disconnect from something very hard to name. But it has to do with authenticity. It has to do with nature. It has to do with real. It has to do with, you know, what feels honest. I want to write about that. But I didn't know how to write about it in a way that it could be heard by people who didn't already agree with what I said.
So I decided to do this research project. And it's a result of the class I teach. One of the classes I teach. And, you know, my goal in life isn't research, in particular. I probably shouldn't say that, but that's not where I live. It's like, I want to do it, because I'm so passionate about these ideas. And I so much want to get them heard and witnessed and all of that. So in a kind of random way, I just started this research project. And all these students showed up to work on it. Like they heard that call that was like the environment. I want to do that. And we started with the simplest of questions. Think of a place, what does it mean to you? And our first pass through the study, we were amazed at the similarity of the response. People were describing relationships. Describe a place, what does it mean to you? They were describing a relationship. And then later, when asked, what does it remind you of, people said, mother, father, mentor, best friend, sibling. Those were the words that people used. If this place were no longer here, how would you feel? Devastated. That's in the paper. You know, this huge percentage of people use that word. Devastated. Cool, what else devastates you? I mean, we know right? The loss of someone you love. So we expanded the study, started doing more surveys. And then we added interviews. Interviewing people.
And what's amazing to me, is as much as what we're finding out. What's being told to us in the surveys in the research, is how eager people are to do the interviews and to take the survey. We're not like a big operation. Right? But people are taking the survey. We don't have anything to offer them. We're not giving the money. Just saying take the survey and do the interview. Huge percentage of people I would say I think we have 60% of people taking the survey want to do an interview because they want to talk about it. They want the chance to talk about what this means to them.
Doherty: And when you say talk about it, you mean they want to talk about their feelings and their relationship with places and nature?
Bodnar: Absolutely. And the stories are. One person talked about the fact that they came from a family where there was just so much pain and substance abuse and domestic violence. And they had nowhere to go but outside. And the outdoors parented them. That there were lessons of living there. They were watching what was happening in the ecosystem around them. They figured out how to grow up. How to live a life. You had to share. It was one thing that she referred to. You had to make space for others. It wasn't always about you. Like little things.
Another person talked about a childhood pond where all the kids used to play and watch fish and frogs and watch the tadpoles become frogs. And it was just a yearly thing. And then one day, they showed up and all the fish were dead. And it was horrifying. It was like traumatic is the word that was used. And they didn't know what had happened. And they were told not to touch the water. The water that they had been playing in. The mud they've been squishing in. Don't touch it. And it turns out that the treatments for the golf course had gotten into the water supply. And it was poisonous. And it was dead. The pond was dead. And this person started to commit acts of sabotage against the golf course. And they still remember the pond.
Pihkala: Thanks for sharing all that. That's so important. And justifies how important places and place relations and entanglements with them are to us. And many people can still recollect things related to their childhood. And, of course, things are changing with urbanization and technology, such that there are some people who already now find it a bit difficult. But luckily, even in cities, you usually have some water spaces and some parks. That all justifies to, I think, the sort of very deep element in our humanity which is connection to the more-than-human world. And what you say about students volunteering, I think that testifies to it. And I'm thinking about this story of Flaco the owl also having a symbolic dimension of, you know, there is a certain wildness, living even in domesticated conditions. But I think this is very profoundly important work that you're doing.
Bodnar: I think, to that point, in our current version of the study, we're trying to select for urban versus rural and suburban. Trying to see how that changes the quality of how they talk about their environments. It's in progress. So I don't know how that will look. I can give you a hint, however, about something else, which is that people who are parents, feel a sense of their relationship and their connection to the environment has changed a lot. Because now they're thinking of the future. They're thinking of their children. I don't know if that's going to hold up. But the early findings are very, very robust. That becoming a parent makes a big difference.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: As a quick point for that, Thomas. Just today I was having a workshop online with a group of Finns, professionals in religion. And one of them shared that when she had her second child, she actually had to have medication for her eco anxiety. And that was a very brave thing to say, of course. This was a group which had established group dynamics. And I had tried to create a safe space. But I was still very, not totally surprised, but struck by the honesty. So just echoing that I've also heard many still anecdotal things about how parenthood really can activate or reactivate this, our eco-distress. And in some episodes back also testified to this thing. So just wanted to say that before moving on, but please, Thomas, what did you have in mind?
Doherty: Yeah, no, this is such a great conversation. I just want to cycle back to some ideas for our listeners. Because we're using some psychology terms and things just to make sure people are tracking this. Because it is really easy to understand. But, you know, Susan, you're working from this tradition in therapy. Psychoanalytic tradition which really focuses on our inner lives. And sometimes even unconscious parts of our life that we're not really aware of. And this idea of attachment, which is our primary connections with our close people in our life. Our parents. Our significant others. You know, we have this gut level attachment relationship.
And some people are lucky enough to have a nice secure set of relationships with people in the world. And other people have more, you know, avoidant, you know, uneasy relationships. And so that's just something for listeners to realize. That's what we're talking about here. And, you know, object relations are the internal parents and the internal people that we have in our psyche that we carry with us. A lot of which, hopefully, are quite positive. But we can also have conflicts as well. Right?
Bodnar: Yeah, the important thing is that it's a relationship. It's not always positive. And there can be, I think, one person in the research who talked about this really remote cabin that their parents used to take them to in Minnesota. It was literally in the middle of nowhere. And they had no plumbing or electricity, or anything. It was just a bare bones cabin. And they used to greet those trips with a mixture of absolute excitement and terror and panic. Because every time they went there, it meant letting go of everything that was familiar. And didn't always feel good about them. You know, the wilderness is scary.
Doherty: Yeah.
Bodnar: When we took our kids to Humpy Creek, and there was, you know, brown bear scat everywhere. And the salmon were running upstream. It was terrifying.
Doherty: Yeah. So anyway, what we're doing is really kind of revolutionary. Because traditionally in therapy, people talk about all this attachment. And, you know, these internalized presences. Purely in an interpersonal realm in terms of our family. And so what we're talking about, and what Susan is doing is really, you know, bringing this out and saying we have the same kind of attachments. This gut level unconscious attachment with the place where we grew up. With these environments. And then that leads to we've mentioned regulatory disorders or regulations. So we regulate our emotions. Yeah. I just want to make sure the listeners because this is so rich. I want to unpack this. So because they know what we're talking about here. Because it's a takeaway. You know, so if I'm good with my attachments, and I can work those. Then I can kind of regulate my emotions. And my attachments can help me to regulate my emotions and be a healthy person.
And so all we're doing is saying, and I think the listeners get this, I get this totally. I can tell my story of where I grew up in Buffalo, New York, and all this sort of stuff. But you know, our attachments are not just people. They're places. They're animals. They're the ground. They're the land. And climate change. And environmental issues. The issues in East Palestine, for example, with the train derailment are activating these deep connections. These deep inner attachments are bringing it up. So I just want to make sure that we have that clear for the listener.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks, Thomas. That's very important.
Bodnar: I will tell you, when my kids were first born, they discovered the moon here in New York City. And they became obsessed. We had to see the moon every single night. It's life changing. I didn't even know where to find the moon. I took them out like snuggly in a stroller, and literally asked people on the street, do you see the moon in the sky? People were looking like what? Who is this crazy person? But it was really tapping into how children view the world. What they know is the moon. Animals. Moon. Flowers. Tadpoles. That's their world. And when you start to go inside their world with them and you actually validate it and strengthen it and give it power. It's going to change you as an adult.
Doherty: Yeah, healthy emotional experiences that parents do that promote this kind of attachment, you know, healthy attachment. So as we talk and where I'm going with this, my own work is that, you know, some people are lucky enough to have double attachment. They're securely attached in general in their life. And they also have healthy relationships to places, but we can have variations of attachments. And that's where it gets really interesting. We can be ambivalent. I know, you know, a lot of people are ambivalent about their attachments to places because of these losses and some of the things that you've talked about. And so the juicy question is how does that resonate with your attachments to other people?
Bodnar: Yeah, I mean, one of the things that has also come up in the research is a woman from Albania. Tearfully discussed the coast where she lived, as she watched it transform into a hotel after hotel after hotel after hotel with the beachfront being given over to commercial enterprises. It broke her heart.
A gentleman who was at the time about 60 something spontaneously wasn't part of the research, became tearful, when he went to visit childhood home. And found out that the field where he used to play was now turned into sort of like a McMansion village. I've heard in the research, people describe how violated. Word they used, violated. They felt when places that had been natural, became converted into malls. Feeling that in a way, told the story of our modern world. Taking these beautiful natural places and chopping them down, to make stores so you could buy things that in the end, were sometimes an attempt to get you back to where you would have been if you've been able to just be in that natural place.
Pihkala: Yeah, that's a great quote from Susan's 2008 article “Wasted and Bombed: Clinical Enactments of a Changing Relationship to the Earth”. I warmly recommend it for many reasons. But this line from the sixty year old man: “my personality is a mall plastered over a wildlife sanctuary”. This reminds me of many things. Also, Terrence Malick’s movies, which are a complex thing. But that's one movie maker who is doing movies so that he is showing out the scenes, which are actually the inner landscapes of the characters. And then that doesn't always give you much [box office] revenue, because it may be that these movies are a bit difficult for people to be able to get [a sense of]. But just pointing out this theme of how we intuitively see the landscapes of our psyches, and what's the relationship between buildings and so-called natural things there.
This is so juicy that I would warmly recommend that we try to find a time to do a second episode where we get deeper to these kinds of things. And there would be so much to discuss here. The sort of disappointments and devastating experiences we have touched upon in several episodes. Sherry Weber Nicholson's book was a very important early take on this. And then some later work like Glenn Albrecht's concepts of solastalgia can be related to this. But also to sort of repressed or suppressed experiences of being so shaken inside that it's difficult to get forward. But also, there is this option of building more ecological inner landscapes again together with what we do in the outer world. And perhaps in an effort to bring us towards these kinds of ecological reconstruction I'd like to ask you two, that does this resonate with you? This sort of idea of simultaneously trying to enrich the biodiversity of both the inner and the outer landscape?
Bodnar: Yes. And I will say that when we validate experience. Even an experience that's painful, you populate consciousness. You know, when a person's sadness or a person's joy or a person's questioning or a person's anything. Grief, envy, admiration. When that's allowed to exist internally, it fertilizes. It creates a kind of emotional biodiversity. If a person has emotional biodiversity, they will, this is just my idea, but I think they will start to demand it from their places.
Doherty: That's a lovely term. See that's where the creative comes in. As we were imagining earlier, before we started recording, You know, emotional biodiversity. What a lovely term to come out of this. But yeah, I think Panu, you're totally onto something. In Portland here, like many places, we, you know, we're a city that is around a river. The Willamette River. It's been why the city is here, obviously, is this river. But for many, many years, the Willamette River was really polluted. And, you know, we as a city until the 1950s, just dumped all the sewage into the river. And there used to be factories. So the city actually lived away from the river. And, you know, people grew up here, we're taught never to go in the river. There were Superfund sites and World War Two shipbuilding. And, you know, chemicals and various things like a lot of places.
But there's been a movement in the last decade. Human Access Project. A program really because the river is cleaner now. And it has been cleaned up over the years. And the Human Access Project has sponsored over the years events where people swim and float. And they have a float in the river every year. And it's essentially taught people that the water is safe. And that you can go into the water. And they have people swimming in the river. So it is a rejuvenation, recovery or restoration. So I think it is quite possible to think on these multiple levels.
Bodnar: I'm so glad that that's happening. And to see those kinds of projects everywhere. It's tender that we have to teach people that water is safe. But yes, let's teach people that water is safe. And that air is safe. And that the ground you walk on is full of nutrients. Like let's believe that and let's teach people that. I mean, I think you know, one of the things I'm really learning a lot about doing this special issue on eco therapy for the journal eco psychology. Really recognizing the powerful role that an ecologically integrated psychotherapy can have not just for individuals, but certainly for individuals. But for communities, for cultures. And really trying to understand I feel a need to say this all the time and try to find a way to write about this.
This understanding has been with native and indigenous peoples of different kinds and in different ways forever. This is not actually news, but it's just news to us. And I always feel a need to acknowledge that we took a very powerful set of understandings away from many different peoples invalidating their truth. Only now to come back to it as though, “Oh boy, look what we found out.” And I'm glad we are finding it out. And I sit as a, you know, white person, female person struggling with this. I'm no expert. But my heart is wide open. And putting down, you know, taking away one's ego. And letting oneself be a listener to history. To others. To children. To people who are coming to do our research. To my students who want to do it. Everybody needs to be in the conversation together. Even corporate America. You know, it's time to stop separating our voices. But I like to bring them together. So that we can make people know that water is safe and air is safe. And that is not only safe, but that there's information and knowledge and powerful potential for connection to self and other animals and environment all of which can help us build a better world. And sort of hold it so it doesn't implode itself, you know.
Doherty: It's beautifully said. We definitely as we always say we could keep talking. And when we think about bringing you back with more here because this is a thread we're gonna keep following in our podcast as we go forward here.
Bodnar: But it's great to talk to both of you. It's not exactly like there's opportunities everywhere to have these conversations. Right? It's a rare chance to be able to sit down and talk about this and not feel self-conscious. And I'm so grateful that you're doing this podcast because I'm sure I'm not alone in feeling lonely with these ideas. And you're creating community. And when there's community, it's shared. And when it's shared, it's strong. So thank you.
Doherty: You're welcome. I agree. You know, the therapist creates the therapy they need for themselves, right? Yes. So thanks. Panu, what's your evening like here? Where are you heading for the rest of your day?
Pihkala: Well, you know, typical Finnish winter evening. It's dark already. But luckily, we have snow. That's yet another topic we could talk about. And I know, Susan, you've been working with snow and lack of snow also. But now we have it. And we are glad about it. And we don't worry about the lack of it. So that's one thing is trying to both have a long term perspective and to live in the moment. But thanks a lot for these very broad ranging discussions you brought to the space, Susan. And this great inclusive vision, including also the decolonial elements that you shared at the end. So this has been greatly a pleasure.
Doherty: And Susan, what's the rest of your day look like?
Bodnar: More clients. And yeah, I'm back-to-back [providing counseling to] a lot of people. And more hopefully walk therapy. Oh, I have a beautiful kid that I work with for just two seconds. Neuroatypical, very rigid about things that he does. Routinized. Doesn't like me. Doesn't want to come to see me. and I say okay, let's go outside. We work outside all the time. He wants to play football. All he wants to do is knock me over, knock me over, knock me over. And I say hey, okay, but look, there's witches. Look, those things over there. They're witches. Those are trees. I know, they're trees, but we can pretend they're witches. And all of a sudden, these are witches. And then we have a whole thing going now about being outside. He sees the outside world now. His eyes are opened. And we're now climbing bean stalks to go see giants, the clouds in the sky. And it's changing him. That's what I'm doing today. I'm working with him.
Doherty: That's really inspiring. So yes, there's therapists out there around the world that are trying to do this work. And Susan, you're a leader. And I'll do my own versions of this today as well.
Bodnar: You are the leader, excuse me.
Doherty: We try. We try. But it's really great to see these connections again, Susan us to talk and we'll talk more. And the ecopsychology journal and your work. And we'll have our show notes with some of the many things we referenced in here. We reference movies. We reference news stories. And some of the academic work that therapists will really appreciate. So you all will be well. And listeners will be well. And you can find this episode and other episodes at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And please support us so we can bring in more guests like Susan, we all enjoy. So you all be well and take care. Okay, take care.
Bodnar: Thank you.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com
Season 2, Episode 15: A Primer On Coping With The East Palestine Event
Mar 17, 2023
Season 2, Episode 15: A Primer On Coping With The East Palestine Event
Thomas looked back on his psychological research into technological disasters to help explain why the recent train derailment and chemical disaster in East Palestine, Ohio was so traumatic for that community and so unsettling for observers from afar. These kinds of chemical disasters—with their ominous dark clouds, fearful citizenry, and fish dying in local streams—are very hard to cope with due to their uncertain long-term health risks. These events also tend to divide communities due to issues of human negligence and injustice, as poor and marginalized communities are often unfairly placed in harm’s way. Panu and Thomas showed how the train disaster is a variation of the larger issue of eco-anxiety about chemicals and toxins that besets people worldwide. To understand how the East Palestine event affects our emotions and feelings, it is first necessary to honor some of our basic environmental values (self-protection, concern for others less fortunate, and duty to protect vulnerable species). Listen in to the conversation and find support and connection.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. A show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change. And in this podcast, we focus on climate emotions, our climate feelings. And by extension, our coping and how we get through the day. And you can support us at our Patreon. And you can always find us and all of our past episodes of climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Pihkala: Yes. And today, we are also going to speak about climate change – even though we are starting from quite a concrete thing. Namely, trains and what can happen with them. It was just minor news in Finland, but Thomas, you told me about this train disaster in East Palestine in Ohio in the US. And that was quite something when I took a more explicit look at the link you sent me. So what's going on there, Thomas?
Doherty: Well, thanks for asking Panu. Yeah, this is an issue that's, I think, getting more press in the United States because of all the different complexities of it. And I think it's great. It's not a fun topic to get into. It's a really messy topic. But I think in terms of our goals with this podcast of thinking about how we can actually have happiness and wellbeing in this era of climate change, we need to … deal with these kinds of things. And so we know that there was a train derailment in this community on February 3rd. A long train. Just like what happens in the United States. A long train full of different kinds of cars. And we know, unlike other countries, the United States, all the rail is private, so there's private companies that own the trains and own the tracks.
And this particular train derailed in a small community. A rural community that has been economically depressed. It's much like where I grew up in Western New York in Buffalo, New York. A former manufacturing community that's been experiencing hard times. And this train had several cars that were carrying toxic substances. Vinyl chloride, PVC, and various chemicals that I would have to look at my list to see. Butyl acrylate. Isobutylene. Basically industrial chemicals that are toxic to people and to other animals. And as people in the US know, [there was] this massive pile up of cars, and then there was a danger of an explosion. So they had to purposely burn off a lot of these chemicals creating a huge kind of ominous dark cloud over the community.
And it's really insidious. It's a great example of a technological disaster. Because it's the dark cloud. It's the chemicals. It's the mystery of what this means for people in the community. And the ominous things that happen. Fish dying in local streams. Farm animals dying. We can get into more of the psychological manifestations of this. But it's just kind of a mess. And then, of course, it's been polarized by different opportunistic politicians arriving on the scene. And people using it to beat up on each other. The different political parties here. And then the community kind of caught in the middle. And then there's even been conspiracy theories and various things. So it takes us to the dark side of the psyche here in the US and other countries. Are you familiar with things like these chemical spills and train wrecks in Finland? I know, again, another credit to your country, I did realize in my research that Finland has some of the safest train systems in the world. But are you familiar with these things happening nearby to you?
Pihkala: Well, it surely is quite different. From my travels in the US I noticed that the trains can be very very long. And Finland so far has just the state railway company, which is pretty good. But then because of the zeitgeist, the times in which we live there's discussion whether that should be privatized. And that's a big discussion. And the experiences from any of the countries where the railroad companies get privatized, they are not exactly encouraging, I think. But this also brings into mind, of course, anxiety and worry. And my research has been dealing more with the sort of, bit more abstract and large scale anxieties and worries. Although I've often made the point, both in writing and in speech, that what we nowadays call eco anxiety can be also related to more particular things and not just climate. So climate anxiety is one big part of eco anxiety.
But this case also reminds us, as you hinted, when we talked about this, that environmental anxiety as a concept seems to originate from things a bit like this anxiety and worry about chemicalization and that sort of thing. So you know that history way better than I do. So what's your thoughts on that?
Doherty: Yeah, I think it's good to talk about it. I'd like to think of this episode as a primer for how to cope with these kinds of issues. Because it's very easy to feel like a victim. And to feel powerless and hopeless. And I think the first step is to really, like with all the issues that we talk about, you know, eco grief, eco depression, eco anxiety. Thinking of them as doorways and not walls. Like they're doorways to pass through. That we can become bigger. And we can learn how to cope with this. So I think [it’s important] having a growth mindset about these things. That we can, in fact, evolve and grow, to be able to cope with these things, and take action to prevent them in the future, is the mindset to start here. And so I would encourage the listeners to really think of this as a primer.
Even though the train derailment might not be as directly linked in people's minds with other climate and environmental issues. It does play into our general pool of worry. As researchers talk about, we have a pool of worry in our mind. And an ambient level of daily stressors that we have to put up with in terms of global consciousness. And so trains are obviously running all the time. And we have 1000 train derailments a year in the United States. And so these are happening all the time. But we can kind of move it out of our mind temporarily until something like this happens. And then it reminds us of reality. So I think we can imagine ways to be our best selves. To be the best person that we can when we deal with this kind of thing. You know, and I know you and I have talked about this.
But you know, when I first, as a psychologist, started studying climate change, I had to look into the disaster psychology literature and the research on disasters in general. And, you know, I learned that, you know, researchers tend to distinguish between natural disasters and technological disasters. Natural disasters happen without necessarily human cause. Technological disasters, like this train derailment, do have some sort of human cause. A human error. Human negligence. Human mistake. Because the trains are meant to be safe. And they're supposed to be regulated. So something went wrong somewhere. And technically someone's responsible for that. And unlike, say, the recent earthquakes in Syria and Turkey, even though they have a human aspect, in terms of maybe poor work, construction rules, or building rules, no one is necessarily to blame for the earthquake itself happening. And so we tend to band together to try to help people and we celebrate the survivors.
But you'll notice the news, there's no celebration in East Palestine. There's no celebration. It's all negative because these technological disasters expose inequality and negligence and corruption and lack of regulation and these sacrifice communities. these marginalized communities. And so unfortunately these technological disasters tend to drive people apart. They separate people based on existing divisions. So the people in East Palestine already feel marginalized. They already feel left out economically. And they're already prone to hating outsiders and not trusting outsiders. And so when an accident like this happens, it just widens those existing divisions and makes everyone feel bad. Promotes distrust. And some of it is realistic because we don't know how these vinyl chlorides are going to affect the water and the wells and we don't know exactly. I haven't seen anyway, direct research on why the fish died. Like what exactly happened from that. So it is very mysterious. And as the news shows, people are worried about their long term health. Their children. Their property. Their property values. So it's right for them to be concerned.
Pihkala: Yeah, definitely. So and, as you say, this has strong elements of environmental justice.
Doherty: Yes.
Pihkala: Eco justice issues. And that's something to be kept in mind. And something again, which is worse in the US than in Finland, but we have our share of that also. And part of that is related to how the Sami people, the indigenous people in the North of Scandinavian, Nordic countries are treated. But also in urban areas. When I'm teaching courses at the University of Helsinki, which I sometimes do, I often show the students some video material about environmental racism. And they are very surprised about, you know, the role of the zip code in the US predicting health and life issues. And that sort of thing. So it seems that we are dealing with quite deeply ingrained issues. Doherty: Yeah. And just so listeners are clear about the idea of, you know, zip code, you know, predicts lifespan. So depending on where you live in the US, you know, we can kind of predict someone's lifespan just on their community and the level of prosperity and health and economic development in their community. And so yes, we've got all of that happening here. So one way to think about this from a more growthful perspective is: it's a teachable moment. It's an opportunity for us to stop and to breathe. And to collect our nervous system. And remind ourselves of our values. Again, this is the process I use with people.
When I'm working on this, we stop. We collect ourselves. We give ourselves the benefit of a growth mindset. And we remind ourselves of our values. People are concerned about this, because their values are threatened. Values of natural balance. The natural order of things. The rights of people. The rights of other species. Everyone across the political spectrum wants a safe and healthy life for themselves. That's a common human goal. It doesn't matter if you're a billionaire, or just making it through the day. Everyone wants to be safe and happy. And so, you know, these values are all toxified we could say or threatened when something like this happens.
So, you know, there's an empowerment in understanding how our minds work. And how our emotion systems work. And we realize, oh, my values are under threat. You know, things that I hold dear are under threat. And then, of course, we can start to think about, okay, where do I get my information? How do I educate myself? Have I been doing my doom scrolling on the news? And realizing that the news, the various news sources are sometimes biased. And there's a lot of static among the different perspectives, because there's so much mystery in some of the outcomes. And then we can decide whether we want to get into this further and educate ourselves about this. And what level we want to become active in this. And that is an existential decision. Right?
We haven't quite talked about that in our podcast directly. But you know, it's described in your recent research and papers. You know, there's a distancing. A healthy distancing about how much do we want to take on of this? And can we take a break? Right? So again, we're, if listeners can imagine coming from a center. Coming from a place of control and choice. That's a place to start. It's just the other technological disaster aspects that are helpful to remind ourselves. You know, we talked about the social justice issues and the mystery of these chemical things. An earthquake is devastating, but it's not mysterious. We know what happens. It shakes the ground. Buildings collapse. Then it stops. And then we rebuild. So it's relatively simple to understand for our human minds.
But the spilling of a chemical that's never existed in history, into the environment. We actually don't know what's going to happen with that chemical. We literally do not know. And so it's very mysterious. And it's hard to cope with. And there's a post mortem, where people are seeking who's responsible. And they're wanting to place blame. And then they look back on warning signs. And of course, it's incredible with this train, if you look into it, someone was able to find some security footage from a nearby factory that showed the train going by in the dark of the night. And you could see the flames coming off of the wheels. You know, as it rolled by. So we were amazingly able to track what happened with this wreck. Even though there's a diffusion of responsibility.
People can have physiological symptoms just from stress. So, in the news, talks about residents having rashes and various other mysterious physical symptoms. And they're not sure if they're from the chemicals. But the insidious thing is that just from stress alone, we can develop rashes. So some of these symptoms that people are having are psychological symptoms. They're real. And they are suffering, but they aren't necessarily associated with the chemicals. And it's really hard to tell the difference.
Pihkala: Yeah. It's very tricky when there's this uncertainty element and invisibility included. And this also reminded me of the risk perception research around climate change. Folks like Paul Slovic, for example, and George Marshall, in his book about climate communication he is discussing this and interviewing Slovic. And the difficulty with climate change being that it's often so invisible. And even the weather impacts, there's certain ambiguity, and then different people can try to find different elements from their personal histories and link those weather events with that. But with technology, if there's something new coming, which then can be pinpointed, then it's a lot easier for people to react. And it brings in an object. And perhaps also a sort of visible enemy if you want to oppose that. So there's this unknown risk or dread risk, as Slovic calls some of these very serious risks. And radiation is one of those. So there's some links with this climate change psychology here also.
Doherty: Yeah. And that's where we can use this pragmatically. This is the kind of thing I'm talking about in my writing and in this book project that I'm working on. You know, how do we use some of these situations to our benefit? What researchers have found is that, you know, we get numb to large numbers, right? So 1000 train derailments, that seems like a lot, but it actually leads us to more habituate to it. Oh, well, there's 1000 of them. So you kind of get used to the large numbers. So we get numbed unfortunately, to you know, 1000s or millions of people. We get numb to the number of climate refugees. You know, the statistics. We get numb to large statistics, whereas individual personal stories really still activate us. And make things more meaningful for us. So that's part of the opportunity with an issue like the Palestine trail derailment, is that it's an opportunity to see a real story in real time with real people. And actually we're less numb to it. And paradoxically, that's a good thing. Because we want to be able to feel. And numbness isn't our friend.
So, you know, maybe that's why this is a teachable moment. That it might potentially lead to better regulation of these trains, if we can push through the moment. And that's where the politics come in. And the action because there is a moment, a window. As we know from politics, there's a certain window of opportunity when the public is open to do things. And if we can act we can put some simple regulations in place. Labeling trains better so the communities know what chemicals. Because this train wasn't even labeled as toxic. So some of the toxic train protection rules wouldn't even have been at play. But, you know, this is an opportunity to tighten up the rules and regulations. It doesn't mean we have to nationalize and, you know, take away the private companies rights in this case, but it does require some logical rules and regulations. So there's an opportunity here.
If listeners are inspired, they can see what's happening in their states. And try to be involved in that because there's a window. But what will happen as we know, unfortunately, is that corporate lobbyists and people that are working toward purely promotion of profit will immediately try to fight against the regulation. And try to delay. Try to hold off. Try to stop the legislators from making the regulations until the public forgets. And they move on. The same thing that's happened obviously with climate change. The delayism. So this moves us into the realm of politics here.
Pihkala: Yeah. That's very true. And vigilance is a concept which could be discussed more in the eco emotion and climate emotion discourse, also. Some sort of eco vigilance, you know. The ability to stay sort of alert. Not too alert, but you pay attention. And you collectively try to take care that different norms are being followed. And very often, it requires wake up calls every now and then.
Doherty: Yeah vigilance. Yes. You know, like Churchill said, you know, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Right? So the price of, you know, ecological sustainability is eternal vigilance. Because we have to stay on this. So anyway, it's not that we're forcing listeners to go into action. But we're saying one direction is action. And looking at your state and community. I know in Washington state, they tried to regulate some of these trains. And then the federal government stopped it because it was seen as suppressing the market and suppressing profits. And so this takes us into the whole economic system. I know Portland, my city, is trying to regulate the trains. We have our own issue. So even if listeners just looked at what trains move through their communities, that would be a start. Portland has to deal with coal trains moving through and various things here. The same kind of issues. And I know states of Idaho and other states are actually trying to fight the city of Portland regulations because they're saying it hurts their economy.
Right. So you know, that's where it gets messy. We have to get into the politics if we actually want to make change. Now, not everyone needs to do that. But someone needs to do that. And if we're not doing it, at least we can talk to our legislators or maybe contribute to a group that is working on this kind of thing. But again, it comes down to the choices that we make about what our values are and what issues we want to take on. Because we can't take on everything.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, this also reminds me of a case in early personal history in the 1980s. The community where I grew up, we talked about this a bit in some of our very early episodes of this podcast, it had a medium size sawmill. And that was a big part of the economy of the whole little town. And then in the 80s, it became apparent that a chemical called chlorophenol had leaked into the ground water. And people had been drinking that for a while. And the Ministry of the Environment had just been established in Finland, like just some time ago. And that was the first complex eco social case for the whole Ministry of the Environment in Finland. And that turned out to be a big learning experience.
It didn't go too well to begin with. There wasn't enough skills of negotiation. And it got quite heated between the sawmill who tried to deny responsibility and people were of course, scared, you know. There's this unknown risk. And also a dread element. And that sort of thing. But eventually that case led into better practices and better legislation. And finally, also for this small town of Kärkölä, they reached an agreement about cleaning up the chemical things and reached some also agreements with this sawmill and that sort of thing. But it was a very long process. And as a kid I've also been drinking some chlorophenol, but luckily apparently, it didn't cause much trouble in my body. There was some increase in cancer rates in town, but it was very difficult to prove scientifically the cause and effect. So that's, of course, often a very tricky thing in these kinds of contaminations. But I really appreciate you, Thomas, sort of speaking about these opportunities for learning and change and action which these moments also bring.
Doherty: Yeah. So again, it's, we need to stop and just have grief for this situation. It's a sad situation. It's a troubling situation. People are injured. Animals have died. A community is impacted. So that's normal. It's normal to feel sad here. But we also have other emotions that we can, we can move through. I mean, so again, the coping steps are to remind ourselves, this is an ecological issue. It's linked to our system. You know, it's linked to all different aspects of our natural world. And the economy and politics. And looking at our feelings as we're talking about. And realize that we can decide what we want to feel. We can also feel curious. We can feel patient. We can feel, you know, angry. We can feel inspired.
A missing step is actually looking at our own impacts. Like how is this issue actually literally affecting me in East Palestine. You know, when I did the research years ago on climate change, we identified the emotional impacts. Even if you're not in the location where the event is happening, you can still feel impacted by it. Even if you're 1000s of miles away, and those chemicals aren't literally coming to you at all, you still feel bad. And that is exactly what's happening here with this Palestine, that we don't even realize it. It's just happening, ‘wow, I'm upset by something that I only know about through the news.’ But then we can start to think about our values. And the people we want to be. And then we can decide if we want to particularly take action on this issue or other issues. Because we can't take action on everything. So, there are some steps, as you know, that we can cope and break it down for people. So it is an opportunity.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. And once again, the balancing act between not staying totally away and being exposed to these particularizing media stories. Which, again, can arouse empathy or righteous, moral outrage in us. And we need that to act, but then also, not to follow these very lively particularizing stories all the time. Because then there's the problem of compassion, fatigue and those kinds of effects. So once again, coming also back to this. The tricky but very necessary balance.
Doherty: Yeah. Because, I mean, there's a quote from my insight meditation timer app that I get a nice quote every day when I try to do my meditation. And there's a quote I saw recently from Pema Chödrön, a spiritual teacher, you know, “fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth.” It was a profound quote. And I thought about, you know, our fear and our concerns are because we're touching on the truth.
These events, like the East Palestine derailment, remind us of the truth of the world. The truth of our world. The truth of our systems. The truth of our economy. The truth of our technology. And it is scary. And it's painful. But do we want to live in truth? Or do we want to live in numbing and denial? That's the choice. I think most people would choose, even though it's difficult to want to live in the truth. And so that's the existential start here. Easy to say, harder to do. Because as you said our minds do want to get too much truth is hard to handle. Interbeing and being connected with nature opens us up to this dark ecology of pain and loss. Our hearts are wired for this so we have to be open to it. There's something noble about that I think. Something heroic.
Pihkala: Yeah, in all colors and shades we are connected with everything around us. And the borders can be quite porous, but any way this could lead into also a quite metaphysical discussion as you know. The “structure of being” -type of thoughts. But I think we need to leave that for another session. It's been fascinating to sit with you, Thomas with East Palestine. And trying to stay open to reality. So thanks for the episode once again.
Doherty: Thank you, Panu. Yes and to anyone who's listening and to the people. If you're in East Palestine we're with you and we're aware of the situation and we're feeling with you. So we wish you all well our listeners. And thinking about how you're going to channel things into action. Panu and I part of our action is doing this podcast for you. That's something that both of us feel good about in terms of taking daily action and bearing witness. So you all be well. And Panu, you have a good evening.
Pihkala: Take care everyone.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness podcast is a self funded volunteer effort, please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 14: Emotions and Climate Adaptation with Susi Moser
Mar 03, 2023
Season 2, Episode 14: Emotions and Climate Adaptation with Susi Moser
Thomas and Panu were pleased to connect with geographer and climate change communications expert Susanne “Susi” Moser, whose path finding publications such as 2007’s Creating a Climate for Change set the stage for much of the current psychology and social science of climate change. Susi shared her own climate journey as a young earth science researcher charting her own emotional responses to the reality of climate change, and how she found allies in the work of ecopsychology activists like Joanna Macy, and ongoing challenges for working scientists to cope with the emotional side of their work. Susi described her mission providing positive visions for change for engineers and planners in the scientific and technical community – climate adaptation professionals whose day jobs are to “look the apocalypse in the face every single day.” Join us for an inspiring conversation on finding new meaning and a larger frame.
“When you think about the scientific or technical professions, it is very uncommon to bring in emotion, your whole selves into the conversation, into your work, right? We're supposed to be, you know, heads on a stick. But that's just not who we are. And, in fact … all the conversation we've had in recent years about storytelling is all about that, right? It is actually about re-embodying ourselves into a larger fabric of who we are as people. What our identity is. How it changes through the experiences we have in life. And how it is held in the community.”
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. The show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about this personal side of climate change. Particularly their emotional responses. And how they make sense of this big issue. And today, we're very lucky to have a guest.
Susi Moser: And I'm Susi Moser. And it's just a delight to be here with the two of you. Thank you so much for having me.
Doherty: And Panu and I both know Susi, and her work. We follow her. She's been a leader in this kind of area of climate change, climate psychology, and understanding our emotions and feelings about climate for quite some time. And she's been doing all kinds of innovative work. And so we're glad to have her. And we're gonna have a conversation about that today. Panu, do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Susan. It's such a pleasure to have an opportunity to discuss with you. We've met in person in Finland, actually. You've been an active keynote speaker on topics such as climate change communication, and adaptation. And lots of things related to the human mind and psychosocial issues. But should we start with history? Would you like to share some of your journey? How did you end up in all this and all the stuff related to climate emotions also?
Moser: Yeah, it's a really interesting question. I actually think it goes back to the late 1980s. You know, sort of when it first became a topic in public conversation. Obviously relatively, you know, late after it's become a scientific issue. But at that point, I was a student of geography. And I studied earth sciences. And, you know, my climatology teacher was already quite interested in it. But, you know, my geology teacher said, yeah, nothing to worry about. You know, Earth has gone through climate change for a whole bunch of time. So that was sort of my first scientific introduction. And then I was just really curious. Studying it myself.
And I don't know, when I started to realize, my God, what are we talking about? It hit me for the first time, probably in the early 1990s. What it would mean. I studied the impact of storms on coastal regions. I visited coastal regions. I saw what that devastation is like. And, you know, I looked at sea level rise. A curve that is just going up no matter what we do. I mean, it matters what we do in terms of how steep it goes up. But it will go up for millennia. And yeah, most of us on this planet live in coastal areas. And it just became very clear to me from the start that, you know, while this might be the hardest thing to talk about, it is actually going to be one of the most impactful things that human species has ever experienced. And then I just, you know, I tried to communicate that. I was awful at it in the beginning myself. Typical scientist, you know, starting with pretty much the beginning of time to explain things and losing people in five minutes. So, yeah, I had to learn some hard lessons about that.
And then really, you know, once I started to get interested in the question of how we communicate it. I mean, the whole point of the communication at that time was to get better at it. Essentially, to mobilize people. And oftentimes, people used fear. They used guilt. They used all kinds of emotional, you know, ways to get us off our seats. Off our butts. And I was like, wait a minute, this is dangerous territory the way we're doing this. And, you know, as a science communicator, I was trained to forget emotions. Put them aside. And it just felt completely wrong to me to do that. So that's kind of how I first got interested in the emotional side of climate change. And, in fact, you know, a lot of what I've done since is a follow on to this to fully recognize and appreciate that it's actually a very healthy response. And a very normal, non pathological response. How we react emotionally, psychologically, to an existential threat. So I'll stop there for, you know, give you probably lots of things to start poking into. But anyway, that's how I started.
Doherty: But one of the things I'm really interested in is that we talk about this environmental identity. You know, which comes out of conservation psychology. But this idea of our sense of self in relation to nature and the natural world. But you're I'm guessing, if you go even farther back, can you think of things that formed your environmental identity, even younger? Your connection with nature and the natural world? Because it seems to me, you must have had some inner motivation to push through on some of this. Because you must have felt marginalized at the beginning. When you were starting. I'm just wondering, when you look back now, particularly with your insights. And then your larger life story, in early development, can you see any turning points from nature and your connections?
Moser: Well, it was my saving grace to have, you know, a large backyard to go back into. And, I mean, that was, for me, the safe place to be. It wasn't a scary place to be. It was, you know, just where I felt most at home. And so that's been true for me throughout my life. But certainly in my upbringing. Probably my interest in that. And my desire to protect nature. And all those things, they probably go back to my early childhood. And then I just professionalize it by, you know, choosing geography. The one topic that I thought I wasn't going to get bored with, given the size. And the complexity. And many dimensions of Earth with all its people on it. And geography is just perfect for that.
So those were some key choices that I made around that. And then the psychology really came out of my own, you know, introspection of my own reflectivity. And my own experience of nature. And how I experienced hearing about climate change. And what it would, you know, imagining forward what that would mean, for all of us.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks a lot for sharing all that. That's really fascinating to hear. And how did it go in relation to coping with all of this, during those times 1990s and early 2000s? When you said that somewhere around the early 1990s, you woke up more profoundly to how severe the climate crisis actually is. And then you had some of these quite pioneering ventures. So, how did that go? When did you find some allies at some point?
Moser: Yeah at some point, but not early on. So early on it, you know, felt like I was pretty much alone with my emotional response. And, quite frankly, you know, I probably only let myself go, not very deep into that because it felt overwhelming. And it was probably in the early 1990s that I discovered Joanna Macy's work. And that was essential for me. In fact, actually, it was probably the late 1990s, because in the early 2000s, I took two long training sessions with her. And, you know, led me to actually also lead and integrate the work that reconnects into my work. But that was the first time I actually felt like there were companions on this journey. You know, I wasn't alone with the grief. And, you know, and I will say it's still for most of my daily life, a fairly lonely journey in the sciences, at least it is so unconventional too. Still unconventional to actually name your emotions about the things you study.
So, you know, I know now where my allies are. And the, you know, the allyship has grown in the sense of simply having the fact of climate emotions being talked about more often. In, you know, all your guests are, you two are like, you know, part of that larger field. So that's changed the context. But sort of my daily life, it is still you know, not something I spend all my time in. I don't know if you're aware or your listeners might be interested, there's a documentary that was made. And I was in it. The documentary is called Once You Know. And it actually traces the journey of the filmmaker. But it includes the journeys of scientists who, you know, take the emotional side of their work seriously. And how do they live with that? And how do they integrate that or cope with that? And also use it in a way to, you know, infuse and fuel their work in really wonderful ways. So that was an interesting experience. And it sort of has grown my own community of people that I can speak to about these things a little more substantially.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for sharing all of that. Joanna Macy's name has been mentioned in this podcast also, several times. And we are planning to do an explicit episode on this Work That Reconnects that you mentioned. It's the name of the method she and others developed. And that's been hugely influential for my work also. And many regard Macy as an elder in all work around eco emotions, or whatever we call them. Or just, you know, our emotional response to what's happening in the world. There was the threat of nuclear war in the 1980s. And she and some others were also active in facing the effective response to that.
Moser: Yeah. Yeah, I think she's one of the crucial elders. At least for very pragmatic, kind of, you know, work. Like how do we work with these emotions? Right? How do we not sit alone with these emotions, but connect with others? And are held in community in deep emotional grief. And working through that. And by that, I don't mean to, you know, get rid of it, right? But to honor it. And to find a renewed energy and power to go back in the world and engage with it as opposed to be paralyzed and disappearing. And she has been probably one of the most influential people in my work.
The other one is Bill Plotkin. And I know you have also mentioned him in your podcast before. His work, I think, in many ways gets at the root causes of why we have something called climate change in the first place. And so that, to me, has been very, very influential as well. Yeah.
Doherty: Yeah. So this all gets to this idea of eco psychology. These are all this idea of really revisioning what our sense of psychology even is in relation to being on the planet. Yeah. So I want to stay a little bit just for a moment with the science communication piece. Only because we have listeners. It's a paradox, I think, Susi. There [are] way more resources and support for science teachers, or researchers or your students who do, you know, who are feeling, obviously, all the feelings that are coming with this work.
But, even now, as I tell people and students, you still kind of have to be a pathfinder, you know. So what I'm hearing from you is that even now. Even at your level, it still can be lonely at times. And you're still having to be a bit of a pathfinder. But I think that's just an important thing for listeners to take in. And that kind of could be a segue to our adaptive mind conversation in a moment. But it sounds like that's just the nature of it still. It's better than it was 20 years ago, but still difficult.
Moser: Yeah, I think we're in a, you know, we're really trying to change culture. Right? When you think about the scientific or technical professions, it is very uncommon to bring in emotion, your whole selves into the conversation, into your work, right? We're supposed to be, you know, heads on a stick. But that's just not who we are. And, in fact … all the conversation we've had in recent years about storytelling is all about that, right? It is actually about re-embodying ourselves into a larger fabric of who we are as people. What our identity is. How it changes through the experiences we have in life. And how it is held in the community.
And so, you know, science has essentially asked us to make it a professional pride to dissociate from ourselves. And, you know, I mean, in your profession, Thomas, you would call it pathological. But we've made it a matter of credibility to be that emotion free. And I think what we're beginning to see is, it's to the detriment of the mental health and well being of the people doing the work.
Doherty: Yeah.
Moser: So, you know, I don't think emotion disqualifies me as a scientist, you know. I think it is, the more repressed our emotions are, the more they actually influence us unconsciously. And actually, that makes for bad science.
Doherty: Yeah.
Moser: So I think the more self aware and clear we are about, you know, how else we are impacted by what we know, the more effective we can be in analysis. And in synthesis of an understanding. Scientific understanding. And also more effective in communication.
Pihkala: That's great wisdom, I think. And really, really important. And there's such a range of issues here. There's this whole idea of Western science, especially since the Enlightenment period. And, all the complexities [that] also revolve around gender. Through these developments when reason was started to be seen as masculine and good, and emotion was started to be seen as feminine and weak. There's [a] very long history of ideas and developments here behind this. Just to give the listeners a clue of the scope of this huge work.
So there's both writings about communication. And how it's important to pay not only attention to emotions in general, but also to the difficult ones. And that was really rare in the 2000s. And when I started my work on difficulty, eco emotions, that was very important source material. But you've also done, because of your expertise in adaptation, sort of field work. There's some articles where you're actually, you know, drawing on people's experiences that you have met. For example, along the coastlines. And there's the philosophical things around concepts of hope and despair, for example. So that's something that I highly appreciate in any scientist or thinker. In this case you, but just wanted to give some glimpses to the readers about the obvious thing.
Doherty: Yeah. And I feel less lonely when we're having these conversations too. Because I think about this stuff all the time as well. You know, Susi, early on in our planning, you talked about some different emotions that you were curious about. And, you know, this adaptive mind. This idea of how do we kind of create this world that we need? Do you want to talk about some specific emotions? Or some specific things you want to kind of get into? You know, we have some time to chat. Let's see, what are you curious about?
Moser: Yeah, so maybe I could just, you know, first start by just saying what I mean by the adaptive mind just so that people understand where that comes from. So, you know, besides the, as Panu just mentioned, besides the work in communication, I've done a lot of work in adaptation, mostly in coastal areas. And, you know, early on, there were a handful of us working on this. And around 2006, after Al Gore's movie came out, all of a sudden, people realized we cannot just mitigate climate change. We actually also just have to live with some of the now unavoidable consequences. So lots of people started to enter the field of adaptation around 2005, 2006, when that came out.
But 10 years later, I started to hear people at conferences, just take me aside and say, you know, let's have a drink, whatever. And they would just say, and how do you deal with this all the time? You know, people started to just have confidence, basically asked me how to emotionally cope with what they see every single day. I mean, others have said this before, but it's essentially, when your day job is to look the apocalypse in the face every single day, how do you cope with that? And then people started to say, well, it's not just that, but you know, I need to give talks to people who are traumatized from the most recent flooding or from the most recent wildfire. What trauma informed work in adaptation? You know, people started to talk.
Yeah, and it's deeply interconnected with all the intersectional challenges that communities face. Race and poverty. And you know, the whole rest of it, right? And so those people were really looking for skills to help this deep transformative shift that we need to go through. And that is both a shift socially, economically, but it's also in our relationship to the environment, right? And how we relate to each other. So out of that sort of set of needs, I basically said, you know, I want to work on that. I want to think about what are support mechanisms? What are skill building opportunities we can create? Because you don't learn that in engineering school or in planning school. Or, you know, if you're a climate scientist, you don't get the lowdown on how to avoid burnout, right?
Anyway, those are the kinds of contexts that lots of people in the scientific and technical communities didn't have the skills to deal with this constant traumatic and transformative change that people are facing. So out of that, basically, was birthed this idea of the adaptive mind. And it's a project that is aimed at skill building. At building those capacities. And, you know, one of the first things that I come across again and again, in this work is, first people just arrive exhausted. They're just completely fried. And so much of what we do in the beginning of our training cycle, is to help people just reconnect with themselves. Reconnect with each other. Reconnect to nature. Just as a baseline. Just to kind of, you know, get to a place where they can even take in learning about new skills. You can't learn when you're completely fried.
And the next step in that often then is about having that community hold space for climate emotions. And it can be anything, right? Grief is often in there probably dominantly. But also anger. And anxiety. And fear for what happens to the children. You know, whatever. So it's a wide range of experiences people face. And, you know, we basically, then hold that space for people to have that experience. And what inevitably happens is, when people actually have space for their emotions, they don't get stuck in them. They actually then are able to, you know, think clearly again, right? Coming back to the work of Joanna Macy. You see with new eyes. You have opportunities to connect with others.
And think differently about how do I address this more fundamentally than, you know, just putting one bandaid after another that just dries me up? So that's kind of, you know, what we're trying to do there. And yeah, so that climate emotions are and really holding space for that, with some skill is really essential in that work, because that's the part that no one gets.
Doherty: Yeah. I'm thinking of our episode with Scott Ordway. The composer who has been making music about the wildfires in his home. And his discussion. At least listeners can go to Season two, Episode 10. HIs discussion of how when we played that piece of music for the community, you know, that was damaged by the fires, how cathartic that was. And how healing that was. So that was an artistic take on a similar kind of coping.
Moser: Well, it's such a beautiful thing too to, you know, tap into things that are nonverbal, right? To get into a whole different part of our brains. To, you know, it taps parts of us much more easily than if I say, oh, would you like to, you know, express your grief? It's just, you know, it's much more difficult to do that in that way. Whereas music can take you there in like, two seconds, you know? So I think of imaginative ways of opening to a different future. I know, you've talked a lot with people about hope in your series of podcasts here. I always think, you know, if we can't imagine a better future, like, why bother with hope? I mean, right? You need to open that up. And art, other forms, all forms of art can help open that. So that's often another part of what we do in our adaptive mind work.
Doherty: Yeah. And I think meaning then comes out of this work, ultimately. You know, my life has some significance. Things start to make sense. I have a purpose. Do you see that, Susi, coming out in the process that you're describing. You know, how these kinds of emotional openings and space holdings, then allow people to start to have a sense of meaning. You know, repair their meaning making?
Moser: You know, it's actually in my experience, in this particular piece of the work, a central question. Many people don't burn out just because they haven't had a vacation in a while. Or because there had been too many disasters that they had to attend to. But they burn out because their work doesn't make sense anymore. You know, like, why should I bother and drain myself doing it with something that just feels completely irrelevant in light of the magnitude. And, you know, lots of that has to do with our very obscure and strange sense of self in Western society, right? As individuals, we are often thinking of ourselves only as individuals as opposed to part of a collective. That's certainly a big part of the problem of why we keep burning out.
But also, you know, so much of our work has become a very narrow and mechanistic way of fitting into a machine that we don't actually want to be part of. Right? It's the machine that actually creates all this problem in the first place. And, you know, like, imagine, for example, you're a sustainability director in an urban community. And your work is to try to build trust with, you know, underserved communities, marginalized communities, right? Your police department next door is hitting those same people with batons or worse, right? Like, it makes no sense to be part of that community. And yet, you want to help. You want to do something. So you need skills to navigate and change the system that you're in at the same time that you want to be effective and actually, in those interactions with people who are not trustful. Who is afraid for a very good reason.
So, anyway, those are the, you know, the kinds of real life situations that many people in my line of work find themselves in. And who just doesn't know how to address it. And the question of meaning is absolutely central. How do I bring myself at the deepest level to the repair work. To the restorative work. To the healing work that needs to happen on this planet?
Doherty: Yes. Well said. Well said.
Pihkala: Yes, truly. So and as you two know, meaning has been a very key concept in my work also. And perhaps, Thomas, we should do one episode explicitly on meaning and various takes on it. I don't mean any, you know, academic philosophical discussion. But the lived experiences of meaning. And sort of different types of meaning that are changing now. And some of them related, for example, to the felt significance of our work. Which Susi has commented [on] here.
So speaking of sticks and carrots. Which is a very simple metaphor for communication. It's not straightforward, but meaning can be an important carrot in that sense. Because if people see those people who are willing to try to face reality. And feel the emotions. And do things for the community. And the planet. If they see meaningfulness and a sense of meaning in those communities and people, that's going to be very motivating. And then, of course, what is needed is also pathways to become part of those communities. So that it's not an in-group, out-group thing. But does that spark something in your mind, Susi?
Moser: Well, I feel, you know, that's actually at the heart of what makes communication work, right? As opposed to just communicating and conveying a number of scientific facts, right? That's what I used to do. Sort of just, you know, can I find the best word possibly to convey the end of the world as we know it, you know? In some factoids that people can remember. Or that sticks in their minds.
But really, when you think about any talk, any moving event, or keynote, or whatever that you have heard it is when people are touched in their hearts. And their deepest own concerns about what is my life about? Why am I here? You know, and can you in some ways, connect to that part? Through story or, you know, whatever it is. And ask people to be in the world from that place. It's a very different proposition than how do I communicate, you know, certain parts per million. And the temperature curve, right? I am asking people to reconsider how do you want to be on this planet while you are here?
Doherty: Yeah.
Moser: And in my experience, I can tell them very frightening information and very uplifting information. And still have people walk out with hope when I have touched that place.
Doherty: Yeah.
Moser: If I haven't done that, it was a lost opportunity.
Doherty: So for our listeners who are listening, I mean, we're, again, this fly on the wall in this conversation. I think one of the takeaways is that … working with meaning is like swimming in deep water. You know, we have it and then we lose it. And then we're okay temporarily losing our meaning because this work is difficult. And it is all, you know, irrational. Like you say the world is absurd. And so we have these periods of losing meaning.
But then if we can go to the emotions. And be with other people. And share these emotions, then that kind of cycles us back, probably to the meaning. So I think, for young listeners in particular, you know, as Susi and Panu can verify, you know, we lose our meaning. We think we have it and we try to work and it becomes difficult. We get burned out. And then we go through that time. And then we recover our meaning, right? So that's a takeaway for the listeners, right? All these cycles.
Moser: Can I build on that?
Doherty: Sure.
Moser: So you said, it's absurd. I don't think the world is absurd.
Doherty: Fair enough.
Moser: So for me, when we temporarily might think that way, I think that's the moment when the frame through which we look at the world is too small to hold it. To actually make sense of it. We are invited in that moment, into a bigger frame. So when I'm in a bigger way to understand what's happening, than even this descent, you know. Or even this falling apart of Western society makes sense to me. For other people who, you know, are still holding on to that particular frame, it's terrible. And it makes no sense. You know, why bother living, right? But when you see it in the larger frame of say, this is an archetypal movement, where smaller self definitions have to necessarily crumble, make space for something different, right? And you then discover something new.
So it's not even remake, recovering, meaning. It is making a whole new meaning. Like you come out differently after that. And I think we as a society. I hope we as humanity will come out very different. When we are through this transformational rough spot that we're in at the moment. And, you know, hopefully get to being a very different way on the planet. I mean, as Joanna Macy would say, from a life defying or life destroying way of being to a life supporting. Life is restored. Life enhancing force on the planet. I always love to think, you know, can we keep the Anthropocene to a really, really thin layer? Going back to my geological training, right? Like, can we keep that to a really thin layer? And then become a force on the planet that actually helps to rebuild life?
Doherty: Yeah.
Moser: I don't know. As opposed to destroying it.
Pihkala: That's a great reason. As it has been said, we need visions. And things that we can hope for. That certainly is one that I'm in for.
Moser: Well, we're supposed to be, you know, Homo Sapiens. Sapiens. The white wise ones, right? We're not anywhere near the wise ones. So I think it's time for us to still become the species we could become.
Doherty: That's a great place to close out today. I mean, on this growthful vision. I do want to, we'll share some of the links. And to that documentary, you mentioned Susi. And to some of your work. And I could easily see having you back again for another time to continue this conversation. Obviously, there's so much we could go into. But I hope the listeners got something out of today. Both young listeners. Science folks. Folks working on adaptation helping communities to live in the world of climate change. And I really appreciate your work, Susi, and I wish you the best. And I hope you hope you have success in the next little bit here.
Moser: Thank you so much. It's wonderful to be with both of you. And yes, to be continued.
Doherty: Alright, I'll take care of yourselves. Bye bye.
Panu Pihkala: Warm thanks, Susi. Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 13: SustyVibes with Jennifer Uchendu
Feb 17, 2023
image credit | The Susty Vibes team on the streets of Lagos during World Cleanup Day
Season 2, Episode 13: SustyVibes with Jennifer Uchendu
Thomas and Panu spoke with Jennifer Uchendu, a researcher and climate activist from Lagos, Nigeria. Jennifer is founder of SustyVibes, a youth-focused climate organization with a mission to design and implement projects that make sustainability cool, actionable and relatable in Africa. The trio discussed Jennifer’s sense of Nigeria’s environmental situation and history and climate emotions she has observed among youth and elders in the country. Jennifer explained the SustyVibes mindset and the new Eco-Anxiety in Africa Project, where she works with scholars like Charles Ogunbunde (see Season 2, Episode 8). As Jennifer reflected:
“It's been a journey of just learning. Pointing myself to more and more exciting projects. But ultimately, the goal is to ensure that young people … in my generation, young people who look like me, have the right agency or the tools to transform whatever feelings of fear or powerlessness to hope and to actions.”
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. The show for people around the globe who are thinking about the personal side of climate change. Particularly their emotional responses and their feelings about climate change. And you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And support us at our Patreon so we can bring this content to you. And today, we are very excited to have a special guest.
Jennifer Uchendu: Hi, everyone. My name is Jennifer Uchendu. I'm calling in from Nigeria. And I'm the founder of SustyVibes. Looking forward to our discussion today.
Doherty: Yes. And so we're really glad to have Jennifer coming in from Lagos. And we've been waiting for this conversation for a while. And, as you know, we try to make this as best we can a world conversation. And with different people, and different ages. So I'm really looking forward to [this] chat. Panu, do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Jennifer, also, from my part. I'm really glad to have this opportunity to discuss. We've met online a couple of times, in things related to climate emotions. And I've been fascinated by the work you've been doing in Nigeria. Both research and leading and working with NGOs. And so there's plenty to talk about here. And we're really interested about Nigerian perspectives, also. But would you like to start by saying a bit about where you are and where you come from, so to speak. So, what's up for you, Jennifer?
Uchendu: Absolutely. Thanks, Panu. I'm calling in from Lagos, Nigeria, where I live and work. SustyVibes, my organization, you know, we're based in Nigeria. [We] started here [and] have now started expanding to parts of West Africa. But really our work is for, you know, young people in Nigeria.
I always like to tell the story, as you know, seven years ago, I was, you know, this really young person. I'm still young now. But I was super young. Really passionate about, you know, the environment and looking for a platform where I can be a young person that meaningfully participates and contributes to environmental protection. And at the time, there were typical, you know, NGOs and CSOs in Nigeria that were run by older people. And there wasn't a lot of space for that kind of youth led and youth focused work. And then I started writing a blog about sustainability and the environment. And that kind of evolved into the work that I do now. Which is like bringing young people together and driving work when it comes to, you know, environmental protection.
And I found myself in this work for climate and mental health as far back as 2019. Where we saw that even though young people were coming together to do work on environmental protection, there were still lots of emotions coming in and interplaying in our everyday lives that we needed to kind of interrogate [and] explore a bit more. And, you know, that's where we got to find out about eco-anxiety. You know, grief and all of those emotions that make us whole and human, I would say. And it's been really interesting, you know, navigating these emotions. Finding ways to safeguard them. Especially for us as Africans, recognizing that, you know, our own emotions and triggers as it relates to the climate crisis is quite peculiar. Especially when you look at it from the lens of climate justice, you know, and whatnot.
So there's been so much to explore. It's been a journey of just learning. Pointing myself to more and more exciting projects. But ultimately, the goal is to ensure that young people, you know, in my generation, young people who look like me have the right agency or the tools to transform whatever feelings of fear or powerlessness to hope and to actions. So yeah, that really is me in a nutshell.
Doherty: Nigeria is—I'm looking at the map of Nigeria, Jennifer. I'd like to say just at the beginning a bit about you—what is the experience of people there and young people? It's funny, my daughter is 15. And she's studying human geography. And she has a test today where—I was helping her study for her test. And one of her vocabulary words is “superimposed boundaries” on countries. Where you make a boundary of a country that lays on top of all the existing cultures and nations within the culture.
And I know Nigeria is a very diverse place. How do you as young people in Nigeria, see yourselves in relation to the history in Nigeria with the oil? And with the politics? And I know, even into the 90s, there was violence against environmentalists? I mean, I'm really wondering, do you feel safe [in] your work? You know? Is it really revolutionary what you're doing? I'm just curious, what it feels like here in the 21st century.
Uchendu: Yeah, absolutely. Such a great question to have asked. There's so much to unpack, you know, to be a young person passionate about issues around the environment in Nigeria. On one hand, you know that our livelihoods, you know, lifestyle is very much linked to our environment, you know, for us in Nigeria. You can't take that away from, you know, our reality. You know, just a couple of days ago, we woke up, and we just found out that we had no water. You're just trying to figure out what exactly it is, you know. It's like, it's the reality where every day there's some linkage with the environment. With natural resources and whatnot. But at the same time, where you live in Nigeria. Whether it's the urban or rural area. Whether it's the southwest, the north. Kind of, you know, dictates your relationship with whether it's power or, you know, the issues at hand. So a lot of people in the southwest who live in the urban area oftentimes are kind of more shielded than people who live in rural areas. And interestingly, you know, I've also been very curious about how people who live in urban areas feel about the climate crisis. Especially as we have, you know, kind of like a better lifestyle, as it were.
So, I've actually just started a new research project, working with Dr. Charles Ogunbode. You might know him, where we're investigating climate emotions in West African cities. So it's kind of, you know, that curiosity to find out, okay, what really is at play. Especially for young people who live, you know, in cities, and having said that, we're also very cognizant of our history. Yeah, when I got into this work ten, eight years ago, and got to learn about, you know, about "Ken" Saro-Wiwa, got to learn about, you know, the Niger Delta. I was just kind of enveloped with so much anger, and so much kind of grief to see that we lost people who have such passion, who really cared about their people, just, you know, in the face of corrupt and oppressive leadership. And while that's scary, we live in an age where that is not as expected as it should be. Because we're now in a democracy and whatnot, social media. You know, there's so many things that help us kind of achieve our activism. But definitely, when you remember that I think what that does to us, it empowers you to want to do more. You know, to want to be more radical, more revolutionary to kind of push the limits and to demand for what's right.
And, you know, I see that even in kind of the ideologies and things that I believe in, and what we've kind of cultivated at SustyVibes in terms of how do we, for example, understand what an energy transition means for us. You know, it's an energy transition. We want to ask: are there principles around justice and equity? Are they being, you know, put into some of these big words that we hear. Because it's really about our futures really about, you know, how we get to live in 10, 15 years time. So that's how we think about, you know, this conversation. Really thinking about our place. And, you know, how we can continue to, you know, demand for what's right in ways that feel authentic to us.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks a lot, Jennifer, for sharing that. And with Charles Ogunbode, we had the pleasure of discussing a couple of episodes back and heard a little bit about this very interesting research project about climate emotions in West and East Africa. And glad to hear that you're, Jennifer, part of that. And what I hear from you is that these things really come close to you in Nigeria, and for Nigerian young people. And the timescale in which very major potential threats are seen, that's much shorter than in some of the places in Northern Europe, where I'm living, for example. And then also the very understandable, righteous anger and sense of injustice related to these tragic happenings. And unjust uses of power, for example, in Nigerian history.
And you have also written yourself that you have often encountered feelings of anger and powerlessness among young people in relation to these global complex crises as the climate crisis is. So, could you share a bit about the spectrum of climate emotions you encounter in the people you work with and meet. So, it seems that this anger, helplessness, that's one part of the spectrum, but what all is there? Could you say a bit about [that]?
Uchendu: Absolutely. And yeah, because when you hear, you know, the work that we do. The name of our organization is SustyVibes, you know, we kind of designed our mission around youth energy, youth passion. And around having fun. Around kind of building our agency from what makes us young people. And so our projects have really been designed around, rather than having, you know, technical workshops, let's host a party instead. When we think about advocacy, can we have an exhibition or a movie screening? So there's really been the idea of relaxation and fun incorporated in our idea of, you know, sustainability advocacy.
But I mentioned in 2019, we saw kind of like a shift. That even though we're doing all of these really exciting things, we still felt, you know, a sense of overwhelm. I personally felt, you know, that we're just up against so much when it comes to the climate crisis. Especially when you see, you know, we felt like, you know, a tiny 0.00001, you know, fraction of the change that was needed to turn things around. And that feeling, that kind of narrative oftentimes brought us down. You know, it made us feel kind of very weak and very small. So, you know, and that side by side with feelings of anger. Anger because we're like, why do we have to work so hard? Why do we have to, you know, give up a lot of things, you know, to be these people we are. Climate activists per se. And, you know, the world just kind of goes on. Some people would never have to deal with it. So you would see that kind of, you know, drag and weight. Weight of, you know, building of hope, as it's where we're feeling as young people at SustyVibes. And I thought it was really interesting, because it wasn't until I got to the UK that I was able to, you know, put the two emotions together to see that young people in the UK were feeling, you know, things like shame and guilt. And I was like, what am I ashamed of? You know, I'm angry. You know, it's a different thing on this site.
I thought it was really interesting to see how even just context power and privilege and positionality just changes the way, you know, the emotions you get to encounter when it comes to the climate crisis. So in that spectrum, there are days, you know, we talk about days where we feel super hopeful. Where we feel excited, you know, about the work that we do when we go out to the streets. When we go tree planting, and communities, you know, adopt the trees. And, you know, commit to looking after them, because it's important for them, you know. We're really excited about the work that we do. And every SustyViber, you know, kind of has that mindset put in them. That we do really good work for the environment. But there are days where, you know, it's all gloomy, and you hear the news, you know, you see something happening and you're just sad all over again. You're like where do we kind of go on from here?
So it's definitely a spectrum. Where we kind of oscillate from, you know, really hopeful and joyful moments to days where we feel completely powerless, and we don't want to do anything, you know, after all. And I think it's okay, you know, to have all of those feelings. The important thing is learning how to safeguard them. Learning how to hold, you know, both spectrums of the emotions. And just pushing forward every day. And showing up to be, you know, better, more responsible humans as it were. So that's the mindset we now take into our work.
Doherty: That's very well said. That's very well said. When I think of vibes. I was hearing someone talk about vibing just the other day. You know, to vibe with someone. You know, you talk about SustyVibes. You know, to vibe with someone is to really feel comfortable with them. To feel light. To feel happy. To be in the present moment. To feel safe. Right? That's how we talk about it in terms of our personal relationships, right?
So that's, I think, something we need to think about. How do we bring that energy into our work when we're working on these super heavy, wicked problems? And I don't know, I think old people forget about that. But, you know, younger people are still making the world. You know, they're still finding the world. Why don't you say more. I know, you have a lot of things you want to express about your work. Do you want to talk about some of your projects, or some of your research?
Uchendu: Yeah, for sure. And even just to touch on, you know, the idea of SustyVibes. You know, when I came into this work, you know, thinking about sustainable development, I had someone who said that even the concept of sustainable development sounds like an oxymoron. Because development is all about growth. And then you're talking about sustainability. You know, where do you find balance? And I was looking to create something, you know, that is really about making sustainability actionable, relatable, and also cool. So that it doesn't sound, you know, like things that don't fit together. So that we see it as a possibility. You know, where we don't, you know, see a sustainable idea and innovation, and we think, oh, this is, you know, completely foreign and impossible for us.
And that really has been that mindset. So it's about being comfortable making it, you know, part of our everyday lifestyle to talk about these issues. You know, to say, I'm a tree hugger. And that doesn't make me weird, you know, per se. I am a tree hugger because I believe that, you know, I'm a big part of nature. And whatever I do, you know, fits into the larger ecosystem. And that really has been, you know, the mindset we put into our work. So it's also funny, you talk about, you know, older people, elders, you know, intergenerational kind of work. I think it was sometime last year that we got into a project with Stanford University, and a couple of collaborators. Britt Wray, you know, looking really at what is the power in conversations around, you know, climate emotions. And thinking about how conversations and dialogue even among young people, and older people might be useful to help us kind of navigate these very difficult emotions.
And we've started a project. Intervention for Lago. It's happening both in Lagos, the UK and the US. And it's been interesting to see even older people talk about these difficult emotions that they have also had to cope with, deal with. But at the same time, they've not found, you know, ways to express them as we now have as young people. And it's just been really interesting to see them, you know, kind of offer advice or resilience. But at the same time, look to us to see how even in expressing emotions. In validating emotions, we find strength, you know, to cope through, you know, what, we're all going through as, you know, in the climate crisis. And that has kind of brought off an offshoot of a project we're now about to start, where we're looking for, you know, climate activists who are now older people over 60 in Nigeria, who have for a very long time been doing this work. Trying to see what narratives they've held on to for a very long time that has kept them to kind of continue and you know, pull through. And have that kind of march on mindset. That you just have to continue pouring in yourself to do this work.
And that, you know, ties really well with the topic, you know, the theme of this podcast. These elders have found joy in their work even though it's difficult. You know, they've found joy. And they've been able to hold both feelings of suffering and pain, with joy and, you know, accomplishments and achievements over time. And I think there are opportunities for us to also learn, you know, from our elders. And from older people when it comes to the climate crisis. So we're really excited to be doing that work with Stanford University, and you know, in Nigeria, as well. So I just wanted to touch on that.
Pihkala: Thank you, Jennifer. That's very profound and great to hear that you have made openings in this intergenerational dialogue. And one of the very sad things that can happen around climate issues is that there may be generational disputes. Or between people who have or seem to have different kinds of attitudes and behaviors. So there's a lot of bridge building needed in communities. And it's always great to hear when people have good experiences of that. It also sounds like you have been able to get away from others, to remain open to this full spectrum of life, all the different emotions as you, as you say. And I'm very much appreciating that you explicitly acknowledge the oscillation escalation between various moods.
And in my own research work about the various journeys that people have with climate emotions and different dimensions, the fact of oscillation has been very important there. So trying to validate that it's a very normal thing which happens. And also advocating that we need distancing in a healthy sense. So self care and community care and relaxation. So I hear a lot of things happening with SustyVibes that I've also been discussing in the more theoretical work. So very good to hear.
Uchendu: Thank you.
Doherty: Yeah. Jennifer, when you talk, I mean, a lot of this, I think, for the listeners, for everyone is, really. Well, we talk about environmental identity. So we have an identity about [this]. Part of our identity is how I relate to nature and the natural world. And it's claiming that identity, whatever that means for us. And it's always intersecting with all of our other cultural and gender and sexual identities. And, you know, so you're talking about claiming your environmental identity as a Nigerian person. And, as, I'm not sure how you think of yourself. And maybe as a young woman, or whatever terms that you know, you use. You're claiming this and helping other people. And other young people claim this. And, you know, it's cool, it's good, it's fun. It's important. It's not weird, as you say.
I started with this. And I used to take American young people out into the woods in the US for their therapy. And my co worker said, well what about me? How does this work for me as an adult? And that's how I got into my own idea of sustainable self, right? Personal sustainability. So like, we take our abstract sustainability ideas about the world and put it to our own life, you know. So it makes no sense to run ourselves down and burn ourselves out to save the planet. Because we are part of nature, you know, yeah. So that was my equation at the time. This idea of personal sustainability. Sustainable self. Your equation is SustyVibes. What other things in Nigeria and other parts of the world in terms of creating their own visions? Or what do you see about it?
Uchendu: Yeah, for sure. I've had young people come up to me to say, even just the concept of SustyVibes has inspired them to start, you know, new initiatives where they just think in terms of possibilities. You know, as you mentioned, you know, sustainable futures. And what that would look like. And that, for me, has been just very fulfilling to see. You know, that this concept or this idea resonates with a lot of people. When we host a party, for example, and we have lots of people sign up and attend, it's very validating.
And even with SustyVibes, our eco anxiety work is channeled through something called the Eco Anxiety Africa Project. Which we started last year in February actually. And the amount of you know, how many people have embraced you know, that project. Have reached out. Have, you know, felt very validated. Have said, oh, we needed this for a very long time. And I've had even older environmentalists say, eco anxiety has been with us for a very long time. We've just not had a word, you know, to define and kind of conceptualize it. So it feels good to, you know, see people see these initiatives and this project and, you know, just fully embrace it. And say they feel validated. You know, they feel kind of empowered to say that they are not crazy to have all of these emotions. That these are real human experiences that make us human. And it's even within these emotions, that we find strengths to act for, you know, environmental protection. So I think that has been really useful for us. Yeah.
Doherty: Yeah. Anxiety as an ally. You know, it's a normal part of our emotional equipment to feel anxious about threats. And I think, traditionally, sustainability, like you talk about sustainable development, is very intellectual. It's very economic. It's very reductionistic. Even people that understand science and conservation. Wildlife conservation. A lot of these people have silently suffered because of [being] scientists themselves. And the economists and the activists haven't had that emotional language. So it is really empowering to be able to share these things. And then not feel like you're weak or less than or not as rigorous and things like that.
Uchendu: Absolutely. Yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah. And it's very important, sort of public work, and public witness. And I've heard similar things from older people in Finland. Now that for the last six years, we've had more discussion about eco emotions in Finland. So they have been [coming] to me. And my colleagues say that, you know, in the early 1970s, with the oil crisis, we did feel this kind of anxiety already then. But there were just no words for it. So that seems to be a thing to be discussed in various parts of the world. How to connect the generations with some more active now and then the older ones. And find ways to join forces. And what about elsewhere in Africa? I know that's a huge continent. But do you have some sort of friend organizations in countries or areas nearby? So how's the scene around that?
Uchendu: Yeah, for sure. I mean, the projects, the research projects, I'm working with Dr. Charles Ogunbode, looking at Anglophone West Africa. And with every organization, we've reached out to collaborate. You know, they've said, you know, yes, this is something that's been needed. This is a gap, you know, in our work. We've done kind of climate adaptation, or mitigation in ways that have been very much about kind of infrastructure, or funding. You know, economics of things without looking at the social fabric. You know, our well being. And what adaptation means through and through. And it's been very, you know, good to see, you know, project partners. So with TEAP [The Eco-anxiety in Africa Project], what we've done is to host monthly webinars.
And we've tried to find, you know, people in other parts of Africa who resonate with this idea. So we've had, you know, webinars with collaborators in Kenya. You know, we have one later this weekend with collaborators in Egypt, you know, who want to explore things like empathy. And how it, you know, really supports us in, you know, navigating climate anxiety, eco anxiety. So it's been very interesting, you know, to see that kind of spectrum. You know, there's folks in Ghana, who are using the arts to also explore, you know, this topic. And so you see, when you see all of these projects coming up, you're excited because it kind of resonates deep. And it shows that we're making progress.
We are now kind of filling the gap. Filling the knowledge gap to have more about these conversations, because advocacy is key. The next level would be, how do we then put this into policy? How do our environmental and health ministries, you know, come together to look at how to really support people when we talk about climate adaptation? So it's, you know, it's been refreshing to see, you know, this new direction, and this conversation. And one thing I didn't talk about is, SustyVibes as part of the consortium working on, you know, the really global dialogues on climate and mental health with the Wellcome Trust. And we're really looking forward to leading a lot of these projects, you know, particularly in the Global South. Working with all of our consortium partners in _____ University and whatnot. So it's, it's been good to see that this direction, this attention, and all of these opportunities are coming up to do this kind of work.
Doherty: Yeah, this is great. This is a great, great conversation. We're coming to the end of our time. And I think we really succeeded in Jennifer, just learning a little bit about you and your work. You know, practically for the listeners, what you're hearing is how to deal with eco anxiety. You know, it is painful. It is scary. It is overwhelming, but we don't eliminate it, we simply add additional emotions to help support. So on each side of my anxiety, I have empathy. and I have my positive vibrations. And I have my relationships, right? And I have my hope. So it's not black and white. It's about multiple emotions in harmony. And then that anxiety kind of has its place. But it's not alone.
And then, of course, one thing we might do in the future, all of us, is do some sort of geography of eco anxiety. You know, because different regions have different variations. Jennifer, you're not tapping into the shame that someone maybe in some more privileged places tap into. So there's a geography of this as well. But I really appreciate your time. And Panu I know you're working on how to cope. [Do] you want to click close us off with some comments today, Panu?
Pihkala: Well, warm thanks, Jennifer, for your time. And all this lived wisdom you are bringing both to this conversation and for the places where you are working together with others. So there's been great content in relation to helpful coping with emotions. Which are sort of embodied methods happening both in oneself and together with others. So one warm thanks, Jennifer, for all that.
Uchendu: Thanks so much, Panu and Thomas.
Doherty: Yeah. And I'm gonna get started with my day here and in Northwestern US. Panue, you have your evening. Jennifer, what's the rest of your day hold for you?
Uchendu: I have one last meeting for the day. And I will just wrap up. Yeah, it's almost 6pm here.
Doherty: All right. So you still have some work to do before you can get healthy. Thanks again, Jennifer. We'll have a number of good links in our show notes. And we'll be getting this episode out soon.
Uchendu: Thank you.
Doherty: Thank you all and to the listeners.
Uchendu: Thanks. Bye.
Pihkala: Take care. Bye bye.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 12: Art Gives Ecological Grief a Body, with Daniela Molnar
Feb 03, 2023
image credit | Genaro Molina, Los Angeles Times Staff Photographer
Season 2, Episode 12: Art Gives Ecological Grief a Body with Daniela Molnar
Thomas and Panu were joined by artist and poet Daniela Molnar, who creates her paintings using scientific records of glacier retreat in the Cascade range and natural paints and pigments she gathers near her home and in her wilderness journeys. The trio discussed how art making is one way to “enfranchise” climate grief that otherwise goes unrecognized, where in Daniela’s case she confronts forces of grief and wonder, in dynamic interplay. “Making paint is a kind of ecology,” Daniela observed. When making your own pigment the “world becomes full of colors,” rocks and plants gain agency and different waters from rain or sea behave in a way that is very much alive. Daniela evoked the creative tension apparent in regeneration of damaged landscapes where a “wound is simultaneously an injury and a process of healing.”
“When we talk about non-resolution in a work of art and how it has that dynamic equilibrium, that's what beauty is. It's that tension. And the world is beautiful. You know, the world is incredibly beautiful. Even as it's incredibly wounded. And to allow ourselves to experience both fully is really a way to live in the world. And live our lives fully. And live in a way that moves us into different cultural territory that I think is essential.”
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Thomas Doherty
Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. This is a show for people around the world who are thinking and feeling deeply about global climate change and other environmental issues that are affecting us as people around the world. And here we really get into our different kinds of feelings and our different kinds of emotions. We go deep into that. It's a rare opportunity and we're really glad to have it.
Please make sure to find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And please support us on our Patreon. And – we've had a theme about art and creativity that Panu and I are very close to. Today we're really lucky to have a guest.
Daniela Molnar: Hello, my name is Daniela Molnar. And I'm an artist, a poet and a writer. And I work with themes of climate change and climate grief. I work a lot with natural pigments. And I'm delighted to be here. Thank you.
Doherty: It's really great to have Daniela. I met Daniela a couple of years ago when she was teaching at one of the art institutes here in Portland. And we had a talk on eco-anxiety and climate change. And so I've been able to track her work a little bit. And also interact with her in terms of general therapeutic work for people in climate and environment.
But I've been really excited to explore Daniela's process and to learn how she makes her work. And so we're going to talk about that on a number of levels today. And listeners, you can think about your own creative life in various ways as this comes up. Panu, I know you're interested in this too, do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Yes, warmly welcome, Daniela also for my part. Very nice to meet you. This is the first day that we meet you. We just had a brief conversation and found out that we have something in common. We both know a little Hungarian. You have much stronger roots there, but I've got some family connections also.
But we would like to start with your journey with climate change. I know that you've been doing many things in relation to it. But would you like to share something of your journey?
Molnar: Sure. Thank you for the question. I think that my journey with climate change, and it has changed a lot over time, began probably when I was an undergraduate. I studied both art and environmental studies. And I actually focused more on environmental studies for a variety of reasons. So this was the late 90s. And I was learning about climate change sort of as this big thing that we knew about, but it didn't have nearly the same sort of scope or emotional impact that it has now. But I was working with forest ecologists in the Pacific Northwest who were starting to recognize the enormous impacts that climate change was having. And it really impacted me on a deep level. And it also was the kind of thing that, and I think many people feel this, where I was like, well, I'm not sure what to do. And that feeling stayed with me for many years.
My life went through various twists and turns. And I ended up teaching, as Thomas noted, at an art school in Portland [PNCA]. And I started a program there in 2016 called Art and Ecology. And in that program art students were able to learn about ecological issues and use it as a lens with which to fuel their art. And in putting together that program, the core course focused on climate change. For obvious reasons. Climate change is this issue that touches on every other issue. Every other social issue, political issue, environmental issue, cultural issue. It's an incredibly complicated and vast topic.
So I use that as the core course to orient us to these ideas. And in putting that course together, I just went deep into climate change research. And, frankly, went into a state of profound climate grief. I was so overwhelmed. Completely just struck by the things that I was reading. And had no idea what to do with it. And then was in this position of trying to teach it. And those circumstances put me in a position of really needing to work through what I was experiencing with my art, as I was trying to teach others to do the same. So that's a little bit about how I came to where I am now. And that's still really very much what I'm doing with my work.
Pihkala: Thank you very much for sharing that. So it's quite a journey. And you already described many of the emotional tones you had and the earlier what should I do about this. Which on one hand, is a sort of question of what can be called practical anxiety. You know, there's some problem which has some uncertainty in it. And it leads people to ask: what's my relation to this? And what should I do?
But it really sounds like it struck you much more forcefully during that time when you were reading science. And then having this difficult role where you have to do something with other people. Which is a responsible position. And then one may be quite torn by the almost traumatic consequences of the information. And this is something that many environmental educators I know have been struggling with. So thanks for sharing that intimately.
Molnar: Yeah, I think that teaching is, you know, it offers an opportunity to really work through these issues in a forum. I like to think of any teaching environment as a community in which I don't have, and this became very clear to me when I was trying to teach about climate change, I don't have the answers. You know, as the teacher, I'm not the authority. I'm working through it with everyone. And I'm grateful, even though it was a very difficult course to teach. I'm so grateful for the opportunity that I had to teach it because it really put me into a position in which I was able to more fully feel these issues. And feel them in community with my students. And they taught me a lot. And I'm grateful for that.
Doherty: Yeah, this is great. I, you know, as we were planning our discussion, I was thinking about my use as not a professional artist as but my use of art personally from my own coping and identity. Environmental identity and sense of place. But also helping other people use this. And teaching therapists how to do art therapy, essentially. And then for the listeners, there's different kinds of listeners for this episode. Some people are just curious about this. Other people might be professional artists doing their own work and their own sort of hero's journey with their art process.
So it seems to me there's two levels with this. There's the level one which is just art therapy, where we use even existing works of art, famous paintings, poems, you know, music. Panu and I did our music episode. We use these as ways to channel and express ourselves. And to find solace. And find, you know, comfort and universality that other people have tried these paths across times and places. And so that's really helpful. And it's relatively simple, although obviously, some artwork can be super challenging and really raucous. I mean, you know, what is it? Kafka has a quote about you know, art should be the ax that smashes the frozen sea within us. Or something like that, you know. So some artwork, obviously, is very challenging. But then there's the other level where people are actually on a path of creation. Where you don't know where it's going to go.
And I know, Panu you've talked about it, it can be really challenging. And I know your work. And so we can kind of maybe go in two directions here. About how people can, you know, find solace. But also maybe at some point today, I want Daniela to tell us literally how you make some of your pieces so people can really understand this process for you. Where do you think we should go? Any thoughts?
Molnar: Yeah, well, maybe I'll just touch on the idea of art. I think of art engaging with our either making it or engaging with art that others have made. And when I use the term art, I'm using it really broadly. Like, to me, the differences between a painting and a poem and a song are really just differences of kind, not of substance. So any type of art, I think, is a conduit. It's an opening. And it's a way to connect with someone who may have been dead for hundreds of years. And yet, still, you're connecting with the spirit of this person. And that may sound abstract or, you know, difficult to understand. But it's not something that I think needs to be understood. It's something that we feel. And because it's something that we feel, and I think it's just a very, very basic part of the human experience. It exists in all cultures, throughout time. It's accessible to everyone. Whether you make art or interact with art. It's a way to open up to someone else's spirit. And when you open up to someone else's spirit, you're also opening up to your own. So I think that there's always that available.
And I think, to me, it's one of the most beautiful things about humans. That we've made this culture in which we can freely share across generations and geographies and vast stretches of time. And I do think that it's a wonderful tool to use to more fully understand, you know, who we are and what we're doing with our lives. And then as you touch on, there's a difference between, you know, getting out some markers and some crayons and just letting yourself play. Or I think coloring books are a wonderful way to just let yourself play. And kind of turn off your conscious mind and get in touch with that spiritual and non rational part of ourselves that gets neglected so often.
And then there's, you know, making art a central part of one's life. And building an art practice and an art practice is, you know, it's a daily commitment that really is core to my experience. In which every single day I'm waking up and dedicating myself to the act of making art. And in doing that, very difficult things come up in that process. I don't think there's anywhere to hide in making art. There's no shadows that you can, you know, crouch behind. Anything that you're experiencing, is going to come up if you're making art in an honest way. And that brings its own challenges. It also brings tremendous possibilities.
So you alluded to the ways that I actually make the paintings, which I think is really, really important. And it does kind of open up this double sidedness of what I think of in my art as like this force of grief. And this force of wonder. And wonder and grief are always in dynamic interplay in how I'm working constantly. On a moment to moment basis. In the paintings themselves. So I make a lot of my own pigments from natural materials. And pretty much anything in the world can make a pigment. Which means pretty much anything in the world can be painted. And if you're walking down, you know, a street in the middle of the city, something's going to be there that can make pigment. So it really changes how one sees the world when you start to make your own pigments. And that the world becomes full of colors. In a way that's different from, you know, just seeing colors as like surfaces. But it becomes like a depth to the world.
And then I also combine the pigments that I make with waters that are from different sources. So rainwater, river water, tap water, ocean water. When I'm lucky enough to be by hot springs, hot springs water. And when you mix all these different things together, the paints that arise are really different in how they operate when you're actually using them in a painting. They behave in ways that are a little unpredictable and very, very alive. And what this pigment making process has taught me is that the materials that I'm actually using, many of which are rocks and plants to make the pigments, they're extremely alive. And they have their own agency. I'm not saying that they necessarily have their own minds. They don't have consciousnesses like human consciousness, but they have an agency that's very alive.
And when I'm making paint from water, which also has its own agency. And a rock, which has its own agency. and I'm combining them and putting them into a painting in which I'm trying to work through confusion and grief and challenging, you know, emotions and spiritual conundrums of all sorts. The rocks, and the water will often show me things that I couldn't have arrived at on my own. And often what they're showing me is this combination of grief and wonder or beauty and violence. That is simultaneous. And I think where it brings me in my work is this very fundamental, but difficult to hold onto, idea which is that in any exchange, in every single moment in our lives, we're constantly in this binary between, you know, how absolutely challenging the world is, and how absolutely beautiful the world is. And that our minds really want to have certainty. And so our minds want to go either towards the beauty or the horror. Neither one is more true than the other. And they're both utterly true.
And if I'm able, in my art making, or in interacting with other peoples art to engage with that non resolution, then I'm able to stay hopeful. And I'm able to stay open. And I'm able to allow myself to continue to experience the world and all its fullness. And that's really important for me specifically in relation to climate issues.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for all that. That's very fascinating and feels most important. And I can resonate with many parts of that myself. And I know many people who are searching for this difficult balance. Or actually the balancing act. I think it's a kind of dialectical thinking that you're sort of, there's some oscillation between opposing poles, so to speak. And out of that the fullness of life may emerge in all its colors to use this kind of expression. Co-creation is another word that came to mind. Both related to the teaching and education dynamic.
Stephen Siperstein is a very interesting climate educator and a poet who has written in a fascinating way about the interactive character of climate education. And becoming more aware of the problems of hierarchical attitudes towards education. And being open to what can be co-learned and co-created in the moment. And what you, Daniela, say about agency of the colors, and different elements of nature, there seems to be a co-creation, there, also
Molnar: Yeah, that's beautifully put. Absolutely. It's the co-creation or co-learning that I referenced with my students, which is ongoing. Anytime I teach, that's the case, is absolutely also the case with the pigments in the water, and the paint. That I'm co-learning and co-creating with them. And it really is a feeling of non-aloneness, which is important. Like it's this sense of being part of the world. And part of a human community. But also a more than human community. Which is, I think, completely essential to working through some of these very challenging emotions that come up around climate change.
Doherty: Yeah, I'm struck by a lot of parallels between other conversations we've been having. We had a great conversation with Kim Stafford, the poet, about him speaking in the voice of other parts of nature. And also connecting with children and their sense of wonder. And reconnecting as adults with our own sense of wonder. And then this other darker, more challenging theme of, you know, the penalties of an ecological education is living in a world of wounds.
So once we get curious about this stuff, and want to actually go to a glacier and see what's going on. And actually, experientially, you know, visit these places, it opens us up to this knowledge that then can, you know, as they say, things can't be unseen and unknown. So it is this rite of passage. I was talking to an old friend who was visiting and he's working in Antarctica. And he was telling me about it. We looked at the map of Antarctica from the South Pole, which I typically don't do, and he showed all the geology of the place. And explained why these glaciers and ice sheets are so important to the planet and plate tectonics and many things that I just never grasped. And he's been to Antarctica 23 times. And sits with this all the time. And there are people out there around the world, event listeners, who are sitting with this tough knowledge. Yeah. So, Daniela, I mean, you do go, part of your work is traveling into nature. And going to places. That's part of your gathering of the materials and gathering of your own experience.
Molnar: Yeah, it is. And it's an important part for me. You know, sometimes finding pigments means walking down the alleys in my neighborhood in the city. But oftentimes, it means going into wilderness areas. And I had the opportunity to go to Alaska, and hang out with some glaciers this summer. Which was profound. And I also lead others into wilderness areas and teach others how to do that themselves. Because I do think it's an extremely important activity that is its own type of creative practice. Because you are exposed to what could be seen as a wounded world. It is a wounded world. And there's no way to get around that when you start to know what you're seeing.
But I also think it's important to note that a wound, you know, if you cut your finger, that wound instantly starts healing. A wound is both, you know, the injury and it's instantly the process of healing simultaneously. And the same is true in wounds in the world. You know, even if that wound keeps recurring, which often it does with environmental issues. There's also a constant process of regeneration and rebuilding. And both of those things, I think, are really evident when we're able to, make ourselves open to these places and be in them fully.
Pihkala: That's very profound, I think. And reminds me of many things. The journalist Dahr Jamail, while traveling around the world and writing about that in his book, The End of Ice, for example. Several other examples. But perhaps what I'd most like to ask now is the link between what we started with you're telling of the journey towards the reading of climate science and teaching, and then the art practice? So how did it go for you? Did your sort of body or body mind start doing things with art and climate change? And how much was that conscious? And would you tell us something about that transformation period?
Molnar: Yeah, thank you, Panu. I think that whereas I have a background in scientific illustration. And I've worked with scientists in various contexts. So the way that I initially started working with climate change visually, was to actually rely on the visualization of data. By which I mean, I was looking at how the shapes of glaciers are changing. Most of them are dramatically receding. And I started painting that shape of what's been lost. And they're sort of elegies. But I was also, at the beginning, trying to communicate information. Really trying to kind of sort through it myself. And that's not exactly what happened. I don't think I arrived in the process of doing that at all.
I think what I arrived at was first a far deeper engagement with climate grief than I ever thought I would be able to do or withstand. But I did do it and I did withstand it. And as I've come out through the hardest parts of that reckoning, I've also come out, understanding that the art that I'm making doesn't need to explain anything. I think that the work you two are doing in this podcast, and then your own practices is crucial. Because I really do feel like some of the core work of climate change is cultural work. I think we need to feel our way through this as much as we need to think our way through this. And so what I'm doing with my paintings at this point is trying to welcome viewers into an emotional engagement with these ideas rather than present more information. And the colors are a huge way to do that.
I do think that the, you know, the stones and the flowers that I'm using communicate something directly to our bodies that can't necessarily and doesn't need to be put into words. And I think that people, through art, whether mine or someone else's, can kind of bypass the parts of our brains that want to find answers or find reasons or find ways to learn and justify or, etc. And just feel whatever needs to be felt in that moment. Which opens up space. It opens up space for whatever is going to happen next.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, one thing that we were thinking about for this episode, as well as just getting the idea of grief and ambiguous grief and disenfranchised grief. And so I think that's a place to maybe round up our talk today. You know, we've talked about this in the podcast, you know, grief is, you know, a feeling. You know, that when something either has been lost, is currently being lost, or we can also have anticipatory grief about things that we're going to lose. Even in the greatest moments of our lives, we already have an anticipatory grief that this is going to end. It's part of the human condition.
But with climate change, we've got this happening writ large. You know, so it's very ambiguous. What am I? What am I actually mourning? Is it something in myself? Is it something outside? And this disenfranchised grief, you know, when someone cuts down a tree, and I feel for it, but there's no way to have that be recognized in the culture. But so some of this is to flip it around, it's enfranchising the grief. Right? So it's giving it a place. I heard a quote, grief is love with no place to live or something like that, you know. So maybe we can end this idea of enfranchising, you know, giving. I'll have to look at the definition of the franchise, but it's giving something a role, power, agency. So, enfranchising, grief or other feelings.
Molnar: Yeah, that's great. I love that. I mean, I do think climate grief is a type of disenfranchised grief. And one thing that art does, is it does, it gives it a body, essentially. A painting is an actual, you know, body where these feelings can live. And I think that art is uniquely competent at also holding ambiguity and not not requiring resolution. So a painting, or a piece of music or a poem, thrive on what isn't resolved. Like that's the beauty of most art is these competing forces within it. And that, you know, holding those in dynamic equilibrium in a painting allows us to do the same. It allows us to feel both the grief and the wonder. And it allows us to understand that those are both very present in our lives. and that both deserve attention. And in ourselves. But we can bring ourselves fully to both.
Pihkala: That's wonderfully put , I think. Thanks for that. And also, Thomas, for what you spoke about earlier. And I'm leading a course at the University of Helsinki I designed about eco anxiety and various disciplines. So one could call it ecological distress or whatever. So one lecture is about various forms of grief and loss and sadness. And one is about art, or art-based methods where I'm inviting people who know more about that than ma. Of course, I do have some art practice myself. But my dear colleague Henrika Ylirisku, for example, who has been exploring the many possible functions that art can have in relation to ecological themes and climate. And sometimes challenging us. And sometimes providing opportunities to explore something. And we may still not get it after we leave the room. That is what has actually happened.
So I completely agree that there's great potential. And we don't always need to, or are even not able to, rationally name it. That's what's going on. But still it's important. And enfranchising grief is a great line. And I was just thinking about your ambiguous loss. And perhaps an ambiguous choice might be named also. That's related to the normativity around climate emotions. And some people are struggling that I cannot express joy, because the situation is so gloomy. And what I hear you say, Daniela, is that we should really give room and space for all kinds of feelings, including joy. Am I right? This is, of course, also my opinion.
Molnar: I think you're absolutely right. And yeah, I love that. I love that you brought up that phrase with ambiguous joy. Because joy is different from happiness. and grief is different from sadness, right? Both are far larger and more complicated. And I think it is more elemental to the human experience. But yeah, ambiguous joy, we need joy in our lives. And I think that beauty is both of those things, you know.
When we talk about non resolution in a work of art and how it has that dynamic equilibrium, that's what beauty is. It's that tension. And the world is beautiful. You know, the world is incredibly beautiful. Even as it's incredibly wounded. And to allow ourselves to experience both fully is really a way to live in the world. And live our lives fully. And live in a way that moves us into different cultural territory that I think is essential.
Doherty: Yeah, that's a beautiful way to kind of bring us back to our mission statement for this podcast. You know, Climate Change and Happiness. What does it mean to feel happier? To feel these kinds of things. And this idea of ambiguous joy is something we're groping toward and all these episodes. But I thought we did a great job, coming back to the feelings. And the core work here through art and through a conversation of art. So Daniela, thank you so much for coming in. This is just a taste of your work. But we'll have some links and a great video of your process on our show notes. And I really wish you luck with your shows in Oakland coming up this new year. Thank you very much for joining us.
Molnar: Thanks so much for having me. And thanks for the work you're doing.
Pihkala: It's been a great pleasure. All the best and all you listeners take care also.
Doherty: Yeah, so keep in touch with us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. We are a self-funded volunteer organization, so please support us so we can keep bringing you these messages of coping and ambiguous joy. And see our donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com or at Patreon. You all take care. Bye bye.
Season 2, Episode 11: A New Perspective on Eco-anxiety and Grief
Jan 20, 2023
image credit | The Process of Eco-Anxiety and Ecological Grief - graphics by Anne Palm
Season 2, Episode 11: A New Perspective on Eco-anxiety and Grief
In this episode, Panu shared insights from his major new paper The Process of Eco-Anxiety and Ecological Grief. In a dialog with Thomas, Panu described stages like the “semi-consciousness” we experience as we come into awareness of the severity of the ecological crisis and the shocks that can follow an environmental awakening. He explained how healthy coping requires a balance of taking action, expressing emotions like grief, and creating healthy distance by taking breaks. Thomas gave examples of people he has observed going through these stages and processes. Coping with eco-anxiety and ecological grief is a journey. Join us to learn new tools.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello. I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. The podcast for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change. In particular, their emotions. Their emotional responses. And you can find us a climatechangeandhappiness.com. And you could support us at our Patreon.
And today, I'm talking with Panu. And Panu, I know, one of our interests for us personally and for the listeners is the journey that we're all on in terms of our understanding of climate change. And particularly our emotional coping. And how we make sense. And how we deal with some of these issues and threats and stuff like that. And I know you've been working on a really big kind of what I would say a wisdom piece. A paper that you're pulling together a lot of the research and ideas for other scholars. And, you know, for other academics and researchers, but you're also, you know, have this model. Pulling together things that I think is really, practically useful for people. So we're talking about that today. And we're going to jump into that. Wherever you want to start with that. Either the background or currently what's on top of your mind. And we'll just chat about this today.
Pihkala: Thank you Thomas. In 2019 in Finland, I published a second book of mine about eco emotions and eco-anxiety [Mieli maassa? Ympäristötunteet]. So that one was a sort of handbook about various feelings and emotions that we may experience in relation to environmental issues and [the] more than human world. And in that book, I had a quite rudimentary model of the process of encountering the ecological state of the world. So that could be called the process of eco distress or process of eco-anxiety. And that quite simple graphic finger was very helpful for many people. I got good feedback from that. So that caused me to think about whether that could be elaborated more. Because that wasn't a product of a long thinking process, rather something I decided at the end of writing the book.
So then, especially from the beginning of 2021, I started thinking about this more seriously. And also, I had read many writings about the topic which were using a very famous stages model. Namely, the five stages of grief, by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, going back to the turn of the 1960s and 70s. And that's still by far the most famous model or frame of grief around the world. So often, people from various fields know about that. And I guess, Thomas, that was probably part of your training as a psychologist also. So do you remember when you first came across Kübler Ross's model?
Doherty: No, I don't remember because I think it's one of those things that's in society. And in pop culture. And so we absorb it. And then we take it as a given, like Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Or one of these kinds of things. But they're not necessarily even literally true. Or they might have been, you know, surpassed by other ideas in academia. But these kind of stand the test of time. People need a roadmap. They need some sort of model. So, you were inspired by this, but I think you're going beyond this. Or you're taking this another step forward.
Pihkala: Yeah, you're exactly right. So the Kübler-Ross model. Which is sometimes called DABDA, after the initials of the so-called stages. There's denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. You know, those are things that may happen when people encounter grief and distress. But then, as Thomas well knows, scholars of grief and bereavement have criticized the model since the beginning, for a couple of reasons. One is that not all people go through all of these things.
And the second one is that in practice, many people get the idea that this is linear. That, you know, I should move from denial to anger and bargaining and depression and acceptance. And the third point is that sometimes in contemporary societies, people think that one can reach acceptance. And then that's it, the grief is passed. And, of course, there can be great advancements in processes. But it's not so simple. As I think many people realize, there's going to be changes in moods, and when something comes up in life, you are reminded of the person or thing that you have lost. And then it's very normal to have these mood changes.
And now, in the last few years, people have been applying Kübler-Ross Stages of grief also, especially for climate grief. And I think there's a great need to apply the richness of scholarship from grief theory into this topic without giving the linear impression. Even though there is some strength in many of the wordings in the Kübler-Ross frame. So that's part of the motivation for me to work on this.
So I wanted to create a model, which would be simple enough so that it can be understood pretty easily, and could be used in education, for example. And perhaps even as a tool for self reflection. But also that it will be more nuanced. And that it would integrate the possibility and inevitability of mood changes. And what might be called fluctuation or oscillation.
And that wasn't an easy task. It was much more difficult than I thought it would be during the COVID-19. It certainly took me time to get that all figured out. So basically, the model is as follows. There is a chronological element, not stages, but phases. And in the middle, there is a three-dimension part. What I'm calling Coping and Changing. And I'll explain that more in a bit.
First, there is what I'm calling Unknowing. And this is something we have discussed in the podcast recently. Partly through the framework of blessed unknowing about the ecological crisis. Then a complex period of Semiconsciousness. And some of these terms come from [an article by] [Sarah Anne] Edwards and [Linda] Buzzell, the so-called “Waking Up Syndrome”. A kind of classic text in ecopsychology. And something I think, Thomas, you have encountered quite early on. So, after this complex phase of Semiconsciousness, where people may sort of know and not know, at the same time – and desire not to know more, because it would be so troublesome to really take in all the information. And the need for changes in one's life.
But there usually comes some kind of realization and Awakening. Which then may lead people to different directions. Some people start engaging with the ecological crisis much more. Or they just can't avoid it anymore. There may be distress of various kinds. And some people still try to get away from the topic. Which I think is very human, but of course, it often leads to severe problems, both in the psychological lives of people. There's cognitive dissonance and other things. And of course, the ethical responsibility for our common planet is difficult to do if you try to move away from the topic altogether. So there may be various kinds of shock or stress and trauma here.
And then comes the sort of heart of the model. This Coping and Changing. And as I heard you, Thomas, say many times, “all models are inadequate, but some may be useful”, to paraphrase. And this is very true for this model also. So it can't capture the fullness of what's going on. But it tries to capture enough so it might be useful. And in Coping and Changing, after long days of work, I conceptualized three dimensions which are 1) Action and 2) Grieving, which includes other emotional engagement. And thirdly, 3) Distancing, which includes both healthy self-care and problematic avoidance. The idea is that seemingly, people need elements from all these three dimensions to adjust and transform in response to the state of the world.
So action is needed so that we can take better care of the planet and ourselves. And it also may help psychologically. But as we've often talked in this podcast, if you just do action, you get in danger of activist burnout and other stuff. And [in] grieving and emotional engagement, of course, people grieve in character, as you say, Thomas, and have different takes on this. But encountering the state of the world includes the need to encounter losses and changes. So that's the grieving part. And also there, if you just go very far in that without action, and without relief, then you usually end up in trouble.
And the third part, which is here called Distancing, is the part where you take some distance to these matters. And the grief theorists very emphatically say that we need that. And it's very normal for people to also take breaks from the grieving process. And there are other things in life which demand our attention. So that's healthy. But then again, if you only do distancing, you end up in disavowal or denial. And once again, you end up in trouble. So this is sort of one of the main ideas. That we need elements from all these three. But if we just do one of them too much, then we end in trouble. How's that for you, Thomas? What thoughts come to your mind when hearing all this?
Doherty: Yeah, no, this is really great Panu. I'm following along and I have the luxury of looking at your figure that shows this graphic that shows your process. And we'll put that in our show notes. And, you know, if you go to our website, each episode has a picture. Some sort of picture. And the picture for this episode will be this graphic. So it'd be like one of the slides that Panu shows. It'll make this come alive to people. But I think just for the listener. And what I'm taking away, too. I mean, there's a pathway here. There's some steps.
I think the first part of this is the, you know, unknowing, or semi knowing or awakening or shock. You know that waking up syndrome. Which I think most listeners, I doubt people would be listening to this podcast if they didn't have that experience. So that captures where we're at. And I love the blessed unknowing stage that you talked about. The innocence that we had before we really took this on.
But then I see a bigger circle that has three things inside of it. There's this creative tension between moving toward action, dealing with the emotions, and then also pulling back a little bit and being able to kind of like, have some emotional distance. Or being able to wait and stop. Be mindful. So the distance, I think, is the most interesting in the sense that everybody knows about emotions and actions. I think we're often toggling back and forth between anxiety and grief and fear. And then what are we going to do about this? But that is distancing. That's like this little special lever, that I can turn things up or down. So I think it'd be nice to chat a little more about that. Because do you think that's really a key for self care?
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for that question, and all the comments. And it was difficult to choose a name for this dimension which is now called distancing. At one point I called it “Avoidance”. I was thinking about “Disavowal” also. So the trick is that it includes both the healthy forms, and the sort of unhealthy forms if you do it overly much. So this is one of the reasons that I was searching for a word which captures both the problematic denial part and the healthy self care part. And of course, one can't find a perfect term which would capture all of that variety. But from the coping theory and grief theory, I found people who are using both distancing and avoidance also, in that positive shade, or positive tone. Pointing out that it's not normal also to do what some people call functional denial or healthy denial. I didn't want to put denial there.
But I think you are very right, Thomas that distancing is sort of the newest term which is named here. And partly that comes from a very practical need, because I've met many young environmental activists who have great trouble in allowing themselves to distance themselves. And that's very understandable because the problems are so pressing. It's so difficult to do structural change. And so sometimes they end up at the danger of burnout. Because [of] not encountering emotions enough and not doing enough distancing and healthy self care.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, no, I think for all the listeners just thinking about this. I mean what I hear often is people will make some sort of joke about being an ostrich. And having their head in the sand. Which is a classic image. I don't actually know that ostriches really do that. We should explore that. But I think ostriches are wiser than that. But anyway, that's a common thing that I hear from a lot of people. People who are quite engaged and quite intelligent and quite aware. But they're like, well, my heads in the sand, you know. But what you're saying is, it's okay to have our head in the sand sometimes.
Pihkala: Yeah, it's all about balance, you know. Of course, action and emotional engagement are hugely important. But I don't think that as humans, in this very “long emergency”, as some authors call it. I don't think that we can make it through if we don't get the benefits of healthy distancing, also. And in a way, this is linked very much to the conversations we were having with Ro Randall some time ago [on] the podcast. And she's been developing together with colleagues living with the climate crisis model. Which also reflects this change of needing to put more emphasis on how we can have the energy and do some rejuvenation and recreation in order to stay functional.
Doherty: So if someone's too far in the head in the sand. And they're comfortable there. And they want to move out into the emotional section, what do you think are some good ways to begin? Do you talk about that at all in the article?
Pihkala: I wish I could talk about it even more, but it's quite a long paper and definitely needs some further work. But I've been very interested in this concept of so-called ecological emotional skills. So emotional skills about ecological emotions. And I think we need many kinds of those. But of course, some methods are pretty universal. You know, listening to what you feel and also in your body. Trying to find names. This goes back to some of the content of our very early episodes of the podcast.
And then trying to develop an emotion-positive attitude, for example. And what I've seen in literature and some people is that if you have your head in the sand for a long time, there's a great danger of feeling actually ashamed underneath the armor you have. So I think skills related to encountering the threat of ecological guilt and shame are actually very much needed at that point. But of course, it's difficult to do alone. Or just start doing it, you know. So the help of safe support groups and discussion partners, I think might be very crucial there.
And I'm also thinking of this concept of yours, Thomas, climate hostages. You know, realizing that all of us, we are both victims and perpetrators in a way. But because we are individuals, I think we really need to understand that we shouldn't take all the blame of the world on our shoulders. So those kinds of things that help you to be more okay with yourself. I think that's one important dynamic in moving towards emotional engagement. Starting with grief and sadness may be difficult, if there is this guilt and shame dimension in the way. But what do you think, Thomas and also reflecting on many people you meet?
Doherty: Yeah, I mean I'm really enjoying our conversation because this is just another lens to think about these really complicated ideas. It seems to me that if we take the safety of being an ostrich as a starting point then we kind of peek out of the sand a little bit. And take in a little bit about what's going on. So some of it is taking small sips of this emotional stuff. You know, just a little bit here and there.
But what I heard that I personally think is really key is that it's easier to do this with other people. If we're stuck and lonely and isolated, it's really hard. But when we're with the people that understand what we're going through, then of course, we just feel a little more able to express ourselves. So that's the universality of being in a group. So that's, I think, a super important takeaway. And then the other piece, and you might say more about this, but some of these emotions are … it's not that they're necessarily harder than others, but they get in the way of other emotions. So I think that shame and guilt. Those shame and guilt. They stop us from expressing or maybe they keep us isolated. So I think we can get over some of those. They're kind of like clogs in the emotional river. If we can work on those. Does that ring true to you that these are more problematic emotions? Maybe?
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. I definitely think so. And as we discussed in our podcast episode about ecological guilt, it can also have many forms. And sometimes people use that word in very different connotations. So if we think about it broadly, of course, as a sense of responsibility and having an ethical compass, being able to feel guilt is a very much needed part of human life. But then, if you feel it very strongly, and in a complicated way, then definitely so as you describe.
And, of course, the troubles in contemporary society about grief in general. And ecological grief in particular, one big obstacle here. Because contemporary industrial societies aren't very good at teaching, for example, children and young people skills in grief. And if that's, you know, basically totally foreign to people, the idea that it would be good to embrace grief and sadness, because those are emotions that help us. They are not the problems or the enemies, but there are some losses, and then grief and sadness come to help us. But this knowledge and wisdom is much missing from contemporary societies. And that complicates things a lot.
And that's, I think, one of the reasons why the Good Grief Network, which is about ecological grief, is so powerful. It combines social support and engagement with feelings of grief and sadness. And even these death cafes or climate emotion cafes. Which may go into pretty deep and dark territory. But they also enable social support and go towards the shared feelings of sadness. What do you think about this sadness and grief dimension, Thomas? I know you have a long history of dealing with that?
Doherty: Oh, yeah. Well, what I'm thinking about, I'm thinking about the listeners who are saying, well, it's capitalism. You know, we're supposed to be always in the US, rah, rah, rah, cheer, cheer, cheer, everything's great. And don't be a downer. Don't be a Debbie Downer, you know. And so, this grieving and shadow side stuff is just as radical. You know, it goes back to all those things we talked about in relation to Joanna Macy. And a lot of the work is radical to say, wait, I'm actually suffering here, in my plenty in my first world. So it is radical to bring that out and do that together.
So yeah. And then, you know, I think the goal that I'm hearing from you is that your distance becomes a thing that you move around. Like I become an ostrich that keeps his head close to the sand, but not in the sand so that I have one eye on. I'm peeking, and I'm seeing and then eventually, I lift my head up a little higher, and then I can actually walk around with my head up. But I know that I can do my coping skills emotionally in my body. So that I don't have to, like bury my head all the way. Like I learn to kind of take care of myself. The distance becomes really dynamic. Like in the sense of I'm always adjusting. And it's like a balancing act kind of thing. Is that, like a dance or a balancing act, or some sort of embodied? I'm not sure what image you would use.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. Thanks for that. Thomas. I think that's very profound. And I'm arguing that flexibility and awareness are some key issues in moving forward in coping and changing.
Doherty: Flexibility.
Pihkala: Yeah, so actually the model ends with another circle. There's an arrow called Adjusting and Transforming. The work of Blanche Verlie from Australia has been one influence here. And theories of so-called Post-Traumatic Growth. Which deal with different kinds of troubles and stressors. Not just with huge traumas, but also with them. So the idea is that of these three dimensions [Action, Grieving, Distancing], the subtitles become the main titles. So instead of Grieving, which includes other emotional engagements, when you're able, through many factors, to adjust and transform, then “other emotional engagement” is the main title and grieving, the subtitle. And also self-care becomes the overriding form. And then you are able to use distancing when you need it. So you have this skill of putting your head in the sand when things become too much, but you are also able to move towards things. And I'm fascinated by the image of ostrich here because they look very slow. But, you know, when they start running, they are very, very fast. So, that's actually a funny image of an ostrich which has the skills of also running fast, putting the head in the sand if necessary. I don't know if ostriches are able to cry, but humans definitely need that skill too.
Doherty: Yeah, our apologies to ostriches and to folks that are listening that are natural historians and do understand. This speaks to our own kind of anthropocentric world where we use these animals as symbols. But obviously, all animals like ostriches are highly evolved for their landscape. And they've got that long neck to find their food in the trees. And they can run fast from predators. And all this sort of stuff. And so yeah, we do want to become, I guess, you know, we're all trying to become evolved. You know, highly evolved for this landscape. And so, something we might have an episode about the ostrich effect.
Because I think we, I'm just kind of brainstorming now. And I'll keep it short, because I know this is focused on your model. But we're starting to think as well, how do we evolve? Like, I need to have long legs to run away from threats. I need to be able to hide if I need to. And I also need to have a long neck, so I can see really far and see these big issues. And so I don't know what the climate creature would look like. That would be highly evolved. You know what I mean, though? It's interesting. What that would be. But we've got a few minutes. And you know, listeners are saying, okay, what's in it for me here? How do I understand? So they could be in any place. Do you have an example of a real person or some sort of way that this works out? So someone might be able to try it on for size. Like anybody that you know, that has gone through this.
Pihkala: Yeah. In the article, I'm using a couple of quotes from Sally Gillespie, an Australian psychotherapist, who has written a very fine book on Climate Crisis and Consciousness (2020). And she is definitely one who has gone through many things on her climate emotion journey. And she's open about it. And mentioning that, for example, [that] apocalyptic dreams don't haunt her as they used to, at some points. There's still mood changes, but generally, there is more flexibility. There is experience of meaning in life. So I think the quotes from Gillespie are important examples coming from someone who has gone pretty far on the journey that I'm trying to conceptualize. At least in a helpful way, even though one cannot capture all the varied dynamics here.
Joanna Macy, who we named, I think is another example of a kind of elder who has really gotten through this. And in many books and essays, there's examples of people in various positions. And it's different for different people in different contexts. Which may sound like a cliche or understatement, but I think it's very important to emphasize that there's a lot of factors affecting this. So this is not an Olympic race. And it's not just up to the individual, but people are in very different positions concerning the factors which affect them.
Doherty: So I think it's helpful. Even back to the New York Times story that came out earlier this year. Which talked about me working with different people, I see. Different people are recognized in your model. I mean, I see some people that are so over on action, that they haven't really ever spent a lot of time on the emotion side at all. I see some people, unfortunately, that are swallowed up by their grieving. And they would love to put their head in the sand, but they can't. They can't do it. I think for some listeners it's just hard. It's hard. And then I think some people are so distant that they have a hard time imagining either action or emotion. So I think that's the challenging part.
But I think we all have our unique recipe. Like where our strengths lie. So what you're talking about is trying to do like, 1/3 1/3 1/3. Or something like that. Where we take care of ourselves for 1/3 and we take action for 1/3 and we have emotions for 1/3. That's highly simplistic. But that would be interesting to practice on a given day.
Pihkala: Exactly Thomas. And thanks for sharing those observations of people who you meet. And we'd love to hear from you, dear listener. So what does it evoke in you? So you can reach us through our website, www.climatechangeandhappiness.com. And if you have close, trusted people who you can talk about with these things.
So that's one possibility to use the model's basic ideas. To reflect on some of that. And I know that with the people I've shared the model with before getting it into the publication process, it has generated very interesting conversations. Where often people look back and think about that hey, when I was in the upper levels of elementary school, I had this awakening, but it was so difficult that I tried to go back to semi consciousness. But that worked for a couple of years, but not more. So it may also evoke this, looking back. And I know, Thomas, that that's one method that you use in your work. You know, doing this sort of timelines and thinking about our personal histories. Both in relation to so-called ecological identity and the happenings in our lives. So hopefully, the model might be using that kind of work too.
Doherty: Yeah, there's no going backward on the process. Once we have that awakening, we have to move forward. And so you're giving us some tools for that. So well, folks, I hope this is helpful. You know, even though you might be alone today, in some ways, you're not alone with us. Because that's what this podcast is meant to be. A place where we all can share this together. Again, you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And support us at our Patreon. And we'll keep bringing these in-depth discussions to you. And you all good luck on keeping your head slightly out of the sand. But getting together with other people that you can do action together with. Take care of yourselves.
Pihkala: Take care. Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self funded volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 10: Composing During the Climate Crisis with Scott Ordway
Jan 06, 2023
Season 2, Episode 10: Composing During the Climate Crisis with Scott Ordway
In the first episode of the new year, Thomas and Panu spoke with composer and multimedia artist Scott Ordway, whose recent works such as The End of Rain, The Clearing in the Forest and TheOuter Edge of Youth explore themes of nature, identity and the effects of global climate change. Scott described the process of creating The End of Rain, an ambitious 2022 orchestral work that wove documentary, music, imagery and landscape investigations to tell the story of the aftermath of a catastrophic wildfire that swept through Scott’s childhood home in the redwood forests of Northern California. Scott also shared a musical selection from his recent choral opera, The Outer Edge of Youth.
“I wanted to understand how fire and drought are changing us emotionally in personal and often hidden ways. Because my questions concerned communal rather than individual consciousness, it was important to me that my work be guided by the experiences of a wide range of people and that the final product reflect the things they told me. I wanted my work to be an act of sustained and careful listening.” — Scott Ordway
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast, a show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change – the personal side of climate change. And, you know, in the show we focus on emotions, what you're feeling in your body, and your feelings, the words that you use [to describe your emotions]. And you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And see our Patreonreon.com/bePatron?u=71854012. And today we have a special guest.
Scott Ordway: My name is Scott Ordway. I'm a composer and multimedia artist based in Philadelphia and originally from Northern California. I'm so happy to be here.
Doherty: And we're really glad to have Scott. And we're going to be talking a bit. We're assuming this episode is going to be coming out early in the year. And this is a beautiful episode to begin our podcast season. Panu, do you want to get us going in our dialogue?
Pihkala: Definitely. So we are going [to] talk a lot about music today. Also emotions. And as almost every person on the planet knows, [there is a] very strong connection between music and emotions. And some time ago with Thomas we did a couple of music themed episodes for our podcast.
Scott, as mentioned, has been working with music in many ways for a long time. And some of his work very explicitly touches on the emotional side of climate change. And overall the changes in the world around us. But Scott, could you start by telling us a bit about your background? So where do you come from? What's up for you?
Ordway: Sure. So I am, as I mentioned, a composer and multimedia artist. In addition to writing works for orchestra voices [and] chamber ensembles, I also work with photography and video as a way to explore themes that are important to me. I was born and raised in Northern California. In and around the coastal redwood forests. And the landscape of coastal Northern California was a huge part of my upbringing and remains an important source of inspiration for me today. And it's also an area which is seeing tremendous changes in the last decade as a result of climate change. And has been a point of inspiration for a lot of my recent work.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for sharing. I had the privilege of listening to one of your recent works, called The End of Rain, which explicitly deals with the impacts of wildfires and droughts to California. Both to people and the more than human world. And would you like to say something about that work? And how did you end up working with that?
Ordway: Sure. So as your listeners may know, in 2020, Northern California suffered some of the most intense wildfires in recent history. And these came on the heels of several previous years that were also among the worst wildfire seasons in living memory. In late summer 2021, one of these wildfires burned quite near to my childhood home in Santa Cruz, California. And I was experiencing this at the time, from the other side of the country, in my home, now in Philadelphia. And as I watched these fire maps, intently. Day and night. Getting closer and closer to the places that I knew and loved so well. And ultimately burning many of them. I knew that I wanted to respond in my own work.
At the same time, I knew that even though this was my home. And a place that I knew and cared about deeply, that my own personal experience was somehow insufficient to capture the intensity of this feeling. Because, as I said, I experienced it from across the country. And so I designed a process through which I gathered first hand testimony from about 225 Californians who had experienced these events directly. All in all, I gathered about 80,000 words of firsthand stories of fire and drought in Northern California. And working from this large data set, I extracted something that I think of instead of a nonfiction poem. Where each line of the poem came directly from one of these responses.
And so, working almost like a journalist speaking to one person after the next. Asking for introductions. Traveling all around the state. I gradually assembled this long poem which I could set to music. I was fortunate enough to have a commission for the work from the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in Santa Cruz, California. Which is one of the oldest and most celebrated festivals of contemporary orchestral music in the United States. And through that festival, I was able to work with the Grammy winning vocal ensemble, Room Full of Teeth, who would sing this text as soloists.
So with this incredible commission in place, I set out around California to speak with people who had experienced this directly. And also to make video and photography to do documentary video and photography that would illustrate the themes that I heard in the texts. So the final work involves projected documentary video, crowdsource texts sung by Room Full of Teeth, and a large orchestra. At the same time, I published a volume of landscape photography, so the audience could experience the poetry as well as the photography in that way as well.
Doherty: It's really beautiful. You can see some images of the book at Scott's website, Scottordway.com. And I've been just checking them out. And so this was happening. This is a creation in time. This performance must have been quite powerful. Scott, did you hear back from people? I imagine that some of the people who attended the performance were also touched by the fire. What was it like for you? For your family? For people to have this? Because you create a ceremony. You created something that doesn't happen, really, in the world, regarding these disasters. A kind of a ritual and a ceremony to kind of bring them together and extract some meaning and purpose from them, I think. But how did people react?
Ordway: Well, this was something that I was really nervous about. Anytime you create a work that purports to speak on behalf of anyone other than yourself, you're taking quite a risk that you will somehow misrepresent someone. Or that you will have gotten the tone wrong or gotten the spirit wrong. And I thought very deeply as I was gathering these texts. And also, as I was making the selections of which lines to include in the final work. I thought very deeply about what I heard from people. And really did my best to make this piece a conduit for other people's point of view, rather than simply a platform to share my own.
The premiere, which took place in July of this year, or July 2022, I should say, in Santa Cruz, California was for me one of the highlights of my life as an artist. Not only because it was a major event in my home region, but also because I had the opportunity to speak with so many people who had either experienced these events directly, or who had themselves contributed to the text. And what I heard from people was that there was something quite unusual and striking about hearing their words filtered through this process. And included in a symphonic composition. And then sung by these world renowned singers.
And the feedback that I heard was quite positive. The people that I spoke with felt that the work adequately summed up their experience of these events. Or crystallized their feelings in a way which perhaps hadn't before. I'm sure there will have been others that felt that was less the case. And maybe didn't stop by to tell me afterwards. But in either case, the dialogue with the audience was unlike anything I've ever experienced after a premiere.
Doherty: How did your family fare? This is a CZU fire, right? So a big fire complex. How did your family fare yourselves?
Ordway: My family, while they were evacuated. And my hometown was largely evacuated. My family was fortunately spared. For them, the traumatic part, I think, came in losing portions of natural parks which we've known and loved for so many years. Buildings and structures which we considered part of the permanent landscape of the region.
And also losing the peace of mind. And thinking that they were somehow immune from this. Because this fire burned in regions that really have not experienced fire like this in generations. We're not talking about remote wilderness here. This is very, very close to some very densely populated urban areas. So it was quite unsettling for a lot of people that didn't previously envision themselves as living in a fire zone.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for sharing all [that].
Doherty: There's a ton of directions to go. Yeah. But Panu, take this away here. I've got some things to bring up here in a moment.
Pihkala: Yeah, there's several things that I really appreciate about the method. And in the end product of The End of Rain. One being that you were willing to really listen to people's experiences. The second being that you were interested in the wide variety of people's reactions and experiences. And trying to produce a sort of collage or mosaic or whatever word one could use here. And I think that's very valuable. And sort of appreciating and recognizing that people will react differently.
As a scholar of ecological emotions, there's, of course, a very wide variety of things that have come up in other studies, which are now manifested in the lines of The End of Rain. Or in the imagery in a slightly different format. So I think it's very fruitful, also, for researchers to take a look at many kinds of impacts that these kinds of events have. And you explicitly described in the text, also the impact on people's beliefs and assumptions. And that's something I think that would need even more discussed.
Like you say that it may change people's view about the world and their image about sense of safety, for example. Which, of course, are very basic psychological needs, also, as Thomas very well knows, as a therapist, also. But could you tell us a bit more about the sort of emotional journey that you had to go through in making this? So how was that process or journey for yourself?
Ordway: Well, one of the fundamental questions that motivated this work was a hypothesis that we are looking at the forests in a different way than we have in recent generations. And that specifically forests are bringing up a different set of emotions than they have in recent times. And my understanding is that for much of the history of humanity, when people looked out from the cultivated parts of the world, toward the wild parts of the world, they did so with fear and trembling and with trepidation. And that when people looked toward the forest, they saw a place of danger and uncertainty and darkness. As opposed to the parts which were cultivated and understood. And only in the last several 100 years did the forest become a place where we thought of peace and safety and tranquility, and restoration and rejuvenation. Only in recent years, or recent generations have we begun to think of the wild parts of the world as a place of peace and safety.
And my hypothesis is that as we're entering this age of perpetual fire, we're returning to a much older way of looking at the forest where we see it as a potential source of danger as much as a potential source of peace and tranquility. And my own journey has been similar. Particularly when I'm in California and other parts of the Western US. When I see a dry forest, I'm not just thinking of how peaceful it would be or how rejuvenating or inspiring it would be to spend time in a forest. But I'm also thinking of the threat that it poses. And thinking about the relationship between the built environments and the wilderness. So my own way of looking at the forest has become a lot more complicated than it was even a few years ago. And I found in speaking with people for this project that that feeling was widely shared. The forest is not as simple as it was a generation ago.
Doherty: Yeah. And the listeners can take this in. There's people listening, obviously, that have personally experienced worry about forest fires or impacts. Certainly in the Pacific Northwest, everyone can identify with this new sort of trepidation about dry forest and dry underbrush and crinkling leaves and baking sun and all this kind of thing. So yeah, it's good to zoom out. Just remind us that, you know, Scott's work is illustrating climate psychology, right? We have the idea that there's different impacts from climate change. Disaster impacts and societal impacts and the emotional weight. And for a lot of people, you know, they've only just dealt with the emotional weight [of] watching climate as a distant thing. Something that's happening to other people far away.
But of course, these impacts are all coming together. And in a singularity at different places in different times. And if you're in that place, then suddenly you're feeling the emotional weight, and actually the disaster and the social upheaval and the rebuilding. So it is a loss of innocence for those regions. Certainly in the Northwest, it's a loss of innocence. And then it's a loss of — its deep anxiety. Eco-anxiety. So that worry about the potential fire. And the no-longer-trusting-the-heat, and the sun. That's a great example of the subtle kind of pervasive, you know, eco-anxiety. It's lingering in the back of our minds. Which I think is why your piece is so helpful.
Because, you know, there's three ways we have meaning in our life. You know, we feel like our life is significant, we have a purpose, you know, things make sense. And I think after that disaster, people's meaning … they feel insignificant. They don't know what's going on. They don't have a sense of purpose. And so I think your work, at least for yourself, restored some of that meaning, I think. Obviously, why you probably did it. But I think it was, you know, a community meaning making ritual. What do you think about that?
Ordway: You know, as I started out the work, I was imagining that I was going to be writing something considerably more somber than I did. And I was surprised and inspired as I traveled around, speaking with people. I was surprised at the extent to which these events had a galvanizing effect on people and on communities. I spoke with many people who told me that their communities were stronger after the fire than they had been before the fire. In the process of confronting these catastrophic events, they forged connections with their neighbors that hadn't been there before. That they found strength in their community that they hadn't been aware of previously. And that they came out of these events with a determination to be stronger as a community. As a group. As a collection of people.
And there were some people that I spoke with, in particular in one community that had suffered some of the most catastrophic fire damage in the history of the United States. And these individuals told me with great determination, that I was under no circumstances to write a sad piece for them. That I was under no circumstances to make this work about defeat or tragedy. But instead, they wanted me to know that they were rebuilding. That the forest was coming alive again. That their community was coming alive again. And that spirit really surprised me. I wasn't expecting to find that in quite the way that I did. But I tried to honor that in the work.
And I ended up ending the piece with two lines which are sung one after the other in an alternating fashion, which, to me, were both equally true. The first of those lines being we must change now. And the second being, things will grow back. And as I was trying to determine the ultimate emotional point of this piece. Or which of the conflicting emotions I wanted to focus on and highlight, I just couldn't decide between those two things. The need for change is undeniable. And it's also undeniable that things will grow back. The forest regenerates. Communities regenerate. Things do move forward. And this tension and this ambiguity is what I've tried to explore in this piece.
Pihkala: That's very striking both in the piece and how you describe it now. And some folks apply dialectical thinking into climate psychology and the times where we are living. But the idea is that sort of two opposites may be true at the same time, you know. In relation to action, individuals have to do stuff, but also there's a strong need for structural change. So these both exist. It's not either or. There's very good reasons for this pair. And there's grounds for hope also.
So there's the dialectical coexistence of many things, which are sometimes considered binaries. And I think that your work speaks to the true ambiguity and the dialectical character of the times in which we are living.
Doherty: Yeah, and one of the things that I've heard with the therapist that I've worked with and people is that people do lose their ability to relax in nature, in the natural world. Or when they go to do some restorative activity then they feel overcome with grief. And this knowledge, you know, the penalties of an ecological education. Living in a world of wounds kind of thing. And so my standard answer to that is that's true. But it's not a barrier, it's a doorway. It's a doorway into a higher way of being. It's a more mature understanding of the world. We don't have that innocence. We lose that childhood innocence.
Ordway: In the course of particularly the photographic ends and video components of the work, I spent many, many dozens of hours walking and hiking in quite remote regions of California. And I began this process in December 2020. Which was just a couple of months after these fires. And I continued this process through June of 2022. Just before the premiere. So it was about an 18 month series of trips. And what was so moving to me, was at the beginning of creating this piece, I was absolutely shocked and horrified and just devastated by the sight of seeing these forests in the condition that they were in.
After these first trips, as I began speaking with more ecologists and people that work with the Park Service and scientists, I learned in much greater detail about the fact that fire is a natural part of the lifecycle of forests. And particularly these coastal redwood forests. It is a healthy and necessary part of the forest ecosystem. And other than its impact on human communities, fire was a neutral phenomenon from an ecological standpoint. It was not necessarily sad from the point of view of the trees. And as I started spending more and more time in these forests, not only did I become accustomed to the sight of burned out trees, you know, it became a little bit less shocking to me after a while. But also in the course of those 18 months, I started to see new growth. By the end of that period of time, groves that had been completely devastated were sending up new shoots. There was just green exploding everywhere by that spring of 2022.
And so for me, this sustained contact with these ecosystems made it impossible for me not to see the truth that things will grow back. They are growing back. They've already started. In the time it took me to write this piece the forest has begun that process of rejuvenation. And what we need to do is reconsider the relationship between where and how people live and the wilderness.
Doherty: That's very well said. That's very well said. I think we need sustained contact and a sense of time.
Pihkala: Yeah. Yeah, definitely.
Doherty: Maybe we can steer the conversation toward the other pieces that we want to talk about today as well. The Outer Edge and The Clearing. [Do] you want to get us in that direction, Panu?
Pihkala: Yeah. There's this framework of post traumatic growth. That's actually the title of one of the last texts I did in Finnish for this national eco anxiety project, from which we had guests visiting our podcast. Post traumatic growth refers to the fact that often after a major crisis, there's both damage and growth. So, in my mind, that very strongly resonates with the vivid imagery that you are talking about here, Scott.
And music is, of course, something which can help in many ways in producing all kinds of growth. And many works of yours also, other than The End of Rain, deal, in one way or another, with this relationship between humans and the more than human world. So, would you like to say a bit about some of your other works, which come close to the topic at hand?
Ordway: Yeah, I'd be happy to. So whereas The End of Rain is very much a documentary work and is kind of a piece of musical nonfiction, if you will. Most of my other work is concerned with imagined worlds or more fictional representations of these ideas. My most recent recording, which is available on Spotify and Apple Music and everywhere else that music has found is an opera called The Outer Edge of Youth. And in this piece, I imagine a relationship between two young boys who are uncommonly quiet and sensitive. And find a friendship with one another that's rooted in their shared love for the beauty of the natural world. And the landscape around them. This piece is set in an imagined forest that, for me, is very similar to the coastal redwoods of Northern California. And these boys find, one day in the forest, that they're able to understand the words of the birds singing in the trees. And in the course of the piece, the boys have an extended dialogue with the birds on the subjects which are the most urgent to them, at the end of their youth and the beginning of their adolescence. And so they speak with the birds about the nature of love and human relationships. About the nature of compassion. The relationship between humans and animals. About the nature of beauty. And the possibility of the divine. And also the difficulty of having a spiritual life in a broad, secular world that we live in. And all of these questions are left unresolved.
But it's a slow and contemplative work that really just dramatizes the world that's gone on in my head for so much of my life. Which is how to reconcile the intensity of human emotion with an appreciation of landscape with inspiration in the natural world. And with a society which quite often makes it very difficult to live and be in touch with these things. Which doesn't privilege this kind of slow appreciation of beauty. So that work is streaming everywhere and maybe we can listen to a short excerpt from it now.
Pihkala: That will be excellent. So here's an example.
[audio excerpt from The Outer Edge of Youth]
Doherty: Yes. Now this is beautiful. I love our podcast because it always kind of works out. I've been struggling with helping people make sense of their connection / disconnection with nature. This is both-and kind of situation. The fear that's now coming into people. And then, for me, it's coming back to this idea that it's the end of innocence. When we're children we have a blessed unknowing. We have a beautiful natural innocence of nature. But as adults, we let that go. We can go back to it as an adult, though. And think about it. And learn from it still.
But it's not the same. And, you know, we are adults, and we do have this knowledge. So I feel like our conversation has described that a little bit. Because I think, Scott, you've been able to kind of as an adult go back to that. That fraught, you know, fruitful time. And then the idea of having the birds, you know, be the advisors is really beautiful. And captures some of that magic of childhood that we can evoke in art.
Pihkala: Yeah, the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur, who lived in the States for quite some time, had this idea of “second naivete.” So, you know, the first naivism, in a good sense, is when you are a small kid. But then for some issues, the human task would be to cultivate an ability for a sort of second naivete. So he was thinking of this with several issues.
But that's something that comes to my mind when listening to this. And perhaps that could be applied for connections with a more than human world, also. There's definitely good reasons for that, as I hear you, both Thomas and Scott saying. It's been a very fascinating conversation. I've greatly enjoyed it. And warm thanks, Scott, that you could join us. We have to wrap up relatively soon. But what's on your minds, Thomas and Scott, as we start wrapping things [up]?
Doherty: Well, the idea of naivete. We recently spoke to poet Kim Stafford and he spoke quite forthrightly about claiming that naivete in his poetry. And now he gives a voice to the raindrops and various things like that. So there is almost kind of a. If it's done well, it's a very radical and very mature act. A very fruitful kind of generative act if it's done well. And so just looking back to the episode. I refer listeners back to the episode with Kim as well, in this regard.
But, Scott yeah, where does your creative life lead you these days? And how does it feel? We don't need to open up a long chapter here. But like, I know you're in Philadelphia now, which is a very different place than Santa Cruz or the California redwoods. So what's your creative life leading you even today, in this week?
Ordway: This project has really opened a lot of creative possibilities for me. And going forward, I'm looking for new projects that similarly use this process of journalistic and documentary text gathering to tell stories that are grounded in the experiences of people in the contemporary world.
And I'm also designing projects that continue to use photography and video as ways to enrich. and kind of augment the texts and the music that I'm creating. So I'm really interested in this idea of multimedia work. And creating works that are able to speak directly to the public about issues that people care about. And to do so using music which connects with those deepest and hardest to access places of who we are as people
Doherty: It's so nice that we're having arts in our podcast here. I'm really gaining from it in our show notes we'll have links to Scott's works. And some neat interviews with Scott. And also some other examples of music that are out there. For people in the know, they know there are composers that have been doing climate related work for some time.
But for some others, you know, we're not clued in. So there's some links to follow this or ourselves. And I think we'll be. Scott, I'm going to be delving into your work a little more. Now that I have the personal story it makes it so much more special to think about.
Ordway: Pleasure speaking with you both.
Doherty: Panu take care of yourself, have a good evening. And you all take care. Listeners, you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com and see our past episodes. You can also find us on Patreon. And you all be well. Take care. Pihkala: Take care.
Ordway: Thank you.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded, volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 9: Sitting Around the Fire / Permission to Feel Joy
Dec 23, 2022
Season 2, Episode 9: Sitting Around the Fire / Permission to Feel Joy
Thomas and Panu take a moment to “sit around the fire” at the end of 2022 and winter time in the northern latitudes, as Panu watches the snowy weather in Helsinki, and Thomas muses about world events and his family’s yearly solstice ceremony. Listen in as the pair reflect on global dangers and our feelings about them —ranging from the brutal conflict in Ukraine and renewed threat of nuclear war to new and often unexpressed stress and unease as our seasons and weathers change around the world. And, holding the contradictions: Watching exciting World Cup matches against the backdrop of systemic injustices, and the “holiday season” with its frenetic, electronic consumerism and opportunity for simple, authentic connections with loved ones. Panu and Thomas model the healthy process of ecological conversations: sharing the deep and dark thoughts we have with safe and trusting listeners, bearing witness, and also naturally finding the bright parts of life, gratitude and “permission to feel joy.” Remember, you are not alone. Please find your own healthy rituals. Look forward to more unique episodes of our podcast in the new year and please support us at Patreon and at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Links
“Sit Around the Fire” From composer Jon Hopkins with spoken word by Ram Dass
Viola Sampson, “Darkening quarter”, in Rust, M.-J. & Totton, N. (eds.) (2012), Vital signs: Psychological Responses to Ecological Crisis. Karnac, pp. 3-16. Available for purchase. And so, I begin to see that this darkening quarter of the year is a turning of fullness and expanding into the darkness. It is an opportunity to stay present to the darkness within and without, and not shrink from the cold or the world's grief. It is an opportunity to inhabit the greater darkness of the Earth, allowing its shadow to imbibe me and draw me inwards and downwards into my roots.
Jolabokaflod: An Icelandic holiday tradition to adopt?
Transcript
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. This is our podcast. Our show for people around the globe who are thinking and most importantly, feeling—take a breath there listeners—who are feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change. Our emotional responses. And how all these issues sit with us in our lives.
And Panu and I are sitting here toward the end of 2022. And we have a metaphor of we're not personally together, we're drawn together through our technology. But we're metaphorically sitting around the fire here. Gathering our thoughts about the end of the year. The show is a public conversation about climate feelings, climate emotion, some of our professional and our academic research work and our guests and people that are exploring this and also just the personal side. And all you listeners have your own personal side. So we're here to talk about some of this and really have a sitting around the fire end of the year energy for ourselves. And as I talk about these things, Panu , what's up for you there in Finland, near Helsinki at this time of the year?
Pihkala: When I look around, from this place, sitting next to the fire, I see a lot of snow, which personally is a great source of joy. And for many Finns, we are a people accustomed to snow. In Helsinki, which is near to the Baltic Sea, it's always been a bit more irregular than inland. And now with global warming, it's been getting even more irregular. We even had one winter a couple of years ago, when we had practically no snow at all. And people were pretty miserable. And no cross country skiing, no going downhill for kids. And even the public health impacts are serious because there's less light and that sort of thing. So now there's lots of gladness, because of the heavy amount of snow. And it's been here since mid November.
But of course, as usual in life, there's ambiguities. At the same time, we are living this special time when there's war in Ukraine. And energy transition is going strong in Europe, but still, there's gonna be a lack of electricity in the winter and many people in Finland are also afraid of how high the cost of their electricity bill will be. So this nice snow with winter with cold temperatures is also going to bring some trouble here.
Doherty: So yes, where you are in Finland, this terrible war and conflict in Ukraine is very much more present in your daily life [than] for listeners that are not not close to that conflict. And does it cause fear and worry in your family?
Pihkala: Well, the human mind is quite adaptive. And springtime was very difficult for many Finns. There was the cumulative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. And then the war began, and it evoked lots of national traumas in Finland, about the difficult relations with our East neighbor. There's also been lots of great cultural exchange between Finland and Russia. So I definitely don't want to characterize it only as a struggle or rivalry. But there is also the very troublesome history of the Second World War. And we still have people who lived through that period. And it's much present in the national psyche, so to speak, so that's been causing lots of fear and worry and anxiety.
But then as the months go on, people have calmed down. And there's been all sorts of actions being done and so on. So it's on the back of people's minds, of course. And this connects with a major theme in our podcast, the impacts of the climate climate crisis. Because that's also something that's there, at least on the back of our minds, regardless of how actively we think and feel about it.
Doherty: Yeah, so you know, we're holding this, this podcast. You know, listeners, if you're new, this podcast is our public conversation. And also our personal lived experience of what we feel about the state of the world. I mean we focus particularly on climate and environmental issues. But we have these meta stressors that all of us are holding. You know, the war. Human’s propensity to be at war with each other. And imperialism and fights over resources in this whole geopolitical chess match of wars that Europe has been beset with, as long as we can see in history.
And so we're holding space for how war is affecting us, much like climate change. You know, there's direct, indirect and emotional impacts of the war in Ukraine. I mean, it's directly impacting people in Ukraine and in Russia and surrounding areas. The carnage, the destruction, the death, the suffering. You know, it's a true disaster on many levels. And then also the indirect ripple effects of that all through the world. And how it affects our politics and our own economy. And whether we have heat in the winter, you know. And then the emotional impacts of just sitting from a distance and knowing it's all occurring, even if we feel relatively safe, and untouched, where we are. We're not untouched emotionally about all these kinds of things.
So just, you know, again, to the listeners, just realizing you're not untouched, emotionally. Your emotions and feelings are activated. You know, your body sensations. All the emotions in your body. And then we're talking about the language for our emotions. Our feeling language. You know, anxiety is another thing for people.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. When there's so much uncertainty about whether there's gonna be snow, or what the winter's gonna be like. So this snow anxiety or winter longing or winter grief. And the Finnish equivalents are something that I've been often discussing, both in the Finnish media and in some international media also. And we've been thinking together with some colleagues that what kind of social practices would we need to encounter these kinds of emotions and feelings? So perhaps some events, at least talking about it's doing some symbolic actions that go to the territory of art and performance and ritual and so on. But now, we are living in the midst of the snow so no need for that now.
And one big dimension of these macro worries, or global stressors is, of course, the threat of nuclear war. And that's something which the war in Ukraine, also fortified and strengthened in many people's minds. And that impact, I think, extends also beyond Europe, but it's probably the heaviest in Europe. But how about you, Thomas, what's on your mind when you're sitting around this fire in the dark time of winter?
Doherty: Yeah, so here in the Northern Hemisphere, it's the dark time. So there's this great kind of tug of war between wanting to be quiet and to be comfortable and to, you know, hibernate a little bit. And then also the pull towards celebration and Hanukkah and Christmas and other holidays. And, of course, consumerism and all the advertising and cultural rituals. And then also with the positive parts of gathering with family. And I have family members that are coming into town. Literally, you know, staying at my home and coming to see myself.
My daughter is performing in a school Christmas performance the next couple of nights that has all the young people. The school band, all the different musicians in the school. And the choir, and the dancers and artists. All the students put on a winter festival celebration that's quite beautiful. And so just such such warm, positive feelings about all of those kinds of things that are happening all around the world. So just listeners can kind of be thinking about this. Again, holding space for our personal lives. And then also all this heavy stuff with just the tragic human actions in Ukraine and the threat of nuclear war. And I think this time of the year, people will because we are going through a transition of a changing global climate there is loss. Or what we were used to. There's either winter loss, snow loss, because we're letting go of these snow patterns. Particularly people that are mountaineers, or skiers or outdoor people are letting go of what they understand of the winters in some ways. And then, of course, there's summer grief as well, for folks in the Southern Hemisphere. As we know, in places like Australia with black summer fires and things that you know, summer is not the same, either.
And so we all globally are being stretched and stressed a little bit. And to try to be, you know, make peace and be comfortable with all these global environmental changes. So just, it seems a little bit obvious to say, but this is just something to hold space for. That we're thinking about and, you know, coping and things like that.
Pihkala: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. So different cultures, and also subgroups in various cultures will have different things that they hold in great record and significance, and which climate change is then threatening. So I totally agree that there's a great need for cultural sensitivity. And, also, preferably possibilities for people to think about and feel about how this relates to me and the people close to me and the locals. And as you say, Thomas, in some parts of the world, it's more anxiety related to the summer and not to the winter. So that's one example. And I'm also thinking about the discussion we had with Charles Ogunbode and his research of climate change reactions and emotions in Africa, for example.
Doherty: Yeah, what did you take away from our conversation with Charles? What are you thinking about?
Pihkala: Well, many things as you usually do. And it's fascinating to hear a bit about his perspective on life. But of course, growing [up] in Nigeria, and growing up in Finland are quite different areas and still there can be things in common, like, appreciating the local natural environments or the forms of the modern human world. And so, that always strikes me as great contextual differences, but also, the great deal of things we have in common, just by being human, especially if there's similar value orientation.
Doherty: Yeah, I mean this would be the episode that I think will be just previous to this episode for listeners if they're looking. But you know, Charles has studied people's feelings in Africa and East Africa and West Africa about climate change. And really, we talked a bit about that relationship between kind of resignation and fatalism. Like I cannot do anything about this, I have so many other things to think about. I can't really take on this particular global problem. But also a sense of deeper resilience. Well, I'm going to make it through. I've made it through these other problems, too.
So all of us, I think, are balancing that sense of, you know, resignation, and also resilience. That we're going to make it through, you know. And again, each listener of this episode has their own personal story. And so just even just knowing that you're not alone. Like we recognize that your story of being in your shoes, with your family, where you live on the planet, you have your story. Herein the Northern Hemisphere, we're in this darkening part of the year. So we want to kind of come together and be inside and think about things. You know, in other parts of the globe, people are outside. It's warmer, they're active. They're called into action and things like that.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. And one thing that's been on my mind lately is that a long time project of conceptualizing a process model of eco anxiety and ecological grief finally came out as a journal article in an academic publication. Of course, I always try to do those with a style that would be as easily understandable as it can be in an academic publication. And we'll actually talk about that model in one of the forthcoming episodes. So there's very interesting episodes coming up next year. And now, I don't want to go into too much detail now, but in the model test, key dimensions related to action, grieving, and then having distance. And this having a distance can include both self care and avoidance.
And I think this is closely related to what you, Thomas, said about the various contexts. And in some situations, people really have to do some distance. So it's not always, always evil, so to say. But it has to be evaluated contextually. That what's the resources of the people to respond? And what are the conditions, both socially and ecologically. But this idea of self care and community care is, of course, something we have been heavily discussing in this podcast also during the year. And that's something that you, Thomas, have been writing about and speaking about for a great number of years. So for me, that's one of the themes that emerges strongly from your written work.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. Thanks, Panu. Yeah, I mean, I think, yeah, I'm really intrigued about your use of the word distance. You know, in your coping model, because I think it's a juicy topic for listeners to think about this idea of distance. Even in our. I mean, I know, here, where I am, in the US, people are often, you know, swept up in the holiday season. And there's positive rituals. And there's also consumerism. And buying things and advertisements. And, you know, so the distance can be just. If I can kind of articulate this, all these global things we're talking about, at best we remain open to them. Our eyes are open to them. We're bearing witness to all this stuff. We're not in denial about these issues. War, nuclear war, the aggression in Ukraine, the history of colonialism and imperialism in the world, our power grid, and how we rely on fossil fuels. And how that becomes an easy way for global piracy and power to take over fossil fuels. And how we have the potential for different, maybe more just, and sustainable technologies. So just being aware of all that sort of stuff and keeping our eyes open to it. But then we can look away also to other things.
So I think that's the way to think about it. [It's] like, okay, I'm aware of all these troubling things. And that's in my sight, but I can also turn my gaze toward other beautiful things as well. And my family and my children. And I'm not in denial of those other things. As it came up recently in our conversation somewhere along the line, the whole myth of the ostrich. You know, that the ostrich has their head in the sand. You know, but ostriches don't really do that. That's a myth. You know, when they're under threat, they either move away, or they camouflage themselves, but they don't stick their head in the sand. You know, that human image we have. But ironically, ostriches tend their eggs in underground nests. And when their head is in the sand, it's most likely because they're tending their eggs.
And so we do have to focus on our own lives. And our own personal health and well being. Our children. Our family. And that's a good place to put our gaze. And it doesn't mean that we're forgetting about all these other things, you know. But, you know, at any given moment, you know. And even in the next few weeks, it's going to be most important to put our gaze with ourselves and our families and on true positive things that are happening. And then not necessarily let this stuff in the world drain us of our joy. That's true joy.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. This sort of permission to feel joy. IIolupa would be my Finnish word for that. I think that's a very important topic. And something we touched upon in a conversation with Daniela Molnar, a very interesting artist. And that's gonna come up on the website also. That [future podcast] episode. And it's also closely related to this topic of feelings of inadequacy, which we have discussed a couple of times in the podcast. Because they seem to be so hugely common among people who care about matters. And that can become an obstacle to discuss sort of healthy distancing. That feelings of inadequacy then become stronger.
So that could be one hoped for takeaway from this episode would be to give ourselves and each other permission also to do some healthy distancing. And self care and community care during this period. And I think this time in the natural world in the Northern Hemisphere. The darkening quarter, as Viola Sampson, an author of a great essay about this in ecopsychology, puts it. And we could use that also to benefit us, because it can allow us to do some inner journeys. And you can sort of turn a bit inwards from all the hustle in the outer world. And hopefully this time of the seasons would give some possibilities for that for as many people as possible. But I heard, Thomas, you say that in our pre conversation that you've also very literally taken some time out and sort of retreated some time ago.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, Panu and I always have a little pre-planning conversation before we record. And, you know, we just empty our sack of all the things that we're doing. And just like, you know, as two friends or colleagues would. You know, sitting around the fire somewhere, that's our model today. And I recently did a retreat. I have a practice of doing a mindfulness meditation retreat for myself in early December each year. It's very hard to do, because, of course, I'm a parent. And I have all my work and my deadlines. And so it really takes a lot of courage and energy to tear myself away for a weekend to be in a retreat, reflective mode. But invariably, it helps me to look out at the world with new eyes.
And so that's part of I think, the potential for this time of the year for people. Is to take a moment just to look at the world. And to find some new eyes. And it's quite existential. I think about just humanity and time and our human culture. I've been reading The Dawn of Everything –the David Graeber and David Wengrow book that many listeners might be aware of. And, you know, just thinking in big terms about time and society. And, again, this play of humanity that we're immersed in. So yeah, I think it comes back to that. That toggling between bearing witness to this terrible stuff, and also bearing witness to the beauty in our lives, and our family and our children. Even things like the World Cup, which is happening today. Or at this time around the world. You know, France and Morocco are playing in the World Cup later today. And that's one of our few global rituals that we have as the World Cup and soccer and football. And there's so many levels to that. The artistry and the athleticism of the football players is just so striking. But of course, the intense marketing and consumerism surrounding the World Cup. And the corruption and Qatar and just the whole backstory of that. So it's a mess of things, right? That we have to deal with there.
And some people, you know, aren't really aware of all that stuff. But a lot of us are aware of all those different levels. And so we're going to celebrate the players and the athleticism and the adventure of those games. And the celebration and joining together and the singing and the camaraderie. And also realize there's a lot of other pieces going on there. It's just a lot. It never ends, Panu. You know, the news has all these stories about fusion reactors and quantum computing in all these recent scientific discoveries. And, you know, every year there's a new discovery that may or may not be helpful. And all this sort of stuff. So we have to sort of keep our eyes on the true justice and fairness in the world and how to focus on that. Yeah, what else is coming up for you as we kind of chat here?
Pihkala: Yeah. Speaking of the World World Cup. I've usually watched those. And it's great that humanity comes together. But of course, it's imbued with lots of ambiguities and ethical issues. And those need attention and especially this year, it's been much more ambivalent than usually. And this is something that people together must then discuss and make decisions. And they are often not easy ones to make.
And speaking of the sort of [The] Dawn of Everything type of things and the solstice time, I've been fascinated by this new documentary about ancient cultures. And once again reminded of how many of the very old structures of humanity, built us calendars linked with the cycle of the sun and the annual year. So this is something that really goes deep into the rules of civilization. And I think it's also a profound statement to the connections between humans and the more than human world. And definitely during this dark time in the Northern Hemisphere, there must have been lots of watching of the stars also during this time of the year. And this is, of course, something very pertinent in relation to electricity. And also global warming and other ecological issues. So that's some counterculture that I think we really would need to also have actual fires and go out in the dark evenings and nights to take a look at the starry sky.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, that's a great connection with all the ancient cultures. We know the Newgrange, Stonehenge, the Aztecs. You know, all around the world. These cultural calendars. Tracking. Yeah, so the solstice is coming up here soon in the Northern Hemisphere. I do encourage listeners to be within all the things that are going on, and one of the heart of this season is celebrating the solstice. Either the summer solstice in the south or the winter solstice in the north.
And, you know, I know myself, my family, and we have a solstice gathering. A very simple solstice celebration every year that I would encourage listeners to think about. Where we go outside in our yard. And we have a fire and we stand in a circle and have candles. And, you know, we reflect on the end of the year. We blow out our candles and let it be dark for a moment. And then we light the candle from the fire. And then in turn, everyone lights each other's candle going around the circle. Just [a] very simple ritual, but it helps us to sort of recognize the end of the old year and the beginning of the new year. And I know for me, as soon as I do that, it helps the whole Christmas thing to make more sense for myself. And all the marketing and things just go away.
And I realized there's a true core. So I've been able to find a true core of that time of the year that's very authentic. Very simple, very authentic, doesn't cost a lot of money. It just is very analog, you know, it's very human. So I encourage people to find some analog moments. Which I mean, not digital, not on a computer. You know, being out in nature with your head under the stars and feeling the air on your skin. Even taking a long walk or being outdoors can be really helpful for our bodies at this time of the year. So, a lot of it is coping, you know, healthy as always healthy coping for each season of our lives.
Pihkala: Yeah, that's a nice phrase. Seasons of our lives are linked with these natural seasons. And good to hear about this ritual of Solstice we haven't spoken about that ever. And that goes into the category of ritual imagination and creativity. And I think that's one of the crucial skills for us. In this ambivalent time that we are living in. I'd like to share a quote from this essay, The Darkening Quarter by Viola Sampson. Which is from a book called Vital Signs: Psychological Responses to Ecological Crisis, edited by Mary-Jayne Rust and Nick Totton. So here it is.
And so, I begin to see that this darkening quarter of the year is a turning of fullness and expanding into the darkness. It is an opportunity to stay present to the darkness within and without, and not shrink from the cold or the world's grief. It is an opportunity to inhabit the greater darkness of the Earth, allowing its shadow to imbibe me and draw me inwards and downwards into my roots.
Doherty: That's a very nice quote. And we can put that in our show notes. You know, yeah, different things that draw us down to our roots. That's a good takeaway for us. And for the listeners, you know, what's going to draw you in a healthy way down to your roots here in this particular season. And I want to thank everyone for joining us on our journey.
This year, I know we have regular listeners around the world. I hear from people that have come, you know, along the journey with us now. And all of our episodes. Over 20 episodes that we've done over the course of 2022. This is the end of our first year on this project. So I really thank the listeners who have supported us. And, you know, you can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com, our website where you can find descriptions of all our previous episodes and links. And you can find this page on Patreon. And we do need support to make this project happen. This is an all volunteer effort. And we need support to pay our very gifted intern. And ideally, we would have support to compensate our guests that come and give up their time. And support for technology and things like that. So at people's end of the year, think about supporting our podcast, among other things in your life. And Panu, what's going to happen here in a little bit as after we sign off?
Pihkala: Yeah, it's a dark, snowy evening in Helsinki. And the boys will soon be home from their hobbies. And the academic year is getting close to its end. So one more week of work and going over some essays by students. I do some teaching, mostly research. So that's on my agenda before taking a break from the computers. And during Christmas, and New Year. And how about you, Thomas? What's up?
Doherty: Well, like a lot of listeners, I have guests in my home. And I have my mother-in-law. My late wife's mother is visiting. And we have family and we're gonna watch my daughter in a performance among all of her fellow students this evening. Also one of my jobs today is to be a dad and to hold space for my 15 year old daughter who's nervous about her big dance performance. And really just have joy in the beauty of all these young people and all their talents.
And I'm going to root for the best team to win in the World Cup match today. And I have my own heavy journey of writing and things that I'm trying to do and create, which I'll try to put some time into today. So I feel like I've done my work. My daily work. Yeah, so I wish that for all of us that you can get your daily duties done and also find some joy. So our theme, one of our themes today was permission to find some joy at this time of the year. And that doesn't doesn't mean that you're burying your head in the sand. There are truly some beautiful things in the world to be thankful for at this time of the year. So take care of yourself, Panu.
Pihkala: You too, Thomas. And thanks all the listeners for this and do take care.
Doherty: Take care everyone. We'll talk to you in the new year. And you all have good holidays however you celebrate them.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded, volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 8: Climate Feelings in East and West Africa with Charles Ogunbode
Dec 09, 2022
Season 2, Episode 8: Climate Feelings in East and West Africa with Charles Ogunbode
Panu and Thomas were joined by Charles Ogunbode, a psychology researcher at the University of Nottingham in the UK, in a dialogue about anxiety and other eco-emotions around the world. Charles shared insights from his widely reported paper “Climate anxiety, wellbeing and pro-environmental action: Correlates of negative emotional responses to climate change in 32 countries.” His study found that while climate anxiety is hurting people’s mental health around the world, from Brazil to Uganda, Portugal to the Philippines, people’s ability to speak out and take action is curtailed by lack of free speech and ability to demonstrate in many countries. Charles described his early interest in wildlife protection in Nigeria and his formative discoveries of research on conservation psychology and unconscious aspects of emotions like the melancholy that we can feel in relation to widespread destruction of the natural world. He described how his current projects create nuanced portraits of how Africans perceive the harms posed by climate change that move beyond simplistic stereotypes. Thomas, Panu and Charles reflected on unique environmental emotions and coping responses of citizens of East and West Africa that, given their shared colonial histories, feature both resignation about climate threats and also a deep resilience. Listen in and join us!
Charles reports he is an Associate Editor of the new journal, Global Environmental Psychology and is co-editing a special issue of the journal on “Living with Environmental Change” with Susan Clayton. (Hear from Susan in Season 1, Episode 6: “Environmental Identity and “Climate Flow”).
Transcript
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. This is a show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change and other environmental issues. We focus on our personal emotions, our feelings, our private lives. And today, we're really happy to have a guest with us.
Charles Ogunbode: Hello, I'm Charles Ogunbode. I'm an assistant professor in psychology at the University of Nottingham, in the UK. And it's really nice to join you today on the podcast.
Doherty: And we're so happy to have Charles. Charles has been very active as a researcher, really expanding our understanding of climate emotions around the world. And I know Charles, you've been focused also on your own family and your own life. Panu, do you want to get us started today on our global conversation?
Pihkala: Definitely. And warmly welcome Charles also, on my behalf. We have met online talking about young people and climate anxiety. But it's really great to have a more relaxed and free flowing opportunity for discussions. And there [are] also links. I'm from Finland, as many listeners know. And Charles has been leading really international research where one of the countries has been Finland. Not me, but my colleagues have been involved in that. I know, Charles, a bit about your history. That you've been in many places. So would you like to get us started by telling a bit about your personal and professional journey?
Ogunbode: Yes, thank you. Thank you, Panu. So basically, my background didn't really begin in psychology. I did a degree in wildlife management. Because when I was younger, I got interested in conservation. And I actually wanted to become a conservationist. So in the course of my degree, I went and did a whole bunch of sub practical training things and different nature reserves and national parks and things like that in Nigeria. And in the process of doing this experience, gaining activities, I soon figured out that a lot of the issues were not to do with the actual sub scientific or ecological aspects of the problem. A lot of the issues were to do with people. So it was, you know, conflicts between park rangers and local communities. You know, a lot of it was mistrust between the different parties involved. People not being very clear about what the purpose of conservation activities were, and things like that.
So I thought, okay, I'm really interested in doing something around the human side. And incidentally, just towards the end of my undergrad degree, I just happened to stumble on a book, titled Conservation Psychology. Which was written by Susan Clayton and Gene Meyers. It was given to me as a present, just random. And I read this book. And I thought this is exactly what I want to be doing. So that was the sort of start on this. I signed up to do a master's program in psychology. And carried on sort of looking into things that probe environmental behavior. And things like that. And that's basically developed into what I do now.
But the more sort of recent history of what's brought me to sort of emotions and well being and things. Which has become quite a big focus on my work now. That kind of happened a few years ago. [The] last three, four years. Maybe three years. When we had our first child, my wife had eco anxiety. Climate anxiety. We lived in Norway at the time. And I was already working on climate change at this point. And I was doing work mainly around trying to encourage people to be more concerned about climate change. Trying to get people more engaged. And basically, my outlook at the time was very much focused on risk perception models. Trying to be like, you know, if people really understood the risks posed by climate change, then they will be a motivator to act. That was, you know, in summary, my driving motivation.
But then when I saw my wife go through this phase where, you know, she was consuming lots of information about climate changes on social media and getting involved in loads of things. And she was just in a really sort of anxious state about this. And we had this child. And, you know, I think it's a combination of that particular phase in our lives. And also, you know, this big lumination thing. We just brought a child into this world. And, you know, there are all these things. And it was just really stressful. And that made me start to think a bit differently about what it means to be emotionally engaged with, you know, climate change and the ecological crisis in general. And it was around this time as well that, you know, the Friday's for Future and, you know, Extinction Rebellion. All that stuff really take[s] off. And, of course, climate anxiety as a concept kind of entered the public sort of mainstream consciousness.
So I would say, actually I really value that period in my life, because I think it made me move from a more, in hindsight, a mechanistic understanding of what emotions are in relation to the climate crisis. To where I am now where I like to think, well, one of the things I'm advocating at the minute is how we need to have this ethic of care around how we communicate about climate change. And try to motivate people. And things like that. It's not enough to just be well, let's just find a button that's going to make people engaged and act. We also have to think. We've got to have some responsibility as well. For these forces, and these reactions that we're trying to generate with people. So that's, in short.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks so much, Charles. That's very rich. And I really value this openness with which you are describing that journey. And this already connects to a huge number of issues we have been touching on [in] this podcast. There's the so-called ecological identity or environmental identity. And very interesting to hear about this early history of yours. And I guess for many people, it goes like this. That there's a place and an ecosystem. And that's happening. And also the sort of better paradigm than “we need more information”. Ogunbode: Yes.
Pihkala: That happened for me, also. It was really eye-opening to then start looking at another way. And the works of Renée Lertzman and Ro Randall and some others were very influential for me in that regard. So there's some points that I can also personally connect with here.
Ogunbode: And actually to add to that someone else whose work was also very critical in that transition for me was Renée Lertzman. The first sort outside of my social cognition paradigm and where I am normally. The first piece of work I read that took me. Kind of started to develop an understanding of emotions was her book, Environmental Melancholia. I think it was. That was a really good book for me to kind of get started on this new direction.
Doherty: This is great. Yeah. I'm really enjoying our conversation. And there are so many commonalities. Panu and I both have done outdoor work in the past. And my background doing outdoor therapy and river guiding. And I also considered going into wildlife conservation. And then actually had a turning point where there was study environmental studies or psychology. So I think that's common for a lot of the therapists that I've worked with. That they've had these backgrounds.
And just the listeners. I think the listeners can identify with all of this process that we're talking about. Going from the intellectual to the emotional. And psychologists in particular are very intellectual type species. And so really moving to the emotional and the depth. More depth psychology. And more the psychoanalytic archetypal directions like Renee and other thinkers. And yeah, the insight of we need to take care of people, not just push levers and buttons in a behaviorist kind of way to get people to act. But there is this compassion for us all. As I say climate hostages because we're all kind of stuck in many ways in this area.
Do we want to go into more of the international and what we're? It seems like one of the many things you're doing, Charles, is really illustrating that eco anxiety and feelings about — even to step back and say everyone has feelings about nature. And the environment. And their connections. And their identity. And you've been studying this in different countries outside of the countries that are often listed in the studies. The Finlands and the US and the UK and Canada. Would you want to talk a bit about what you've been learning in your research the last few years?
Ogunbode: Yes. That's been a really interesting journey as well. And I think one of the reasons why kind of, it's got this resonance for me. I'm very driven to bring in, you know, the voices of the people we hear less about in this area. Especially to do with emotions and things. So there are a couple of things that have kind of dovetailed in that work to make me feel really invested in it. So the first part is before I started to think about emotions, in this way, I've always had this pet peeve about the concept of climate literacy. So there's been a lot of work out there where they rank countries around the world talking about, you know, what proportion of the population understand what climate change is. So usually, it's you know, they're familiar with the term as a technical term. Do they understand that it's caused by humans? Do they understand it? Very much that's the sort of technoscientific construct of climate change. And it's like, you know, how many people around the world share that understanding.
And I've always found that to be quite problematic, because when we look at places like Africa. When we look at parts of Asia. And when we look at, you know, people don't necessarily have access to the language. And that would be English or French. Or whatever, that dominant language of science is. But it doesn't mean that they don't have an understanding of climate change. They interact with climate change on a daily basis. they're affected by climate change. Their lives are shaped by climate change. And to say these people are not aware of, they're climate illiterate. It just feels very arrogant. And I found it quite problematic.
And more importantly, than that, the proposed solution was usually oh, we need to educate people. We need to give them more information so they really understand, you know, what the scope of the issue is and things like that. And while I'm sure a lot of the motivations behind this are completely benign, I just feel if we kind of thought about it, it'd be more critical. Especially in Africa. And I can mainly speak for Africa because I'm from Nigeria. And I've had that African experience. And I can say, you know, the English language, this sort of Western understanding of science approach to science came to us through colonization. So basically, saying that you want to educate people to bring them up to speed with your western understanding is essentially saying you want to reinforce those colonial processes. You know, the part and parcel of education is not neutral. In that sense.
So I feel the climate change research community hasn't necessarily been that critical, or adequately critical around that topic. And then the way it connects with eco anxiety work is also that in a lot of the work that has been done, again, in Africa, looking at, you know, the human side of climate change, and how it's experienced where the impacts are. The questions have been very basic. You know, the emphasis has been on, particularly sort of agrarian communities. And things like that. And, you know, are people able to feed themselves? Do they have access to water? You know, that kind of thing. And not that those aren't important questions. They are important questions. But the problem is, the research never really progressed beyond that. It's almost like, you know, as long as they're alive, it's fine. And none of the other things that are necessary to have a full meaningful life. Dignified life. Ever seems to be considered.
So that was why when the eco anxiety started to pick up as well, I thought, well, why are we not seeing anything really, outside of, you know, North America and Western Europe about this. Again, it's that same thing about how, you know, it's really important here. We have all these complex emotions. And all the things that are important, but other people around the world, we don't really bother to ask how they're feeling. So I thought that was something that needed to be set right. So that's been a big motivation to do the work that I've been involved in over the last couple of years. Trying to collect data on this from all over the world. And that work has been really rewarding because I then kind of connect it to other people. And it's become something even more than what I started out thinking about initially.
So initially, it was just about, look, we need to get a sense or get a measure of how people feel about climate change. It's not just about, you know, what they understand. Just how do they feel, at whatever level of understanding they are. Because I think emotions actually can tell us a lot about what people think. Beyond just asking someone, you know, how do you understand climate change? What does it mean to you, etc. I think we're quicker to be able to get a sense of how we feel about something before we're actually able to put it together cognitively to say, this is my attitude. And this is my belief. Or whatever. We just have that. You know, like intuition and things like that. I thought, you know, this is such a good way to bypass the poor climate literacy thing and just focus on how people feel.
Yes, so that's kind of been a big part of it. And then what's kind of also developed out of it more recently, that's become also quite exciting for me is, of course, we then had the projects. Invited loads of people. And work together. Gathered all this data. But then it goes thinking about the way we actually do the research. So it's not just about the questions we're asking and what issues we're tackling. But it's also, how did we get here? You know, we started with a very small group. It was myself and a bunch of colleagues from many European countries who started up the project. Essentially we came to it with an understanding of what climate anxiety was and invited people to help us figure out if that applied in a whole range of countries.
We never really asked our collaborators, you know, what's it like, from your side? You know, how do you think we should measure this? Does this even make sense to you? You know, so we've now more recently been spending a bit more time just kind of reflecting on the process. And also thinking about how potentially this could not only inform what's happening around climate, emotions research, but also become a template for psychological research on sustainability and climate change in general. To really, you know, properly embrace this global outlook and understanding. This idea is one way of seeing the world. One, society. One group is not more important than another one where we have a collective problem. And we need all, you know, perspectives. All hands on deck, basically, to make sense of it and navigate our way out of it.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for sharing all that. And I think there's hugely important things related to the colonial history. And how it links with climate science. And giving [an] emphasis on the lived experience of people. Often in the complexity. And also listening to other kinds of information than just, you know, the rational, cognitive, put into word type of thing. And sometimes folks in environmental education have also got very interesting results when they ask kids to make drawings, for example. And then people are very surprised at what actually comes out of that. Have you gotten feedback, for example, from Nigeria, or other countries?
Ogunbode: Yes. So, there's some work, which. We've gathered all this data. And we're going through it now. So the project I was involved in, which looks at people's understanding of climate change in eastern West Africa. So the West African side of the project focuses on Lagos, in Nigeria. It's a coastal city. It's the biggest economic center in the city. And it's got a very interesting sort of dynamic around climate change, because the government had invested a lot of money in climate change adaptation because essentially, the city is threatened by rising sea levels. And things like that. But in the process of delivering these climate adaptation projects, there's also been a lot of forced evacuations of some of the traditional communities that lived on the coast. And they're essentially making this development that also doubles as luxury housing for rich residents. So it's quite a complicated scenario there. So it's been really interesting to get all the data in from there. Talking to people in Lagos about their feelings about climate change. And what they understand climate change to be. What kinds of actions they're taking, etc. And we're just working our way through that data right now.
And then in East Africa, we also are working with communities in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda. Countries on the what's called on the coast of Lake Victoria Who sp depend on the lake for fishing. And we're talking to them about their experiences of climate change as well. And their feelings about it. How it impacts them, etc. And basically, when we started this project, at its core, it's a natural sciences project. So we've got this sort of modeler. We're doing all kinds of hydrological modeling in Lake Victoria to see what the scientific objective, you know, climate change trends are there. Same as with Lagos as well. And then the idea of the project was for our social sciences to come in. So there's myself and Caroline Van Den Berg, who is also an environmental psychologist at Utrecht. And colleagues in the University of Bergen as well. So a bunch of psychologists anyway constitute the social science side of the project. And we're supposed to come in basically and speak to people. Get their impression of what's going on with climate change. And then essentially bring this data to the objective natural sciences data. And see the degree to which there is agreement or not, in what people think compared with the measurements that have been taken by the scientists.
But it's been a really good opportunity, as I said, to kind of get a feel for how people think about it. And one of the interesting things actually I've been doing, which was how that photo came about. As the slide where I misspelled your name Panu. It was basically me applying your taxonomy of climate emotions to the reports that we got from people in Nigeria to see how much of those emotions you identified in your paper represented in the spontaneous accounts that people give. So all we've asked them is, how do you feel about climate change? That's it. There's no pre question. There's nothing. It's just their spontaneous reactions. And it's been really interesting to see what kinds of things we will come up with. It's raised a lot of questions actually about not just the emotions that people feel, but also the language that's available to them to describe the emotions that they have.
So it's been really interesting. So a lot of people the dominant emotion, strangely, seem to be indifferent. So it's been really interesting to try to delve into what that means. Because normally, when we think about indifference in the Western context, it's, you know, I think you described it actually, it is categorized in among these of hostile emotions. It's a rejection. It's, you know, of whatever the issue is. Whereas in Nigeria, it seems to be something closer to resignation. Where it's not coming from a place of not caring. But it's coming from a place of either, well, they're just so many other things. So many other pressing concerns. Or this just seems to be beyond my ability to do anything. So I'm just not. I'm not even going to be worried about it. Because that takes too much energy, you know. So that's a big one. And then in East Africa, the dominant feeling is sadness. You know, when you ask people they just say, oh, I'm really sad this is happening. I'm really sad about what the implications are going to be. I'm really sad because, you know, in the future we'll have less food. Or children will be, you know, negatively affected, etc. And, again, it's a negative emotion, but it's not one that really speaks of activation or action, if you know what I mean.
So yeah, it's really interesting, kind of looking through that data. And the plan is to try to feed it back to some of the local organizations working in these areas. And trying to think well, how can we, you know, what do we do to kind of support people and make sure that, you know, these feelings get channeled into some kind of action that will be beneficial for, you know, sort of just resolving the issues. The challenges that people are facing. Because to be realistic, for a lot of these people, they genuinely do not have a lot of means to have an impact. You know, so we're talking about people who are kind of disenfranchised as far as political systems are concerned. They're, you know, relative to someone like me or you, they're quite far away from the centers of power. If you know what I mean. They're not in a position to put pressure on leaders to do anything like that. So yeah, it's a very interesting scenario, where it's been really informative. Really helpful to be able to learn about it. And just bring that into, you know, my understanding. And my colleagues' understanding of just the global landscape of, you know, climate change. the human experience of climate change. Anyway.
Pihkala: That's very interesting. Just some brief comments from me. And then I'll drop the ball to Thomas. This issue of different words for emotions and feelings in different languages and cultures, is something me and Thomas have been very interested about. And, of course, the Finnish language plays a big role in that for me. And there's some things we have a word for, in affective phenomena in Finnish that don't exist in English. And the other way around. And what you are saying about indifference, for example, is highly interesting. Because I see many variations in sort of, kind of calm acceptance, totally calm. And it's difficult to find a word. But if you just can't do anything about it [the climate crisis], then you may have in a way engaged with it, but then just made the estimation that, you know, it's totally beyond me.
Ogunbode: Yeah.
Pihkala: That's something that I wonder if some language has a good word for that, which would bring the connotation instantly.
Ogunbode: Yeah.
Pihkala: What's on your mind, Thomas, when listening to this very rich conversation?
Doherty: Oh, yeah, I'm really, you know, to bring the listeners in particularly, I'm thinking of you listeners in the US. You know, I've been looking at the map just to orient myself. And I do recommend people pull out a map and just, you know, locate Lagos and Lake Victoria. And just to get a sense of the part of the world near the equator that we're talking about. And, you know, it's such a different context with colonialism, as you say. Just the political situation and cultures in Africa.
It makes sense once we look at this, why the findings would be that, you know, the sense of being able to take action. You know, it is more prominent in European countries and US countries. You know, wealthier countries. There's a lot I mean, for us, and for the listeners thinking about our emotions. So this idea of indifference and sadness. Which I think people feel in the US, too. I think actually parts of the US people feel very much similar. That's partly why we have political issues in the US. People are very much disenfranchised. We have a very unequal country. And so when we think about this calm acceptance, I wonder, is it, to get more nuanced again about the feelings, is it fatalism? Or is it also a kind of resilience? Right? So is it sort of like, we will endure. That's just, not having ever been to Africa, my sense of a lot of African cultures is there as a sense of resilience in the sense of endurance. This sense of humor. You know, the sense of teaching stories and things like that.
So I wonder about fatalism versus resilience. So that's one direction to go. And then just to acknowledge, and Charles, you might have thoughts about this too. You know, I feel like in places like the US and Finland, there is more of the sense of guilt and shame. As someone privileged. Whereas there's, probably in Africa, people feel guilty and shameful of their privilege. But the privileges are different.
Ogunbode: Yeah.
Doherty: Less evenly distributed through the countries. But I don't think people in Africa are immune to shame and guilt either. So just staying a little more with all these nuanced feelings would be interesting.
Ogunbode: Yeah. No, absolutely. I think those emotions are certainly relevant in that context, as well. And there was one person who explicitly used the term guilt. And they were talking about it in terms of. I mean, presently there's still a lot of people who don't quite realize that climate change is something that's driven by processes beyond their local context. So a lot of people would say, oh, it's because of the trees that are cut down, you know, somewhere down the road. Or it's because of those factories or some. So there's that sense of local responsibility. And there is some guilt around people. So most people wouldn't necessarily use the word guilt. There was that one person who did. But from the description of where they think these problems have come from, there is a sense of, we're doing a disservice to future generations and our kids and things like that.
So those emotions are perfectly relevant in that context. And that's part of the reason why I think there's emphasis on the technical understanding of climate change. And who has it? And who doesn't. It's the wrong direction to be looking at. Because the people arrive at the same kinds of outcomes. And have the same kinds of reactions. And they make logical judgments. And it's not so much the specific kinds of information that they're working with that really matter in that process. But it's how they come to make those judgments. How those feelings come to arise. And what the consequences of those feelings are. Those are the sorts of things that I think are probably more important. And so I think, to a large extent, there's sorts of drives to make restitution or restoration and things like that. I think they are present as well.
And these are the sorts of things that I'm really hoping that the more we can generate this kind of information. And get them in the hands of, you know, active campaigners and educators in this context, then they can really begin to channel those drives into more constructive channels. Because the other thing I find a bit frustrating sometimes is I've really appreciated the emergence of a focus on sub-climate justice, for example. Basically justice framings of the climate discourse. But I also see that within that, our role as African or people in the Global South in general, is to be the soft victim of the problem. And I think it's quite disempowering, in a way. And so I think we also need to not just, you know, while we're recognizing and engaging the structural issues, we also need to not lose sight of self worth. And, you know, people's individual and collective agency to make change within those systems as well
Pihkala: Yeah, that sounds like a hugely important point both that you're sharing. And I don't know how this is for you, because you are known now in many places as an eco-anxiety researcher. Do people come to you and ask how we should cope with eco-anxiety? And if they did, what would you say?
Ogunbode: I always refer them to people who I know are much more qualified than myself. So I've been really lucky to. For a while I was quite actively engaged with the Climate Psychology Alliance in the UK. Unfortunately, because I just work fresh and stuff going on, family life hasn't really been able to keep me involved as much as I would like. But they've been brilliant. And usually I just say, get in touch with the CPA. Okay, there's lots of really great people there.
Doherty: Yeah. I mean listeners should know that there's so many people working on all these issues all around the world. Charles, I mean, that people in every country you've done that are understanding climate change in their own way and working. And so people don't understand that piece. But then there is a lot, what I call the, you know, the climate elephant or the blind man and the elephant parable. Where everybody has different pieces of climate. And I feel for you, Charles being the human feelings researcher in a room full of climate adaptation people that are all focused on, you know, hydrology. Because human feelings are still disenfranchised in the climate discourse. You know, the emotions are less present in all the reports. And so there is this intellectual bias. And so that stuff.
But then even among the people that cares, there's like, well, who can help? Well, you can help, you know. And so the therapists are trying to come in, but then they feel like they don't understand hydrology. And they don't understand the climate. So it is a work in progress for all of us. So if people feel like an impostor, or they don't know enough, that's just quite normal for anyone engaging in this area. Yeah, we have time for maybe one more point. We can go a little over our time because it's such a rich discussion. Well how do we want to close off our discussion? Charles, is there something else that you want to bring in or that we didn't talk about? Or directions for the future?
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks once more for dwelling on that. And as you sort of hinted before, that also helps the researchers. So that's my experience, both personally and with my colleagues. So that's the good side of it. And it's advancing a paradigm change, I think, I think you've been in many ways involved in this. And that's something for the listeners also. So no matter where you are, everybody can do something for this Great Turning. That would be Joanna Macy's word for it and other terms. So just being open to these issues, that's already a great step. So not going into that “I can't take this I want to stay away all the time”. [Instead:] “I want to stay.” Very grateful, Charles that you found the time to come and discuss. I've learned a lot today. And it's been a great pleasure.
Ogunbode: Yeah. Well, I mean, this is very much to do with what's been on my mind recently. But I think I'm gonna stay with this for a while, because I think there is a lot of value to working on this. And it ties into what you were saying just now about, you know, there. Suddenly, among psychology, there's a growing proportion of people who are really beginning to take emotions more seriously. Really, I've been really glad, since climate anxiety came around. You know, there are lots of ways we can critique the concept. And there are lots of, you know, issues with it. But it's done one thing, which I think is really important, which has given us this term to talk about emotions that most people can relate to. They know what you're talking about, when you say climate anxiety. They have some sense of it. So we can now talk about that. And what it means. And also it's helped us move away from why people are not worried enough. If only they were worried, then maybe we'll see more action. It's helped us move away from that to a more nuanced understanding of emotions. And that's really important.
And the other half of the equation that now needs to happen is how we then work together to really move this forward. And this is where it connects to what you were saying, Thomas, about, you've got a therapist. You've got people like myself who are just sort of like, you know, psychology researchers and things like that. And I think sometimes it's easy to lose sight of the greater goal. Just because of the incentives within academia. And how it works. And things like that. And it's almost like, you know, you're solving competition, one another, and things like that. But I think it's a really important sort of challenge for all of us to be able to in whatever way, whatever skills we've got on whatever, you know, capacities, we've got to read to, you know, keep in focus that all of these different things complement one another. You know, I've been in some meetings with other psychologists where there'll be some really searing critiques of, I don't know, more some like cognition oriented psychology. And I've been in meetings, I feel like, oh, well, I don't understand this psychosocial stuff or. You know, it very quickly descends into the sort of disciplinary tensions.
And I just don't think we can really afford that right now. I think we need to maybe put in a bit more effort in getting the different disciplines within psychology to kind of speak with one another and figure out how to kind of work together to achieve the bigger goals. You know, there's been a lot of work by people I really respect. You know, over the last few years. Lots of commentaries. Lots of opinion pieces. Lots of things trying to forge this vision for psychology around emotions research. And it would be great to see more work like that. More people coming together and trying to really push, you know, self drive that collective effort forward. Thank you so much for inviting me. I do feel like I'm in the company of really great people, because I've read so much. I read your work. I read Thomas's work from very early on in my PhD. So your papers with Susan sort of lay out, you know, I love those things. You know, actually do research on them and things. So I really appreciate it. It's great to actually be talking to you in person. And Panu, obviously, you've done tons of stuff. I can only aspire to, you know. So it's really good. So I hope that we will, you know, be able to carry on this conversation in another space at some point in the future.
Doherty: Yeah, me too. And Charles, thanks for carrying the fire and moving it forward and bringing it more worldwide attention. The idea of the ethic of care, I think, is a great takeaway. You know, responsibility for our emotions. And also for holding other people's emotions, even if they're different. Even if they're different. Underlying some of these academics, you know, debates are people's different emotions, too. And so like, you know, really caring for different kinds of climate emotions than our own is good for all of us. Well, thank you. And to the listeners, thanks for joining us again. If you like our content, please think about supporting our podcast. We're a self funded volunteer effort. You can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com, or on our Patreon page. And otherwise, Panu and Charles, you have a good evening. And I'm going to get on with the rest of my rainy day here in Oregon.
Ogunbode: Have a nice day, Thomas. Thank you, take care, Panu.
Doherty: Take care.
Pihkala: Take Thomas, Charles and all the listeners.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded, volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 7: When Grief Is A Barrier To Enjoying Time In Nature
Nov 25, 2022
Season 2, Episode7: When Grief Is A Barrier to Enjoying Time In Nature
In this episode, Thomas and Panu confront an issue that is commonplace as the impacts of climate change are more widely felt: How can we enjoy our time in natural settings and seek the restoration we crave when our awareness of environmental destruction and our feelings of ecological grief are so strong? Panu shared research about how climate grief acutely impacts many young people and their emotional connection to places. Thomas reminded us that ecological grief has been a perennial challenge among ecologically aware people, even a strange privilege—citing Aldo Leopold’s famous dictum “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds”—and looked back to his own youthful confrontations with old growth clearcuts through his “postmodern expeditions” practice. As this podcast demonstrates, we are not doomed to live alone with our feelings about the world. We can join with others that share our values and sense of urgency. And, as our recent discussion with Rosemary Randall taught us, grief is not solely a barrier but also a gateway, an invitation to new ways of being that mourn our losses and reinvest our energy back into life. So too with our potential for re-securing our attachments to places and restoring (re-storying) wounded places. Listen for more details and share in this important discussion.
The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded, volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. Become a Patreon or visit our Donate page.
“All I see is lovely trees and that reminds me that we are killing all the trees and then I feel angry and sad, so I won’t or can’t go there any more. If people stupidly tell me that time in nature is healing all I can say to them is that all I see is dying animals and plants”.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I’m Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. The show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change. The personal side of climate change. And other environmental issues. Obviously climate change is one part of a larger suite of challenges that we have. And talking about our emotions. And today it’s Panu and I. And we are doing some of the original work of this podcast which is trying to sort out some of these challenges that we confront personally and that people come to us. Questions that people come to us with. And today we’re getting into this question. This issue. This suffering that people have when they feel uncomfortable or they feel grief going out into nature. So rather than getting this restoration they’re seeking they have to confront these sad and negative feelings. And it gets in the way. And they don’t know what to do about this. And so we’re going to talk about this. And so listeners you can see how this fits for you. But Panu, tell me more about this problem? How are you hearing about it? And how it’s being discussed in the world.
Pihkala: Yeah. That’s something that came up prominently, for example, when we were organizing facilitated discussion groups for people who wanted to talk about their ecological emotions. Especially so-called eco-anxiety. Ympäristöahdistus in Finnish. So this was in Finland. So clearly people who care about the more than human world deeply and who are highly aware of what’s going on, it may be difficult to bear. And so many things may remind people of ecological threats and damage. So the potential triggers for feeling some kind of distress are so numerous that it’s complicated.
I’m also strongly reminded of interview research done by my dear colleague Caroline Hickman from Great Britain, who has been interviewing children in various parts of the world. And asking about how they feel about climate change. And what are their thoughts about it. And this following is an excerpt from Caroline’s 2020 article We need to (find a way to) talk about … Eco-anxiety. So here’s Caroline:
“A number of young people told me that they no longer felt able to go and spend time in nature because it made them feel so angry and sad and full of grief at the loss of nature that it was now becoming unbearable for them.”
And then follows a quote from a child who is saying:
“All I see is lovely trees and that reminds me that we are killing all the trees. And then I feel angry and sad. So I won’t and can’t go there anymore. And if people stupidly tell me that time in nature is healing, all I can say to them is that all I see is dying animals and plants.”
All I see is dying animals and plants. So that’s a pretty strong case of becoming so affected. So, what thoughts come to your mind, Thomas, when hearing that example?
Doherty: Well it’s really a beautiful quote. And it speaks to the directness of young people when they come upon these things. I’m just thinking of Greta and other young climate activists who are really calling out these issues. I think this is really important. I think, myself, I have experienced this problem. I know you have, Panu. Anyone listening who’s done any environmental work of any kind. Whether it’s conservation work or landscape work or humanitarian work, has had to confront this. So, I have had this question come up recently in my therapy training group. As therapists are struggling with this, also.
And so there’s two things going on here. One, it’s novel and new for many people. Like you said in our planning conversation, the extent of this is really important. Many, many people are being able to tap into this now because many, many people are having consciousness raising about environmental issues and climate change. And things like that. Although, we can look back in history and find many people that have already trodden this path. You and I have trodden it. We’ll talk about ways that we cope. And we’ll look at other well known environmental leaders that have spoken about this.
So, the first thing that I tell people is that, first of all, your feelings are true and accurate. You know, the feelings task is important. Let’s just stay with the feelings. Validate. Elevate. Create. Let’s validate this. Put it on a pedestal. Not just sweep it away. Particularly young people. No, let's stay with this. This is important. Tell me more about these feelings. And then let’s get creative about them. When did it start. And what do you do about it. How do you cope. So that creativity like in our recent episode with Kim Stafford. It’s all about sort of having a blank page. But then, realizing, as I always tell myself, if I can think about something then I know someone else already has. And then I can start to sort of see this. You know, what I tell a therapist is that, simply put, this is not a barrier, it’s a doorway. This is a threshold. This is a rite of passage. So it’s a normal part of our development of our environmental identity. It’s stark when these young people have such sad and troubling things to say. But it is a sign of development. It is a sign of moving forward.
So that’s the way I would start talking about this. As a kind call to adventure. Kind of the hero's journey kind of model. And obviously we want to refuse the call because we don’t want to let go of our innocence and our kind of idea that nature is there for us and pristine and safe. But that’s ultimately a child-like idea that these young people are. It’s kind of being stripped away from them, unfortunately. But I think there are ways to nurture this and move forward.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks for sharing all that. And one phrase that was used I think in an early 2020s report by Lise Van Susteren, a colleague was the working wounded. Referring to people who work with environmental matters. Or simply work outdoors and so can’t escape the facts that there is much happening [in] ecosystems. And it was very difficult for a long time for many of these people because the working communities didn't really have resources for encountering the emotions. As you say Thomas here, you know, staying with the feelings. But instead, in many natural science communities, for example, it’s a totally new idea to talk about emotions at all. Not to mention emotions related to what’s going on in the natural world. So people felt very isolated. And there was lot’s of unhealthy suppression and repression going on. And some people like Phyllis Windle in the 90’s already wrote a very good article about the grief of environmentalists. And that goes much deeper in history as you say, Thomas.
Doherty: Yeah. One of the gifts of the ecopsychology movement. Particularly in the 90s. That original ecopsychology edited volume was that people pulled a lot of these ideas together. And there is a good chapter in there on restoration. So many people have had this insight. That restoring myself and restoring nature are part of the same process. There’s many things. I mean whenever I get into this I always go back to the famous quote from Aldo Leopold. From the Sand County Almanac, you know, one of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds. Much of the damage inflicted on the land is invisible to laymen. And ecologists must either harden his shell—this is a dated quote in some ways. In terms of gender and things like that. But, an ecologist must either harden his shell and make believe that the consequences of science are none of his business. Or he must be the doctor who sees marks of death in a community that believes itself well. And does not want to be told otherwise, right? And that’s very much what this young person that you quoted is channeling. This kind of thing. But we don’t need to live alone, first of all.
That’s part of the issue. Most eco anxiety and eco grief, the problematic aspects of it are because we are alone. And we don’t have anyone to share it with. So, we are doomed to live in a damaged world. Humans do impact the natural world. And there is no way of getting around that. But we’re not doomed to be alone with it. We’re not doomed to be, you know, ignorant of it. Or in suppression of it. But obviously these young people are having a meta awakening. They’re awakening to our economic systems and our legal system in which nature and trees do not have any intrinsic rights. Right? And that we do have to kill a lot of trees and harvest a lot of trees. Whether you use the word kill or harvest is notable here. But we do harvest trees. And, of course, native cultures have created and have always had ways to understand the reciprocity of using trees. And animals. And having a relationship with nature that provides a ceremony for all of this interbeing and interconnection. In young people and in our capitalist society we don’t have any ceremonies to hold all this sort of stuff. So it is quite jarring to have this waking up syndrome, as they call it. Particularly with young people.
Pihkala: Yeah, definitely. So the awakening or realization can be very difficult. Especially if there’s no community to help you with the awakening or realization. And in many human societies, there’s been ancient traditions designed to deliver potentially traumatic information. Or, you know, these deep facts about the human condition and living on earth. For example, related to mortality and so on. So, something like that would be needed also in relation to the times we are living in now. And many concepts have been used of the state where people encounter these painful truths. Some have been applying frameworks related to post traumatic stress disorder, for example. Getting creative and using terms like mid-traumatic stress disorder [e.g. Mary Pipher, The Green Boat, 2013]. Because we are living in the midst of it. And I think personally and as a researcher that some of that scholarship about post traumatic stress is very fitting.
But of course we need care in how we use concepts of trauma, for example. And concepts which have the word disorder. So that may have some unwelcome implications. But, some elements of the scholarship like, you know, becoming quite shaken by the images and thoughts. And they are intrusive. It’s difficult to get away from them. And even when you go to a dear forest you start seeing burning trees in your mind. So that has some profound links I think with what the scholars of post traumatic stress are about. But how about you, Thomas, as a therapist? How do you see these issues?
Doherty: Yeah. Well, I think we need to be careful. Particularly mental health therapists need to be careful because their tools are ultimately about disorders. And about trauma. And I don’t know that I necessarily want to saddle young people with trauma in this regard. I think, in the healthiest sense, this is simply a learning process. It’s a way of learning our environmental identity. And I think of it more as a rite of passage in a building capacity versus some sort of trauma. Obviously there are traumatic feelings, but I’m not interested in saddling a young generation to all be trauma survivors and victims. I don’t think that’s very inspiring. And I don’t think that’s what our ancestors would like. I don’t think that’s what native cultures would ultimately think about. Or Aldo Leopold. Or Rachel Carson. Or any of these people.
So, we have to be careful if your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And so, using some of the healing concepts from trauma work, but not necessarily using pathology as the lens through which we see the world. I don’t find that very inspiring. Rosemary Randall who we. The last two folks who we had on the podcast, Rosemary Randall and Kim Stafford, were great examples of people that were approaching this issue, but in a very growthful way. And very compassionate. And ultimately inspiring. Rosemary Ro used William Worden’s grief work in her work with people who are confronting their own climate impacts. And, you know, so there are road maps here for us, right? You know, accepting the reality of the loss. We have tasks when we’re going through ecological grief. And so when someone is having this barrier to being out in nature, there are some steps. It’s accepting reality intellectually and emotionally.
The emotional piece is the hard one, obviously. And then working through these. Sharing the feelings. Understanding nuance. What the feelings are. Anger. Grief. Loss. You know, I have my grief map that I use with people. So it’s like are you grieving something from the past? Are you grieving something currently? Are you grieving something that you expect to happen? And all the being with that disorganization. So there’s a period. It’s a rite of passage. Once you open that door and step in. It is confusing. And we don’t know. And our old ways don’t work anymore. And I might keep going to a natural place and be confused about it time and time again. Until I can see that place in a new light. And adjusting to this new environment. And new skills. New sense of self. And putting my energy into this new world. Which is, oh I need to help caretake and have a sense of stewardship for these places. It’s not just the backdrop. It’s not just a product. Or a commodity. Or an Instagram photo, right? You know, young people are sucked into the beauty and the adventure of nature. And they think they can partake of it. And then also the shadow side comes along with it. And that we don’t see the shadow side on Instagram, right? We don’t have a shadow Instagram out there.
So anyway, listeners should know there are steps. And there are people that have trodden this path before. Many many people. We talked about Rachel Carson and the idea of a sense of wonder recently. Obviously she was able to balance both fear and pain and concern. But also the sense of wonder. But when you think about things that inspire you, Panu, personally what comes up for you?
Pihkala: Yeah. Several things. Francis Weller. The American West Coast psychotherapist who has written profoundly about grief is one inspiration. And he’s using the metaphor of gates of grief. So that comes to mind. Thomas when hearing your metaphor here. And I’ve really found his work helpful. And in his workshops there’s also people tapping into their feelings of ecological grief. Even though they might have come to the workshop with a different purpose. And of course these are intertwined. You know, various things that happen in our lives become intertwined.
I've been very impressed by Trebbe Johnson’s work. She and colleagues have developed Radical Joy for Hard Times Network. Radicaljoy.org I think is the website. And this method of what they call “Guerrilla beauty”. But anyway the idea is to go together there, to go into these wounded natural places as they call it. And being aware of the very human temptation of trying to look away, and not going somewhere where painful feelings and memories come to mind. But instead going toward them. Spending time there together. They even sometimes have a sort of method of liminality. Liminality, referring to this sort of rite of passage-like space, where you step away from ordinary life for a while. And then you sometimes step back. So, for example, going on a pilgrimage or a sacred journey is a classic example of a liminal state.
And so it’s related to this rite of passage thing that you, Thomas, mentioned. But, for example, if there’s some clear cut forest which is dear to you, you may just take a branch and use that to signal a border. A threshold. So crossing that branch you sort of enter into this liminal space with the clear cut. You spend time there. You reflect on the feelings. You do things that your body sort of advises you to do. And perhaps then, also, doing something in return like a small gift of beauty. That’s what they do with the “Radjoy” network. Then stepping back over the branch into everyday life. So it’s quite a creative methodology. And has spread into many countries. And I really like the idea [of Guerrilla beauty] to encounter these painful feelings together.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: I guess, Thomas, that that resonates with many things in your ecopsychology work in the past few decades.
Doherty: Yeah. I mean it reminds me of what I did when I was quite young. I mean I confronted this stuff a long time ago. An interesting experience for me is after I left college—and I still had not had my eco awakening at that point—I was still naive about really the state of the world. And living in this bubble of capitalism. And kind of anthropocentric thinking. And then I went to Alaska and I worked as a fisherman. In Kodiak, Alaska. It was such a wakeup call. I was confronted with all my illusions about what the wild is. And about, you know, nature. And I saw this really utilitarian view of nature and the natural world. And what it takes to actually get salmon and halibut and cod. The fish we eat. And from Alaska. And, you know, I really had this awakening, but I had chosen it. See this was also Ro talks about chosen. When you choose something and learn it, it’s different from when it’s thrust upon you. It’s always nice to come back to our very very first ideas. Before. When we have beginner's mind. Before we become educated and read a lot of journals and articles and things like that.
And I did some projects called “Post-Modern Expeditions,” I called them. Where I would actually go, when I was living in the Seattle area in Washington state in the US. You know, I would go into a clear cut. And then go into the old growth. And when you walk around a clear cut area, you can find the edge. And you could walk from the clear cut into the forest. And it’s unlike anything you typically see because the edge is so stark. It’s not like walking into a city park where there’s a kind of gradual going deep into the forest. Where there’s a clear cut, in some places you can go from a hot, dry, dusty clear cut, that’s full of sun and the sun beating down on you. And there’s all this slash. And kind of, you know, debris and insects buzzing. And things like that. It’s quite hard to hike through a clear cut area because there’s no paths. And then as soon as you walk into the forest. As soon as you walk into the part that’s not cut, it becomes silent. And cool. And it’s muted. And you realize, oh I’ve stepped into this whole different world. It’s a whole different ecosystem. You know, an old growth forest is immense. A huge canopy. And undergrowth. It’s kind of hard to describe unless you’ve done it. But I would purposely do this.
That was my first ecopsychology work was plumbing these things. Or canoeing down an industrial river. The Duwamish River in Seattle. Which is full of, you know, factories and container ships and things. And then going twenty miles south and going down the Nisqually. Which is a wildlife refuge. And paddling through there. And realizing this is the same landscape, just two different versions of it. I don’t know why I was doing it, but that’s what I was called to do. But, you know, once you expand your horizons then, you know, you’re not stuck in this kind of painful innocence. So I think where we go with this is like, how do we move toward stewardship? Restoration. Understanding regeneration after fires. After Mount St. Helen’s eruption in Washington. We learned so much about the regeneration of the landscape. And about life. Life and nature are tenacious. And places will restore themselves over time. All the places we’ve lost can and will restore themselves. Maybe not the same anymore because our climate is changing obviously. But that power of restoration I think. And regeneration after a loss. After a fire. Can be quite inspiring for people.
Pihkala: Yeah thanks for sharing that. That’s a very profound experiment and method you mentioned. And I hear a lot of intuition in the method. And can resonate with many parts of it. There’s lots of clear cuts in Finland, also. We have endless ongoing debates about how to treat forests in Finland. And when I was still more involved with Christian congregations, I was sometimes also pretty spontaneously leading grief rituals for clear cut forests. So applying sort of what you have into the situation at hand. So that’s a glimpse from my own history related to these themes.
But I really think that the embodied dimension is important here. Going somewhere. And then activating your senses. Trying to keep the emotions open. And the eminent grief researcher William Worden, who was mentioned here, he’s been alive and dynamic and changing the wordings in his tasks of grief. Which I think is a great sign of following the times. And an earlier formulation of the fourth task was reinvesting emotional energy and life energy. And, of course, also around us the life energy is moving and replenishing as you, Thomas, say. So I think there’s so much strength in that formulation. But lately he’s been integrating this framework of continuing bonds and emotionally relocating the lost object or person in one’s life. This is too large a topic to go into depth here now. It’s related to things I’ve been doing in my research also lately.
But I think that by going into these wounded natural places. Or these sort of ambiguous juxtapositions of, for example, the border between a clear cut and an old growth forest. I think that’s working through our affective bonds with the more-than-human world. So working through our affective bonds with the more-than-human world. I think this is what’s going on. And there’s interesting possibilities for integrating grief theories and then ecological grief dynamics.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah. This is such a juicy thing. And we’ll keep coming back to this topic. So listeners you’re taking this in. And kind of seeing how it lands for you. I mean I think the key thing is that this is not a new idea itself. But the newness is the extent of people that are rapidly coming to grips with this kind of loss of innocence. This waking up syndrome. And, you know, so it is a kind of adulting for us to let go of the innocence. Well that’s not the right word. We don’t let go of our innocence. We integrate our innocence with our maturity. And our adult mind. Obviously Kim Stafford who we just spoke to. The poet. He channeled a very kind of infectious, beautiful adult kind of innocence in terms of creativity.
But there is an adulting here. Where we say, we need to take responsibility for this. We are the people that are going to change this. And it is also somewhat of a white phenomenon. I’m thinking of Sarah Ray and some of her writing about this. You know, the people that are more vulnerable to some of this are privileged because they did have this sense of innocence. And a sense of nature is there for me. And these stories. And, you know, the childhood stories about how nature is beautiful. And all this sort of stuff. And so some of the people that are most privileged are the most vulnerable to these feelings. But we don’t want to blame the victim. We don’t want to say well that’s your problem because of capitalism. And you’re first world people so you should suffer.
Although there is an impulse, I think, among some people to really hold people’s feet to the fire. And say you deserve to suffer. Not because many other people have suffered. And, you know, listeners can tap into that energy too. But we don’t need to reinvent the wheel. You know, people like Louise Chawla and David Sobel. Some of the educational theorists have looked at ways to cope with these kinds of things. Maya Lin has a great website. What Is Missing? Which is an online kind of memorial to extinction. And so I think one interesting thing to think about is our own memorials. I was talking to Panu before we started. I said, is there truly a memorial to extinction? I mean like a Lincoln Memorial style memorial to extinction. There isn’t, unfortunately. As far as I know anywhere in the world. And so that’s kind of what we need. And if we had something like that. Where people could go. And it was publicly recognized from the powers that be, then I think we would feel a little differently about this. But that would be recognizing a huge shadow-side of our society which is difficult. So.
Pihkala: It indeed is. And in my 2017 Finnish book [Päin helvettiä? Ympäristöahdistus ja toivo] I had a subchapter on memorial places. So this is something also that I’ve been thinking about for a long time. And in Britain there’s been this quite large project on so-called MEMO. Mass Extinction Memorial Observatory. [now Eden Portland, UK] So the original idea was to have a quite conspicuous building. But they ended up in financial difficulties. And they are continuing the project in some way. But that was quite an inspiring idea. And then of course smaller scale things have been happening. But also together with some artists in Finland, we have been thinking about these memorials for also climate change. Which is a transitional loss and change. And then extinction which includes these very sort of permanent losses also. But perhaps this topic of memorials and places is something that we might devote a whole episode for at some point.
Doherty: Yeah. Part of our environmental identity work is maybe, you know, creating memorials for things that we’ve lost. But we do this in our life anyway. We know that we have to let go of certain things at certain times. So ultimately, listeners, we all have to follow our hearts here. So our minds have a sense of what is and isn’t. And what should be. But when we get into a place, there’s beauty. There’s process. There’s life of all different levels. And so if we can kind of approach a place with fresh eyes. Particularly the eyes of a child. You know, as an adult we can tap into different ways of thinking about things. But it is a process. And I don’t want to make it seem easy. Because if you’re just in the first emotional stages of this. This rite of passage. It’s quite daunting. But in the rite of passage. The classic model. We have to go on this quest. We find some friends and some helpers. We find some people that can teach us. And then we get some insights. And so that’s where we’re at with this. We’re getting insights.
And, you know, our podcast is part of our own rite of passage. We go out into these difficult topics and try to bring something back to the world to talk about. But we’re all doing this together. So we’ll keep talking about this. But just know that you’re not alone if you feel a barrier to going out into nature. And it’s helpful to find other people that can understand this without either getting too caught in the doom. You have to rightsize it. Find people that are resonating in the emotions that you think are growthful and helpful for you. There’s a lot of detours where people get stuck in loss. Get stuck in anger. Get stuck on disorganization. Get stuck on numbing themselves. But we want to just feel a sense of the current. Keep going on the current of life.
Pihkala: Yeah definitely so. And we have wrap things up quite soon for this episode. But I want to finish from my part with a lived example of a Finnish young woman who joined a facilitated discussion group on eco-anxiety. And she was telling us that often when she goes to local woods, that makes her cry because it reminds her of all the ecological destruction. But still she said: “I go there every night because at the end, it still makes me feel better.” And it brings all these good things. And reminds of care and love and so on. So I think that was a very moving example of somebody who was able to pass the threshold even though it was continually painful for her also. But in the end, it was still worth it. And the energy levels were higher because she did it. So good luck all you fellow travelers over there.
Doherty: Yes. Don’t turn your gaze away, but be compassionate to these wounded places that you’re discovering. Be compassionate to them because the wounds in the place remind us of our own wounds. So, giving thanks. Giving thanks for what we have. Thanks for this opportunity. Panu, I’m always thankful for our discussions.
Pihkala: Likewise.
Doherty: And I’m thankful that we have all these other people that really do understand what we’re doing. And that we can look to. And that we can learn from. You all take care and we’ll talk to you again soon.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded, volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 6: On Nature, Poetry and Creativity with Kim Stafford
Nov 11, 2022
Season 2, Episode6: On Nature, Poetry and Creativity with Kim Stafford
Thomas and Panu were joined by long-time writing teacher and former Oregon Poet Laureate Kim Stafford for an uplifting dialogue about creativity and finding daily inspiration in our relationship with nature. Kim shared poems, quotes and lessons drawn from his teaching and daily writing practice. Echoing British landscape writer Robert McFarlane, Kim observed: “A landscape that has not been evocatively described becomes easy to destroy.” As the days grow shorter in the Northern Hemisphere, join us for an energizing conversation that ranged across cultures from the epic poetry of Finland to Native American wisdom.
An excerpt of Kalevala, the Finnish epic poem, in both Finnish and English; see here for a full e-book in English
Transcript
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello! I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. The show for people around the world who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change. Particularly in this podcast we talk about people’s emotions and feelings. Their private life. And we are very honored to have a guest today.
Kim Stafford: Hello, I’m Kim Stafford. I’m glad to be with the two of you and everyone.
Doherty: And Kim is an old and treasured colleague of mine. I don’t get to see Kim very often these days. But as we were talking earlier before the episode, Kim was one of my allies and support in some of my academic adventures. Particularly creating an ecopsychology certificate program for counselors. Which I did about a decade ago. And that was a really tough sell at the time in academia. Things have changed now, and people are scrambling to do this kind of work. We were a bit ahead of the curve. And so Kim was always there. Kim being the resident poet and writer in my program at Lewis and Clark. And so we’ll talk about Kim’s work and his work as a poet. And Oregon Poet Laureate. We’re going to share some memories. And also some poems. Panu, do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Gladly. And warmly welcome, Kim. It’s a great pleasure to meet you. And in this podcast we’ve often talked about the arts in various ways. Sometimes devoting entire episodes for it. Music, for example. But we haven't really talked much about poetry. So that’s a very exciting thing to do. And I was wondering, actually, to get us started, would there be, Kim, some poem that would especially resonate with you today that you’d like to share with us?
Stafford: Yeah, thank you Panu. I’m going to read a poem called Advice From a Raindrop. And first say that one thing that works for me in writing is to speak in the voice of a creature. You know, to speak in the first person as a tree. As a wave. As a river. Is one way to immerse myself in the healing properties of the natural world. So this is Advice From a Raindrop:
You think you’re too small to make a difference? Tell me about it. You think you’re helpless, at the mercy of forces beyond your control? Been there.
Think you’re doomed to disappear, just one small voice among millions? That’s no weakness, trust me. That’s your wild card, your trick, your implement. They won’t see you coming
until you’re there, in their faces, shining, festive, expendable, eternal. Sure you’re small, just one small part of a storm that changes everything. That’s how you win, my friend, again and again and again.
Doherty: Thanks Kim. That was really nice on a rainy day here in Portland. It makes me think differently of the raindrops because they are inexorable right now here.
Pihkala: Yes. Thanks a lot, Kim, for selecting that. And that immediately resonates with many things in my mind. Of course the actual rain. But when coming to the topic we often discuss here, it is the emotional side of the ecological crisis and climate crisis. One particularly common feeling that people have orients around helplessness. And sometimes feeling inadequate. So for me, for example, this poem speaks quite directly to that feeling that I’ve noticed that many people have.
Stafford: Yeah. To not be alone. I mean that’s one of the big remedies for helplessness in my life. You know, even if I feel that my views about how human work should be connected. If I feel alone as a human, I’m accompanied by the rain. By the singing birds. By the trees who didn't get the memo that they should be discouraged. They just keep reaching for the sky.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, we talk about environmental identity. Our identity in relation to nature. You know, nature can be part of our identity, but what you’re talking about is our ecological self. You know, that sense that we are nature. And so we are really, you know, part of the weather. Part of the raindrops. Which is really hard in the climate change era because it’s threatening. And people are feeling even more, unfortunately, separate from nature because of this anxiety. And eco-anxiety stuff that’s going around.
Stafford: Well, maybe I still have a childish sense of the world. I remember in school when [the] history teacher started into a lecture by saying, “you know for primitive people, the wind was a being. And stones were beings. And rivers were beings. But now we know. And so on and so on.” And I thought, “Wait a minute. No. That’s right! That’s the way it is. The weather is, you know, my companion. The weather’s moods are my moods. There’s this permeable non-boundary between what’s inside me and what’s all around me.”
Pihkala: Yeah. That’s very profoundly put I think. And resonates with many things which are growing now in popularity like this post-humanistic discourse where people are trying to think more critically about these boundaries. And [it] also reminds me of Per Espen Stoknes. A Norwegian psychologist and author who did a book about [the] psychology of climate change. [What We Think About When We Try Not To Think About Global Warming: Toward a New Psychology of Climate Action, 2015]. But then he has a final chapter on air. Loving the air. And forming a very intimate relationship with air and wind. Partly drawing from the Sami people and a famous Sami poet.
Stafford: Ah yeah. Yeah we had a class here in Oregon taught by a native woman CMarie Fuhrman. And she told the students, you know, when they were saying how sad they were about human treatment of the earth and so on. She said well, you know there’s one thing you need to remember. The earth loves you. The earth is glad you’re here. The earth is glad you’re noticing things. You are being loved. You are being cherished. And suddenly the responsibility for the relationship was not on the shoulders of the misbehaving human. You know, we’re children in this great motherland. Feel yourself being cherished.
Doherty: Yes. And that brings up, I think Kim, what I know you for is your presence in, you know, when we work together. And in the workshops that you do. And I’ve always thought your style of teaching poetry and doing workshops was always very therapeutic. Like it always seemed. It wasn't therapy directly, but it was personal and very therapeutic. I remember, I mean, some of your insights. A saying that I often quote of yours when I’m working with people. That I remember from the old days. Just like your dad William Stafford who is known for aphorisms, you’re known for your aphorisms also. And one that you would say was “We are ready for when the barriers fall.” It’s a statement of yours.
Stafford: Yeah. That’s actually from Emily Carr. A Canadian writer who said that creativity does not consist of overcoming barriers, but of being available when the barriers lift. You know, so Hamlet’s readiness is all to be ready. Not to be discouraged that all is lost, but to be perennially like a child. Curious about what’s next. What could happen. What could open.
Doherty: So that’s great. That’s neat. Because that’s what happens with these quotes. You know, I think it’s your quote. And of course it’s from Emily Carr.
Stafford: Who knows who she got it from, Thomas.
Doherty: Yeah, exactly. But I always read that in terms of movements. And being a change agent. That sometimes we just need to be ready for when the barriers fall. Socially. Structurally. To take action. And so we’re biding our time. You know, we’re staying with our values. But of course, there’s also the creative side. We’re ready for when the insight and the muse. The insight. The ability to express ourselves happens. But anyway, there’s a holding. There’s a social holding and I think people come away with maybe we can talk about just the importance of the expression of any kind. And how poetry is helpful.
Stafford: Yeah. You know as we’re talking I’m realizing I have an adventure every morning. And that is when I start sitting at my desk. It’s dark. It’s raining outside this morning. And I’m looking at this blank piece of paper. And I’m realizing there’s something wonderful about not knowing. You know, not knowing that terrible things are happening. Not knowing that far away people are suffering. You know, that’s all in the background, but before me is this open space. And when I start putting words down, if it’s not too big a claim, it’s a kind of miracle. You know, there was nothing there and now there’s something. It’s like a little plant starting to grow. Something is growing before my eyes. And so to me that is my daily therapeutic opportunity to go from worry to nothing to something.
Doherty: Mhmm.
Pihkala: Has this always been with you? Did you start doing this already as a child or a young person or how did you come to it?
Stafford: I think, Panu, it really started by going into the woods. You know, when I was a little kid there was a forest. There was a canyon. There were a bunch of thickets. A creek. A tree you could climb. A hollow log you could wriggle through. And that sense of, you know, what’s there? What am I going to find today? And I would come home and my grandmother would say, Kimmy what did you find today? You know, I think that’s probably the thing to say to a child. What are you thinking? What did you see? And that my grandmother’s curiosity really was the foundation of what I bring to the page. What have I found? You know, what am I finding?
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks for sharing that. And I very much personally resonate with this sense of adventure as something very key to life. And sort of keeping the child in us alive. Strongly reminded of Rachel Carson who I have very high appreciation for. And many people know her for the Silent Spring, but there’s the wonderful trilogy of books about the sea which are filled with both wonder and scientific analysis. And then there’s the small book about cultivating a sense of wonder, also with children.
Stafford: And think, Panu, she was dying of cancer. And she wrote this beautiful book for children. A Sense of Wonder. I think that’s the elixir. I don’t know if it will save us, but will it save us today? You know, it will save our readiness to try. To keep trying. To keep reaching. To keep being curious. A sense of wonder.
Doherty: So that speaks to this idea. We often talk about what people’s eco emotions are. And so I think Kim you’re talking about that. What else comes up for you when you think about your eco feelings or eco emotions?
Stafford: Yeah. Well, you know, every morning the birds. I wrote this poem recently about the one bird that, you know, cries out first. At four in the morning. At three in the morning. And starts singing. And pretty soon dawn comes. And I imagine that little bird saying “look what I made happen. Again. I brought the light.” I think I will make something. To put something forth. To reach out to a friend. To write a letter. To have a conversation. To take a walk with someone. To learn something new. You know, that little cry of the spirit locally may not seem like much, but it’s what’s been keeping the earth going for billions of years. What’s that next thing? You know, what little thing can I do that’s part of something much bigger. But it’s not nothing.
Pihkala: Would you happen to have that poem at hand? Or some other poem that you would like to share in relation to these things?
Stafford: Yeah. Well I have a funny little poem here called Foolish Young Flowering Plum. You know, there’s a certain time in the early, very early spring when the wild plum trees are the first to, you know, get ahead of the game and flaunt their colors. So I was walking along. It was just starting to get light in the morning. Late winter really. Foolish Young Flowering Plum.
It’s winter — dark days, still too cold for bird or blossom — dull sky, and all our hearts in shadow. But there — at a ragged cleft darkened by cedars of gloom a flash of light cries out — the incandescent wisp of wild plum — far too early to be so happy, so naive, a child refusing to obey the rules of grief.
[from Singer Come from Afar, Red Hen Press, 2021]
Doherty: Like one of my sayings , our feelings are wild so we have to just, you know, observe them. Just like we would be out in nature. And if you make a lot of noise and blunder around, you’re going to scare everything away. And so, but there’s that wildness even when we’re down or feeling depressed. Like we’ll see something. Something will happen. It’s that attentiveness to the flux of emotions. That’s really helpful.
Stafford: Yeah. I have a spectacular example of this. You know, my brother took his life when he was forty. And our family went into the darkest time. And I was asking my father about this. He was far away when it happened. He had to fly home. And he was telling me about it. He said “well I couldn't sleep, of course. And I got up early. And I got to the airport. And we were flying west. And as we came down into Denver, I looked up in the sky and there’s a kind of a buckskin light over Colorado. I’ve seen it before.” And I said “Daddy, that’s the greatest gift you’ve given me. That no matter how dark things are, you see something and it lifts you. You see something new and it lifts you”. And I think that’s really our opportunity with the natural world to be lifted. By things we haven't ruined yet.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks for sharing that. And sorry to hear about that loss. And we briefly talked with Thomas in one of the episodes about the work of Bill Plotkin. Who is one of these eco psychology people who tries to serve the world by organizing people's chances to go into more natural surroundings. And try to be open and receptive to whatever grabs one’s attention.
Stafford: Well Thomas when we were at the grad school together, you know, the way I teach writing is I tell my students this is your hippy dippy fuzzy wuzzy touchy feely class. You know, where we’re trying to listen to our hearts. And write what we feel and so on. And one of my very serious colleagues at the graduate school, you know, with a dismissive wave of her hand said you know, the way you teach writing, Kim, that’s just therapy. And I didn’t say it but through my mind went the sentence, my brother died because he didn’t get that. Don’t just say therapy to me. Happiness is very, very practical. A sense of wellbeing is profoundly practical.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah so that speaks to our kind of inner policing of ourselves. Which is something to be aware of. You know, particularly during this crisis of politics and climate. You know, we can get kind of harsh with others. But then with ourselves too. Even therapeutic people surprisingly. I remember one of my colleagues dismissing me because I was teaching a wilderness therapy class where we were going out camping in nature. And taking the counselors out on river rafting trips to test themselves. And he just [said] they’re just going river rafting. You know, as if that was irrelevant.
Stafford: And we’re in a classroom using big words.
Doherty: Yes exactly. As if that was irrelevant to life. And it really strikes what’s the danger of, you know, the ivory tower. And then we have the green tower. Which is a kind of purity. I’m more eco-friendly. I have to be very eco-friendly. And all this sort of stuff and so. And I know that infiltrates writing and literature just as well, I know. You seem to be able to kind of avoid that kind of piousness.
Stafford: Well, you know, they say that with poetry if you do it long enough you can work your way into two figures.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah exactly. Yeah.
Pihkala: What about Kim, things written by other people? We touched on Rachel Carson, but speaking of this general topic of ecological issues. Climate issues. Are there some writers whose poems or texts have moved you?
Stafford: I think one of the people for me is Robert McFarlane. In the UK. He has this one sentence that I think is absolutely foundational to what we’re living now. A landscape that has not been evocatively described, becomes easier to destroy. A landscape that has not been evocatively described, becomes easier to destroy. So the work of the writer, in the era of climate change is to see things. To help people see things. To help people hear the amazing voices of the earth. And so that we can’t just say well let’s pave it. Let’s develop it. You know, let’s make it more human. Let’s string some wires, you know. No, it’s beautiful. That place is beautiful. Let’s get our power from apprehending the beauty of what’s around us. So, again, beauty is very practical.
Doherty: Yeah. Panu, what are you thinking about from the Finnish side? I know there’s a strong tradition of this. We were joking about Kim’s early youthful travels in Scandinavia. And the sense of the culture there. And the acceptance. And the freedom to roam. And all kinds of things that are part of that culture. But what’s coming up for you on the Finnish side even in terms of literature or some of your work over there?
Pihkala: Yeah. Just during the last 20 years I’ve been reading a triology, written in the 1950s and 60s by this Finnish natural scientist called Reino Kalliola. He was one of the first state persons for environmental protection in his time. But he was also a humanist and a lover of arts. So he was doing exactly the thing that Kim mentioned here. So he was doing sort of natural science about Finland, but he was doing it so eloquently. And also drawing from classic Finnish literature. And they did prints of his books with printed paintings by the Finnish artists also. [e.g. Suomen luonto vuodenaikojen vaihtelussa, 1959]. So it was really a combination of both the natural science and the lyrical depiction. And that was really foundational for the Finnish environmentalism. So that very strongly resonates with me.
Stafford: Well Panu, I’m going to reveal my ignorance, but I can’t remember the name of the person who went all over what is now Finland to create the Kalevala. And, you know, I heard many local stories in many places and put them into one big song that, from my reading, really formed the Finnish nation. I feel like maybe our work now is to gather songs in a kind of overwhelming wave to wake up the human project. You know, a sense that we’re all in this together and we can all make a difference. And let’s sing our kinship into a new way to do things.
Pihkala: That’s very beautifully put. And Kalevala. The national epic collection of the …. Very old rhythmic poems. Elias Lönnrot is probably the one that you are after here. And it’s a tricky name for everybody outside of Finland. They were still alive, some of these old poem singers. And so that’s very foundational for us Finns. And did have an influence on J.R.R Tolkien’s mythology, for example. And also for the music of Sibelius. So it’s been contributing in different art forms also outside Finland. And it has a special thing around nature, of course, going around.
And poetry is still going strong in Finland. Of course the number of sales are not as high as poets would like them to be. Or lovers of poetry. And many Finnish poets have been moving onto describing various dimensions of the ecological crisis, also. Sometimes trying to explore the beauty of these strange combinations of built environment and natural environment. And that’s very difficult stuff to translate into English because of the peculiarity of the Finnish language. But some sort of collective singing or poem making is going on around here. But that’s a very interesting thought about comparing Kalevala to the themes of today.
Stafford: Well I have a little story for you. I was at a Finnish immigrant community in the Northwest here. Naselle. And the self appointed mayor was telling jokes in Finnish. And hundreds of people were cracking up. So I know I’m onto something here. And then he translated one of the stories. He said, you know I was talking to my neighbor Arnie and I said Arnie, home come you’re so talented? You’re a musician. You’re a fisherman. You’re a woodworker. You do some writing. How do you do all those things? And Arnie said well, you know, I’m Finnish. A Finn does what he wants to do. Other people just do what they know how to do. And I think there’s a secret there. We each need to do what we want to do. And not let people tell us, no you’re not good enough to do that. We just need to say. I’m going to save the earth, personally, but not alone. And here we go. And we’ll do what we can.
Doherty: Yeah. That’s a good segue, Kim. I’m channeling the listeners who are out there and I think they’re feeling uplifted by the energy in these kinds of conversations when we bring in arts and poetry is really uplifting. Because it’s not denying the world, but it’s just looking at the world from a certain angle of sight. You know, that reveals all this beauty and surprise.
But I know, Kim, you do a lot of teaching of writing to people. Young people, for example. People that don’t see themselves as literary. For the listener that’s listening and saying, okay this is all well and good, but I’ve never written a poem. And I don’t have all this knowledge and these stories. What are some of your kind of takeaway tools and advice for small writing practices? Because I know that’s a part of your teaching.
Stafford: Sure. Yeah. Well I learned a great secret from my predecessor. Who was the poet laureate in Oregon before. Elizabeth Woody. Who is [a] Wasco-Navajo native woman. And she said at one point, you know, the more I do poetry, the less it’s about what the poem is and more about who the poem serves. And that became my mission as poet laureate. And as a poet. And as a citizen. Who the poem serves.
So I started inviting people. And maybe I can invite our listeners to do some optional homework. Think of someone in your life who needs a poem. And then write one for that person. Write a poem for someone. And I realized that’s sort of what I do. You know, I go to a place. I write a poem for the place. Not about the place. For the place. I’m in a community. You know, I went to visit some inmates in prison. I wrote a poem for them. I worked with some immigrants. I wrote a poem for them. And here’s an example of a little poem written by a child. I was in a fourth grade classroom. And I said to the students, think of someone in your life who needs a poem. And make one for them. And this little guy turned in a poem. It goes like this. It’s called Max. Which is the name of his friend.
There are 200 countries. There are 50 states. There are 7 oceans to cross. There are 7 continents. There are billions of stars. And I met you.
It’s so little. It’s so beautiful. It’s so friendly. You know, so it’s not about skill, it’s about curiosity and courage to say what’s in your heart.
Doherty: Yes. Yeah, let’s let that hang in the air for a moment here. And for the listeners as well. You know, it’s a long slog. And we do need these kinds of slivers of light. It reminds me of the saying that was in the movie The Postman years ago. “Poems don’t belong to the people who wrote them, they belong to people who need them.” [“Poetry doesn't belong to those who write it; it belongs to those who need it.”]
Stafford: Yes.
Doherty: Yes. It was something along those lines. So I know we all think about what we need. We’re toward the end of our time. Kim, would you like to give the listeners another poem today?
Stafford: Yeah. This is sort of my theme song. One way to write a poem is to go to rhymezone.com. And just take a salt shaker and sprinkle rhymes through a poem and see what happens. So this is called I Am the Seed. I’m circling back to, you know, I am speaking in the voice of the raindrop. I am speaking in the voice of the seed. I Am the Seed.
Every chance I get, any place I fit, in a cleft of grit, in ravine or pit by ancient wit my husk I split— I am the seed.
I fell to the ground without a sound, by rainfall drowned, by sunlight found, by wonder crowned, by luck profound— I am the seed.
After fiery thief, after bout of grief, though life is brief I sprout relief, with tiny leaf, beyond belief— I am the seed.
Up I rise to seek the prize from all that dies, by bold surprise, before your eyes, small and wise— I am the seed.
I am the seed, small as a bead. Tell me your need. Your hunger I’ll feed— any trouble you’re in, I will begin, for I am the seed!
Doherty: Very nice.
Pihkala: Thank you. Thank you for sharing.
Doherty: Panu, what are you sitting with here? Or Kim, what are you sitting with here? We wrap up here in this nice dialogue.
Stafford: I’m sitting here. I get to be with two people far away. And in just a few moments we got into deep, important things. And that’s a perennial opportunity for human beings. No matter what is against us. Around us. Ahead of us. We can sit down together and share a cup of tea and our thoughts. And we will be stronger.
Doherty: Yeah. I’m spontaneously making up a new rule for myself about public speaking. It's to get a poem in there as early as possible. It’s my new rule that I’m going to use because—
Stafford: Yeah. The secret way to do it is don’t say here’s a poem, just start saying it.
Doherty: Yes. Yeah. Because it creates this container, you know. That’s different. Immediately.
Stafford: I think poetry is human birdsong.
Doherty: Yeah. That’s great. That’s another one I’m going to put in my list there, Kim. What are you thinking about, Panu?
Pihkala: Well, I’m thinking about exactly the same thing that Kim described here. That it’s been a very good moment of spending time with quite deep issues in life. And with both shades of sadness and lots of shade of joy and wonder. So I’m very grateful for this opportunity. And I hope that you listeners can continue having these kinds of moments. But warm thanks, Kim, for joining us. It’s been truly a pleasure.
Stafford: Thank you both so much.
Doherty: Yeah. And so. Yeah, Kim, you’re starting your day here. What does your day hold for you today?
Stafford: Oh I’m doing an old man thing. I’m organizing my archive. I’ve been a hoarder of paper. There are thousands of pages. I’m trying to organize.
Doherty: Wow.
Stafford: Clean out my house. Ship it all off to the library so when I’m gone, people can go in—like going into a forest—and find strange and magical things.
Doherty: So you’re harvesting, right? That’s that way I think about that. You’ve got the beauty of harvesting. You don’t have to, you know, you’re not being the seed at this particular moment. You’re being the harvest.
Stafford: Yeah, although I start the day with writing a poem. And then spend the rest of the day organizing all the poems I’ve written. Doherty: That’s great. I think we could all stand to harvest things. I know the book project I’m working on. I’m trying to think of it as a harvest of insights and things. And that’s something I’ll be working on today as well as seeing some therapy clients. And also doing my training with therapists who are trying to help in the climate crisis. So I’ll be doing that kind of stuff today. Panu, how’s your evening for you?
Pihkala: Well, you know, after daylight savings time and now the evenings are even darker and mornings have more light. But the same as usual so the boys are soon going to come home. So there’s some family time to be had.
Doherty: Well, it is a dark time. Just in the seasons here. In the Northern Hemisphere, anyway. And so this has been a nice kind of bright candle light or sunlight. Whatever image you want to use for a discussion for us at this time of the year. So I wish you all well and we’re going to put a bunch of links in our show notes of poems and all the little beautiful insights that came up today. And to the listeners and you both, be well and take care.
Stafford: Thank you.
Pihkala: Take care.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded, volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 5: On the Birth of Climate Therapy with Rosemary Randall
Oct 28, 2022
Season 2, Episode5: On the Birth of Climate Therapy with Rosemary Randall
Thomas and Panu were honored to host Rosemary Randall, pioneering British psychotherapist whose 2005 paper “A New Climate for Psychotherapy” and Carbon Conversations group anticipated the current Climate Conscious Therapy movement. Thomas and Ro reflected on the significance of Ro’s adaptation of psychological grief models to help support and empower members of the public who were experiencing distress as they confronted their own carbon footprints. Panu focused on Ro’s current sense of the emotional impacts of the climate crisis on young people and her new program on Living with the Climate Crisis with the UK Climate Psychology Alliance. As Ro has noted, “It’s a cliché that the antidote to climate despair is action. Far less attention is paid to the process of moving from a state of acute distress, anxiety and grief into a form of action that feels commensurate, practically possible and sustainable over time. This is the process which Living with the Climate Crisis groups aim to address.” Join us for a consoling and thought provoking conversation.
Thomas Doherty: Please support the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: Well hello. I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. The show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about what we call climate change. The climate crisis. Global warming. Our carbon footprints. Our collective and personal carbon footprints. But in this show we focus on the emotional aspects of climate. And today we’re really honored to have a guest that I’ve known of and followed for many years.
Rosemary Randall: I’m Rosemary Randall, but most people call me Ro. Which is a name I’ve had since childhood.
Doherty: And Ro, welcome. Ro is coming in from Cambridge in the UK. And, again, as you know with our podcast this is Thomas and I’m in Portland, Oregon, USA. So I’m just starting my day. Getting my daughter off to school and sitting down to chat. And Panu is toward the end of his evening in Finland. And Ro is toward the end of her day. Late afternoon in the UK.
I became familiar with Ro around 2008 when I was working on the Ecopsychology journal. We were helping to get this academic journal off the ground and she was one of the people that we approached to publish a paper. And she wrote a very influential paper on climate change and grief. One of the first papers to really address people’s grief about their carbon footprint. And their grief about their own involvement in climate change. And that kind of set a tone for a lot of what we know as “climate psychology” and climate therapy now.
So I’m really honored to have Ro here. And to just kind of chat about what she’s doing now. And some of her insights. And I know Panu has also followed Ro’s work. Panu do you want to get us started with a discussion today?
Pihkala: Warmly welcome Ro. Very good to see you. And we’ve been talking over the years. And your work has been an inspiration for me since 2013. So not as long as for Thomas, but still for many years. But, would you like to start Ro by going back a bit? We’ve talked in detail about how you got involved with climate psychology and climate emotions in the first place. Would you like to share something about that background?
Randall: Well, I’m a psychotherapist. And so that’s where the interest in psychology and emotion comes from. Along with all the things that took me into that career in the first place. But when I think about what first made me concerned about the environment, I think back to a conversation with a cousin of mine from when I was about 19 or 20. And he was visiting from the states. His family had emigrated. My father’s brother had emigrated to the states just after the second world war. And he said to me “do you know what ecology is?” And I said, “well kind of.” But I didn’t know what he knew. And I hadn't read Rachel Carson. And he had. And he was part of the burgeoning environmental movement in the United States. And that was when I began to think and I began to connect. And I began to value in a different way a lot of the childhood experiences that I had with my parents growing up. Being in wild places. Camping. Being outside. Being connected to the natural world that supports us.
And for me that was the beginning of joining to other concerns I had which also have strong roots in my family background. But values to do with socialism. Values to do with feminism. And I think that it was that conversation with Michael, my cousin, which brought into my life something which hadn't been there before. The idea that our relationship to the natural world was also political. And culture. And a source for great concern. Back then. So it’s something that has run through my adult life. Sometimes more strongly. Sometimes more weakly.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. And often in this podcast we talk about environmental identity. And people’s life paths and trajectories. And that’s, of course, something which is studied in environmental education research. And the connections between psychology and education are very close. And awakenings. And epiphanies. Something which may happen for many people. And I hear you sharing a story of one kind of those.
Later on know that you also did some research on climate activists yourself. And thought about various phases that people may go through in this journey. But, how did it then go with combining the official work that you are doing with psychology and therapy and with environmental and climate concerns? When do you consider that that kind of work started for you?
Randall: I think for a long time they were quite separate. I practiced in private practice as a psychotherapist. I worked as a counselor in the university. And I lived a—I suppose—low impact kind of life. And for many years I think that was about it. I had lots of friends from the early days of the environmental movement. From a time when I was on the editorial collective of a magazine called undercurrents in the 1970s. And I retained some of those connections. But I think those two strands of my life were actually quite separate until the 2000s when the news about climate began to hit me much more. And I began to think about it. And I began to write about it. And I began to wonder why when other professions seemed to be waking up to the climate crisis, psychotherapy wasn't. And I wrote a paper which was published in 2005 which I called “A New Climate for Psychotherapy” because I wanted psychotherapists to wake up. I wanted to say come on guys we should be concerned too. There are groups with names like Historians for Climate, where are the therapists?!
But the curious thing was that my colleagues didn't really respond very well in my immediate environment. Or even particularly more widely. But I went to a conference at the Center for Alternative Technology that year in 2005. I’ve got back in touch with some of my old friends from the environmental movement. And I presented a version of this paper which was very brief but in which I described the process of disavowal. Where people know with one part of themselves exactly what’s going on and with another part of themselves they just carry on as usual. That splitting of the mind that allows that was a revelation to many of the people I was speaking to.
And so I discovered that the people who were really interested weren't my therapeutic colleagues, but they were the people in the burgeoning climate movement in the UK that I was now meeting. And that set me on a different path. Along with another of those epiphany moments that Panu was talking about. Because my son who at that point was [age] 20, 21 had fetched up working at the Center for Alternative Technology. And we went out on a walk. And I’ve told this story many times. But we went out on a walk and he was lecturing me about carbon emissions and carbon footprints. And I was like what? Who are you talking to? I know all this. But of course I didn't. And he knew much more than I did.
And that was the point at which I realized the enormous difference between an average UK footprint. Which was then thought to be a 10 ton footprint. And the sustainable footprint which was 1, 2 tons. And I didn’t want to believe it. I found myself in the process of disavowal. Temporarily. But there I was. And it was another of those epiphanies where you think what I’m doing is not enough. I have to take this more seriously. I have to change direction. And that was when I brought climate and psychotherapy together both in my own mind and in my own life.
Doherty: That’s really great, Ro. And just tracking along with this. And I think for the listeners, as we’ve talked about before, there’s sort of a timeline of climate change. If we lined up all the listeners in a row from the elders to the young people. The elders can find these moments where climate entered into their life. Or their awareness of climate change changed. Ro is giving some great examples of that. For young people, they’ve always known about climate change. It’s always been a spector in the back of their minds from birth. But there’s a lot of people—some of the listeners—who have been doing this work for a while. And their environmental journey is long. And it does go back to sort of “pre-Inconvenient Truth” times. “Pre” when climate change was a pressing issue. When it was more of a general ecological awakening that Ro talked about. So it’s just really helpful.
And then of course the other piece that I’ve been thinking about a lot lately is this idea of a carbon footprint calculator. Which is a thing that was created inadvertently by… Well it was sort of a construct in research in sustainability, but it was popularized as most people now know from British Petroleum and their “Beyond Petroleum” advertising campaign. So they kind of inadvertently brought this into the public. I think partly, as we know, to distract from their own role in the climate crisis. And to put it on people. So there’s this whole dilemma of us taking responsibility, but also being blamed personally for things that are well beyond our control.
And then that, of course, I think is where the grief comes in. I mean I’ve been thinking, you know, which came first, the calculator or the grief. Right? But it seems to me, Ro, when you started. And I can really see you going around. You know, who are these far out people going around to these meetings with carbon calculators and having people talk about them. But as soon as people did, it seemed to me that they opened up to the feelings. And to the grief. And to the powerlessness. And the climate hostage situation that people are in. And is that how you got into the grief work then? Because the calculators brought people’s grief out?
Randall: Yes. It was. What my son was working on at that time with his colleagues was a carbon calculator. And I think the recent publicity about BP’s role in this I think has sometimes been slightly confusing because I think for me the carbon footprinting really goes back into the work of Mathis Wackernagel. The ecological footprint. I think that this whole debate takes you into the question of how we look at this. On the need to adopt a systems understanding. We need to look at this from a psychosocial perspective. Where we don’t give up personal responsibility, but we do also take account of the complex systems that make us complicit in it.
And where I began was with the carbon footprint calculator. We used to go around in Cambridge where I live to all kinds of public events with a calculator. We would often calculate people’s carbon footprints. And what I did was I tried to train people in the use of this so that we weren’t just asking people about the numbers. We were asking people how they felt. Because when you ask people about the areas of carbon footprint. Your home energy. Your travel. The food that you eat. And the money that you spend. You’re delving intimately into people’s experience. And when people look at the impact of what feels like an ordinary life, it’s a very upsetting experience. And that took me very rapidly into the need to support people in talking about how serious climate change was. And how much it meant that life had to change because however you chop it up if you want to live in a world that has any form of equity and justice and how the lives of those in what I call the overdeveloped countries have to change. And I think that’s a very hard thing to take on. And there’s been quite a lot of pushback against that in some courses. And that technology will always save us. That life doesn't have to change because the planes are magically going to fly on vegetable oil regardless of how many hectares of land that might take. So I think it’s a difficult and complex problem. Because of course the moment you ask someone to think about reducing their emissions, you’re into systemic issues. Which means that that’s difficult.
Doherty: Yeah into the ecological issues, you know, “when you pull on one thing in the universe it is hitched to everything else” as John Muir said. Let me add one more point and then turn it over to Panu. We don’t have time to get deeply into grief and loss work, but I think for the listeners it seems to me that what was really helpful Ro that you did was bring in the work of William Worden who was one of the researchers who studied grief. Grief that happens when something we value is lost. Not necessarily grief about our own death, but grief if a parent loses a child. And the stages of grief that happen for people regarding that. And this whole journey of grief where we kind of are broken from life and have to eventually kind of reinvest our energy back into life after we process and work through the loss. And then all the detours that people can get into as that happens. We idealize what was lost. We get stuck and don’t want to move forward. Or we have severe emotional blocks. Or etcetera etcetera.
But it seems to me that bringing in that particular therapeutic inside to the carbon area was really helpful because previously people were thinking about their own death. And kind of Kubler Ross kind of—denial, anger, bargaining. But the Warden stuff I thought was more accurate. That’s a summary but that’s a fair statement I think about the grief process.
Randall: I think that’s right. And I think that the kinds of climate grief that I’ve encountered since I wrote that paper have changed. Because at that time I was thinking a lot about people’s grief in letting go of the kind of life they’d become used to. Because when you look at any plans for how life might be. Whether it’s the UK Government’s one. They all involve changes in the way that we live. But what I encounter amongst young people particularly now is a very, very acute sense of disorientation. A very acute sense of the world coming apart. [It] feels to me much more like the experience of a child losing a parent. It’s that same sense of being completely unmoored from life. Of feeling that this can’t have happened. This is impossible. This can’t be true. At the same time at which you know that this is true. You know that mum or dad is not coming back. But what you feel is the loss of everything around you that makes life safe. That makes it feel as if life has got some chance of going on being. That you have some chance of going on being.
And I think that kind of sense of being completely poleaxed is something that has arrived in my experience in the last five years or so. I think earlier people were certainly overthrown by what was happening. But it was a much more rapid return to that sense of well I need to reorient. I need to do something. I need to think about it. I need to find a way through this. I do think that it’s harder now for people.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks for sharing that. And I’ve noticed similar things. Especially in my work in Finland. And it’s a kind of existential crisis. It goes to the level of people’s systems of meaning. You know, the sort of foundations of who they feel and think that they are. And how they related with the world. And some of the very fundamental basic assumptions and beliefs become challenged. And that’s, of course, a great chance for traumatic grief. And a complex combination of existential issues. Grappling with various meanings in life. And then experiencing various kinds of changes and losses and having to function in your everyday life at the same time.
This is very closely related to some of the recent work I’ve been doing in relation to various theories of grief and bereavement. But I’m not going into details now. But that’s something that I very much valued in your work, Ro. That you have always kept both this knowledge of where people are and then awareness of the great complexity of what is happening. And I think that’s one part of the appeal of the work of you and colleagues to also the environmental activist people. Because then they start to think that hmm this might offer solutions to those dilemmas [such as] why are people not giving up driving with their own vehicles, for example. To use an example from our 2009 article.
And also that granularity about emotions which is something we have often talked about at this podcast. And which is very close to using both. Or us three I would dare to say. And I remember reading your 2013 article from this great book Engaging with Climate Change. And that led me forward in thinking about shame and guilt also in relation to ecological issues. So I just wanted to bring those links to one of our previous episodes where we discuss guilt. Not so much shame. How do you feel about the reception of your work now in the 2010’s and early 2020’s? Have you seen more advances or new, you know, obstacles arising? I know that life is a complex mix of different kinds of developments but just wanting to ask about it? How’s it been lately about the reception?
Randall: I think the whole field of climate psychology has developed hugely in the period since I was first so disappointed in my colleagues. I mean I have since acquired many, many wonderful colleagues and coworkers. Like yourselves who are thinking and working on these issues. Who are making all kinds of wonderful advances in understanding in complex ways these interrelationships between these wicked systems and our personal experiences of them. That’s been a huge change. There’s so many more people writing, working and talking about these things now.
Doherty: Yeah so you’re less alone, I guess we could say. More like minded people. And I think that’s one of the consolations of this time. Ro you said five years ago or so, you know, I think there was—we’ll probably have to invent a name for it—a societal tipping point here a few years ago. I think most places around the world where climate went from a special interest kind of environmental issue to a public issue. I know in the Pacific Northwest in the US where I live it was with the fires and the smoke and the droughts. So generally the natural disasters have brought that into people. So there is a whole new audience clamoring for this kind of help.
One of the terms you used Ro that I liked in the article—which we’ll link in our show notes. When I’m training therapists I’m actively training therapists who are, you know, trying to get schooled up into all this work. And, you know, talking about the special place that therapy holds for people. It’s a place, to use a military metaphor, where we can kind of, or a sports metaphor, get off the playing field. Or get off the battlefield and take our armor off for a little bit. And sort of see what we’re doing and collect ourselves. And you call that “the hinterland.” So it sounds like that’s a concept that you’re all aware of in your group as well. And I think that’s helpful for people to find their place to take off the armor and sort of be with this. Do you want to say anything more about what you think about what that space is? Or what makes a good space like that?
Randall: For me, personally that space has come with the group I’m part of here in Cambridge. We call ourselves Cambridge Climate Therapists. And in our early conversations one of the things we talked about was this idea of the hinterland. Which was the place back from the action where it was possible to sink. And to reflect. And so it’s a place where you could feel it slowly. And you can feel it with the assistance of sort. Rather than being in action where your actions are instant. You do what seems intuitively for the moment. But being able to be in that space. When we’re in the hinterland I feel that as people with psychological skills we’re better placed to be useful to those who are taking off in very difficult actions. Getting burnt out. Suffering traumas ... And maybe generally not being able to stop enough. To examine what’s going on. And often finding that within the organizations they’re part of that the distress is being projected in very difficult and painful ways. But I think in order to be able to help people with that you do have to take this step back. You have to be in the hinterland. Where you are acting much more slowly. Reflectively. Carefully.
Pihkala: Yes. Thanks for sharing all that. And raising up this importance is also a kind of rhythm, you know. Rhythm of engagement and withdrawal. I’ve been working with some people who organize periods of silence as a way of withdrawal. So that’s one way related to that.
But I know that you’ve been developing this new method based on the influential old work around so-called carbon conversations. We’ll again put links on the podcast website. And there were some very good facilitators guides also for those conversations. But would you like to say something about this new development? It seems to connect with many of the themes you were describing.
Randall: Well just a sentence about the old carbon conversations project. This was something which I started back in 2006, 2007. And we ran small groups for people who were concerned about climate issues. And who wanted to look at how to reduce their impact. And this to our surprise took off and became very popular in all kinds of places. There were some volunteers who we gave some very rudimentary training to. And this project ran for quite a long time. It was a psychologically-based project. And to me to the point where I thought it had run its course. And I wanted to move on from it. And then about three years ago. No. A year ago. Rebecca Nester who was part of the Climate Psychology Alliance here in the UK and an old facilitator of carbon conversations got in touch with me. And we had this conversation about what a group-based activity for the 2020's would look like. What would it be?
And that was the beginning of a new project where both of us felt strongly that people need to be located collectively when they respond to the climate crisis. They need to be working with others. This could be in their own community. This could be politically. This could be at work. We need connection. And what we were seeing was that some of the people who were getting involved in climate work were moving very rapidly into action. And were not really being able to process what was happening to them. We were also seeing people of my own generation and people of the generations in between suffering from burn out. Suffering from feelings of despair and disappointment. Feelings of exhaustion. That they had been involved in these issues for so long. And so much of it seemed like you were trying to hold back a tide that you couldn't stop. So we felt that there were these huge emotional issues which were impeding and affecting people’s ability to engage in fruitful action.
And so we began to plan for a kind of new carbon conversation. And these groups are now coming to fruition. We’ve run a pilot group and we’re going to publish the materials we hope within the next two or three months. So that other people who are skilled in facilitation can use them and adapt them to their own purposes. But in the actual framework for this work, it’s very much psychosocial. It’s very much systemic in the way that we look at things. But there are basically three chunks of material in the ten meetings. Or the ten sessions that make up living with the climate crisis.
The first part is given over to talking about the experience of living with the climate crisis. Waking up to it. Having lived with it for decades. Being consumed by it. Whatever that happens to be. And it that we’ve looked at and will be using a method which you may be familiar with which is David Denborough and Ncazelo Ncube’s Tree of Life. Which they developed for working with trauma. But which we are using in a much more general sense. It’s a storytelling method. And it’s a method which builds strength. It doesn't focus on the trauma, it focuses on what you have within you that you can bring into a collective situation. And it has very much binded the idea of the need to look at the collective origins of distress. In the political and social systems. And to become able to speak richly and deeply with a thick narrative about them. So we’ve drawn on that in our approach to helping people understand what’s happening to them. And that makes up about a third of what we do.
We then look at communication. Which is often something which campaigns struggle with. And we use partly therapeutic understandings of what happens when you get into really difficult conversations with your family and your friends and your colleagues. And partly we draw on Marshall Ganz’s public narrative work in that. And finally we look at the systems that people are part of and where they want to take action. How to move towards action. We look at the skills that people have. We look at how to reflect on what you’re doing. So again we’re drawing from a lot of different areas of psychological understanding in creating this. But overarching is this kind of metaphor that we have. We use the climate movement as an ecosystem. And an ecosystem where you need to find your place. The idea that there’s a place for everybody in that. But you have to find it. And at the moment you may be living in a desert. You know, there may be nothing which surrounds you. Or you may find yourself in a monoculture. Or you may be one of the old trees that just needs to kind of keel over and nourish the new growth. That’s how I feel at the moment.
Doherty: Yes. You know, well this is beautiful, Ro. We’ll take about five more minutes and wrap up our talk today. There’s so many things. I mean again bringing in the listeners. You know, I’ve been involved in this for a long time. Panu has. But I learn new things everyday with this. That’s another important thing to keep in mind is that we’re always learning. Some of the things that Ro said today touch me deeply. I mean this idea of just a place to “feel slowly” is such a great term. Now I know Panu would get that because that kind of comes really out of I think Panu’s style. But for me that’s something. I’m pretty concrete so I get these things in my head. Oh, feel slowly. That’s helpful for me. Because most of us are feeling fast.
And then I think obviously one of the changes from the carbon conversations. I almost said “carbon confrontations” right? A little freudian slip. So, you know, it was like we were being confronted, but now, you know, we really need to bolster people more. Ro when you said like a child losing a parent. That gave me chills. Really hit me emotionally. Because that really is how people are feeling. And a situation like that is just a different emotional game. So I really do appreciate this. So anyways I’m learning and I think listeners, you know, we’re always learning through this. But Panu what are you thinking of here as we wrap up such a great conversation?
Pihkala: Yeah I’m very grateful that we’ve had a chance to engage in this. And this new revised method of living with the climate crisis sounds very good to me. And, of course, we’ve talked about this with Ro over zoom some time. And there’s many shared interests, but I haven't heard about it at this length so I’m very glad to hear this. And I think that for the listeners this metaphor of the ecosystem also in relation to climate and environmental matters is very important. And I think that’s a message that we’ve been trying to deliver also with Thomas. That there is a place for everyone here. And it may feel sometimes that what’s the use of anything that I do. And people’s circumstances can be very different. We have various amounts of resources and possibilities and so on. But there’s something for everyone even if it’s close circles and advancing caring in this increasingly chaotic world. That’s a very fundamental and important task. So I’ve been very grateful for this conversation.
And, as Thomas said, we regretfully have to wrap up quite soon. It would be interesting to continue this for a long time. But could I ask you? Ro still you’ve already mentioned some of these, but what are some things that give you resources and strength in these times? You mentioned the companionship of Cambridge Therapists and some. Do you want to dwell a bit on that?
Randall: As far as thinking I do with my colleagues in Cambridge Climate Therapists. I have a tendency to rush. To burn out. To respond instantly. So that group slows me down. And that’s very important to me. I also rely on my husband. Who’s also been my partner on a lot of this journey for over 40 years now. And the rest of my family. Some of whom are in Wales where we go quite often. To the little town where they live. The rural town where they live. Where climate change feels a little bit further away sometimes. Particularly this summer when in East England it was drought. Constant drought. And it's the connection to people that really sustains me. Love. Perhaps at the end of it it’s love.
Doherty: Yeah. It is true. So much of this work. So much of what I’ve found in my therapeutic work is isolation is really the toxic piece in this. We can bear things when we’re bearing it together. So the isolation piece for all of us to keep in mind. Yeah so we’re going to wrap up today. We, again, got into the emotional side and the deep slow feeling and slow thinking. So this is good for our listeners to hear.
And then to bring back to reality at the very end. Even though it feels like the parent is being lost, we have to remember that there are a lot of parents out there doing good work. We’ll put a link into A Guide to Decarbonization that American journalist Ezra Klein put out recently. There’s so many people doing so many interesting, positive, very smart things regarding decarbonization in the real sense, not the personal carbon footprint. But in societal change. A whole structural societal change. So we don’t want to lose those people. It does them a disservice. Our imagination makes us think that there are no adults and parents out there. But that’s not true. We know that we are adults ourselves and also there are very gifted people working in the UK and the US so we want to just shout out to them as well.
Thank you so much Ro. It’s been really a pleasure to chat with you.
Randall: May I say one last word which is just that I think when we think about grief, we have to remember that there is a place, the other side of it. And I think that’s what you were talking about here. Is the place. The other side of grief. You never forget the person you lost. Your life is forever changed, but there’s a place on the other side where life has meaning. And where life is worth living. And that’s where we want people to get to. Through connection and love.
Pihkala: Exactly. Relearning the world.
Doherty: Yeah. Relearning the world. The other side of grief. Our loss and our reconnecting with life and so we’re playing on that knife edge today here with this episode. But thanks again. Ro, what are you going to do with the rest of your evening?
Randall: I’m going to make food. And I’m going to chat with my husband. And I’m going to chill.
Doherty: Very good.
Pihkala: Sounds excellent. My sons will finish their choir rehearsal quite soon. Luckily they still like to do that. They sometimes are tired of going to practice, but they still like the thing. So I’m going to take them home from the center of the town amidst the darkening evening in Helsinki. But warm thanks especially to you, Ro. And to Thomas and all the listeners. Do take care.
Doherty: Yes. And I need to get my day started here. After this great start and do work on all the things we’ve talked about today. I’m going to be focusing on including checking in with my therapy group. My therapists out there in the world so we’ll definitely talk about my insights today with the therapists and spread this love around. Alright you all take care.
Randall: Thank you very much for having me on your show. It’s been a pleasure.
Doherty: The Climate Change and Happiness Podcast is a self-funded, volunteer effort. Please support us so we can keep bringing you messages of coping and thriving. See the donate page at climatechangeandhappiness.com.
Season 2, Episode 4: Everything You Wanted To Know About Eco Guilt
Oct 14, 2022
Season 2, Episode 4: Everything You Wanted To Know About Eco Guilt
Thomas and Panu discussed ecological guilt, a ubiquitous feeling many of us experience, but rarely explore deeply. Panu explained various levels of ecological guilt from small daily uneasiness about our activities and their ecological impacts to more troubling experiences of public shame and even species guilt. Thomas had insights about the levels or “volume knob” of this and other eco- and climate feelings and the societal forces at play in heightening our guilt feelings or minimizing them, and possible benefits of “ditching guilt” when it stifles our happiness and ability to take action to solve environmental problems. Panu and Thomas also recognized the paradox of having the privilege to feel guilty about issues like one’s carbon footprint and how an assumption of ecological guilt obscures other common emotional experiences about climate and environmental problems that people have around the world. What should we do about eco-guilt? Are we all climate hypocrites? Is taking action really an “antidote to despair”? Listen in on this surprisingly intriguing talk and then draw your own conclusions.
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I’m Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. This is an international podcast, I am in the US and Panu is in Finland. My morning and Panu’s evening. And this is the show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about the personal side of climate change and the climate emergency. And in particular their emotional responses and their feelings. Much of the discourse we see is often about the facts and the information and the data and the policies. Which are highly, highly important. But we are making time here to talk about the emotion, the emotional piece, how we feel.
And today, dear listeners, we are going to talk about ecological guilt. Everything you wanted to know about ecological guilt. What is this? And how does it work? And how do we understand it? I totally understand if someone wants to turn the podcast off and, you know, maybe listen to something else. But I would ask you to stick with us and talk about this because we have wrestled with this in various directions. And it’s a very interesting topic. And we’re going to talk about it from different angles. From our various expertise. And what we’re seeing in the world and our colleagues and what’s happening in the world for others and for ourselves. Panu, do you want to talk about a range of things and then dive into one? And maybe talk about some of the recent research you’ve been doing? Where do you want to start?
Pihkala: Perhaps starting with the simple question: what is guilt? And I might ask you all — listeners also — to just take a moment and think about that. How do I understand the word guilt? And of course in various languages the connotations might be different. In my work with environmental matters, I’ve noticed varieties of guilt for a very long time. And then at some point I realized just how different people’s images about guilt are. I realized that when talking about ecological guilt, some people instantly think of very strong guilt. You know, that kind of thing when you are a kid and you notice that you’ve done something wrong and you fear that your parents will find out. And this might also very closely link to shame.
But that’s not what the scholars of ecological guilt are only about. So there may be very strong feelings, but there may also be these quiet everyday glimpses of disturbance. When we are making things and making choices which we know are not perfect for ecological matters, but then again our lives are so complex in contemporary societies that it is often very difficult to strive for any purity in matters. So that’s what I want to start with. This broad range of what we are talking about here. So not just the most intense feelings of guilt but also these fleeting disturbances we feel. And also crediting Tim Jensen who is an author who has done great work around ecological guilt. But how about you, Thomas? When did you start thinking about ecological guilt more? And what sort of variations do you have in mind when you hear the word ecological guilt?
Doherty: Yeah. Panu thanks. I mean this is really interesting. Even though, I mean, listeners should know that Panu and I do talk about this stuff. And we’ve already sort of had a pre conversation about this. But even as Panu speaks I’m understanding more about where he’s coming from. Because when I heard you talk about variations of guilt, I thought you meant guilt about different things or different kinds of feelings. But I see that you mean variations in just the intensity and awareness of guilt. So I can have really lightweight guilt or really mundane guilt. Or like serious, shameful, in front of the whole community feeling terrible kind of guilt.
You know, okay so yes as with all emotions. We’re emotional beings. We cannot be alive and not have emotions and our unique feelings. So you’re suggesting that, you know, this environmental stuff is really challenging us to just know a little bit. Make friends with guilt as a thing and how it manifests in different ways. It could be really mundane. And I think that’s helpful. I don’t often think about it that way. And maybe listeners don’t either. Just these differences — it’s like turning up the volume. A lot of times the volume is really low. Like one. And then once in a while if we see a bad news story or we really are in touch with our carbon impacts that we’re doing, then the guilt meter turns on louder.
Where I live in the US, we use electricity for power. And I’m trying to use more of that and get off fossil fuels. And making strides in my lifestyle. But, you know, my electric company sends me a notice every month with my bill and it tells me what I’m using for electricity. You know, where my electricity is going. And it’s helpful to know that I am increasing the electric use, you know, in some areas that I want to like having more of my cooking through electric versus gas. But I see that a big part of my electric use is always on appliances. It’s just these appliances that are always on. And it makes me feel guilty that I’m just, you know, having these power sources just sitting around my home that are just sucking energy all the time, not really doing anything. So to me that’s a mundane day-to-day place where I might have some eco guilt. And I’m not entirely sure what to do about that because I don’t even know what all of these appliances are. You know, if you leave your computer plugged in of course it’s sucking power. Or, you know, any number of appliances have little indicator lights that are always blinking. So, yeah. So there’s a volume level of guilt.
And then I know you’ve talked about some of these traps. These double binds. Flip side kind of things. What do you mean by that?
Pihkala: Yeah. It’s related to the sort of plasticity of guilt. You know, you can feel guilt for something that you have done. But you can also feel guilt for something you haven’t done. So for example, you get the feeling that you should have done something based on some values. And then you get some kind of guilt for not doing so. And of course our feelings of guilt when evaluated from an ethical perspective or from a psychological well-being perspective. There’s, you know, more constructive forms of guilt and less constructive forms of guilt. And I think this is very important in relation to environmental matters because there are quite complicated questions such as who should be feeling what kind of guilt and in what levels in what situations. And it’s quite easy for people to feel either too much or too little. That’s my observation. A very broad one.
I meet a lot of people with strong environmental identities. That’s a concept we have often talked about in this podcast and especially you Thomas. And for those people a pressing psychological issue is that they tend to feel quite often and quite heavily ecological guilt. But then for some other people, especially if they don’t see good ways forward from ecological guilt — if they don't see options where they could act in a more ecological way — people may distance themselves from these feelings and sometimes use numbing and trying not to care about it so much. And that’s another complicated issue that may happen.
So coming to your question, the power dynamics in our societies around ecological guilt are also highly important because there are forces which are trying either to get us to feel more ecological guilt or less ecological guilt. So that’s something I think is very important.
Doherty: Yeah. Well that’s really helpful too. I mean I was looking up just guilt definitions and, you know, it’s always helpful to remind ourselves what is the definition of a word. And guilt is seen as being responsible for something that happened. I am guilty of it. But guilt can also be a feeling of being responsible for something. Right? I might feel guilty, maybe inappropriately. Like maybe it wasn't really my fault but I still feel guilty because I feel like I contributed to it. So yes.
And then shame is the public side of that. Like how to be seen. You know, guilt is private. That’s the insidiousness about guilt as well. Like a lot of the troubling eco emotions. They isolate us and we feel it privately. It’s our private suffering. And so listeners I just want to validate that if you have private suffering about these issues, you’re perfectly normal unfortunately. You don’t have an eco disorder, it's just life because so many of us are privately suffering in so many ways through all this stuff. So yes.
And then Panu, you bring up the power thing. And that’s why I’m always weary of the eco guilt story because I don’t really want to normalize it in the sense of just saying well everybody, you know, you should all feel guilty and feel bad. Like you say, different people feel different levels of it. And I know some listeners who are environmental advocates or activists who are saying okay how do I use this now? How do I make those people that don’t have enough guilt how do I turn up their volume? And, you know, because they need to change. And unfortunately some environmental groups don’t think about the human casualties. So they don’t really care about how to turn down the volume of the people that have it over much. Because again one of the power structures is the environmental movement. Who really sees eco guilt as a lever to make societal change. And it is a kind of lever we just have to be very careful about.
Yeah, so guilt becomes this kind of lever that people want to be able to get their hands on those knobs. Those volume knobs a little bit. So, yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah. That’s a very important observation you’re making, Thomas I think. And our previous guest Sarah Jaquette Ray…
Doherty: Yes.
Pihkala: …discusses this also for example in her book Field Guide to Climate Anxiety where she sees the problems around ecological guilt being so heavy that she actually advocates “ditching guilt”. And to a certain point I totally agree. But then, of course, for people who have resources and power including me, for example, even though I’m not rich by any standards in Finnish society, guilt as responsibility, I see, has its role. But that must be combined with the caution around overly strong burdens. Especially because there are some [problematic] power structures. And trying to do so.
And that’s something that Tim Jensen in his book, Ecologies of Guilt in Environmental Rhetorics, criticizes and shows interesting examples of how some companies have used psychology in efforts to share the responsibility more to individuals and citizens. One of the more insidious ones was British Petroleum after the DeepWater Horizon oil spill: developing a public relations campaign reminding people that you know we all are using oil in some way. For example, we are driving cars. And then there’s the plastic thing. So they were very intentionally trying to distribute responsibility and guilt to citizens and individuals. And trying to divert attention away from the very serious procedural mistakes that they were making which enabled that terrible accident in the Gulf of Mexico. So this is one example of how insidious that dynamics around ecological guilt can sometimes be.
Doherty: Yeah. Exactly. And so that’s, you know, again in academic or therapy circles we talk about a critical consciousness about something versus being unconscious or uncritical. And the critical consciousness just simply means I understand there’s a whole context here of power and things that are happening. None of this happens by accident. Obviously we have marketers that want to turn down people’s eco angst, eco guilt so they’ll buy more products. And don’t worry about plastics. And don’t worry about fossil fuels. And it’s inevitable. And we need this.
In the US it’s kind of, you know, a national value to be a consumer and to use these things. And so people use all these sorts of ways of thinking. Yeah, so they do exist. There is unfortunately kind of a culture war going on around these feelings. And individuals are trapped in the middle. And part of the whole kind of ecological awakening that people have is they start to realize this. And they start to take control. So ultimately we want to be in control of our feelings. And really feel the feelings that are genuine for us. And built the capacity and ability to hold those and not just be, you know, manipulated by things.
And so, yes, carbon footprint is a real thing. Like we can think about our use of energy and we should. That’s ethical. But it has also been used as a kind of diversion. Like blaming the public. And so we have to not accept that piece. You know, this is really about structural change. Because we didn’t choose what’s in our products. We don’t choose all the plastic we get. We don’t have power over the fuel standards or what vehicles are even available for us to purchase. If we can purchase a vehicle.
Pihkala: Yeah. Indeed. And after all, reasonable guilt is based on caring. You know, if you care about something then if there’s a presumed violation or not filling your responsibility then you feel guilt. And fundamentally it’s based on care. Of course, there’s many examples where people may get feelings of guilt for the wrong reasons. But still the fundamental foundation stands I think.
And this is linked with the concept of double bind that you, Thomas, mentioned very briefly earlier and which I have been talking about in our pre conversations. That’s also something that Jensen is applying to ecological guilt. This old concept by Gregory Bateson, “double bind.” Which means that people are offered a solution which ends up perpetuating the problem. And so for ecological guilt, the most easily available option is buying environmentally friendly products. And then people get some alleviation from the guilt, but because the problems are structural the individual choices alone can’t change society. That doesn't mean they wouldn't be important, but they can’t do the whole thing. So that’s why Jensen is applying double bind here because it binds people then to experience guilt again because the problems are not going away even though people genuinely wanted to do something to solve the problems by doing these individual choices.
Doherty: Yeah it really stinks, Panu. I mean we’re stuck in these binds all the time. And that one is that marketing binds that there will be a product that will save us. Which is the whole start of a lot of this problem in the first place. So yeah so we want to really honor our feelings of guilt. That they are normal and healthy. And we want to be careful of these shadow sides.
Another shadow side is of course that we assume that everyone has eco guilt, but that might be an assumption based on our privilege or our placement because we have the, oddly enough, luxury to feel guilty. Whereas others might just be working on their survival. So that’s been a critique of Sarah, our previous guest, who has talked about this in her work. That’s been a critique that eco guilt is a white upper class, upper middle class phenomenon. And it ignores, you know, African Americans. People of Color. You know, social movements around the world. The Global South. People have been working on social change. They don’t have the luxury of feeling guilty. They’re trying to take action. And so it kind of obscures a lot of people’s experience if we just assume everyone has eco guilt. That’s kind of a faulty assumption. So we want to think about that side too.
Pihkala: Yeah definitely. That’s a hugely important point. And it may be related to complex dynamics in the industrialized world about so-called colonial guilt. You know, these feelings are related to what societies have been doing in history and partly still are doing. And then that may become joined with the ecological issues type of thing. So it can lead to quite a lot of complications and sometimes also then efforts among the privileged people also to distance themselves from guilt. And it also comes back to a very fundamental theme in our podcast which is that people in various contexts should have the right and encouragement to use emotional words which they think are suitable for what they are feeling. So no hegemony here of trying to define a universalizing vocabulary that everybody should use, but instead paying respect to contextual matters. And also different languages.
It’s also highly interesting that generally in relation to guilt, various languages and cultures have many differences. So it's also fascinating that the basic conceptions in a culture about guilt and shame may be quite different.
Doherty: Yeah. And so that’s another interesting thing about the idea of emotions. That some of them are relatively universal across different cultures and others are quite unique. And then different cultures. You know, you talked about Jennifer Uchendu. The Nigerian researcher is talking about folks in other countries. And so this isn't just, you know, limited to people in Europe and the US and Canada and the UK. You know, there are people around the world who have some privilege. And have some standing. And are aware of their carbon footprints in all cultures and in all countries. Thinking about how this plays out in each nation based on the nation’s history. Colonialism. Being either a colonizer or a colonized. That’s a whole other piece to this. That, you know, makes it more unique to each listener where they’re placed.
In addition to the knobs and where we turn up and down these feelings you hinted at. Other kinds of related feelings. So we hurt where we care. If we’re guilty it’s because we have values. Something that we know is being threatened. So that other image for emotions is like a train. It’s like I might pick one car of the train and say I’m feeling this, but there are many other emotions that are part of this train that I’ve probably felt in advance of feeling the guilt. So listeners, you know, you’re not going to feel guilty unless you have other feelings first like care. Like responsibility. Like love. You know, so there are a lot of positive feelings hidden inside guilt.
Pihkala: Yeah that’s profoundly put Thomas I think. And for eco emotions, sadness is very often intertwined with guilt, also. When we see news about environmental damage, for example, it often evokes both some kind of sadness and some kind of guilt, for example. So, that’s one example of how different emotions need attention.
We have been hinting at shame a couple of times. And, just to clarify, of course there are various ways to define these concepts, but quite often the differentiation is made so that shame is more related to what we perceive ourselves to be more essentially. And guilt is more related to our actions or inactions. And also there might be ecological shame and climate shame, for example, if it gets to the level that we think that we are deficient in relation to ecological issues and climate issues. And the so-called “species shame” may be quite paralyzing if we think that humanity is just flawed. And so that may be quite damaging for any motivation to do repair. But not in all cases.
Some people have fleshed out also constructive possibilities in shame. It’s more difficult to achieve, but they may happen. For example if we have a group which makes the evaluation that “we have been acting in a way which is at least partly shameful”. And then as a group they decide that hey we want to be honorful again and that’s why we will do this and that. So they engage in changing their behavior in some sort of reparation, also. Doing new things in a new way. And this I see, for example, in the Finnish climate organization called Climate Grandmothers [Aktivistimummot]. So they haven’t succumbed to any climate shame, but they have made the evaluation that hey hmm actually people of all ages should make different value choices. And then they are moving forward.
Doherty: Yeah. So gratitude comes in. I’m guilty but I’m also thankful for what I’ve had and I want to share. There’s a sense of — I’m not sure what the emotion is that’s associated with that urge to want to share what you have. But I know that there must be an emotional word for that in many languages. This sense of sharing abundance. Wanting to have the greater good. Thinking about the greater good.
So, again, with all these emotions you can think of it either as a train of emotions or, you know, the outward emotion is like the flower, but there’s roots to the emotion. You know, that has all these other feelings. And so, that gets into the idea of working with people who are coping. It’s about emotional regulation, right? And we can kind of move with different feelings and kind of regulate our emotions a little bit so we’re not just suffering and powerless.
And then I think toward the end here we have to get to the action piece because we’ve hinted at that too and what is the link between eco guilt and taking action, as you’re saying. We have to be careful there because, you know, you shared - I learned about a book today talking to Panu. Sami Grover’s book We Are All Climate Hypocrites Now. Right? Embracing our limitations can unlock a powerful movement, you know. It’s essentially getting past this climate hostage, carbon footprint guilt dilemma and saying yes, we all are embedded and let’s move forward. Let’s get past that. And let’s take action. So, the Zeitgeist is moving forward on this. Like we’re always moving forward on this, but what does it mean when we say, you know.
A lot of people are saying the antidote to eco anxiety is taking action. So that’s also part of the Zeitgeist now too. And you hear it in all these news stories. Take action, you’ll feel better. But it isn’t that simple. And that’s another way where people are trying to get a hold of our knobs. And like say oh you’re guilty, take action. Either let me sell you this product. Or let me recruit you to my environmental program. To put it simply: this can lead to action and action can be an antidote, if the action has meaning for people. Right? If it makes sense. So, if I’m taking action, it makes my life feel significant. If it gives people purpose. Like the listener, if it gives you a purpose. If you feel like you’re suffering makes sense because you’re channeling your suffering into something useful and it makes sense and for some reason there’s a reason for why you suffered. Because of your privilege, your suffering allowed you to take action and that makes you have a sense of purpose. And it makes you feel significant, then yes, your action will make you feel better. But if someone is just thrust into action without understanding why they’re doing it and what it means. And whether they can do it or not, then you’re just being manipulated yet again.
Pihkala: Yeah. Yeah, it can be a tricky thing if you are trying to achieve acceptance just by doing. This links with many themes in my background. In the work with religion, you know, these dynamics are very often discussed. And sometimes also environmental communicators like George Marshall have taken a look towards religious communities. And the ways in which these communities sometimes manage both to encounter people’s feelings of guilt and shame and provide a sort of communal liberation from that. Often through some kind of promise to do good in the future. So there’s a kind of combination of so-called absolution and commitment to trying to make a change.
I would also emphasize the structural dimension here. Sami Grover’s book which I just got is a very interesting one. There’s another called Against Purity. Which is highly important in reminding us that we can’t be completely pure. And if we try to do so we end up in more problems actually. So together with other people recognizing that we are part of this system. We shouldn't let others say that we are hypocrites. Or we shouldn’t let others demand that we would have to move outside societies to be able to criticize the society where we are living. But sort of accepting this implicatedness and this impurity in a way. And still trusting that we can together make a difference. That would be sort of my take on this.
Doherty: Yeah this is great. And, you know, listeners I learn a lot from my conversations with Panu. And I know Panu learns some things too. So, yeah this idea is against purity. You know, this book Living Ethically in Compromised Times by Alexis Shotwell. You know, we’re going to wrap up. Panu brought in at the very end a very important elephant in the room which is religion and spirituality. Which of course as someone who grew up in the Roman Catholic faith, you know, this guilt is entwined with many kinds of religions in various ways. So listeners can think about that’s yet another angle on guilt in general as a feeling. How it plays into your spiritual or religious tradition.
But we talked about a bunch of things. You know, everything you wanted to know about eco guilt. So I hope this was helpful for people. It is a feeling. It is a normal feeling. It’s linked to other really healthy and positive feelings like caring and ethics. And, you know, there’s different levels of it. The real mundane, little levels that we have. And then these really, really heavy levels. And there’s all the power structure at play. So we need to kind of stand on our own two feet here. And, yes our guilt can be fuel for action if it gives us meaning and gives us purpose. And helps things to make sense. So a really good discussion yet again, Panu. I really appreciate it.
Pihkala: Likewise Thomas. Likewise.
Doherty: And I know you have a busy week. And you’re preparing for a television appearance did you say? Or a media appearance tomorrow?
Pihkala: Yeah. In the Finnish television there's a discussion series about various ecological issues. So that’s on the list tomorrow morning. Now it’s evening in Helsinki and we have some nice autumn colors, the ruska in the Finnish language. The word which means bright autumn colors. So it’s time to go outside for a walk in the evening. And I know you, Thomas, have the day ahead of you and various things to do.
Doherty: Yeah, I’m looking forward to doing a conference event this weekend that’s in person. Where I’ll be able to talk about these things with a large group of people and it’ll be nice to be off of zoom and off of the screen and actually with people. And here in the Pacific Northwest it’s a rainy morning. It’s raining right now. It’s that unique time of the year where we’re used to it being dry here so my backyard is full of outdoor gear that we’ve been using like our wetsuits for going to the ocean that were drying. But now, of course, they’re all wet because it’s raining. And that’s just the way it is in the Pacific Northwest in the fall. So the seasons are turning. So we’ll be in touch with more. Listeners, thank you so much for your time. You can reach us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. You can send us messages and let us know how these episodes are landing for you. And be aware of all of your emotions. And you all take care.
Pihkala: Take care.
Season 2, Episode 3: Coping on Campus with Sarah Jaquette Ray
Sep 30, 2022
Season 2, Episode 3: Coping on Campus with Sarah Jaquette Ray
As a follow up to their conversation with young climate and emotions researcher Isabel Coppola, Thomas and Panu spoke with Environmental Studies Professor Sarah Jaquette Ray, well-known for her writings on climate anxiety and social justice perspectives within the climate and environmental movements. Panu and Sarah collaborated on the Existential Toolkit for Climate Justice Educators Project. Sarah reflected on her own climate emotions journey and what she sees as her sacred role as a teacher and university professor, and the intensity of people reaching out to her about climate change. She noted her experience 7-10 years ago of being enlightened about issues of complicity and despair about climate change among students, and her effort to “go back to the drawing board and reinvent myself as a professor to meet the moment that students were asking for.” This included questioning the impulse among students that “burnout is actually the badge of how much I care” and breaking down traditional barriers in the academy between academic content and emotional support and self care provided by the counseling center. Panu was reminded of a concept he has been using in Finnish, “arkipäivän tilastoimaton hyvyys”, translated as “unaccounted everyday goodness” and referencing California writer Mike Davis, the speakers played with the concepts of “unmobilized love” and “immobilized love.” Sarah looked ahead to the Conference she is helping to organize in April 2023 at University California Riverside Environment, Justice, and the Politics of Emotion: A Virtual and In-Person Symposium along with our previous podcast guest Jade Sasser and other climate and emotions experts. Thomas noted the recent death of scholar Phillip Cushman whose works like the paper “Why the Self is Empty” and book Constructing the Self, Constructing America are influential in critical psychology and ecopsychology. Join us for an enlightening dialog among leading climate thinkers.
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello. I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast, the the show for people around the globe who are feeling and thinking deeply about climate change, global warming, and all these aspects of this great situation in our world right now. And today, we're lucky to have a special guest.
Sarah Jaquette Ray: Hi, I'm Sarah Jaquette Ray. I'm a professor at Cal Poly Humboldt.
Doherty: And both Panu and I have followed Sarah's work. And Panu has worked with Sarah. And this episode follows nicely along with our conversation recently with Isabel Coppola, a young researcher who's been studying climate anxiety. So we're going to talk about a number of things today. Both in university. And in our own lives. And in the world. Panu do you want to get us started?
Pihkala: Yes, warmly welcome all and a special welcome to you Sarah. Very good to have you here. We've been collaborating with the existential toolkit for climate justice educators project. We've already had Ellen Kelsey visiting the podcast previously, who is another powerful figure in that network together with Sarah. And of course, in my studies of climate emotions and anxiety, I've often come across Sarah's work. But to get us running, how does it feel right now, Sarah? What's the situation around life and climate change where you are now?
Jaquette Ray: Thanks for asking. And thanks for having me on this podcast. I'm so excited to meet you, Thomas and see you again Panu in this way. And how it feels right now is that there's a lot of intensity. I feel the intensity. I feel the intensity from the people who are reaching out about this. I feel the intensity from the people who are working on it, like you both. And certainly the intensity around evidence of climate disruption and distress all around the world. So I'm thinking about, you know, Mississippi, Pakistan. I'm thinking about the heat waves, even right here closer to home here. And the smoke and the fires in the Northwest.
I am personally in quite a refuge from all of that here behind “the redwood curtain” in McKinleyville, California, where it's foggy and chilly, and the air is very clear. So I feel very lucky for the moment anyway. But yes. Feeling it in all my networks and feeling it amongst students then. And the news I'm paying attention to as well as I follow these other stories.
Pihkala: Thank you, Sarah, for sharing all that. [I] really appreciate it. For the listeners who haven't followed Sarah's work, she's been one who advocates for different constructive methods for people to be able to stay with these various feelings. And often the contradictions. For example, finding oneself in a relatively safe space and being able to experience joy and happiness, for example. And at the same time, knowing what's happening around the corner, and so on. So I know Sarah that you've been a longtime engaged with this. But what I don't know exactly myself either, is that, how did you get started with your climate emotions journey? Would you like to share something about that?
Jaquette Ray: Yeah, this is a good question because it's interesting enough, I have a background in religious studies. And I studied a lot of Eastern philosophy. And I was super into Zen Buddhism and Taoism and stuff. And something happened to me at the end of college where I somehow thought that if I really wanted to make a difference in the world and be of service to matters of social justice… I was also very involved in reproductive justice issues during college and even in high school …. And I just thought if I wanted to do that work, it wasn't going to be through religion and spirituality. And so I kind of gave that up and went down this path. And ended up in environmental studies as my lens through which to work on these matters in the world. And I had sort of given up my spiritual interests entirely.
And I always felt like what I loved about teaching at the college level was the almost-bordering-on-therapeutic relationship with students. And sort of being the midwife of this transition moment. That in most Western cultures, we don't have big rituals and ceremonies to mark for young people. And it felt really bordering on sacred for me to be a college professor. For, you know, watching students undergo this massive transition. And it's always been a big existential moment. But something happened and, you know, about seven or eight years ago, where the existential moment seemed worse than before. You know, when you challenge your cherished beliefs. And you become enlightened about your complicity in various forms of injustice. Or your ideas about what nature is become unraveled. These things are sort of exciting for students even as they're challenging.
But the despair aspect of realizing that they're living in a world that is uninhabitable for many, many people. And will become uninhabitable for them. And is likely to be uninhabitable for many of their children or future ancestors. This existential reality of the scale and immediacy of this happening was becoming part of our classroom lives. And I realized that in order for this generation to be as empowered and motivated, engaged to take on these challenges of the world, that they were going to need something other than what I had been trained to give them. And it was more like what I was learning in college for my BA in religious studies than what I had learned in my PhD and my masters for environment.
So I sort of had to kind of go back to the drawing board and reinvent myself as a professor to meet the moment that students were asking for. And this is where I, at the time, wouldn't have said climate was my frame, but I knew there was something existential that I needed to learn all the skills. I had to study all the psychologists. I had to study all the social movement leaders of all the movements. And I had to maybe also learn something about it. Go back to my thinking about spirituality and thinking about other sources of energy for this generation.
Pihkala: Thank you. Thanks for sharing all that. This brings an interesting similarity between our paths, also because I also for a long time worked with religion and spirituality. And then also moved towards interdisciplinary environmental stuff. Much for the very same reasons that you mentioned. And this also touches on our discussions with Thomas a couple of episodes back about Bill Plotkin work. And transitions and rituals. But before I go further onto that, how about you, Thomas? What does this bring into your mind?
Doherty: Yeah, this is a great dialogue. And I'm thinking of my own teaching experiences, teaching graduate school and undergrad. Again, when I was coming out, as someone who had worked in wilderness therapy and wanted to learn how to do eco-therapy, or wilderness, or outdoor counseling. There were no programs at the time. In the 90’s. Official programs, so ended up creating some of those programs.
So I mean, Sarah, I found your Field Guide book very validating because it really reminded me of a lot of things that I had invented on my own as well. With teaching. You know, kind of just even with undergrads, simple rules, like for every hour you spend dealing with all this heavy existential stuff, you need to spend an hour outside doing something healthy for yourself. You know, these kinds of basic things. And, of course, teaching mostly therapists in the Ecopsychology program that I founded, we were automatically doing all the therapy stuff from the very get go. But very different than … I've met over the years professors. You know, especially 10, 20 years ago, who were trying to teach students about climate change. And then they'd get a nickname like “Dr. Doom.” You know, by their students. Or something like that, because they would just totally… And meeting people that tried to study eco-topics and got so turned off, they just left that major. And so I really appreciate it. I think we've come a long way. I think, just generally, we've come a long way on how to teach young people how to work in these areas. And we have to relearn it every day. Because it's still so hard.
Jaquette Ray: Yeah, I think we're at a real inflection point with young people. I think when I first started noticing this in young people, they really would not have thought of self care. And that hour in nature you just mentioned. And taking the time to rest. That would have all been just a privilege that we don't have time for. And that the urgency of the problem and combined with the kind of guilt around their privilege. And I'm talking about diversity of students here, not just “white privilege” students. You know, I'm at Cal State. So, relatively speaking, you know, compared to college students, this is not a privileged group. But as Americans period, they're privileged, right? They're American college students. So recognizing their global position.
You know, this notion of “I should burn out.” The burnout is actually the badge of how much I care. The burnout is actually the sign I'm doing enough work. If I'm not burnt out, then I'm not working hard enough to solve these problems. And so there was a sense at the time that. I had a real uphill battle to climb to get them to come around to realizing that the burnout was not going to save the planet. And now young people are complete - I feel. I've just heard of young people. The majority of the climate movement is completely aware that this is a marathon, not a sprint. And that they're going to have to take care of themselves to keep engaged for their lives. So I think there's a real shift happening.
Pihkala: That's very promising to hear. And I've been noticing similar things. Especially with new climate movements. Integrating this thing. And it's been a bit more tricky for traditional environmental organizations. Where the working culture very often has been such that you sort of keep your sadness hidden. And try to keep a positive and optimistic outlook. And well, I know, Sarah, that you've been doing critical research on the history of American environmentalism also. That's one direction we could go here. But I'd still like us to keep for a moment with the students. So, what kinds of things have you seen recently, among students? Other than this increasing awareness of the need also for self care and taking breaks? What's your observations about what's happening?
Jaquette Ray: You know, a lot of things, but the one I'd like to pull on the thread of right now is something I've been chewing on for some time, which is whether or not, you know, they have incredible impatience to be in the college classroom. And we saw this with Greta Thunberg and climate strikes. That there was a sense of “why should I sit in this classroom to learn something for a future that is not even guaranteed?” And they were told, you know, instead of protesting, go back to school. Get the degree, so you have some power, so you can do something. And the youth response to that was, there is not going to be. You know, the systems, [where] you think I'm going to get a job are not going to exist anymore. We have to reinvent those systems now. And I think that suspicion of existing institutions was really amplified in COVID, as well. The sort of crumbling apart and the instability of structures that we took for granted, in my generation, is a real opportunity for young people. And I think that there's enthusiasm and excitement and trepidation around what's possible. Are we midwifing a new future? Are we living at the precipice of the great turning? You know, I have students who are really involved in abolition or other forms of social justice. You know, future envisioning, you know? And they want something new and different. They love the thought that we're living in a womb and not a tomb. And so the doom narrative of, or the Doom moment of environmental studies seems to be on its way out. I'd like to think it is. And we're having this kind of radical imagination. “Let's build the world we want,” kind of a moment with young people.
However, they're also, therefore, completely suspicious when you do things like career counseling. So there's so much pressure because institutions of higher education are neoliberalized. We are part of capitalism. There's so much pressure to get jobs after college, right? And of course, our students, many of them are first generation college students. They feel a lot of pressure from their families that if they're going to take the sacrifice to go to college, they darn well better get jobs afterwards. So the pressures coming from all directions to channel the knowledge into marketable skill sets. The neoliberal imperative to vocationalize these critiques. There's an internal paradox there. There's a tension there. We're critiquing the systems that are all falling apart. And we're celebrating what we're going to build next. But then you're also telling me I have to build a resume for the old structure, right? And I have to market myself for this capitalist system that's failing everybody. So I think that's a very interesting debate that institutions of higher education are very slow to be thinking about. And I really wish they would be thinking about it much more richly. I wonder what happens in these career planning, you know, conferences where people are going to the them career planning for what? Young people know. They're already on this, you know. They're like, a killer resume for what kind of economy, you know? For the great transition, you know?
Doherty: No, this is great. We were talking earlier, even just this morning, how we’re involved in different networks. And the Climate Psychology Alliance has various listservs and conversation forums here in the US. And there was a very spirited and passionate, you know, exchange about the role of the university. We have links in our show, and, you know, there was a nice article that came out in the Washington Post the other day about University Counseling Centers getting involved in helping support students with anxiety about climate and other issues. Similar to the work Sarah has been doing in her class. But, you know, it's not surprising, of course, that that's going to show up in the counseling center. But then people are also critiquing the whole idea of a university. And maybe we should just have students learn regenerative techniques for living in a new world versus, you know… essentially scrap the university as a vestige of modernity. But, of course, it's not that simple.
And so again, that's, I think, with this work for me, it's always… You always have to keep stepping back another step and looking at the bigger picture. And the bigger picture. And realizing it's not that simple. And it's not that simple. I think that's one of the hardest things for young people to grok is that it just is not that simple. Part of that whole neoliberal system is offering consumers simple solutions to their life problems, right. And so we do get indoctrinated into this simplicity. I think Bill McKibben talks about that. And other people talk about that. It's just not that simple. You know, these are complicated things that take time. So I don't have anything specific to go from there, but just to name that kind of thing.
Jaquette Ray: Well, just to pull that thread a little bit, too. Because I sometimes think that young people feel like older generations are telling them, you can't have what you want, you know. And I think that part of that is about the kind of developmental stage of where. You know, there's sort of these five stages of development or whatever. Both of you are experts on this more than I am. But this notion that only at a certain point, do you start to really grasp nuance and paradox and gray areas. And I think “this is not that simple” speaks to this sort of deeper climate wisdom, that, you know, we're going to have a lot of both, and here. We're going to have to participate in the current economy as we work to dismantle it. Right? So there's a lot of both-and. That I think, young people, it's not about their naivety so much as it is about their, you know, desire for what [philosopher] Alexis Shotwell calls “purity politics.” You know, the sort of ideological purity, of just signing up for one thing and having everything be clearly in line with that mission. Whereas they're gonna have a lot of hypocrisy and inconsistency in their lives. And that's just the messiness of climate work. All this work. So I think it's hard for them to accept that.
Pihkala: Yeah. I think that's very well said, both of you. And I recently came across this concept called “messy hope”. And having done lots of analysis on different concepts or assessments of hope that was new and fascinating. And I totally agree with the messiness. And the need for embracing ambivalence and uncertainty. And of course, these are very difficult things. And then we see the counter movement, like you, Sarah, hinted at. People want more binary thinking. And movements, which could support that also. So that's something that I'm actually worried about for the years to come. That is, how are we gonna deal with the rise of authoritarianism and the appeal of just going with the group. I'm often thinking of Erich Fromm, the old 20th century scholar and his work “Escape from Freedom,” [that explored social conditions that facilitated the rise of Nazism] for example.
Jaquette Ray: Yeah.
Pihkala: Any thoughts on that, Sarah? I know that you've been discussing relevant topics.
Jaquette Ray: Definitely. Yeah, definitely. I think one of the things in my first book, The Ecological Other, I talked about is the emotion of disgust in the environmental movement. And how disgust activated by people who already have inclinations that are xenophobic or nativist can really leverage environmental reasons to just reinforce white supremacy. And [philosopher] Betsy Harman calls that a kind of “green hate.” This is something that I spent the first chunk of my career thinking about. The ways of the environmental movement. Environmental ideas and emotions, can actually cause greater social injustice. Trying to tease those things apart.
And when I moved to thinking about climate anxiety, I thought I was kind of jumping track entirely and doing something totally different. But I've seen over the few years that I've been researching it, all of the ways that there's some parallels there. And the ways that emotion, environmental emotion in particular… But big emotions leverage these kinds of fascist tendencies. And can, and we see it in lots of places, underwrite some, some serious violence, right? So we see this in the El Paso shootings. We saw this in Buffalo. With the great replacement theory. And we saw this in Christchurch, of course. This notion of the inconvenient truth being with all these immigrants is somehow a problem in the larger climate story. And so the climate anxiety being, you know, leveraged for social injustice. For mass violence. Is something I have great concern about.
And so, you know, while we're thinking about coping strategies. Or how to transform it into climate action. And all these other wonderful things. Or how to live a good life, despite any of it. I also want us to just make sure we're always paying attention to how it's underwriting some of this more nefarious stuff. Including eco-fascism. This desire for purity. This desire for binary thinking. For ideological clarity that comes with just saying, you know, wipe all the people off the planet who are causing these problems in the first place.
Doherty: And that, you know, I just want to give a shout out to the whole concept of environmental studies as a discipline. And then just, listeners, I mean, some of the listeners, you know, will know about this because they've studied this. Or they've had an environmental studies course. But a lot of people aren't aware. One of the benefits of the university is these kinds of dialogues, you know. Environmental Studies is [a] great, very diverse area. Even different kinds of environmental studies programs, as you know Sarah, are quite different in their focus and things like that. But it allows us to talk about these really deep, much more nuanced discussions than you get in the media. And things like that.
When I was in graduate school at Antioch New England. In my clinical psychology doctorate, I moonlighted in the environmental studies program for a while. That's because it was where all my tribe was, and, you know, with [instructors like] Mitch Thomashow and Cindy Thomashow. A lot of these interesting folks. And it's funny. When I trained therapists, they asked me, how did you get to do all this kind of stuff? And I often tell them, oh, it didn't come out of psychology, you know. The stuff I do didn't come out of clinical psychology. I had to go find it in other areas, like in environmental studies, you know. Where people were talking about their environmental identity and ecological identity and all this sort of stuff. So I just want to give a shout out to environmental studies, folks.
Jaquette Ray: And I want to give a shout out to the therapists and the clinical psychologists too. Because, you know, I think there's a potential real tension between these worlds. As you sort are hinting out, Thomas. And yet there's so much rich stuff happening at the ecotone between them that is really exciting. The conversations I'm having with CPA. Conversations I get to have with people like Renee Lertzman and other folks who are trying to be in this space in between is fantastic. And I want to put a plug in if that's okay, for a conference that Blanche Verlie out of Australia, who's written Learning to Live Through the Anthropocene, recently, a book she's just published. And Jade Sasser, who's at UC Riverside [interviewed in our podcast in Season 1, Episode 8] is putting together a conference that's exactly trying to build out that connection on climate justice and the politics of emotion in April at UC Riverside. And so if there's any interest in people wanting to come and participate. Or, you know, visit. It will be in person, which I know makes it a challenge.
But the conversation that's happening around climate and emotions in the world of psychology is really rich and exciting. But Jade and Blanche, and I really want to make sure also that there's a scholarly intervention around the politics of emotion. Which is sort of what you're hinting at there, Thomas. About how environmental studies kind of gave you that lens to think about. These are political artifacts, emotions, you know. And they're actually driving … they're creating politics, too. So.
Doherty: Yeah, we'll definitely put a link in our show notes to that conference. And it is right up our alley in the climate change and happiness area. We've got a little more time. I know we want to cycle back to what it means to be happy. Because that's another thing to interrogate as you talk about, Sarah, in your book, interrogating happiness. Which simply, of course listeners … it doesn't mean “putting happiness in a chair and shining a bright light on it, and slapping it around” interrogate. It means let's look deeply at different sides of this. And let's look from one side. And let's look from the other. And let's really go outside of our existing, you know, mental models, right? That's what it means to interrogate something. But, you know, what do you think Panu? I know you spend a lot of your time interrogating happiness, Panu. So what are you thinking here?
Pihkala: Yeah. And you know, happiness is a very strong figure. It can take quite a lot of interrogation. And it may seem that it's breaking up but still this person perseveres. Especially if we are talking about happiness in the deeper sense as we are trying to do in this podcast. Not exactly, just like the old philosopher Aristotle did. But of course linked with that. You know, deeper values and meaning in life. And, Sarah, we haven't actually, I think ever spoken directly about happiness. How do you see that concept? What's your thoughts on that?
Jaquette Ray: Yes, thank you. I love this topic. And I'm so delighted to be on this podcast, because it has that word in it. So I'm really glad we're going to talk about it. Yeah. Well, there's the sort of usual critique of it that you can imagine. And I put it in the book, too. Which is that the myth of happiness is actually the root of a lot of unhappiness. That we seek happiness in these sort of immediate gratification ways, because capitalism defines it that way for us. And so we actually find that those things are not making us happy. They're making us quite unhappy. And that toxic positivity means that we put all people's, you know, so-called negative or uncomfortable emotions like despair, anxiety, depression, anger, into the privacy of the therapy room. You know, you cope with that yourself. And I was told by my dean, when I first started telling him about all of my students' emotional responses to this stuff. You know, I thought to myself, we need to really reinvent the institution here. And he said, send them to CAPS (the counseling center). You have 15 minutes to spend with them. For anything else besides academics, they need to go to counseling and psychology services.
And this really clear divide between what happens in the classroom, what happens in the therapy room. These things in the classroom are content. They're political. They're public. And whether they need mental health help, is something that they can call their mom about, or go to therapy about or whatever. And that division, I think, is really part of what does us a disservice. That sort of toxic positivity culture. And then there's the other side of the coin. And also. Or the both and about all this is that, you know, despair, anger, anxiety, fear. While they are very motivating, they can actually push people into new transformative places of action. They, for the long term, do not actually generate the kind of energy and resilience that we're all going to need to engage in this work.
And so the real sense of what might be called emotional intelligence, or climate wisdom, I prefer to think of it as. Around the utility of long term spending time with those cortisol and emotions and hormones flushing through our bodies. And in an amygdala hijack situation outside of our window of tolerance. I'm using all of your psychology's ideas now, right? It doesn't actually serve the climate, right? It doesn't serve us and it doesn't serve the climate. So I do actually like thinking about the role of other things, right? That the negativity bias in our brains and in culture, is not actually the reality we live in, right? That's not actually really our reality. That is, you know, a negative frame of reality.
And so I'm always asking what else is true? What is it that we love that we have fear about getting lost? What is it that we love that we have anxiety that's threatened, let's focus on feeding what we want to grow. And those positive dopamine hits and emotions. And, you know, the seeds that those plant create a feedback loop that keeps us coming back for more. And so there is a real role for happiness and for pleasure and desire. And many people will say the climate problem has generated some of the happiest times of their lives. Because they plugged into the community, because they found a sense of purpose. So, you know, we think about the real role that these positive or more pleasant emotions necessarily have in the movement. Are there to be cultivated for sure.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks, Sarah. That connects with a lot of topics we've touched upon with various guests along the way. And I couldn't agree more personally. And all this sense of meaningfulness and connection that people have been finding. But also something that I've actually never put into English. I've been using it in Finnish called “arkipäivän tilastoimaton hyvyys”. Which means uncounted everyday goodness.
Jaquette Ray: I love that.
Pihkala: Now this is a sort of an on the fly translation, but there's so much of that happening in the world which never gets charted in any axes of the more capitalist [chart].
Jaquette Ray: Yes, I was just reading a bio, an interview with Mike Davis, whois of course, the famous Los Angeles and California critic who I love too. And he says there's so much “unmobilized love” out there. And it's similar to unaccounted for goodness. You know, what happens if we mobilize all this love that we feel instead of thinking about all the things that we fear, you know? I mean, those are all legitimate. We all have to have all those emotions, but they do stymie some of our best potential.
Doherty: Yeah. I’m taking some notes and I was going to write “unmobilized love” and my spellcheck said “did you mean ‘immobilized love’?” So we have “immobilized love” and “mobilized love.” So that's great. That’s what’s nice about these dialogues. Feelings are wild. That’s part of environmental emotional intelligence. Feelings just come up as we’re doing things. So happiness is wild too. It will pop up like a weed sometimes unaccounted for.
Jaquette Ray: I love that too.
Doherty: Thank you. We’re going to wrap up here. As we’re talking I just want to add another note for our links. Phillip Cushman died recently. The scholar, Phillip Cushman. And people might know about him. He had a book Constructing the Self, Constructing America, which is about this myth of happiness. So he’s one of these thinkers that’s been talked about recently in my circles that helped people to understand this whole idea of the “empty self.” And this kind of, you know, corporate capitalist kind of self. That sense of emptiness. Things like that. Critical psychology. So, I just want to put a note about that. Another thing for people to be thinking about.
Well where are you all going for the rest of your days or evenings as we wrap up? Sarah, what’s the rest of your day look like? You’re just starting over there.
Jaquette Ray: Yeah. I have two book talks to give.
Doherty: Oh, wow.
Jaquette Ray: Back to back. Which I’m really excited about. There’s been a couple weeks there of nothing. Kind of ready to go and do that. And I have a discussion and I’m really excited. With the founder of One Earth Sangha. Christin Barker. She and I have a chat later today. And this means that I can’t coach my kid’s soccer practice this evening. I have to have an assistant cover me. So I’m a little bummed about that. But, yeah I have mostly a day full of climate emotion work which is what I wanted to have my life look like when I took a leave of absence from my job at Cal Poly. It’s delightful even though I know it’s the topic many people think of as grim. But it gives me great - to go to that point - it gives me a great sense of satisfaction to be able to spend so much of my energy thinking about it today.
Pihkala: Very glad to hear, Sarah. And it’s evening in Helsinki and autumn is coming so it’s actually getting dark now, also. I just heard the door which means that our oldest son came back home from choir practice. And the younger one has been home because he has had a slight cold. And according to the rules now even if you have some slight flu, you have to stay home. So he’s been with me. I’ve been doing research on grief theory and ecological issues and sometimes throwing Finnish baseball with him. It’s been my day. But I’ve been very glad about this conversation, Sarah and Thomas. And we’ll be posting links also to the Existential Toolkit stuff that you can access online. And there’s a book coming out … co edited by Sarah and we’ll put the link too to Sarah’s website also, there’s different things there. But thanks a lot for coming, from my part.
Jaquette Ray: Well, it’s been a pleasure.
Doherty: Thanks again Sarah. It was so nice to meet you – mostly – in person here. And make a connection with you. I look forward to more. And maybe trying to find my way down to Riverside in the spring because I’m sort of nearby there for that meeting. And I got my daughter off to school. I’m going to be doing climate psychology things today too. So there are some of us out there that’s what we do. And there’s a lot of people around the world. A lot of the listeners do good work all day in different ways in life. So I want to honor all of that. And you all take care of yourselves. And I look forward to seeing you further down the path.
Pihkala: Take care.
Season 2, Episode 2: Living with Climate Change as a Young Researcher
Sep 16, 2022
Season 2, Episode 2: Living with Climate Change as a Young Researcher
In this episode, Thomas and Panu spoke with their 23-year-old colleague Isabel Coppola, a recent graduate of the University of Vermont and a Fulbright Scholar who has studied with Panu in Finland. Isabel has been an intern on the Climate Change and Happiness podcast over the last year and has been intimately involved in the creation of episodes and transcripts, and in answering listeners’ email messages. Isabel shared lessons from her thesis “Ecoanxiety in the Climate Generation: Is Action an Antidote?” She discussed her favorite CCH podcast episodes and her future plans. Isabel also reflected on her own lived experience of coping with her “unhinged anxiety” about climate change in her teenage years, and recognition of her relative privilege growing up in a picturesque forested town in New England in the US. Panu added insights about climate emotions and Thomas about environmental identity. Join us for a discussion of a young scholar’s early journey.
In Season 2, Episode 1, Panu and Thomas reflect on the core question of the Climate Change and Happiness podcast (what does it mean to be “happy” in an era of far reaching and often catastrophic environmental changes) – and particularly how it feels “right now” in Summer 2022 as so many places cope with heat, fires and drought. While young people have known of climate change their entire life, adults and elders can look back to when they first heard about the concept and to the innocence or “blessed unknowing” (using Panu’s evocative term) of that time. Practicing “active hope” Panu and Thomas discussed positive events including the passage of long overdue climate legislation in the US and Thomas’s inspiring dialog with the young creators of the ClimaTwins podcast. To capture his emotional tone this summer, Thomas shared the concept of “In Medias Res” a story-telling device that plunges the audience right into the middle of the action without a preamble (from Latin, literally, into the midst of things). This can also become a conscious coping technique: Being mindful of our state of being thrown into the midst of the world, and pulling back like a film director to remind ourselves of our history and where we want our personal story to go. Panu identified with this, and listeners may find this helpful as well.As always, there are links to some of the topics and ideas that Panu and Thomas discussed.
Season 1, Episode 17: Journeys and Rites of Passage
Episode 17 features some intimate sharing between Panu and Thomas about their travels and adventures as young men and how this influenced their environmental identities. They looked back at their efforts as “apprentices” and “artisans” in their work on eco- and climate emotions, referencing the Soulcentric Developmental Model of US Depth Psychologist Bill Plotkin. Thomas recognized some key developmental journeys in his life: “going off to the big city,” finding his ancestral and natural place roots in Ireland, traveling “west” in the US to places like Alaska and Grand Canyon. Panu similarly reminisced about his formative youthful hiking experiences in Finland and Iceland. They discussed the process of wilderness therapy and rites of passage, and recognized the “pride of living outside of the culture” and being more attuned to wildness in people who do that work the world-over (as captured in journey narratives like “Into the Wild”). Panu discussed the ideals of spiritual pilgrimage and “slow travel” and Thomas echoed the Henry David Thoreau maxim, “The swiftest traveler goes afoot.” Panu also noted that “the innocence of traveling is strongly challenged” in our era of “flight shame,” now that we need to be aware of the carbon footprint of our life journeys. This adds a unique challenge for young people. Panu mused: Can there be intergenerational justice about travel, and could young people have carbon credits to partake of the same youthful travels that their forebears took for granted? Or can cleaner travel systems like rail be expanded? We can reasonably think of the global climate emergency as a multi-generational planetary rite of passage with numerous opportunities for personal and collective quests, heroic acts, and dealing with the dark side of human nature and the shadow sides of our societies and industrial economies. Our listeners are invited to consider their own life journeys, young adult migrations, current quests, and what pace is most healthy for them at this point in their lives.
Links
Depth Psychologist and Rite of Passage Facilitator Bill Plotkin
Season 1, Episode 16: Varieties of Hope with Guest Elin Kelsey
In Episode 16, Thomas and Panu had an enlightening conversation with Elin Kelsey, environmental educator and author of Hope Matters. Panu and Elin spoke of their collaborations in Finland and the importance of taking time for reflection in the “culture of urgency” we have about climate change. Elin shared the concept of “solutions journalism” and noted that only 2-3% of news we hear about climate change discusses currently available solutions. The insight is that a scarcity of hope is also a perceptual issue—given the problem-oriented biases of academia, journalism and scientific reports, we do not get enough positive information to feed a healthy sense of hope about progress addressing the climate emergency. Panu, Elin and Thomas considered early examples of hope practices, the current solutions-focused influencing of Tik-Tok science educator Alaina Wood (aka The Garbage Queen), detours like “bright-siding” and toxic forms of hope and negativity, and the healthy place for moments of hopelessness in our flow of emotions as they can signal when an old path is done and new path needs to begin. Join us and update your ideas about hope!
Thomas recognizes Dick and Jeanne Roy, longtime Portland, Oregon environmental activists and their “Practice of Hope” workshops dating to 2005. See 2011 video
Season 1, Episode 15: Climate Music Pt. 2 Thomas's Playlist
Part 2 of our exploration of climate emotions through music: Thomas’s playlist “Shifting Basslines of the Cornucopians” — its title inspired by the Snapped Ankles number, and having a double meaning: Shifting bass lines in the music that inspires us and “Shifting Baselines” in how each generation perceives the natural world. As Thomas notes: “My themes are water and fire, being a hostage to Capitalism and Climate Change, finding refuge, transformation, and our all-togetherness during these challenging times. As Courtney John sings “Yes we are sailing in a different boat. But we are sailing in the same ocean.” In my mix, I am inspired by a variety of sources, the old time music of the Carter Family, the cathartic punk of The Thermals, the immersive ‘Become…’ series of Alaskan composer John Luther Adams, and the tribal techno of ‘Land Back.’ We are nostalgic (and solastalgic) about the beautiful ‘Flatlands’ in ‘The World We Knew’ while the ‘Sword of Damocles’ hangs over our heads. In this ‘Cruel Summer’ with ‘No Snow on the Mountain’ we hope that ‘Somewhere’ there is a place for us.”
Let us know about the music that inspires you to express your climate feelings.
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And, I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast for people around the world, around the globe, who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change. Including their feelings and responses to the climate crisis. And some episodes I've been looking forward to, Panu: Talking about music and playlists—and how we can create our own kind of climate list, a climate playlist of songs that evoke [our] climate change feelings. Emotions and just sensations. And we've been chatting a little bit about your playlist. And I'm going to talk about mine. Tell me a little bit about music and the role of music for you, Panu, in your life and how it links with climate change for you?
Pihkala: Yeah. We discussed it in the previous episode, if you listened to that already. Music is a big part of both of our lives and we both play some instruments. For me, I started with piano lessons when I was five years old. My older sister played the piano very well. And I was like “why do I have to learn this?” So it was really a lack of motivation. I learned the basics and then let it go. But then I got excited about popular music when I was about 13 and started to play some more. And then after confirmation school camps, which are [a] very popular thing in Finland still, you know, young people [were] playing together. So then I got excited and started to play the piano really a lot and moved on into improvising a bit later on. So that's the sort of main thing that I do within instruments. And it also helps greatly with emotional expression. But how about you, Thomas? Would you like to share something about your history and relationship with music?
Doherty: Yes, Panu. I'm music lover: a “musicophile”. And it's always music. Popular music in particular has always been really important to me and my identity. I've been lucky enough to live in key places for music like New York City in the late 80s. And Seattle in the early 90s. And Portland where I live now. And so, I think music, as I was saying, you know, earlier when we were talking about this … Music allows us to express ourselves. Express our feelings in a way that sometimes we don't have a word for. And also how we want to feel. You know, some of my playlist songs are upbeat, danceable music. And they might be very political and very radical, but they're also, there's a dancing energy in there.
So I'm influenced by post-punk music like Gang of Four. You know, that makes songs that both can be danceable and political. So, you know we're so embedded in this system. The dark ecology of a modern world. And the hyper objects of climate change [as we] talked about in past episodes with Timothy Morton's idea. So the music, I think, more than most things helps me to express that. And you'll see that come out in my playlist. Some of that sense of being embedded in a system. Sometimes that's beyond our control.
Pihkala: Yeah that's a very cool point, Thomas. And music is funny in the way that it can combine both the darkness and light. And, of course, many artists use this intentionally. And creating interesting mixes of both gravity and lightness. And it's great that music can spark so many things. Even the same song for different persons, or for the same person in different parts of life. So it's very rich. Would you like to share a bit about your playlist in general? What did you have in mind when doing this difficult job of selecting songs?
Doherty: Yeah I'll launch into the playlist here in a second. I want to recognize groups like Music Declares Emergency in the UK and I think it's myrskyvaroitus.
Pihkala: Myrskyvaroitus.
Doherty: Myrskyvaroitus. Storm Warning. The group in Finland. These are musicians working for the climate. So there are musicians that not only are expressing themselves. Doing expressions on our behalf. But also taking action in terms of climate. Even sustainability within the music business. And addressing the carbon impact of the music industry. So I want to shout out to them. And to KEXP which is a station. An international station based in Seattle near where I live that I've been a long time listener and supporter. And it's where I get a lot of my musical community. I wanna mention them. But we'll have links to some of these things in our show notes. I'm going to launch it. And then Panu just feel free to interrupt me as I'm going.
My playlist is called “Shifting Baselines of the Cornucopians.” It comes from the title of a song by Snapped Ankles. A British band that I'll talk about a little bit. But that title speaks to me. Shifting Baselines obviously, you know, is a double entendre there. It's bass music, but then shifting baselines is this idea of how our baselines about what the world is keep shifting. Each generation we lose perspective on what's a healthy world and we have to keep reminding ourselves what we're striving for as some parts of the world become more degraded. Or we lose things from the past like species and places. And cornucopians, you know, is this idea of the endless, you know, the endless ability of capitalism to keep creating things. And endless growth. This cornucopian idea in economics is something that is a bit of a religion as you know. And we have to be careful about that because it isn't necessarily true. We do live on a planet. So this Shifting Baselines of the Cornucopians is kind of a lot in the title.
Pihkala: That's a very interesting title. And a lot packed into that song. And quite heavy criticism of such a worldview where only money matters. Money or wealth is also present in the opening song, I noticed: "Mining for Gold'. And you have several themes in the playlist.
Doherty: Yeah. My opening song is a classic from the Cowboy Junkies “Mining for Gold” from their 1987 Trinity Sessions record. Which is a very important, beautiful one that I've listened to for many years. And the voice of Margot Timmons there. And this theme of the song. It's an old mining song. Hardrock mining song updated for the late 20th century. But it does speak to this idea of going to work. And this paradox of, you know, "I feel like I'm dying from mining for gold" and I think that's a very telling line just in our modern world. And it takes a new resonance during the era of climate change. This idea that we're trapped in systems that we're working through that are actually hurting us and even killing us. And that just becomes plainer and plainer as life goes on. And so there's an economic kind of trapped theme in my playlist. Certainly the "Shifting Baselines' ' song from Snapped Ankles as well even though that's an upbeat dance number. As they say "it's a great time to be alive if you only you've got some funds." So it speaks to inequality.
Of course, I've got the classic George Harrison song "I Me Mine." The “naked” [production] version of that song. And that I think is one of the greatest of his songs. And it speaks to that. I think we could play the "I Me Mine" song in the background as the COP 26 and 27 meetings occur. And it really puts a context to the world that we live in. And so there's definitely an economic sort of idea here that weaves through. I mean it's the economics and there's also fire and water. Those are the other themes in my playlist.
Pihkala: Yeah. Before going into fire and water, it's that sort of hell and high water theme. We'll hear about that very soon. But stopping for a second. These two dimensions both have an implicatedness. Being a climate hostage as you have often described it, Thomas. And then also this greed element—"I Me Mine"—which of course can be sort of trapped. That people very easily get swept into because many of the values and mores are such in our societies. It also brings a link to one of the Finnish songs in my playlist, this "Kynnet, Kynnet", "Nails, Nails." Which has a line that — "minä minä minä muiden ilmaston pilaa." Which is literally translated "me me me ruins other people's climate." So that was a funny point of connection between "I Me Mine" on your playlist and this Finnish song of mine. How about this fire and water? Sort of contradictory elements, but both very closely related to climate change, of course.
Doherty: Yeah. I mean the second song on my playlist is a cover of the 80s song "Cruel Summer." Another classic 80s song. A recent cover by the artist Joon. But, again, these are songs that capture the ominous nature of the modern world. "Cruel Summer" is somewhat of a lightweight kind of pop song that evokes other summery pop songs — of being away from your loved ones or being lonely in the city. But the "Cruel Summer" the way the tone is — "it was a cruel summer." You know, the last few summers have been quite cruel here where I live. They've been hot. We've had these heat disasters. And so it takes on this ominous tone. And then the era of Covid as well. This idea of being isolated and in the heat dome. I thought that "Cruel Summer" really captured that for me.
And then "The People Under the Stairs" a classic LA, Los Angeles [hip hop] duo. Their “The effects of climate change on densely populated areas…” is a great rap song that really gets into the — I think it actually does better than some research studies on extreme heat and how it affects people in neighborhoods and in communities. And, you know, speaking to the tension and the violence and the discomfort. So that song really captures some of the heat that we've been experiencing.
And then, again, an old song by the Carter Family, "When the World's on Fire." Which is an old gospel song. But, you know, it has that kind of biblical fire element to it. But of course the tune is the same tune that, you know, Woody Guthrie used for "This Land is Your Land." The classic folk tune to the song. And so it's got an eerie resonance when we have the evocation of "This Land is Your Land" and "When the Worlds on Fire." So I think, again it captures the multiple feelings that are coming up, you know, around this work.
Pihkala: Yeah. And it comes close to people like it has for you. The heat waves were quite severe in the region where you were living as you described. So, talking about the direct impacts, also. In addition to the indirect and ambient ones as you and Susan Clayton put it years ago. Talking about the impact of climate change. And of course because I have this history with religion and theology, it was interesting to see several songs that make quite an implicit connection with religion. For example, when listening to this Carter Family song, which was new for me. There were lots of new songs in your playlist for me. And that was very interesting. I couldn't help thinking about this sort of religious type of denial of the climate reality. Which is one aspect of the interconnection between religion and climate change. There's several others, like very ardent climate activism that we also see among some religious people. But also these various forms of disavowal. Would you like to speak some more of this, you know, religion connotations in some of these songs?
Doherty: Yeah. There's a strong religious theme in the Thermals’ "Here's Your Future." The Thermals and there's also a cathartic element in this playlist as well. And the Thermals is a classic punk band from my town of Portland, Oregon. And, well, I'll leave it to the listeners to find that song. But it really evokes biblical floods. Again that brings us into the water theme. But it really is kind of a lashing song about really throwing the future into our face, so to speak. And it really, I think, like some of your songs that you shared. You know, like the Smashing Pumpkins song you shared in your playlist. You know, it is very cathartic. Gets some of our anger and some of our feelings out.
And then we have the water theme that is through this in terms of the ocean. I mean there's this “Strange Boat” song by the Waterboys. Another classic song. It just evokes this journey that we're all on in the modern world. It's like being in a strange boat, in a strange sea. Just a beautiful kind of reflective song. And Courtney John, kind of a roots reggae song. "Yes we are living in different boats but we're on the same ocean." From his Ecosystem album. So it speaks to just being all together. We're all together on the same ocean here.
Pihkala: Yeah. There's several songs in your playlist which very strongly speak about the theme of journey. And also that we are in this together. But also, speaking about strange times. So in a way I thought that this "Strange Boat" song captures many of the elements. But I think, also from our contemporary reality. That's of course part of the anxiety, literally speaking, because there's so much uncertainty. And not all climate anxiety is strong anxiety. There's also just the uncertainty and thinking about what we should do and where we should try to sail with this company that we have.
Doherty: Yeah, exactly. And there's the recent song from the group James, "Wherever It Takes Us." You know, and I know some of the members of that group were affected by Covid. And by fires and things. So the "Wherever It Takes Us" song is kind of a dizzying kind of anthemic song. But it also evokes someone really fleeing from a disaster and just finding some refuge in a car. Maybe from a fire. Or from smoke. And then this idea "We're all in wherever it takes us. We're all in it and it breaks and it shapes us. We're all in wherever it takes us." So it's like we're all in this together. And we're all in this journey. The word of the day on my dictionary app was accelerando. An Italian word for something that's speeding up. So there's an accelerando sort of note to the music, but also to our world. And we're all on this journey that's speeding up.
Pihkala: Yeah. That's very interesting. And the song is very poignant. I was quite struck by this song. It's disturbing and it's powerful and very interesting. There's a lot to take in. And this accelerando of course links with the work of some anthropologists who have spoken about Age of Acceleration. Describing the 20th century and the speed. Of course this theme of trying to ride a car somewhere, which sort of can be escaping, but it can also be a need to survive amidst very strange circumstances. So there's lots of symbolic elements here.
Doherty: Yeah. And just, you know, The Weather Station. Tamara Lindeman shows up in both of our lists. This Canadian artist who goes by Weather Station. I had a chance to see her and her band play in Portland nearby at Mississippi Studios here just the other week. She's, you know, gotten some press for her sophisticated take on climate consciousness. And understanding of some of the feelings. At least just naming this. And, you know, again this news intake. Her lyric "thinking I should get all this dying off my mind. I should really know better than to read the headlines. Does it matter if I see it? No really can I not just cover my eyes?" That speaks to this kind of idea of tuning in, tuning out. You know, the “Sword of Damocles” – a classic song from Lou Reed’s "Magic and Loss." Which is a whole work. It's about illness, cancer and AIDs. And various themes. Medical themes. What a beautiful album. But the Sword of Damocles, this idea, this thing is hanging over our heads. And just speaking to someone who's having [an illness], you know, in a hospital bed. And thinking about their end of life, you know. So it evokes some feelings I think people have about the state of the world.
Pihkala: Yeah. The song "The Atlantic" is very striking also. And links with the stuff that's going on in the world, currently when we are recording this. There's the war in Ukraine and the latest very gloomy IPCC report has come out. And many of my colleagues in the University are also having difficulty just concentrating on their work. And this topic of limiting your media diet. That you, Thomas, have been speaking about for a long time. And we've also discussed it in the podcast. So that's been very important, also in relation to contemporary times. I did notice that you have this element of transformation also in some of these songs. And some hints towards sort of eco-psychological notions. Would you like to dwell a bit on that?
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, that's where this playlist goes. I mean there's this "No Snow on the Mountain." This idea from the band Nada Surf. Just the reality of no snow on the mountain. This kind of ironic use of the Frank Sinatra song “The World We Knew." ["Over and over I keep thinking over the world we knew."] This old kind of loungey Frank Sinatra song, but it really speaks to the world that we knew. The world that we knew, it's going away. It's gone. It's lost. It's slipping from our fingers. But solace, resistance, “Land Back.” This native song. This very strident dance techno-native song, “Land Back.” So it speaks to really reclaiming the land. Reclaiming our place, you know. And "Raconte-moi une histoire" You know, the M83 song. The beautiful song of the young girl's voice with the frog. You know, it really sort of opens us up to global consciousness. And the beauty of global consciousness. And the connecting that we have. So there is definitely transformation in here. Then there's this sort of deeper water, you know, solace theme that comes up as well.
Pihkala: Yeah. And I know that you are very fond of John Luther Adams. The composer who makes these long nature-themed compositions, like this “Become River”, also at the latter part of the playlist. And I also thought about including M83's "Outro" in my playlist, but opted [to] not. But that sort of outro you have here "Somewhere" from West Side Story. So, is that a glimmer of hope or a manifestation of hope at the end of the playlist?
Doherty: Yes. Yeah, I mean there's a song "Flatlands" by the artist Mark Lanegan, who is one of my favorite all time artists and we just lost him. He just died this past week. And so of his many beautiful songs, "Flatlands" is a beautiful song. A cover song. But it kind of evokes beautiful, calm places. Flatlands. Farms. Trees. I think it's what we all yearn for. It's just a place to be on the planet that's safe and nurturing. Some place that we can be. And so I want to really have that image. And then again, the "Troubled Waters" song from Michael Hurley. The classic American kind of out-there folk music.
And then we have this "Troubled Waters" in the Flatlands. You know, flatlands are usually flooded, obviously. And then John Luther Adams. It's not an exaggeration to say it was kind of life changing to come to John Luther Adams' music. And his beautiful orchestral works "Become River", "Become Ocean," and "Become Desert." And I think "Become River" is, you know, consciously climate change-related. But it really embodies being a river from the earliest ice and snow. Through the huge, wide Ganges Delta. The music embodies being a river. And it does have that ominous rising waters at the end that speaks to both, you know, ocean [and sea level] rise. And yes, having recently seen the new version of West Side Story. And sort of being aware of this somewhere. There's this lighter, reprise again. This somewhere, a place for us. So I do believe there is a place for us. You know, there is a place for us somewhere. And we're going to find it, and we're all working toward that together on this strange boat, you know, that we're on right now. So that's it. Yeah. I think that covers my list.
Pihkala: Yeah. That's a beautiful way to wrap it up. And, of course, water is sometimes used as a metaphor for both music and emotion. So I think it's very fitting. And dear listener, you can find our playlists on Spotify. You know the ambiguities related to Spotify as [a] platform. We are trying to live with this ambivalence. And please do share your playlists with us, also. Or your favorite songs which speak to you about living amidst the climate crisis. This is [the] Climate Change and Happiness podcast. We are interested in all things that are going on in these times.
Doherty: Yes, climatechangeandhappiness.com is where we live. And keep making music and keep listening to music. And take care.
Pihkala: Take care everyone.
Season 1, Episode 14: Climate Music Pt. 1: Panu’s Playlist
Jul 08, 2022
Season 1, Episode 14: Climate Music Pt. 1 Panu's Music
It has been said: “Where words leave off, music begins.” The climate emergency challenges us to find words for so many feelings: Loneliness and connection, pain and loss, endurance, dedication, creativity and joy. In this two-episode series, Panu and Thomas share personal music playlists based on a simple assignment: “Music and climate emotions.” Thomas and Panu discuss the important role music plays in their coping and wellbeing, and examples of climate change-focused musical endeavors. Panu begins with a selection of 15 tracks from a variety of artists. He notes “this playlist is an emotional journey. The atmospheres … are more important than the lyrics, but some tracks have also been selected because of their lyrics. The playlist does follow roughly a process of crisis. There are fluctuations of sorrow and anger, but also of hope and beauty—as in our lives amidst the ecological crisis.” Music is a universal emotional language. Listen along and let us know about the music that inspires you to express your climate feelings.
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well hello. I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I'm Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. A show for people around the globe who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change. Particularly their emotional responses and their feelings. And today this is a special episode. I have looked forward to. Panu and I are both musicophiles, music lovers of various genres. And today we're working on some episodes that capture some music that we love that also channels some of our feelings and impressions about global climate change. And so we're going to get into this a little bit. Panu, I know we've chatted at length about music and what it means to us. But tell me some thoughts you have about this climate change and music idea.
Pihkala: Yeah. Greetings everyone. And very glad to be talking about music. That's a very important aspect of life for me. And in many ways: the written stuff, the melodies... They are also related to the daily flow of life. But in practice, listening to various kinds of music during the day is something I do. I also play a couple of instruments. Not in any professional manner, but that's also great for emotional release, actually. That wasn't the original reason I had when I started playing them, but later on I found that that's very important also in that regard. But how about you, Thomas? What's the role of music in your life?
Doherty: Ah, similar to yourself, Panu. I have just always been—music has always been a close companion to me. You know, when I talk to people about emotional expression and using a feelings list. You know, describing how you're feeling and also how you might want to feel and the feelings you might want to cultivate, I think music is like that for me. It reflects back to me how I am feeling. Like the poetry and the tones and the rhythm and the melody can express things that I can't personally express. Puts into words and sounds what I'm feeling. But also like things that I reach towards. Things that boost me. And ways of being that I want to inhabit in my life. So music is both of those things for me. And it's just a part of my life. Yeah.
And only recently in the last several years, I've taken up drumming. So I do some drumming on a vintage drum kit that's a little older than I am. And so it's fun. That was a rebirth of music in a whole other way for me: to be more of a musician myself. And I want to name - we've got a lot of things going on outside in the world: The day that we're recording we have violence in the Ukraine. And we have IPCC reports coming out. Supreme Court deliberations on momentous laws. So there's a lot going on in the world. And I think this music helps us to … channel our various impressions and things like that. Anything particular before we get started? Some orientation for our listeners about music in Finland? Or about this playlist that you're going to describe? Your playlist: how did that come together?
Pihkala: Yes. We came up with the idea of each of us doing a playlist about the theme of the podcast. And mine is focused on climate emotions. Different kinds of them. And since I am coming from Finland and we have a lively music scene in Finland—actually so lively that we've been able to export some of our musicians to the states, for example, at least on temporary loans—I wanted to include, also, some Finnish songs into my playlist. I'm fully aware that not too many people internationally have learned the Finnish language, but there's the melody and the writing. There's also a plan for me to write a bit about this playlist and I'll explain something about the lyrics and the selection as we will also be doing live now.
Doherty: Yeah. And I want to just shout out. There's obviously music as an expressive art. But we know there's musicians that are active in climate work and, of our listeners, there're musicians active in all kinds of things. I know there’s the Music Declares Emergency group in the UK that I've followed. That is really trying to work on sustainability in the music business. And I know there's the Storm Warning group in Finland that you've described. The musicians working for the climate. So I just want to shout out to those folks. And there's stations like KEXP in Seattle here near where I live in the United States that are very active in supporting the community and supporting people as we go through our challenges in the modern world. So there's a lot of levels to this. But we're really on the expressive side. And not the obvious expressive side. None of these are necessarily obviously about climate change directly, but they evoke certain things and that's the angle here. So yeah. Panu, why don't you launch into talking about your climate emotions playlist. And we'll see what it sounds and looks like.
Pihkala: Definitely, Thomas. And for now we are using Spotify as a platform. We'll also share these playlists so that you can listen to them. And life has these strong ambiguities and ambivalences, which are sort of standard also in relation to the climate crisis. And also in relation to musical platforms such as Spotify. There's the controversy around different ethical issues and we're aware of that [e.g., podcasts spreading disinformation, artists leaving in protest]. But for now we are sort of accepting the ambivalence even though that's partly painful. And using Spotify as a platform.
My playlist has 15 songs. There's a certain dramatic arc. Or actually a couple of them. It's possible to listen to just all of them but also from the beginning until song 11 or 12. That would be a sort of English arc. And then there's a couple of Finnish songs. And the last one, a long song by Mark Kozelek and Jimmy LeValle, ”Somehow the Wonder of Life Prevails”, is a sort of summary of many things in this playlist actually. So that's a sort of encore. An extra. A summary at the end.
But the playlist also roughly follows a process of an emotional journey. Or a process of a crisis. Which, after-all, encountering the climate crisis is also: a kind of personal, psychological, social crisis. I'm not just using any, you know, black and white version of Elizabeth Kübler Ross's “Stages of grief” or anything like that. But there is a certain sequence going on from shock, and then variations of anger and sadness, before moving on with the process model towards light and also towards an increased ability to feel joy again. So it's not just gloomy songs, but there's several songs that speak to either climate sadness or climate anger.
Doherty: Then I know in Finland they have a saying, like in the US we say play "Free Bird" or play "Stairway to Heaven," but they say “Soittakaa ‘Paranoid.’” So are you going to have Paranoid, Black Sabbath's song “Paranoid” on your playlist?
Pihkala: That's well pronounced, Thomas. You're proceeding well with your Finnish lessons. And it is indeed true that in almost every live gig in Finland somebody shouts "Soittakaa Paranoid." Usually the bands don't do it. But there's a history here. Thomas knows that I have one Black Sabbath song in my playlist. And the sort of multitude of heavy metal, hard rock bands coming out of Finland is of course something that lots of folks know internationally. Many of these Finnish hard rock bands have a following in Japan, for example. I didn't go very heavily into that. I did have a phase in my teenage years when I listened to a lot of heavy rock and that sort of thing.
But I'm actually starting with a song by Moby called "Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad." Which refers to this phenomena which has been quite common in history when people start to feel some kind of climate anxiety. That they are thinking "why do I actually feel so bad?" And it's not obvious often, especially if there's not a public discussion or recognition of this kind of discourses of emotional distress and motivation. One has to remember that climate anxiety is also about motivation to do something about the threats. So, “Why does my heart feel so bad” and the Reprise version (2021). Moby published a sort of album full of revised versions of many [his] key songs. And this one, also, has a quite striking music video actually. We'll put the link to the podcast website, also. Which has graphic depictions of ecological grief. Especially related to more than human animals. Moby is a famous animal rights and vegan activist, also. And those elements also show on the video.
But that is followed by "Age of Reason" by Black Sabbath. A song which ends with a very fine electric guitar solo. Which is something that has helped me with many dark emotions. Perhaps that has links with my teenage years and the hard rock & heavy history. But the title of the song "Age of Reason" sort of plays with the "why does my heart feel so bad" element. So instead of an age of emotions we get an age of “reason”. And the lyrics of the song actually have points related to global crises. For example, if you listen to this part of the song [see Panu’s blog post for details] you'll notice that.
Doherty: Yeah I know the lyrics - "politics, religion, love and money too. It's what the world was built for, but not for me and you." So yes. It's a classic social commentary coming out of Black Sabbath. I appreciate that. And then I noticed we both have The Weather Station. The Weather Station is the one artist that's made it to both of our lists.
Pihkala: Yeah. Yeah that's a peculiar thing. And it ties in with this part in Black Sabbath's "Age of Reason" where there is "mass destruction hides the truth." This line. And then the Weather Station's name of the album is “Ignorance.” And that's of course a very interesting album related to climate emotions and anxiety. And Tamara Lindeman, the main artist behind The Weather Station, has been reading environmental psychologist Renée Lertzman's work. And it's interesting to have very high quality, popular music which is built also on understanding about climate psychology. And many of the lyrics are quite striking. I picked into my playlist a song called "Robber." Which is quite something. Also its music video. And one of the main themes of the song, at least for me, is the implicatedness which we have talked about in the podcast also. That we are all implicated whether we want or not. And then who's the robber and what are the means. [These are] Some of the questions that are being asked in the lyrics.
Doherty: Yeah. That's beautiful. I got a chance to see Tamara and her band play here in Portland at Mississippi Studios just near my house just a week or so ago. So that's great that you have her there. On your playlist. Yeah. Go on Panu. This is really fun.
Pihkala: Yeah. After the "Robber" the fourth song is a sort of classic rage and frustration song for many people from my generation: Smashing Pumpkins' "Bullet with Butterfly Wings." Which both stylistically and lyrically describes the frustration, you know, this famous line "despite all my rage I'm still just a rat in a cage." That speaks to many kinds of frustration. But for me, the song has always evoked images of frustration because of the social and political situation in the world, including ecological politics. And now I picked it here to depict frustration and anger and rage. Also feelings of helplessness because of the global ecological and climate crisis.
Doherty: So "despite all my rage I'm still just a rat in a cage" right? That's the lyric there. Despite all my rage I'm still a rat in a cage. And that's I think important. I don't know there's something about being a teen or a young person and seeing someone just name out these feelings. Something that we can grasp onto. So I appreciate that. And I think our listeners are appreciating it as well. Yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah. It's also linked to this wide topic of climate activism these days. And we know that many young people are very active in those movements. And that potential in teenage, being able to feel emotionally that moral outrage because of injustices. So that can be sometimes aggressive and even dangerous, but it's also very valuable in the world to be able to feel that moral outrage. But then my playlist goes more into the grief and sorrow territory. Although moral outrage is surfacing a couple of times. There's a very deep grief song by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds called "Sun Forest." Nick Cave actually lost his teenaged son and has done lots of songs which partly deal with that and other subjects of grief and sorrow. From this sort of dark waters, the playlist starts to move a bit more towards the light. The grief process goes on.
There's a young Finnish artist called Suad. And her song "The Burn" which is in English. [An] interesting song and a great album. After that there's a Depeche Mode cover by Tori Amos. One of my old favorites. So "Enjoy the Silence." Which is, of course, quite [a] classic song in pop music. For me it speaks of a kind of existential intensity. And that's one of the reasons why I included it here. "All I ever wanted, All I ever needed, is here in my arms." A very existential framing for me. And for me, personally, connected to, for example, spending time with the kids. Even amidst these eras of the ecological crisis.
Doherty: Yeah. Go on.
Pihkala: Then there's a very special song by the Icelandic post rock band Sigur Rós called Njósnavélin. Sorry for the Icelanders or Sigur Rós for the pronunciation. They sometimes use their own language. Not just Icelandic but [an] even more original language. And that's a very important song personally for me. And it manages to include both lightness and gravity. And it has this element of what the Finnish word suloisenhaikeus is about. So that's one of these peculiar emotion words that we are always interested about in this podcast. So, haikeus is that feeling that you are happy and gratitude-filled about something but you also realize that it's fleeting and passing. So it's related to realized finitude. And suloinen means sweet. So it's sort of sweet and sad at the same time, this suloisenhaikeus. And that's also an existential feeling amidst these climate times I think. And for me the song Njósnavélin captures that. And if you listen to the whole album that's quite a ride through various kinds of emotions. And even in those times almost fifteen years ago, they did a music video of the opening song which is very much about eco-anxiety or nuclear anxiety or both of them. Depending on how you interpret the video. But that was also interesting. But that was the first song of the album. Not the Njósnavélin which I've included here.
Doherty: Yeah. And then you have this song by the artist. I'm not sure how they pronounce their name. snny. This young artist. “A Better World”. And there's a classic artist embedded in that song. I found that very interesting.
Pihkala: Yeah. It includes content from “The Times They Are A-Changin’.” The classic song by [Bob] Dylan. And this is a nod towards rap and hip hop, which I very much often appreciate. Of course there's many kinds of that. But I don't listen to it very extensively in my personal life. But the mood of this song is related to me for the experience that the world is changing in many ways, but there's also an effort to adapt to that change. And also pursue goals which are deemed valuable. So those are some of the meanings that that song has for me.
Doherty: As always, we have to remember that whatever age we are, there are people that are younger than us coming up. And they have other takes on the world. And they're just starting on their life journey. And so they're just maybe just for the first time discovering the music of Bob Dylan or some of these classic songs that we've kept close to us for our lives. So we have to make peace for their new reality as well. So I appreciate that.
Pihkala: Yeah. I think that's right on. And in Finland, many rap and hip hop artists have made very interesting songs about the socio ecological crisis, also. I have especially one of those at the later part of the playlist. It's by Pyhimys, one of the most eminent rap artists in Finland. Called “Kynnet, Kynnet” [“Nails, nails”]. Which is a song about people losing their grip amidst the rapid changes in the contemporary world. Climate change is also mentioned in that song. And then by a young Finnish artist [Litku Klemetti], a sort of more wanderlust type of song which also has a lyrical point about climate change in the Finnish lyrics. But before those, there's two songs more about joy and empowerment. First one by a Canadian artist, Sandro Perri, with his Glissandro project, “Bolan Muppets”. That's quite indie stuff but I've liked it very much during the last ten years. I bought the album from a local store in Toronto once. And then there's perhaps surprisingly Katy Perry's “Roar.” We also need a sense of humor in these complex times. And I like the sort of conscious self-irony in the song and its music video. It has this, you know, “Eye of the Tiger” element. This determination that don't let other people grind you down. And finding your voice. But there's also this very humorous element in it.
Doherty: Yeah. And then this final song, the Mark Kozelek and Jimmy LaValle one. That's a beautiful song: “Somehow the Wonder of Life Prevails.”
Pihkala: Yeah, that's quite a title for a song. And the song has many verses about the life experiences of the lyrical author. And then amidst all the trouble there's still that attitude that somehow the wonder of life always prevails. And I guess that would be a sort of summary of many things in this playlist.
Doherty: It's really beautiful. We're going to share these playlists. There was one song that I might steal from your playlist. You didn't get a chance to mention Godspeed You Black Emperor’s “First of the Last Glaciers.” Kind of a … as anyone [who] knows Godspeed's music it is a very stirring…architectural, instrumental, post-rock kind of composition. But to me, I kind of just bow my head and listen because it gets to some of the wordless feelings that we have about this issue. About climate change and a lot of the things that are besetting us.
Pihkala: Yeah thanks for sharing that, Thomas. Their music has been very important for me, yeah.
Doherty: Well I think we have to wrap up or now, but this is the start of another trend for us of bringing in the arts and music. And I encourage people to make their own climate playlists. I know they already do. I know you already do out there. But really expanding your horizons into what constitutes music about and for climate change, and climate change emotional expression.
Pihkala: Yeah. And please do share with us some of your views either about songs that are very meaningful for you or even if you do construct playlists you'll find our contact info on the podcast website. So we'd love to hear from you.
Doherty: Indeed. Climatechangeandhappiness.com. Take care of yourselves folks.
Pihkala: Take care everyone.
Season 1, Episode 13: COVID Feelings – Looking Back at 2021
Jun 24, 2022
Season 1, Episode 13 | COVID Feelings – Looking Back at 2021
In this new episode, Thomas and Panu look back to a discussion they had in October 2021 about coping with the COVID-19 pandemic and how this compares with coping with climate change. As you listen, reflect on your own experiences of COVID-19 pandemic in the midst of the larger climate crisis. Back in 2021, it was clear these overlapping problems had pushed us to extend our capacity to be with our feelings amidst extreme hardship and challenge — now Panu and Thomas have been touched by COVID personally. In hindsight, Panu’s COVID and climate research and Thomas’s coping strategies ring true. Their wide-ranging 2021 dialog touched on wise use of media and avoiding “cyberchondria,” calibrating our anxiety alarm systems, restoring ourselves in the face of “macro worries,” and the importance of gratitude and embodying “love in action.” A key take away, then as now: Some suppression of emotions is quite useful and healthy in the midst of a crisis. The challenge is to be conscious of this process, and to come back to our emotional expression when we have the opportunity —for this is where we learn and grow.
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
2022 Prologue
Thomas Doherty: Well, hi folks. This is Thomas. And I am sitting here speaking with Panu. It’s June 2022. And Panu and I have been listening to an episode that we recorded in October of 2021 on COVID. The COVID-19 pandemic — and our thoughts about it as it was developing at that time. Since then, many things have happened in the world with the pandemic. As we all know! And with other areas that we’ve been talking about, like climate change. Panu and his family have actually had COVID in that intervening time. My family and I also had COVID just actually a few weeks ago. Finally caught up with us here in Portland, Oregon. And I’m healthy but I’m still feeling a little bit of the after effects.
So we thought we would revisit this episode now, in hindsight. And see how it feels to listen to it. And you all will shortly be able to listen to the episode yourself. But Panu, what was it like to listen back to what we were thinking about in October of 2021?
Panu Pihkala: Yes. Hello, all listeners. So much is going on in these times that it actually felt quite long ago. Even though it’s last October. And we recorded many episodes during that Autumn. And then because of our two week scheduling of episodes, we are only now getting at some of the last ones we did. And on one hand we also wanted to wait and see where this Covid-19 pandemic was going. And then of course we ended up having it ourselves as Thomas mentioned. My family had it the second time. And now I also personally got it. I was four days completely out of business. But because of vaccinations, nothing too serious. But it took quite a long time to recover.
And in Finland right at the time that the prevalent wave of Covid-19 had started to go down, then came the war in Ukraine. So that timing was very bad in that sense, also. That people were struck by another global stressor or macro-worry. Which came very close. So when I was listening to the episode where we discuss many emotional disturbances rising from global stressors. Of course the war in Ukraine this spring came very clearly into my mind. And that reminded me forcefully of the overlapping crises that we are living through. So it was very interesting to return to this episode from 9 months ago.
Doherty: Yeah. I agree. It felt like a long time ago. And I think listeners probably have the same sense. So many things have happened. And the pandemic is still ongoing in some ways. In a more chronic way. So I think this is a challenge. I think it’s a challenge. [Another] colleague that I listened to the episode remarked that he had a hard time separating climate change and COVID because the two issues seem to be so similar. Not necessarily causally. Well, he actually believed they are causally related because deforestation drives partly climate change. And deforestation drove partly COVID in the sense of really these new viruses [are] coming out of, you know, places like these wet markets that are mixing different species and animals. And viruses that would have lived deep in the forest or the woods are now being exposed to humans in this cross pollinating.
So, he saw a lot of overlap between both the basic system of our planet and also the responses of people to the problem. The denial. The science — denigrating science. The reactionary nature. The individualist responses where people didn't want to get vaccinated and all this other stuff. So, as we talked about in the episode I think, COVID is sort of a climate change-like phenomenon that was just accelerated. We saw a lot of these different factors. So it is really a learning. It’s a hard learning experience. It’s not necessarily a positive learning experience about the world. Because it exposed so much — so many problems.
Pihkala: Yeah. Totally agree with you on that. And the terrible intersectional injustices, also. Both globally and regionally. And in the episode we quite a lot discuss the dynamics of eco-anxiety or climate anxiety as compared with Coronavirus anxiety. Or whatever we want to call it. And this came to my mind when listening to [your] colleagues' thoughts about the episode. And I mentioned that I wrote introductions to two books which discuss the COVID-19 crisis and the climate crisis. And now they are finally also starting to be published. That sometimes frustrating slowness of academic publishing. But now in late August and in November these two books should be out. And we’ll share info about that on our podcast website.
One thing which is different is that because at least a strong wave of COVID-19 has now passed there’s a lot of people, including myself I have to say, who would just like to forget about COVID-19. At least for a long while. And this psychological dynamic, which on the one hand is pretty universal. There were some people writing about this at the onset of the COVID-19 crisis. But now it’s live. This sort of very human desire to, you know, let’s do something else for a while.
Doherty: Yeah. Which is human. And so we want to honor that. When we get through a crisis we want to put it aside. We want to - we get fatigued. And we want to set it aside. And so I think we want things to disappear. So the focus with Covid was really people were over immersed. We talked in the episode this idea of cyberchondria. Where people are doing a lot of online research about medical and health issues. And so there was such a strong anxiety reaction from many people with COVID. Particularly in the early stages of the pandemic when it was so mortally dangerous. Now there’s a hope to set aside and put it away. So it is really a developmental process. Because it isn’t going away. It’s going to be a chronic thing in our societies.
But in our story, we did come back to the basic coping of being aware of our news intake. Being in our home place. Finding the news in our own community, around our family and things like that. And also just recognizing all the hard work that we all have done with COVID. All the precautions. All the thinking. All the care, you know, for others. You know, we're surviving. Many of us are surviving. And we’re working hard. And, again, all the healthcare workers that have been working for years now in the COVID area. All the researchers. So, it’s so easy just to focus on the downside and not give ourselves, you know, the support and the compliment and the gratitude and the gratefulness of all the people. Even today that are still working. And I have many clients that are medical professionals. You know, that are still working and still in the emergency room. Still dealing with people. Even trying to find some compassion for folks that really couldn't get with the program in the sense of trying to support a societal-wide science-based empirical approach to dealing with this pandemic. So, we do need to sort of recharge our batteries. And have gratitude. And be able to focus on what’s positive in our lives.
Pihkala: Yeah. Totally agree with that. And it would be good if we would have resources and motivation and energy to organize also some festivals of gratitude for all the work that various people have done in this regard. And it would be great to have a sort of people’s fest around, you know, surviving even though there was lots of trouble. And there may be waves again and so on. But that’s very human. The need for gratitude and remembering goodness. And this is something that we end up discussing at the latest part of the episode that you will soon hear.
Doherty: Yeah. So, relistening to this episode is kind of a ritual. It’s a way to go back in time and to think about things. And, so, I invite the listeners to really use it as a reflective exercise for yourself to think about how your life has changed. And where you are now. And, you know, honor some of your losses. I would say here in Portland soon — I was approached by the Chief Resilience Officer for the City of Portland. And the disaster response team here in the city is having what they call “Heat Week.” And they’re having some events to commemorate the Heat Dome [deadly heat disaster] that happened one year ago. The major heat wave. And I’m going to be speaking on a panel around coping.
But, I really think it’s such a great idea for them to have this memorial to this heat event. Partly for the first responders to really recognize all the work that they did. And also to keep the public aware that these things happen. It’s an exercise. It’s a ritual that I rarely see coming from a government. I know [in] our last episode we talked about the [eco-anxiety] work in Finland. Which is really, you know, proactive. But, so yes. There is something about cycling back and having these rituals to think about our lives and think about what we’ve learned. And that we’re still here. And we’re still going forward. So I invite people to listen and let us know what you think about us bringing back older episodes. This is climatechangeandhappiness.com. And thank you very much. Enjoy the episode. And we’ll keep bringing them to you.
October 2021 Episode
Doherty: Hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Pihkala: And I'm Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. The show for people around the globe who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change, particularly their emotions and their feelings about this. And we are speaking my morning and Panu's evening here on October 1, 2021. And Panu, I know, I'd like to get at some of the talks and things that you were doing this past week, we've got a lot of interesting things on our plates.
But maybe I'll just jump in to some of the things you're up to. You've done some talks, but I know you've been writing about Coronavirus and eco-anxiety and getting into the emotions about these two issues and how they're similar and different. I know I have to be dragged into talking about [Coronavirus] just because my first emotions are reluctance and frustration and fatigue. But that's the way it goes with these emotions about these issues. It's only after I get into it that I start getting more interested and inspired and curious and grateful and all this sort of stuff.
But tell me Panu what, you know. We'll just jump in, what's one of the pieces of this [Coronavirus] and eco- anxiety work you've been up to?
Pihkala: Yeah, I think many people might react to climate emotions or eco-emotions, the way that you just described, you know, that sense of reluctance. You know, it's so difficult the whole business of the climate crisis. That, do I really have to think about it or think about the feelings related to that? Probably that's not the major issue for our listeners, because you have sort of chosen to listen to this, but.
Doherty: Yeah, you've joined us welcome. Yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah. Warmly welcome. We're very glad that you are there. But yeah, I've been doing introductions to two books, which deal with eco-anxiety, and so-called “Coronavirus Anxiety.” Now, this latter one also has many names. Even the same applies, of course, to eco-anxiety, also. There's COVID-19 Fear. And there's COVID Stress Syndrome, a framework developed by some other researchers. But all of these refer to the challenging emotions related to COVID-19. And I know that both I and Thomas have had our share of this and many people more, each one in her own way.
What I'm doing in these introductions, [which are] sort of academic short articles, is that I'm exploring similarities, and then some differences. And when the COVID-19 pandemic started, I think a very sort of gut reaction of a lot of people was to try to apply what they know, and what they can do, to somehow encounter the new situation. And then there's me as an eco-anxiety researcher, trying to apply that in some constructive way to the situation. And that's one of the beginnings of this comparison. I sort of noticed there's [a] different timespan, of course, in relation to the COVID-19 threat, but then there's interesting similarities in the reactions. They are just more condensed in time. You know, when there's a growing sense of threat, but not certainty yet, people are like, hmm, there's something happening in China. And yeah, let's hope that it doesn't spread here. And some others are, you know, taking these signals more seriously, and then others try to ignore them. You know, Thomas, this sort of reminds me of many reactions to ecological crisis and climate crisis when it wasn't so widely known.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, one thing I found, I was able to read Panu's chapter on this. And I really appreciated you comparing some of the timelines of, of, you know, how people cope with COVID and nations cope with COVID and how we have, you know, coped with climate change. And again, that, you know, we've been dealing with people in power have known about climate issues for, you know, since you and I have been alive. You know, and longer still really since the 1950s-60s. You know, people were clued into this, you know, so-called experts, you know. Expert advisors to leaders were. But yeah, you know, again, I think, keeping it real in terms of our own experience, you know. Yes, there's so much for me bound up in COVID. And, you know, it was sort of a, I think there's a lot of suppression of emotions that happen during a disaster, right. So we have to recognize that during an emergency or disaster, we have to take action, and so we just suppress some emotions.
And, you know, I think some vocabulary is helpful here. You know, there's a difference between suppression and repression. You know, suppression is when I know, I'm feeling something, but I have to compartmentalize it in service of taking action. And so, you know, first responders have to suppress, you know, their fear, disgust, or various feelings they have, as they're going into a disaster zone and helping people. And, you know, repression is when we forget that we're suppressing, or we don't ever acknowledge in the first place, you know. And so I think, for me, there's just a lot of suppressed emotions, you know, fear about all the different things. You know, unpacking that unpacking the fear of while our work changes and fear for our families and this disruption to our lives.
And, you know, my father died, late February of 2020, just on the cusp of the major COVID, you know, shutdowns here in the US. And it was actually for a while, unclear whether he had died of COVID. But we don't believe that he did. But, you know, we had to cancel his funeral and, you know, cancel the memorial that we planned for him. And, you know, so, you know, everyone has, or many people have really these personal stories. So it's easy to speculate, you know, globally that I think, you know, that our listeners are all having personal things, you know. And that's, I think, where that natural kind of reluctance and suppression is. So, how do you think about working with that? You know, how do we work with that? Or how do I move in that and move through that?
Pihkala: Yeah, that's a very good question. And there's research emerging, also about bereavement related to COVID-19, and how grief practices have been disrupted by lockdown measures and so on. And that's another interesting branch of research. And, of course, theories of grief and sadness are so much related to climate emotions. But I do agree, Thomas, that there's been lots of suppression, and many times it has been needed. And then there's the challenge that when, finally, things start to open up, and there's great feelings of relief. For example, just this week in Finland, there's been great joy because many of the lockdown measures have been made easier now the situation has got better. So, but that doesn't remove all the need to face some of the emotional toll that has been gathered.
Of course, one might also speak about accumulation of stress. And that's something that I very personally felt after the first COVID-19 springtime. I did totally fine for two or three months, but after that, I realized that hey, there's a lot of stress gathering. Even though nobody in the near family was ill, there was some concern about some people very, very near me, and that, of course, caused stress based on compassion and so on. But, for example, in summer 2020, I had to use much more embodied coping methods or practices than I usually have to do. And this is linked with a very interesting theme related to what we are talking about with is the media stuff. We have touched upon this several times in our conversations, but that became very evident in relation to COVID-19. The need to limit one's media exposure because one can sort of feel the stress levels rising when reading about COVID-19 information, not to mention imagery.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. And the media piece is really this is a good one because I've talked to a few people lately. Some of the people I'm working with and, you know, two people said almost the same thing about well, when I surface the idea of taking a break from the media and pulling back as both of these people are really I think having issues with excessive compulsive media intake which is contributing to all their different challenges. You know, anxieties and complications and fatigues. But, you know, they said, I don't want to bury my head in the sand, you know, I don't want to not know. And so that's something that we have to work at.
And, you know, at the early stages of COVID, it was really fascinating and really interesting. And it was curious to see, you know, and we did want to track things. I think there's a healthy piece there. But, you know, very quickly, it can go over much. Even the most healthy thing if we overdo it. Like, it's sort of like, exercise, you know, an exercise related injury. Right? I could run an exercise, but if I overtrain I'll break my body down. And so I think people will “over media-ize” and not be balanced out. And so I think that's the danger. A term you shared, you know, recently with me is cyberchondria. Right, was it cyberchondria?
Pihkala: Yeah. Yeah. That's the one.
Doherty: You know, so we like words here. You know, at the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. We like our words. And, you know, cyberchondria is - how would you define cyberchondria?
Pihkala: Yeah, that's not an official diagnosis, but it's been borne out of real perceptions during the 2000s and 2010s, that there's often the tendency to seek health information online. And, you know, you get some vague aching somewhere, and then you start Googling. And after two minutes, you start to become convinced that this is cancer or something. Actually, for example, some Finnish health authorities have even issued campaigns, where they say that please don't google your symptoms. Come to our websites, which are reliable. So the sort of institutional work being done to counter the dangers of cyberchondria. Having so much concern about one's health. And once again, it's very natural, of course, to be concerned about one's health, but then there's the issue of how we seek information related to it.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. So there's a sweet spot there. We do, you know, again, I think, using the disaster, you know, framing, you know, during the disaster, you know, we do need to seek out information. We need some intelligence about what's going on in the world. And so we are going to be plugged in. We want to be plugged into the media. But, again, trying to know the difference between what's new information and what's simply, you know, recycling of content, and all the marketing and all the other stuff that goes on within the media, which is not our friend, which is just designed to grab our attention and to keep us, you know, keep us locked into the whatever channel. And so knowing when to stop.
And, you know, as I tell people, you know, they won't be. Just because they take a break from electronic media, doesn't mean their head is in the sand. That's way too black and white. It's not accurate at all. In fact, the experiment that I've found personally true and, you might, listeners might try this. When you unplug from the news, you do not feel uninformed. In fact, in some ways you feel more informed about the world and you're able to think about things a little more deeply. And I think it allows some of the information to settle. Certainly we hear about things, if something's important, we'll hear about it. So actually, I feel like, you know, we become more informed about our lives when we break from the news. And less distracted. And less frenetic.
And then, you know, reminding people that we are the news. You know, we are the news. We make our own news. Our life is the news, you know, and that's where we need to be. Not as a consumer of other people's, you know, information. So, I do encourage people to, you know, just to play around with that idea. But yeah, so hypochondria. Cyberchondria. Doomscrolling. Right? You know, so excessive scrolling through stories. Yes, and you know, there was a spectacle with COVID. Of course, there's a lot of tragedy here with just the. As we talked about in our pre conversation, you know. And you get at it coming back to that timeline. You know, that at the beginning there is investigation, there's healthy, I believe you would say healthy anxiety.
Pihkala: Yeah.
Doherty: There's a very useful and healthy anxiety at the very beginning of these things.
Pihkala: Yeah. Some people notice that there's a threat which includes uncertainty. And that starts people thinking, trying to find more information so that they could better evaluate the threat and shape their responses to it. And this brings out the practical anxiety element. Which happens both in relation to ecological issues, the climate crisis, and it happened in relation to COVID-19. And, for example, the end of February 2020. In Europe, that was an interesting time, because some people started restricting their movements already. And some people, for example, still went to holidays in Northern Italy even though there was information leaking, that, you know, there's quite a number of cases there, and so on. So, that was a time when more and more people should have listened to anxiety, actually. But then, when the threat became very clear, of course, there were also panic reactions, lots of fear, and also this suppression of alarm state so that people could function better. So there's a whole range of things happening. And sometimes, in the media, people are talking about climate anxiety or eco-anxiety in an overly simplistic manner. It can include all kinds of reactions. But of course, I want to emphasize this practical anxiety dimension. And it's more like the climate skeptics who then talk of climate panic, for example, trying to frame this as sort of unneeded rushy, panicky activity, which isn't really not the case.
What I found personally helpful was when I was reading more about our systems, both conscious and unconscious. And I realized that reading this COVID-19 information, even though I sort of prepared myself for that, and tried to remember, for example, bodily practices, like, you know, keep breathing, steady, and so on. Still, it affects you sort of unconsciously. It goes to our alarm systems, and it may trigger some things related to death anxiety, or health anxiety, and so on. But I think that's one further reason for this very healthy emphasis that's here, you Thomas putting forward that there's a need to restrict [our media intake]. Even though we prepare ourselves, there's elements which reach our alarm system.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah. So how do, you know, how to, on a daily basis, do we calibrate our alarm system? So we, you know, we need to rest it. That's, you know, that's another way to think about this with the news. You know, we need to we, you know, we need to rest our ability, you know, to take in the news, so we can kind of start to separate the wheat from the chaff in terms of what's actually useful information.
You know, we were talking about Thoreau in one of our last conversations. Henry David Thoreau writing in the 1840s, you know, and he was saying, you know, the news, you know, I'm more concerned about what's never old, you know, not what's news. But he was already dealing with just this content. So yes, one of the first steps with eco-anxiety work, I think, is realizing that, you know, is identifying what healthy anxiety is, and really claiming that because we're never going to not feel anxious about the world. It's part of our wiring. And it's very healthy. But very quickly when we get into systems and governments and things. We get into public relations and propaganda, and often, you know, leaders don't want to. You know, their advisors will bring information to them and, you know, it's not politically expedient, you know. And so then there's the shaping and the spinning of stories and things like that. And so I think we've seen that with, you know, in the US and China, in particular during COVID. So, we're rolling with that, and we can't control all of that. So that's something that's somewhat out of our control. So we have to sort of learn to roll with that. And then is, there's grief about that.
I was thinking of David Kessler's work on grief. And, you know, he talks about a river like a flowing river and certain griefs are more simple or more complicated. You know, our complicated grief is like a bunch of logs and sticks that are blocking up the river. So it's really hard to feel grief for various reasons. And I think, you know, for COVID, you know, there's different complications there for people, you know, in terms of did it affect them personally? And is it about their political beliefs or family? And things like that. So just in general, their griefs are more or less complicated, which is something to be aware of.
Pihkala: Yeah, and guilt also can be hugely complicated and there can be so many different kinds of guilt one can feel in relation to COVID-19 for example. That “should I have been more careful” type of thing and all sorts of [guilty feelings] wrenching into existence. So, feeling self-guilt and that, of course, [mutatis mutandis, changing the things that needed to change] applies also to eco-anxiety and climate anxiety. So there's numerous things that one can feel guilt or even shame about. And some of them can lead to positive behavior changes. But, of course, we have to face the issue that there's no point in feeling totally overburdened by guilt and shame for a long time. That's not gonna help anyone. Not the planet, or you or those living close to you.
Doherty: Yeah. And I think, you know, in terms of how we can cope, you know, as the listeners, as you're listening. You know, I think if you can kind of get in your body a little bit. You know, kind of feel like take a breath and be in your body. And, you know, breathe into your belly or breathe into your heart, you know, there's scales that we exist in, in the world. So we have our personal family scale, and then our community scale, and our, you know, the world scale. And because of communication technology, we are able to, you know, kind of toggle between this real personal level scale and these world scales. In terms of problems. In terms of issues. In terms of our information. What we know. And it can be really jarring. And so, you know, learning to just know where are you in terms of the scales? You know, what scale are you working on here? I mean, I think and being able to know that is a really helpful skill. Otherwise, people are really pulled in a lot of directions. And again, if we don't have that personal level, grounding, we have no base to take on these larger pieces.
And so I know, you know, for me, I talked about my father's death. And that's where I will first go around COVID, because that was, you know, one of the ways that it personally affected me and my family. And, you know, of course we think about the politics and all this other stuff. And you, Panu, do you want to talk about how COVID affected you and your family as well?
Pihkala: Yeah. Very recently, of course, we had to stay home because we actually got it now after one and a half years of managing to miss it. But luckily, the symptoms were very mild, and us adults had two vaccinations. And we practiced caution. So, for example, in this period, when we had it, but didn't know it, we didn't pass it on to anyone because we were using masks and so on. So that was a recent phase. But, of course, it's been a long time. One and half years.
And this actually links to an event that I was speaking at this morning in Finland, which was about children and the future, organized by an organization called MLL - Mannerheimin Lastensuojeluliitto for those of you who know Finnish. It's an old and respectable organization taking care of children's welfare. And there was, of course, talk about how the COVID-19 time had affected children. And of the very different conditions that children were facing. You know, some didn't receive care, or actually were victims of home violence, for example. But then others, they had more time with their parents than they have had for years. So it's an ambiguous mix. So in a sort of paradoxical vein, sometimes it also brought happiness. And perhaps this links with the theme of our podcast also. That there may be surprising dimensions of happiness happening amidst this very complex and problematic time.
Doherty: Yeah. That's great. Bringing us back to our mission here. You know, Climate Change and Happiness. What does it mean to be happy during these times? When we have these, you know, what they call macro worries. You know, with these world level worries, these eco-anxieties. How do we then, you know, carve out time for trying to figure out what it means to be happy? Or what might it be to be happy during these times and with our family? So again, that's another reason to sort of pull ourselves away from the media and look at ourselves. Look at our lives. You know, again, emotionally as I said earlier, with COVID, you know, I do know how to regulate my emotions, and I work on this and so I, I am able to, you know, surf this stuff. So it's sort of like yes, dread and frustration and a sense of tragedy and just disgust at how COVID, you know, was handled. And a lot of the, you know, the political dysfunction and corruption here in the United States. And, you know, but then I I flipped over to gratitude. And, you know, impressed. I'm so impressed with all the people that have worked so hard. I mean, I know people. My friends, and you know, my clients are medical people, medical doctors and nurses. And just the incredible, spectacular heroic work of people all around the world, you know, in terms of COVID and helping other people. And even the scientific, you know, the speed of the scientific, you know, work and the rolling out of vaccines. It's absolutely incredible.
I mean, again, it's not all perfect, and I don't want to be, you know, just a booster, or Pollyanna about this. But there are some really, truly positive emotions here. People coming together. People being creative. People trying to adapt. It's amazing how people have been able to adapt. Entertainers and various people trying to reach out, you know. So there's a whole realm of emotions. And then I think there is just that fatigue. Because we're not through it yet. It's still unclear. So I think that fatigue piece comes up for people, so.
Pihkala: Yeah, [the] chronic stressor element is present both in relation to the climate crisis and still COVID-19. Very much resonate with what you said there, Thomas. And the amount of compassion and empathy, one might even speak of, you know, love in action. There's been lots of selfishness happening. And of course, we all know that that's not the whole whole picture. And it's very tragic, for example, among the nations, how the vaccines haven't been spread equally, and so on. But still on the local level, there's been lots of, you know, things that lift up one's belief about the good sides of human nature, also.
Doherty: Yeah, I love that idea of love in action. That's a great kind of moving toward the end of our conversation today. But that's a great place to be right now in this conversation. Love in action. Think of all the things that would fit under that heading over the last number of years. You know, all the parents that have been home with their children. And, you know, all the health care providers. And, you know, yes, it brought out, you know, like, a lot of things is the best in the worst of times. You know, Dickens' language, you know.
But COVID is, you know, it's legitimate to say that, you know, the COVID-19 crisis has brought out much good in people. And much love in action. And we need to, and we need to honor that. It's not fair, if we don't talk about that. So I think, you know, listeners can maybe take a breath. And, you know, let go a little bit of the COVID stuff that we've been coping with. And just, you know, set that burden down, as it is. We have moved through it. And, you know, really spend some time, you know, sitting with that idea of love in action and how we've all embodied that in our own ways. I think that's really, that's a neat way to think about, you know, our feelings. And, you know, that we can kind of have multiple feelings, obviously. And we can shine our light on one feeling or another. The story is not over yet. And we can certainly talk about much more with this. I mean, I feel pretty good that we've been able to even step into this topic. But love and action, I really like that. And, tell me, as we conclude here, what else you have going on here in terms of your talks and activities.
Pihkala: Hmm, yeah. I'm still sort of floating with this emotional landscape of love in action. So thanks for spending time here. I really think that that's the basis also for grief, and even for guilt, you know. Those arise because we care. And then one might go into more metaphysical speculations about what's the ultimate caring thing and so on. But let's not venture there now, this week.
There's been an interesting webinar between Finland and Sweden. I know that from the point of view of most of the world, it might seem that it's like two districts of the same city, but we have a long history in this corner of Europe with the different countries. But we were talking about ecological emotions, both in Sweden and Finland and how they are talked about. There's differences in language, for example. So that was a very interesting thing happening on Wednesday. And also opportunities to meet many people who are working with the subject, so that was uplifting. But how's it been for you, Thomas, this week?
Doherty: A lot going on, Panu. I have my group for mental health professionals. A climate conscious group starting next week. So I'm preparing for that. I have a proof of this chapter on climate change in clinical psychology that I was working on. I'm reviewing a paper on support groups around climate change for students. For college students. And that's actually a positive, interesting paper. It's a mixed bag. I'm also working with people and clients that are struggling with, you know, this amassed fatigue of COVID and climate and things like that.
But yeah, I am being inspired by the things that I'm seeing and finding. And so it's, again, it's toggling between, you know, my home territory and having the news that's just in my day and in my family and in my neighborhood and on my street. And then these larger pieces. And I'm looking forward to getting into it with a group of mental health professionals and talking about this sort of stuff. So that's going to be a nice series coming up. So yeah, yeah. So let's keep up our good work. You keep up your good work. I will. And then our listeners, you all keep up all your good work and love in action. You know, those are some lenses to put on and look at the world through today. And this is Climate Change and Happiness. Climatechangeandhappiness.com. Send us thoughts and messages and ideas and we'll keep talking about this.
Pihkala: Yes. We end with these Beatles-like tones. Thanks everyone for listening. Looking forward to talking more with you, Thomas. Doherty: Have a great evening, Panu. Bye bye.
Season 1, Episode 12: Eco-Anxiety in Finland and the Shouting Man
Jun 10, 2022
Season 1, Episode 12 | Eco-Anxiety in Finland and the Shouting Man
In this episode, Panu and Thomas are joined by Finnish therapists Sanni Saarimäki and Taneli Saari to discuss the Finnish “scene” around eco-anxiety and climate emotions. After discussing their own paths towards working with climate emotions, Sanni and Taneli introduce both the Finnish National Project and Tunne ry (an organization focusing on eco-emotions), whose work is apparently the first such project funded at a national level in the world. Together the four discuss the Shouting Man project as a unique and cathartic way to express climate emotions and also explore the role of therapy methods such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy in a climate and environmental context.
Season 1, Episode 12: Eco-Anxiety in Finland and the Shouting Man
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast, the show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change. And the personal side of climate change and other environmental issues. And we have two special guests joining Panu and I today from Finland: And I'll let them introduce themselves.
Sanni Saarimäki: Hey. Hi everybody. My name is Sanni Saarimäki.
Taneli Saari: Hi everyone. I'm Taneli Saari.
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Taneli and Sanni. Lämpimästi tervetuloa, in Finnish. It's a great joy to have you join us. And Thomas has some roots in Europe. But, of course, his family has been living in North America for a while. So we want to engage in European conversation. And, of course, we three, Sanni, Taneli and I, know each other from many years back. Finland is a rather small country. Five million people. With quite [a] large land area compared to many other European countries.
The public discussion on eco-emotions and climate anxiety and other issues related to that [in Finland] really gained more prominence in 2017. And we three have been in many ways connected with that public discussion. And we have sometimes been running workshops together, but we don't work together on a day to day basis. So that's some of the background. And there's a lot to talk about [regarding] various things going on in Finland, and your own journeys towards this topic. And that's something that we'd like to begin with. So could you tell us something about how you end[ed] up [in] this area of eco-emotions and the rest of the stuff? And could you, Sanni, start, for example?
Saarimäki: Yeah, sure. Thank you. And thank you for inviting us to speak with you today. So I am a psychologist from my educational background, and also a history teacher. But I haven't done that in many years. My journey towards eco-emotions started from my own experience. My own personal experience. I had been working in a University of Applied Sciences as a study psychologist for some time. And that's where I also met Taneli. And then after those couple of years I was working there, my contract ended. And it was a bit of a surprise for me. It sometimes happens that [you] may have to change jobs and things like that. But for me, it was a very huge experience to be unemployed. And I have been - before I had been thinking that my role in this whole global situation is to be there for the students. And help them to deal with their own emotions. And then find their own place and go and save the world. So that would be my thing. And I didn't have that anymore at that point when I became unemployed.
And it was a very rainy summer here in Finland. And all I had was time. And I was reading a lot about climate change and other environmental issues when I had too much time. And too much time to also realize how serious the situation was with the climate change. And kind of that eco-anxiety I had hidden inside me somewhere, came through the surface. And at the same time when I was experiencing this eco-anxiety myself, I also thought of a few of my students. They did not come to the study psychologist to talk about climate anxiety, no, but also underneath their situations, there might be climate anxiety or other global threats that they are thinking [about] how that's gonna affect the future.
I had a lot of time and I was thinking: where do they then go if I, as a psychologist, don't know where to go and who to talk to about these issues? So where would they go? And then I was lucky to start a new job as a study psychologist, once again. Now in Aalto University. And I thought first that the eco-anxiety would go away and I would continue my normal job. I would be working as a psychologist once again with stress and motivation issues and things like that. But the eco-anxiety did not go away. It was there.
I was also lucky [at] that point that my colleagues, many colleagues, said that they don't know what to do with this, but if I want to do something with this, they would support me. They would try to help me to do something. And they said, the students are—actually it's hidden there, but they do have these same [kinds of] fears and emotions. And there is not much yet that we could do, but let's experience this together and do something.
And I started to pilot climate anxiety groups. And at the same time, I was keeping contact with Taneli. And he was one of those persons who would actually understand that I'm not—my climate anxiety is not something as a cover. It's a real thing. It's not covering my personal issues or anything like that. But it's there. And we also decided that when these pilot groups were doing quite well in Aalto, that maybe something similar would be needed outside. And we then founded Tunne. Our organization. And now it's been—this is now our fifth year. Yeah.
And along the way, I also got a lot of help from Panu. Especially at the beginning, when I was thinking [about] where to go and who to contact. And there was this article [in Helsingin Sanomat] about Panu's book. And one of my colleagues said that hey, you should write to Panu and ask. Yeah, it has been—then the years have gone by quite fast.
Pihkala: They have indeed. Thanks so much, Sanni, for sharing about this journey. And it's been a transformative journey I'd say. Listening to you and knowing this. And this tunne word means emotion in [the] Finnish language. In the podcast, we've often spoken about different languages. And so we use that word in Finnish, both for emotion and feeling. We don't do any separation for that in the Finnish language.
And this transformative journey of Sanni's and Taneli's and others then led to an NGO organization which focuses really on eco-emotions and climate emotions. But Thomas, you have some common things in your work. You know, listening to people. Even though you don't work at a university anymore. Or [as] a study psychologist. But you see people who have issues that they talk about. And issues that are underneath what they talk about. So what resonates with you when listening to Sanni's story this far?
Doherty: Well, yeah. I think Sanni's story is very universal. I can identify with it. People that really had these—again, it starts personally. There's this idea of having an environmental waking up and awareness. And it's troubling. And [it's been called] a “Waking up Syndrome”. And then people want to do something about it.
And, you know, I know well the challenge of getting this done in the institution. In the US, we would think about [it] in our university counseling centers. And psychologists and counselors are working with students in universities. Yeah, so I've actually done that work. And I could see that. And it really does take some people that just believe in the idea to get it started. And then once you scratch the surface, many people identify with it. It is really under the surface, like you say. No, I think it's great. And it just takes a pathfinder. It takes someone to start. And then people follow along. So yeah. I think many listeners can identify with Sanni.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks Thomas for reflecting on that. And now, in addition to this NGO where Taneli is also being very active—and I'll very soon ask Taneli about his journey—then there's the National Finnish Social and Health Sector Eco-Anxiety Project. And, again, we all three have been involved in that [on] the advisory board and in various strategic positions. But Taneli has actually been working there. And Sanni is the chairperson of Tunne NGO. Which is one of the three organizations working for the National Project. So just for the listeners, there's several organizational manifestations of this work that we are talking about. But please Taneli, you've been listening to us patiently, as suits your character strengths. But could you share something about your journey?
Saari: Yeah. Thanks Panu. And hi everyone. It's nice to be on this podcast. I'm a longtime listener and a first time guest. Well, I have a professional background in social services and [a] degree as well. And I have had this kind of thirst to experience a lot of different fields. And my first job was - I started as a kindergarten teacher. And moved from there to Child Protective Services. And I was still doing that job part time when I was studying. And I was in my early 20s, and faced some really serious situations of my clients. Like sexual abuse. And that kind of stuff that really stops you and makes you think about what we're doing to each other. To ourselves.
And from there, the years went on. And I've worked with people with substance abuse problems. Even prisoners. Then with families, again. With children and their parents and so on. And, like Sanni said, it was in 2014 when I also switched to this University of Applied Sciences. And my job title was a Study Wellbeing Advisor. And both Sanni and me—students came to see us one-on-one. And then we guided these different peer groups. For example, tension and a fear of performing in front of people was one of those topics.
And we had these really interesting coffee break discussions. I have to thank Sanni for those. It was people who believed what you're saying and thinking. It is really meaningful. Yeah. So we had these coffee break talks. And talked about what kind of services our social and healthcare sector should provide in the future. And we had this discussion back then. Like seven [or] eight years ago. That there's no place to go if you want to talk [about] how much climate change or other aspects of environmental crisis[es] affect you. And, in that sense, we were kind of right. And also, that's what Panu's book in 2017 [Päin helvettiä? Ympäristöahdistus ja toivo] mentioned. And I moved to this NGO side of [the] work later on. And then I had some experience [about] how to run an association and what is needed. And, like Sanni told, then we decided that we should form this Tunne. And we have started doing these workshops and different kinds of trainings since 2018.
And that year, also, from our perspective, was a turning point. The IPCC report that was about the 1.5 Celsius degree warming made a real big splash. And, for example, the media and public awareness exploded after that. And also the demand for our workshops and what we do. People were really interested after that. And luckily—we did this work in our free time as 100% volunteers. We didn't raise a penny or didn't get paid at all. And didn't want to. And from [the] start of 2020, we got this grant from this funding center for social and health organizations in Finland. And that funding center has a background in - or all the grants that they give to organizations, they are signed by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health. So that's a nationally funded project.
And there we have three different organizations. Mieli, which is, I think, the oldest mental health organization in the world, as well as in Finland. And they are in charge of the project management. And then there are two like specialist organizations. We from Tunne ry. And then Nyyti ry which focuses on students' wellbeing. And so there are three specialists who work [on] that project.
And we have three areas which we focus on. One is we provide support for people who experience environmental or eco-emotions. We organize these workshops, and these peer groups from three to five times. Then we have these like open webinars and so on. Panu is a frequent speaker in those. And then, besides providing support and places for people who are, for example, eco-anxious, then we also train professionals. And people who meet people who go through eco-emotions. That means that we have trained teachers, therapists, social and health sector workers, [and] people who work with young people, for example.
That's one of the key findings that we have seen in the past three years now. That people who meet people, who go through these things, they are really interested now [in] hearing more about what we know. So professionals are waking up to the topic more and more. I think that even in one year, I've seen a slight increase in the amount of interest. Yeah. And the third area is then we tried to raise the public awareness about the mental health aspects of climate change and [the] environmental crisis, and so on.
Pihkala: Thanks Taneli for sharing all that. I think that the third area—raising awareness both among the general public and also amongst various professionals—has led to some of the developments that you mentioned. And this is an example also of the fact that regardless of what your background is, there is something that you can do. This is, of course, different for many people depending on the context. But here we also have a person from the Social Sciences and Social Work. One person from the study psychology field. And one person who did a dissertation of environmental theology way back, for example. So it's an interesting mix of people. And there's something for each one to do. But what about you, Thomas? What came to your mind when listening to the story that Taneli shared with us?
Doherty: Well, I'm just really impressed. I think listeners can—I'm imagining if there's listeners that are in a policy position, or in some sort of institutional position, it's neat to see the story. And how this actually came about. So it was kind of, like a lot of these things, it's organic. Right? You know, it takes some personal relationships. And personal interests and people being honest about their own eco-anxiety and environmental concerns. It seems to me part of this work is we're working in the system. And then we're working outside the system, right? And we need to have that partnership. So the new ideas might come in from outside the system, but we need the help from the mainstream mental health support organizations and society as well. So I think that models that really well.
I'm really impressed by that—and I'll have to do more research about Mieli being the oldest mental health program in the world. I'm not surprised about that, you know, from a government standpoint. There's a perception in the US that there's nothing being done in our government around climate change or things. And that's not true. There are people within our government doing a lot of things. But obviously there's a lot of gridlock and a lot of counter forces at play. I don't know, personally, of any national or even state level organization addressing the idea of eco-anxiety itself. But I don't want to assume that there's not a listener out there that's not doing that somewhere. So if you are doing it, let us know, because I'd love to share the information.
But then I go into the question. And I don't know, Panu, you might have the same question. But like what I think listeners might be curious about [is] what exactly happens in some of the workshops. And like, what does some of the work look like? That's where I would go with the conversation. I'd like to talk about the Shouting Man Program. I know that's one of the programs. But on a more interpersonal level, like what happens in some of these groups or workshops?
Pihkala: Would you like to start Sanni, for example? And if you want to share some of the methodology that you are using, please feel free. So we'll try to stay away from a very nuanced discussion of various psychological and therapeutic stances, but I know that you've been using Acceptance Commitment Therapy and mindfulness, for example. Which are very interesting. And we've briefly touched upon that in some previous episodes. So please feel free to talk also about that if you want.
Saarimäki: Yeah, thank you. Yeah. I do use—when I meet people individually in my daily job, or if I'm doing workshops with Tunne I do use Acceptance and Commitment methods. And also contemplative methods like mindfulness. And lately I've also been very interested in radical self-compassion. And how to kind of take care of yourself. And giving those tools.
And the reason why these methods came to my work is because they were there already before. And those were pretty much the main psychological methods I had. And I didn't know what to do with climate anxiety or eco-anxiety. But I was wondering if I could use these methods I already know. And I would already have some tools. And that was kind of a big leap for me to kind of accept that yeah, I don't need to first get another degree or something else to start working.
And, to me, it's about preventive work. So I don't do clinical healthcare. I meet students, or in Tunne I meet those people who are in need of having those discussions. But I don't do health care. Or I don't diagnose anything. So I have kind of free hands there. We talk about values. What is important for the person. How to deal with your own self-critic. And how to take care of yourself. How to act and especially how to act based on your values. And step by step choosing your own path. And also when not to act. Like sometimes it's needed to protect yourself or protect something else that you are “not acting,” right now, but you should be choosing the time [to act] and choosing the battles as well.
And then we talk about a lot of acceptance. And that “bad” emotions and feelings come to very crucial roles. How to accept these emotions as part of the process, and [as] travel partners and messengers. And they are not the enemy. How to be with them, and how to get also energized from them. And all of those emotions, they are there for a reason. And many times the reason is not what they are shouting to get your attention. But you have to be able to listen to them and see what actually brings them there. And then they will help you. And also anyone to help to go to that path according to your values. If you take them as travel partners. And mindfulness is about pausing and noticing emotions and feelings. And what's happening around you as well. So I use mindfulness exercises.
Doherty: Very well said. That's a great primer on eco-anxiety support. I really appreciate that. Emotions as “travel partners.” That's a nice term. Yeah.
Saari: That's one of the things that sticks to people. And they kind of pay attention to that one. And that topic comes to discussion. If I could continue with, for example, when we have this, like five time peer group that meets. Well, the first time people get to know each other. They kind of interview each other. What's their trip with eco emotions. When have they kind of woken up to what's going on. And the seriousness and how it has changed during the years and so on.
The second time is kind of like information-based. Then we usually talk [about] how these environmental changes are going to affect or are already affecting people mentally, physically. Or what it does to us as people who live in groups. And then after we kind of then digest the information as well together. Kind of like these are like, hard and difficult things. Sad things. Huge things that are happening to us.
And then the third time, we start to focus on coping. What kind[s] of ways there are to adjust your own emotions. And make yourself feel more relaxed or less anxious and so on. And we kind of get to try together to do different exercises. And kind of give home exercises for people to do as well and so on.
And then the fourth meeting. That focuses on the support of communities. What benefits there are when people come together. And how they can also share thoughts and emotions. But they can also achieve this by doing some sort of action.
And then the fifth time it also kind of rounds up the meeting. And we say goodbye to each other, but before that we talk about the future. And usually we do this for some kind of exercise that makes people kind of start to envision this utopia or pro topias. Futures that are kind of like wanted in a way.
Doherty: Yeah, I'm taking some notes here. This really dovetails a lot with how I work with people. So I really appreciate that.
Saari: And then here we are, of course, like, I have to give credit to - Panu's work [on group methods to encounter eco-emotions; there was a Finnish pilot project on that led by Panu] has been like [a] tremendous support here. And then we are aware of these models. For example, Carbon Conversations [Ro Randall and others, started in Britain]. And other things that have been going on outside Finland before we started our work. There have been some heroes for us as well. Or some models to do.
Pihkala: Yeah, this Mieli. Mental Health Finland. The previous title was Mental Health Finland. It's been the sort of main mental health organization in Finland. And they realized the possibility of climate anxiety around 2018, I would say, on a more official level. And there one of their leaders, especially, was sensitive to the topic. And they published a report on climate anxiety, which I wrote for them in 2019. And it's been very influential, I think, that such a respectable organization in a society says that, you know, this is something that we should think about and feel about.
And, of course, it's a bit easier in Finland. You know, a country of five million. It's like a small state in the US. And the bigger the country or nation is it gets more tricky. But still, there's been some benefits. And one of the efforts has been to make use of the ecotherapy and ecopsychology resources, partly developed by Thomas and colleagues, also for the Finnish scene.
Now COVID-19 has greatly affected the national project, of course. And I know that Taneli, you have had to move many activities online, for example, because of the impossibility of live meetings. There's been cooperation also with some marketing offices for the public awareness, part of things. So sort of normal parts of organizational work. And from that came one special thing that Thomas was also interested about is the Shouting Man Campaign. Would you like to share something about that? That gained some international attention to Britt Wray's newsletter, also.
Saari: Yeah. I think the Shouting Man. He was like a good character at that time and was interested. I think he was taking part in some TV contest, right? So he had gained some leverage and had some followers on social media and so on. But he as a person was also interested, of course, in what's going on in this field. And so he thought our work is important and he took part in that campaign. And yeah. It was a good “trick” in a way.
We also, at the same time, had prepared this like declaration of a climate health emergency in Finland. It was signed by a lot of mental health associations. Also, some [trade] unions, if I remember correctly. So we kind of published that one. There was this event where the Shouting Man told people how to express their eco-emotions, by shouting, of course. Yeah. And the national TV and so on picked [it] up. That was [a] good thing. I don't think it's a special Finnish characteristic or anything to shout out emotions. I see some level of humor there because I think generally we’re considered [to be] like a little bit emotionally restricted people. So like, shouting goes to the other end, right away. And it's like a funny way to express what you say, if you otherwise are a little bit hesitant.
Doherty: Yeah, I'd encourage listeners to—we'll have links to [the Shouting Man]. And we'll wrap up here in a moment. And we can go a little over our time because we have extra guests and things. But we'll have links to all these programs in our show notes. The formal programs in Finland so people can learn about these. And also the Shouting Man. It's nice to see this person. And we all need a little bit of a shouting man in our lives. You know, this catharsis.
I was thinking of primal scream therapy. The old therapy that was developed in the 70s in the—I don't know where. Maybe in the US with Arthur Janov. That was kind of known. A lot of musicians and artists have done primal scream. And that's not surprising, you know. Expressive people will gravitate to that. But it's the idea of catharsis. It’s letting it all out. The band Tears for Fears, have an old song called Shout [“Shout, shout, let it all out.”] They were actually influenced by primal scream therapy. It's a little trivia point.
As I think about this, now, I think about where I'm going to use this in the future. And when I talk about this in our groups, there is always someone that's going to be the “shouting man” in any group. And sometimes we're the shouting man. Or sometimes other people are. But we have to honor the shouting man or the shouting woman, I guess is one way to take this going forward. It is kind of a spectacular thing that draws attention. And, you know, kind of a media thing. But it is also pretty primal. And so I think—I mean I might be wrong, but I think a lot of listeners have felt like that over time. They just want to scream. So I think we should make a place for that. Yeah. This is great. Yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah, we can link the famous Norwegian painting by Edvard Munch, The Scream, also with episode notes. And that's constantly popular as an internet meme. Also, because you can link with that expression. I think that's related to what Thomas is saying. It's such a primitive and stable part of us that sometimes we would really need to do that.
But that also brings us nicely to an important topic that we might close this slightly extended episode with which is coping with matters. And I know from our earlier history, that Taneli you, for example, do music, personally, also. Not just listening, but also doing it. I'm also doing it not as prominently externally, but still. But perhaps giving the floor first to Sanni. Would you like to say something about the ways that you use for coping with both, you know, the stress that your work also sometimes brings. Even though it's also rewarding, I know. But, you know, with eco-emotions in general. So would you like to speak a bit about that?
Saarimäki: Yeah. To me personally. And also many of my students and other people I meet in these issues, it's about connecting. And feeling the real connection with ourselves, of course, but to other people as well. And nature. Finding ways to also see your own important part there. Even though sometimes it might be very small. But it's still vitally important. And my own eco- and climate anxiety has gotten better in these past five years. When I've been actually feeling that I do something. And I do something meaningful. And I'm part of something meaningful. And I do something according to my values. And I don't need to be perfect in it. But it's enough what I do now. And yeah. It gives me a lot of joy. So connection. And also that self compassion there.
Saari: I can also. I feel really good when I see new people come and join Tunne ry's activity, for example. There are these really bright, young up and coming psychologists, for example, who will do these things a lot better than me and Sanni have already. And it's really nice to see that there's a platform that you have been a part of creating. And then there's new people [who] are willing to join that. And they have ideas. And that feels really good. And one thing that came to my mind about the shouting part still. And Panu also referred to music. I have a background in music. I used to listen to a lot of punk and rap music when I grew up. And I played, for example, in hardcore punk bands, which are all about screaming. So I know how much it helps when you think about everything that's wrong. Yeah. So it's very helpful.
Pihkala: Thanks for sharing. That's very profound. And I hear that you have both found meaning in these activities. Perhaps even purpose if we use that word. But that's up for the listeners. And sort of holistic or embodied methods. This is, of course, something that Thomas has been writing and talking about also for many years.
Doherty: Yeah, so this is great. This has been a great conversation. So we're talking about community and, you know, all the work that Sanni and Taneli [are] doing is really about bringing people together so they're not isolated. The students are not isolated. And these groups are not isolated. And so there's a community aspect. And then, you know, our emotions. And bringing out emotions into ourselves. And being close with our emotions. and then taking our actions, you know, as we can. And then channeling our nervous system and giving ourselves an outlet. Either through our own shouting or listening to music or viewing art that illustrates that catharsis.
So this is a really nice, beautiful picture that we painted today. Well, thanks again. I will again share our information. We'll share all the information about this program. And I hope this can inspire more work in Finland and also around the world. And I know there are other people doing these kinds of things in the world. So do reach out. You can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. And if we hear about more programs around the world, we'll be happy to share that information. But I'm really pleased with our talk today. Thank you so much. Panu, do you have any last thoughts or anyone else have any last thoughts?
Pihkala: Kiitos paljon [thank you very much], Taneli ja Sanni.
Saarimäki: Thank you.
Saari: Thank you, Panu. Doherty: Take care, everyone. Be well and thank you for listening.
Season 1, Episode 11: Bearing Witness to the Acts of Wynn Bruce and David Buckel
May 27, 2022
Season 1, Episode 11 | Bearing Witness to the Acts of Wynn Bruce and David Buckel
Reflecting on the recent self-immolation of climate activist Wynn Bruce as a protest and call to action in the face of climate change, Thomas and Panu discuss the importance of bearing witness to emotionally difficult events. In the teaching of systems thinker, Joanna Macy, they acknowledge both the difficulty and value of staying open to the world even when it is painful and seemingly impossible. Inspired by the writings of Daniel Sherrell in his book Warmth, they reflect on the importance of not reducing all of our climate feelings “into their utility for the movement,” but rather allowing some to exist solely unto themselves.
Schrimer 2021 Post-dramatic activism: “Whether it is the fleeting image of a better world or the stark illustration of a world in dire need of change, activist performance is about allowing, or forcing, its audience to bear witness to one particular vision of the world.”
Talkoot is a Finnish expression for a gathering of friends and neighbors organized to accomplish a task. Among many visions of communal work worldwide.
Panu’s suggestions of statements for therapists to use:
“You know, this feels awful, but I want to stay with this with you.”
“I don't exactly know how to react to this, except I'm convinced that life has meaning and should not be thrown away, even for as important a purpose as this.”
Transcript
Season 1, Episode 11: Bearing Witness to the Acts of Wynn Bruce and David Buckel
Transcript edited for clarity and brevity.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello. I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. A show for people around the world [who are] thinking and feeling deeply about climate change—personal reactions and how climate change affects them in their daily life with their family and with their friends.
And Panu, you know, we've been talking about this general theme of being open to the world. You know, “open heart, open mind.” And taking in the world. Not shutting down. Closing down. And so we were going to talk about this in general. And recently there's been a lot of troubling—even more than typical—troubling news. You know, here when we're recording, about politics and war.
And, you know, recently a person ended their life by burning themselves to death as a protest regarding climate change. Wynn Bruce. And it's been in the news slightly. And it brought up a similar event that happened a few years ago with David Buckel in New York City. And so we were really wrestling about whether we should talk about this. This climate, what I would, call self-sacrifice. The self-immolation. And we decided to move forward into talking about [it] because I think we both think it's important. So, Panu, what's the first thing that comes into your mind when we're thinking about this? Or where do you begin with this kind of thing?
Pihkala: Yeah. You mentioned, Thomas, [that] it's very disturbing and difficult. And, in my mind, it links with many things. One thing is my early history. In my previous work life, I sometimes met people who had very dark thoughts and sometimes also suicidal ideation. But then, again, we have to remember that there are many issues at play here. There's very determined acts of self-sacrifice. Or thinking about things like self-immolation as a strategy for making some kind of impact in climate matters. And then there is the topic of having dark moods or feelings of meaninglessness and that kind of territory.
And in general, as you said, this links strongly also in my mind with the difficulty and importance of staying open to the world. That's something that I've been engaging with for a long time. And Joanna Macy's work has been important for me in that regard. And also local[ly] several others. And then, finally, the very also complex topic of relations between death awareness and environmental awareness. And there's a different viewpoint into that, also including the so-called Terror Management Theory. So there's a lot. And we'll be unpacking at least some of these in this discussion, but I wanted to bring several elements onto the table now.
Doherty: Yeah. And I think we're going to kind of move between some philosophy and psychology and just some human experience here. As I was telling Panu earlier, my thoughts about the death of Wynn Bruce or David Buckel or others (perhaps we don't know about those who have done similar actions). If Panu was walking with his family. Or if I was walking with my daughter in our town and we saw someone who had done this act. Who had burned themselves to death. And then we didn't talk about it. We pretended that it didn't happen. Or we didn't see it. That would be really strange. And if we live in a world where we don't stop and feel these things. Because I don't think that's the world that we want. And so I think we do need to be open to this.
We were talking about social justice. And I think some of the philosophizing about this is, you know, when white people do this kind of; white privileged people do this kind of stuff, you know, we don't know how to understand it. But obviously people die every day. And people have been burned in climate related disasters and in wars all the time. And so when brown lives, black and brown lives are lost, sometimes this doesn't get the same kind of press. So we want to keep all this kind of stuff.
And I think practically therapists and mental health people are unsure how to bring this up. Because well, first of all, they're not trained to think about this. And then also, there's a concern that there might be some sort of contagion effect. Where more people will do this. And we don't want to encourage this kind of behavior. And that's a realistic concern, as well. And so we need to name that. But I don't know that there's really evidence of so-called copycat activities with this kind of thing for various reasons. It's a really extreme act to do. It would take a lot for anyone to do this.
There's another larger conversation about politics and political action and self sacrifice in terms of hunger strikes and various things. You know, I know a little bit about the Irish hunger strikers in Northern Ireland and things like that. So there's a lot of — [I] suggest for the listeners, like, you know, we're making this up as we go as well. We are just thinking through this ourselves. But I think it's important to be open. And to be candid with our feelings. I think, Panu, what you were talking about with me about work from Joanna Macy and Molly Young Brown. Coming Back to Life. Their book. But, you know, the costs of not being open to the world. And what causes not being open to the world. Do you think that would be helpful to talk about a little bit right now? Just to give us some context.
Pihkala: Yeah, I think so. And for those of you who haven't heard of Joanna Macy, she's a systems thinker and a social environmental activist who has been pioneering many methods for encountering difficult emotions related to the state of the world. So already in the 1980s, related to the threat of nuclear war and fallout. And later, even more explicitly with the ecological crises. She is still alive while we are recording this. She’s of great age and considered a sage in this territory by many.
And together with colleagues such as Molly Young Brown, she has been developing what they call The Work That Reconnects. A method of trying to stay open to the state of the world and to increase people's resources. So: Coming from gratitude; Honoring our pain for the world; Seeing with new eyes; and Going forth. These are the names of the rough steps. And now the second step, Honoring our pain for the world, is very much related to what we are talking about today.
And the sort of widest manual to their work is this book Coming Back to Life as a second edition from roughly 2014. And it has an excellent chapter number two, which discusses the various reasons why it's very understandable that people want to block out at least some aspects of reality. Because it can be so painful. It can cause some social disturbance. And people are thinking about—do I really want to make changes in my social settings, for example? How will others think of me if I start to engage with these issues more? So, many different kinds of costs.
And then, also [in the book], a great discussion about the various impacts. Impeded cognitive functioning is one. So if we are not as well in touch with our emotions, that also has an effect on our cognition. But then also, the impact on imagination, for example. Our connection with the world. They go on to discuss some pretty deep stuff related to our connections with the world. And that's, of course, also strongly related to the challenges of inviting people to stay open to the ecological crisis and environmental activism. So if people know that that's going to bring some pain. Because you see others suffering and know much about the troubles in the world, so is there also something to gain?
And I think this idea of when you are able to stay open to the world, it will be more painful than numbing, but it will also be a much richer life, when you can actually feel the joy and feel the sadness and other other emotions. And of course, it's easier to contribute for the common good, if you are able to stay open to the reality. But it's not easy. And they are very realistic about that. But I know, Thomas, that you have been engaging with their work and the work of other ecopsychologists in this regard for a long time. So well, what's your thoughts about that?
Doherty: Well, yeah. I think this is just, Panu, is just a great example. People have been working on this for years. And like I'm always coming back to this idea. We're not alone. And there's people doing this. And I think the loneliness is one of the worst problems here. Trying to cope with this alone. Whereas coping with the community is different. And I think it's really great.
Even though I know this work, it's helpful for me to be reminded, again, that there are costs of not opening to the world. Like we don't think as well. We're not creative. We're kind of shut down. Our imagination is limited. Even in our body, you know, it's kind of like a learned helplessness kind of thing. And, you know, we're kind of numb. And then, you know, when someone's numb, you can poke at them and hit them. And they don't feel it because they're numb. And so that numbing is a self protective, you know, strategy. But it isn't helpful for social change, or working in a system. So we're more vibrant. We're more passionate. You know, we have more fire if we're more open. And so I think, again, it's sort of like, how open do we get?
Then that's the other side of it. It’s like, if we're too open, then we're flooded and overwhelmed and angry and dangerous. And things like that. So it's all of us finding our kind of right level of openness at any given time. And, you know, getting over like you say, the major blocks. Like is it guilt? Is it grief? You know, is it inadequacy? Some of these blocks, like, why we can't. I don't want to talk about this person that ended their life regarding climate change, because I'm not doing enough myself. And I don't have anything to say. Or their action is a reproach to me, you know. But I think that's something—that's a block to move forward to. I don't think that's what they're doing these acts for. I don't really know what's in people's minds, but I think they want people to come together. And so I think having a compassionate place is a good start.
Pihkala: Yeah, definitely. And as much as I know about Wynn Bruce and David Buckel, they wanted to encourage people to take mass level civil action for climate justice. And for mitigation of climate change. So they were not wanting people to get desperate and do more self immolation. But they really wanted to wake people up even more to the great urgency of the crisis. And then there's lots of [published] discussion, especially now, of course, of the Buckel case, because it's been a couple of years [since it], and people have had more time to write in-depth writings about it. But increasingly, I think, also related to this very recent case. And we will put some links to the podcast website, for those of you who want to take a deeper look. And it's quite a complicated issue. And then in these cases, I'm speaking, especially with the Buckel case, they resist any binary categorization. So I think it's quite complex indeed.
And when I was speaking about the Joanna Macy stuff earlier, I think that's closely related to the difficulty that many people are having with connecting to these issues. Because the topic[s] of the ecological crisis and climate crisis is already threatening enough. And then when it becomes linked with death and self immolation, it can simply become too much for many people. Including, I presume, many therapists. But as you say Thomas, it would be totally weird if we wouldn't discuss this. And that would turn into [a] quite absurd situation. This, of course, is also the opening of a great book by Daniel Sherrell called Warmth.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: That's a book that we both have been engaging with. And it starts exactly with this absurdity of knowing about the self immolation of David Buckel. And then the author sees personally that life is going on as normal in the park. Even, you know, right after these events.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, so, you know, for therapists and for people. You know, there's these statements. You know, Panu would come up with some actual statements for therapists to use: “You know, this feels awful, but I want to stay with this with you.” [Or:] “I don't exactly know how to react to this, except I'm convinced that life has meaning and should not be thrown away, even for as important a purpose as this.” And so that, you know, we get to say what our belief is about life and what we think. But we don't have to have all the answers.
It is, yeah, the Sherrell book, Warmth, is a great book. It's a great example of a very deeply written, you know, self examination of climate grief and climate despair. I like some of the things that Sherrell talks about. He talks about this idea of a Bruegel painting. Like one of these old paintings that's a broad tapestry of life in a town. And you see all the different people. And you have to spend a lot of time looking at the painting to see all the different figures and what they're doing. And there's a lot in the painting that you don't see unless you look very closely at all the sections of it.
And so, you know, Bruegel has a painting called Children's Games. Which is just a broad, you know, community square with all the different activities. But that's what our life is like. We have a park. Where some people are running. And some people are meditating. And another person is burning themselves to death all at the same time. And that's kind of a powerful metaphor, you know, for the world. But, you know, we'd say to our listeners too, you know, this feels awful, but we want to stay with you. With this.
Tip from me. When you're reading books like Warmth. Or David Wallace Wells, The Uninhabitable Earth. You know, with Warmth it's best to start at the end. And start in the last several pages because that's where Sherrell brings his argument together. Similar to David Wallace Wells. If you start at the beginning of these books, I think sometimes people don't have the wherewithal to get through it. Because it's such a hard slog. You know, going through the writer's pain. And the writers, you know, either the statistics about the dangers and all the, you know, the cataclysms. Or also the personal pain. But when you get to the end, you know, starting at the end sometimes is a little helpful, because that's where the author is kind of coming together with their thinking.
And I really liked what Sherrell said about how your feelings are not reducible to their utility in the movement. He's a climate movement person. And so your feelings are not reducible to the movement. You know, fear and sadness are tools, but they're also things unto themselves. So that's another point to say that we don't have to translate every single emotion into action. That leads to this guilt and inadequacy. I'm not doing enough. But none of us is doing enough. I mean, we can only do what we can do. And what we do is enough. Like what we're doing is enough we can get. We can try to get better at what we're doing. But as you're dealing with this I think we have to be careful of translating all of our emotions into action. And so some of this is just being with the emotions.
Pihkala: Yeah, I think that's a very important point and links with the things we discussed in our ‘feelings of inadequacy’ episode also. Some months back. And Macy and Young Brown use two words, “stamina” and “buoyancy,” to describe some of the things that are needed. And those came to my mind, also, when hearing you speak about Sherrell's book. And I've had it for at least half a year on my shelf. I've done some reading of it. But now, because of the self immolation thing, I picked it up again and gave it more careful reading. And also for me, even though I've been working with related issues for a long time, partly perhaps because of that, but also, despite it, it's not easy stuff. You know, these books that really go into the heart of the matter.
So I think we need to be honest about that. It's difficult. And one needs to find also things to balance these kinds of engagements which are, then again, very much needed. And Sherrell has a long history with climate activism, also, in the sort of efforts to make structural change. So not just the individual consumer behavior. But trying to work for structural change. So that's a special feature of the book, also. So deep self-reflection about the dark emotions, but also about action.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Stamina and buoyancy. That's just something to really sit with. Now for some people that might be a stretch. What I call a stretch feeling, you know, from where you are feeling in this moment. To have a sense of stamina. A sense of stamina means strength and ability, capacity, and buoyancy. You know, light lightness. Able to kind of rise above. That's something I'm going to take away from our episode today, firstly, is, you know, that these. They're stretch feelings, though, so I might not feel them right now. But if I put my mind onto them. And I put them on my feelings list. My feelings vocabulary list. I might notice moments when I feel these things. Because we do feel all these things at different times.
And so, again, there's the feeling where we are. You know, whatever that happens to be. And trying to be really clear. Even again about this issue with these people ending their lives. And the self-sacrifice for this political act. Or suicide. Or however you want to call it. I'm thinking of it as a political act. Like a hunger strike or something like that. You know, I might feel confused. I might feel curious. Surprised. Again, there's an off putting sense of all this sort of stuff. It's fearful. It's disgusting. It's unspeakable. But, you know, we can also be present with it. We can be aware. We can be self-loving. And, you know, being vulnerable to sit with these feelings. And then from the vulnerability of the presence. You know, the stamina and the buoyancy isn't as far away. And so, we all have our versions of this kind of stuff in our lives.
Pihkala: Yeah. Very much resonating with that. And in some of my work, four years ago, five years ago, the concept of hope was very central. But even then, my main angle into hope was meaning or meaningfulness. And I think that the issue of stamina is very closely related to that. And, of course, you know, if we talk about those dark moods, where you don't go for self-immolation as a political act, but getting into danger of self-harming behaviors. Then having some kind of meaning or experiencing enough meaning in your life can be even life-saving.
But, of course, that's not just continuing a feeling of always feeling meaningfulness; sometimes it really requires stamina. And sort of walking on. And meaning will present itself. But lots of social support is also needed. So, again, this is not the sort of heroic individual task. Even though the individuals can do many things. But a communal task of also providing support for each other. Clinging onto meaning. Some of the best existential literature in the 20th century, for example, has been written in very dark circumstances. And still the folks like Viktor Frankl explicitly talk about meaning.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, we didn't chat about this, Panu. But I was reading about the Zen Peacekeeper movements. And they have their three tenants of [1] not knowing, letting go of fixed ideas about yourself and the world and the universe and [2] bearing witness to the joy and suffering of the world. And then, you know, [3] taking action that arises from this not knowing and this bearing witness. So again, there are people that have been doing this kind of work in various ways. And peacekeepers will go to different war zones. Or go to the sites from the Holocaust and sit and be present to bear witness. So there's a bearing witness. When in doubt, bear witness I would say. Bear witness to the thing and the actions will start to arise from the bearing witness. And from the not knowing.
It's interesting. This Bruegel painting that Sherrell talks about. And I was Googling a bunch of these Pieter Bruegel The Elder artworks from the 1500s. And might encourage listeners to Google some images because they're these elaborate paintings. But it gives us his image of life at all its varied complexities. That it's happening. The teeming multitude of life and activities.
I think that can also bring us to the present moment. And to the news that's in our town. And that's in our community right around us. Because like, as I say, when we get too caught up in the electronic media news, we actually don't know what's going on right around us. And that leads to that isolation. And that anomie. And sense of existential despair. But, you know, the world is happening all around us.
I know we've got to close out this particular talk. The world's happening all around. The listeners, you know, who are in their lives. I'm just starting my day here. Panu, you're finishing your day in Finland. You had shared with me an interesting word earlier, Panu. Another great Finnish word. Communal work. And it was coming up around your life. Do you want to share a little bit about that for the listeners?
Pihkala: Yeah, it's part of this great fabric of life seen in the Bruegel paintings, for example. And this word in Finnish, talkoot, means that you get together with others—You don't get paid for the work, but you do something for the common good. One might say, it might be related in the earlier times, to the needs of one farm. For example, the need to build a roof together. The single family just couldn't do it. So the system was that you offered people some food and drink and then people came together and did the work. And, of course, that then led to reciprocity. People helping each other out. And well, the 21th century has sometimes been hard on this culture of talkoot. But luckily it still exists.
And in the place where I'm living, there’s today these “yard talkoot”, “pihatalkoot” now. Which is a tradition that inhabitants come together outside. And, you know, raking the fallen leaves. We don't rake our forests, contrary to some misguided political opinions. But we do rake our yards. And then there's some grilling of sausages. They even have vegan sausages so our kids can eat it also. And doing sort of maintenance things that need to be done. So there's this very nice social element also of socializing and having fun together. So that's a good antidote to spendings hours reading about these subjects.
Doherty: Yeah. And it's all the one. Right, Panu? I mean your job is to sit with this. And work on this. And also you have a family. And they're somewhere nearby. Where you are people are raking and children are running around and food is being prepared for the community. When we have that energy, you know, in the US with community cleanups and various things. And, again, that's a piece of this that we need to add to our mix as we sit with all of this heavy stuff.
So, you know, reconnecting with life in various forms. So yes, you know, I definitely have a lot of respect for Wynn Bruce and David Buckel and their family and their friends. And we're doing this episode out of respect for them. And not knowing the whole story. And just bearing witness, you know, to this. Bearing witness to these events.
You know, we're inadequate, but we're not guilty of a conspiracy of silence. And I feel really good about that. We're not being silent and we're not splitting. Yes, Panu well enjoy the evening there in Finland. And I hope that you can get your back into the work outside. And help out with people. With all the raking and the yard work. Or enjoy some time with your children and your family and your community this evening.
Pihkala: Thank you, Thomas. I hope you have a nice work day ahead of you. And your daughter is also coming home at some point in the afternoon. And also for all you listeners to take care. In this time we spend the great fabric of life shows many colors. Doherty: Yes, it's strained and worn, but it's also beautiful. So we'll end today. Climate Change and Happiness. You can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. We're producing episodes every two weeks. And we really enjoy your presence. And we wish you all well. Take care.
Season 1, Episode 10: In Praise of Cynicism
May 13, 2022
Dark times for dark emotions. In this episode recorded near the end of 2021, Thomas and Panu open the door to the feeling of cynicism and its “friends” apathy, shame, melancholia, “learned helplessness” disillusionment, and misanthropy [dislike of humankind]. They discuss how to be compassionate to ourselves and accept these feelings as inevitable reactions during our current political and environmental crises. They explore cynicism as a way of being realistic about the world, as a protective feeling or style, and from a philosophical perspective as living well in difficult situations, eschewing the trappings of the world and seeking one’s own path of virtue. Thomas discusses how his misanthropy tends to be directed at unjust human systems rather than human nature. Panu highlights a number of thinkers and artists that offer ways to understand and work through our doubt and despair. Is it possible to discover a “post-cynical” position in our deep adaptation to climate change? What is the role of self-sacrifice as an option? Listen in and see what you feel and think.
Note: This episode is a lead-in to a frank discussion of the actions of Wynn Bruce and David Buckel coming in Episode 11.
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. The show for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change, and the personal side of climate change: Emotional responses and feelings and how this lands in our hearts and in our bodies as well as in our minds. And for Panu and I, we're recording this [episode] toward the solstice time of the year [2021] in the northern hemisphere. Although you might be listening to this later.
Anyway, Panu, … this is an episode I'm looking forward to. This cynicism episode. “In praise of cynicism.” I tend to joke that I am a cynical person. And I know many of our listeners might consider themselves to be cynical in various ways too. And so I wanted to surface this in our discussion about climate feelings and climate emotions. So I want to open the door and have cynicism and all its cousins and friends — apathy and misanthropy — We're going to have a party with these feelings. And I'm gonna bring them in and talk about them a little bit. In a compassionate and in a healthy way, I think. So, I know you and I've chatted a little bit, but where does this go for you Panu?
Pihkala: Yeah. That's very suitable for the season. You know, [a] dark feelings special episode. It's been very dark physically in Helsinki, during the last week. So [I’m] really looking forward for the solstice. And this ties in with my work, also. In the Finnish book about eco emotions that I published in 2019, I have a section about these sorts of dark and malevolent feelings. And that's something that I very rarely talk about because it's such a topic that usually nobody wants to really talk about it. So this gives an opportunity for that.
Doherty: Yeah. And listeners can help with different words in languages outside of English for cynicism and misanthropy. Because I know, there are concepts in many cultures. All of my searching seemed to lead me back to the Greeks, of course. The Greeks and the Romans. You know, so we've got cynicism as a general belief that people are selfish and dishonest. You know, is a common way of thinking about it. And, you know, I think sometimes that's being realistic about the world. And being open to this as [an] expectable response given how things are going in the world.
But of course, there's that deeper philosophical piece about living well in difficult situations. And eschewing the trappings of the world. And going toward virtue. So within cynicism, there's this more virtuous core. So we might talk about that. But yeah, what comes up for you personally? What concepts or personal feelings come up around, cynicism, and some of these feelings?
Pihkala: Yeah. that's kyynisyys in [the] Finnish language. So that also comes from the Greek. And it reminds me of the philosophical stuff, also. And some of the great novels, both in world literature and in Finnish literature. We have a very prominent 20th century writer called Mika Waltari. Many of his historical novels have actually been translated into many languages, including English. The Egyptian [was] made into a Hollywood movie even way back in the 50s, or 60s. And those are interesting because he read a lot of philosophy. And it's often characters who really go out and see the world and encounter all kinds of suffering and joy and all the shades of life. And there's deep engagement with cynicism in those books. And I read a lot of them during my high school years. So that's been [a] foundational influence for me.
But in the ecological crisis and climate crisis, of course, this brings up the whole question about despair, for example. And so-called apathy. Is it really apathy? Or is it masking deep suffering that people are experiencing? Joanna Macy the ecopsychologist has written about this. And Renée Lertzman, also, with her concept of “environmental melancholia”. I think it's a really important topic. And also a complex one. So what one sees on people's faces and bodies may not be the whole set of emotions that they have.
Doherty: Yeah, so let's just flag some of these things for now. Or for later. You know, this idea of - Kari Norgaard is another person that's written around socialized denial. Renée Lertzman and Joanna Macy. So yeah, there's the idea that there's more under the surface. There's a potential “learned helplessness” phenomenon – where people become apathetic because they have no options. And it's a poignant story, the learned helplessness research, where they'd have, you know, dogs, you know, in some sort of laboratory where they would get shocks. And they wouldn't be able to resist and leave from getting the shocks. And so they would eventually just lay down and endure the shocks, you know. And that's where that, you know, that's a kind of barbaric kind of research that I hope isn't happening right now. But I think we feel that way. I think sometimes. And I know some of our listeners do. I know I have felt that way sometimes. You just kind of lay down and endure.
So anyway, the point being is there's a lot under this. So it isn't necessarily what we think. I have to say I embrace, I mean, I feel like I was born cynical. Or I grew up cynical. I think about where I was from, Buffalo, New York. Which is kind of what we call in the US, a “rust belt” kind of town. You know, an old city that was really great in the past. And when I grew up in the 70s and 80s, it was pretty dark times for that city. There was not much economic growth. They had not yet learned to celebrate their architecture and all their history. So it was just a lot of rusting kind of buildings and hulks of old steel plants and things like that. My family background is working class. And so I think, you know, one of the catchphrases was “City of No Illusions” is what they call Buffalo. So I had that coming in.
And then of course, I had my own family dynamics. You know, my parents had a tough marriage. And [it] wasn't very happy. And we had alcoholism and stuff like that. So I was kind of primed for a cynical outlook. So in many ways, as an adult, I've kind of learned to be “post-cynical” a bit. You know, like, I'm still alive. So what's left. I might as well try some other things. And then growing up in the 80s, you know, right in the Reagan Era. And the Sex Pistols were teaching me, that there was “no future,” you know. So I had a very much of that kind of 1984 thing growing up. So anyway, every generation has their kind of their stamp. And then our personal family, you know. And even our psychology and our neuropsychology. We've talked a little bit about seasonal depression, and you know, having low mood during the season. So -
Pihkala: Yeah, that's interesting to hear, Thomas. Thanks for sharing. I didn't know the Buffalo part. And I can imagine the sort of disillusionment. That's one emotion word that I've been exploring in relation to the ecological crisis also. And we've often been including some special words of the day. And perhaps the old word of “ressentiment.” Resentment almost, but written slightly different[ly]. That could be one because in many uses that refers to periods where people think that there is not going to be progress. And the past appears as more golden than the future. And it's difficult during those times.
The concept of ressentiment is linked with 1920s Germany, for example. And then it can of course, give rise to many sorts of social troubles that happened during that time. Some of the psychosocial climate scholars. I don't want to get too academic here. But Nadine Andrews and Paul Hoggett have been writing about this threat in relation to the climate crisis. Because if it starts to happen that there's more and more economic troubles also, because of the pressures given by the limits imposed on us by the more than human world, it may be that these feelings of disillusionment start to spread in many places. And I think there are already signs of that in many areas.
Doherty: Yeah. I'm searching for the title of a book I saw in MIT Press. It was - I'll see if I can find it. It was roughly about “how bad can it get,” I think that is the title.
So looming around our feeling discussion is a context of this ressentiment and how it informed past cultures. Certainly in the US there's a strong strain of this. And so we've got a context to our feelings. They don't exist in isolation from the world. So there's that ecology. We are part of the world. There is that inter being. So, you know, again, underneath this, there are these kind of beautiful things that we're all connected. And, you know, these are real, real feelings. Yeah. And, you know, there's different species of this. You know, I was getting into the whole idea of misanthropy and sort of either hating humans or negative views toward humans. And I think we need to air that a little bit. That's kind of a taboo-ish topic in some areas. But, you know, it's again, how could we not have some of this, you know, concerns about human behavior, and quote, unquote, "human nature".
But I think personally, it's really more around the human systems that we have created that are not [just]. None of the systems that we have came from magic. They all were created by people and they can be changed. So I think when we get into a bad system, that's where it brings out the worst in people. So my misanthropy is around human systems personally. And some of the things that we create. That's how I come at it versus internal to the people. Because I know there's good people. I've met good people, even in bad systems.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. I very much resonate with that. And, of course, there's a certain path dependency here. That if you and your group go down a certain road far enough, then it easily becomes sort of self-enhancing. But I really also emphasize this structural dimension around these issues. And related to so-called environmentalism, which is, of course, a tricky thing that in public discourse, it sometimes gets portrayed as an identity group. Even though a vast number of people [are] interested about what we call environmental values. But the discourse about whether environmentalists are misanthropic that's, of course, a very old or discourse also. And it's been quite prominent in Finland, too. We have some special figures in Finnish environmentalism who have sometimes had quite misanthropic views. And then it's been lots of debates and so on.
One interesting thing about that is that sometimes in the behind is such strong caring and love for the more-than-human world, that it then becomes so difficult to see those places and creatures damaged or destroyed. And that sort of then leads to some misanthropic comments which may not be completely logical, either. That was also seen in some of these Finnish environmentalists, like Pentti Linkola, for example. So then bitterness and being hurt are some of the emotional tones behind something some misanthropic environmentalist comments, I think.
Doherty: Yeah. And I think we need to open our hearts and bring this stuff in. I know. I think it's a developmental task for us to go through these feelings. I know when I was younger, I wrestled with all of these things too. And is it worth living? Is it worth adding to the problems?
I was talking to a young man recently in my psychology work who said something very poignant. He's involved in the Sunrise Movement and climate work and various other things. And really struggling with bringing out his views. And how that might affect his relationships with his family around some areas. And, you know, I made a reference to that, well, there's landmines in every direction, no matter what direction you go, there are these. And he said something along the lines of well, the best path is the one that destroys myself or something like that. You know, in the sense that he was really thinking that it would be safest just to destroy himself, you know, than to destroy his family relationships or these other things. So really, we take this in and we sometimes come to even a sacrifice, a self-sacrifice level here.
Pihkala: Thanks for sharing and sharing that. I know that's very important for many people. And while I'm not a therapist, I've met in workshops some young people who have roughly similar takes on life. And [are] feeling those pressures. And it seems that it can be linked with feelings of shame also. And the so-called species shame is one dimension of this. Tim Jensen, in his book about Ecologies of Guilt in Environmental Rhetorics, discusses these for example. And the troubling questions related to what humanity is doing. And then the possibility to feel a sort of species level shame. Which then can lead also to self-loathing, and sometimes even in self-harming behavior. And that's been an important point for me. I often emphasize that what we call eco-anxiety is fundamentally very adaptive, because it shows that people are paying attention to what's happening in the world. And there's motivation to do something for the problems. But of course, one part of this broad spectrum is self-harming and even self-destructive behavior. So it can kind of get really hard.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, and let's stay with this. If you're listening, you know, these are heavy topics. But we can bear these. That's the thing. That we can take these in, because, you know, we're humans. And we can know what other humans feel. And we, you know, we can bring these into our hearts. And we don't have to be collapsed by them. You know, we can have [the] capacity to take these in a little bit.
I mean, obviously, you know, this goes in many, many directions. As I've mentioned, you know, in our conversations, how, you know, opening to different ways that people approach climate change. There's the “deep adaptation” group. And the “dark mountain” group. And the various people that are embracing different forms of just, “let's be open about the reality of this.” And the darkness. And, you know, I come back to, you know, when I'm teaching or when I'm advising counselors or whatever. You know, one way to think about it is three basic tasks here with this environmental stuff. There's expression, description and prescription right? There's how do I feel about it? How do I understand it? And what should we do about it? And so we're really [in this podcast] in the how do I feel about it? And that's an open territory. And so we want to bring in people. Then when you can, you know, and our descriptions obviously often are, you know, related to how we feel about things. So people are going to describe things differently. But, you know, we want to work together. We want to support each other.
Pihkala: Exactly. And trying to avoid overly binary interpretations. Even though that's a very human temptation in distressing times, this phenomenon, which is sometimes called hopium or reverse hopium. Referring to the pressure to either cling on to optimism, or then clinging on to very strong collapse beliefs, for example. Believing that in the next couple of years, it will all go down. Which is not very science-based either. Then there are difficult questions to be discussed in relation to scientific estimates and various downfalls or collapses and that sort of thing. But anyway, sometimes it's easy to see catastrophizing in these narratives.
Doherty: So Panu, “hopium.” Is that the term that you used? Hopium? Like opium?
Pihkala: Yeah. I don't know who first came up with it. It's playing with this term related to a drug and, for example, Jack Adam Weber from the West Coast of the US is using both of these terms to refer to the temptation of either strong optimism or strong collapse beliefs.
Doherty: Okay. I've never heard that term before. So that's a new one. Hopium or reverse hopium.
Pihkala: Reverse hopium.
Doherty: Yeah. So yeah, we get these terms. Schadenfreude. You know, this idea of, you know, and then you have this cassandrafreude. You know, like “I told you so.” You know, so people feel that - so we feel a lot of these kinds of things.
Pihkala: Yeah, that's true. And in a manuscript that I'm hoping to get published soon [note: published in Jan 2022 as Toward a Taxonomy of Climate Emotions], I'm discussing various climate emotions and feelings, and schadenfreude as one of them. You know, this joy when something goes down with some other with whom you have a special [envious or hateful] relationship. And there's been discussion about American politics and certain divides. And for example, certain feelings of schadenfreude that people may have in relation to climate issues. And that, of course, can be quite toxic.
Doherty: Yeah. And there is some joy. And when some aspect of a negative system tends to go down. Or there was almost a relief, I think, in some forms during the pandemic. The early height of the pandemic, when things were shut down, in some ways. I don't want to get too superficial about the pandemic. But yeah, there were certain parts of it that, you know, I know, people felt things were simplified. And it was easier. And there were no planes in the sky. It was a quiet, beautiful sky. And there were a lot of things there. So again, these are all feelings that we want to just open up to. And recognize in other people. We don't have to agree with them. We don't have to, you know, feel them all ourselves, but they are a part of the situation.
And again, I was talking to another person — another in my psychology work. He was bemoaning the fact that, you know, people aren't taking more action around climate change. And he was comparing this to World War II in the United States when people were really motivated to recycle. And to conserve. And to do Victory Gardens. Their own gardens to grow their own food to support the war effort. And he was bemoaning the fact that people don't do that now. And that, again, was a lead into that cynicism and misanthropy that people are lazy. Or, you know, consumerism and things. But I had to really think that, you know, during World War II, the government here in the US was mobilized. And was mobilizing the entire economy to address this. Changing all the car factories to make airplanes. And, you know, so the government was mobilized. And on top of that had asked people to do more. Asked people to go an extra mile. That's not what we've been seeing in the US. The government has not been mobilized. It's been sort of shifted to the individuals. And so it's not necessarily a good comparison in some way. So that brings me back to my systems piece here. You know, don't blame the victim. You know, don't blame the victim of the people. That's just my personal [opinion].
Pihkala: Yeah. I've often been saying to people that one of the complexities of the situation is that we are kind of [both] victims and perpetrators. All of us in various proportions. But the problems are structural. So I very much resonate with your concept of climate hostages. Thomas, for example.
Doherty: Yes. Yeah.
Pihkala: Then, for me, it seems that if we go very far into either end of this. You know, having just a victim position, or just a guilty perpetrator position, then we end up into even bigger trouble. Of course, one's social and economic context shapes very much the situation. But speaking about, for example, roughly middle class people in industrialized countries, I think it's important to avoid both of the extreme ends.
Doherty: Yes, exactly. Exactly. And, you know, in my work that I know, you're involved in around training counselors, I know, we talked about the front line. And there's a front line of action that people have to decide where they want to place themselves in terms of taking action. In this case, for some people, apathy is not an option. You know, it's a luxury that they can't afford to have. Because they are on the front line every day. And so that's where I think we get some of that kind of middle class or American, you know, upper class shaming. Like, well, you can afford to be apathetic, but I'm just surviving here.
So, but yes, there are people that are listening that are on the front lines that are acting and they have no choice. You know, as I say, you know, “some are born on the front lines. Some achieve the front lines. And some have the front lines thrust upon them,” to paraphrase Shakespeare. But, you know, so there's people out there that are like, okay, sure, you can sit somewhere and be apathetic, but I'm out there right now, making a difference. Because I have no choice. It's my own survival. My family. My community. So again, that's another energy to tap into here.
Pihkala: Exactly. And there's [a] real reason for bitterness, for many people. And then it goes to sort of existential and spiritual matters also. And those very deeply human tasks. Are we able to avoid the worst in us even in very troublesome conditions? And I think there's lots of compassion and human understanding needed. And then very strong voices coming from places of suffering, where they also see the task of humanity to try and to not become too toxic, even though the situations can be very horrible.
Doherty: Yeah. And I just want to, you know, we won't get into it today. But, you know, we've been talking to people like, Jade Sasser and Britt Wray about people's, you know, thoughts about having children. And that's an angle on this. And the idea should we bring in new people into the world? And that's something that people, you know, wrestle with, regarding some of these issues. And we've got some other programming that we're getting at that.
And then, of course, the spiritual piece about for listeners that have more of a, either a stoic outlook or a Buddhist outlook. You know, there's the idea that, you know, we try to work on our virtue and despite whatever the situation is. You know, I don't know a lot. I mean, I'm no expert on Buddhism myself. I mean, I'm inspired by these ideas, but the idea of a bodhisattva. You know, the idea that I know how difficult the world is and I am enlightened. But then I choose to go into it. I choose to come back into it to help others. And to help in the liberation of other beings. So I think there's a — I know, that's some piece of that helps to buoy me. You know, that I'm still alive. You know, it's like the old Monty Python [comedy routine], you know, “I'm not dead yet.” You know, and so, I'm still here. You know, I've been through this Sex Pistols of the no future phase for a long time. What's left here?
Pihkala: Yeah, that reminds me of a great European movie from the Polish [film] director Krzysztof Kieślowski. He's got these films, Three Colors. Trois couleurs. Where the main idea in the second film is that a person has become so pessimistic and despairing that he wants to die. And asks his friend to do that. But this is sort of spoiling - sorry for this for that — but in the end the friend fires a gun with a bit of false bullets. And so the man really thinks that he's gonna die. But then when he doesn't, he ends up realizing the existential value of life. It ends with celebrating. That's one one take on the sort of ancient ancient issue on despair and pessimism and still finding life valuable in the midst of that. So opposing nihilism, but being very honest and open about despair and even hopelessness at points. I think that's very important.
Doherty: Yeah. And so I think we have both characters, you know, inside ourselves. You know, all the time. Yeah. And then, as we move toward the end, you had a thought about a person that we tend to refer to a lot. Tim Lomas. And some of his work on happiness and cross cultural, you know, words. But I'm trying to get my head around this idea of the good side of envy. Could you say more about that?
Pihkala: Yeah. Lomas's book called The Positive Power of Negative Emotions is a very interesting read. And I liked the way that Lomas categorizes two kinds of envy. There's the vicious one, where you sort of want to take from somebody something. And then there's what he calls empathetic envy, which comes close to admiration. And goes to the constructive potentials in envy.
So this idea of trying to stay open to the various emotions and feelings we have, even though they may be on the dark side. Something that our societies and ourselves wouldn't like to accept in ourselves. But if we can encounter them, then there's also the possibility to try to work so that we could channel them constructively. For example, try to modify our envy into a more empathetic envy and admiration side. And that's, of course, one force that has really led things forward in the world. Even environmental matters. You know, there's lots of people in Finland who are complaining about climate matters. But then, when your neighbor installs solar panels, and says how much money he saved, then there's quickly spreading of panels on the neighborhood.
Doherty: Yeah. So again, we can play around these emotions. They have kind of shadow sides. And also odd sides. Unexpected sides. I think that's a good exercise for me. And I'm going to try that today. Is to think about people that I do respect and admire. And see about having some of themselves in my psyche. And I might encourage our listeners to think about that as well.
Yeah, we've got to wrap up here in a moment. I am going to deepen in some poems, as well for my therapy training group around arts. And I've got this poem by Theodore Roethke. In a Dark Time. Which is something that [I] was thinking about for today. You know, and he has some beautiful lines about “in a dark time, the eye begins to see.” You know, “I meet my shadow in the deepening shade.” He has some beautiful lines. “What's madness but nobility of soul at odds with circumstance.” He says “the day is on fire. I know the purity of pure despair, my shadow pinned against the sweating wall, the place among the rocks, is it a cave or a winding path? The edge is what I have.” You know, he has some of these great lines in the poem. I'll share the poem with you. And we'll put it in a link. But, you know, so I think we want to express this stuff. And, you know, bring it in, and remember that there's more to the story.
Pihkala: Exactly. I'm gonna look at that poem. Thanks for sharing. And thanks to all the listeners for being with us on this sort of journey during dark times; the souls descend in the terrain of many dark emotional tones, which then may have some secrets in them.
Doherty: So it's either a cave or a winding path. I'm not sure. And you can help - we can all help decide about that. So, Panu, good luck with your coping with the darkness here in Finland. And I'll do the same.
Pihkala: Thank you.
Doherty: And I'll talk to you again soon. Take care everyone. Pihkala: Take care.
Season 1, Episode 9: Finding Meaning in “Generation Dread” with Guest Britt Wray
Apr 29, 2022
Season 1, Episode 9 | Finding Meaning in “Generation Dread” with Guest Britt Wray
This episode is part two of Climate Change and Happiness’s series focusing on childbearing decisions in a time of climate disruption. Science journalist and Gen Dread creator Britt Wray joins Thomas and Panu. Britt describes her “long and winding road” through climate emotions, inspired by her own journey toward having a child. She and Panu reminisce about their earlier conversations about grief and survivorship when Britt was beginning her research. Britt notes her personal shift from “asking is it okay to have a child, to what's required to have a child today? How do we support children in this world?” Thomas noted how Britt’s public exploration of her parenting decisions through her Gen Dread newsletter has filled a void for prospective parents as therapists and mental health continue to become schooled in addressing climate concerns. Wray offers a look into her forthcoming book Generation Dreadthat compiles her insights about coping and meaning-making amid the climate crisis. Britt reminds us that making decisions about having a child, or not, does not mean that feelings about the climate crisis fade away, and she normalizes how we all can find ourselves toggling between “disaster mode” and quiet contemplation of the cosmos. Join us for a rich and intimate conversation.
Season 1, Episode 9: Finding Meaning in “Generation Dread” with Guest Britt Wray
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. This is a podcast for people around the globe who are thinking and feeling deeply about climate change. The personal side of climate change. Particularly their emotional responses. And today we have a guest.
Britt Wray: Hi, I'm Britt Wray.
Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Britt. We are very glad that you found the time to come to talk with us. We have a certain history over the last couple of years. You and I have been talking about climate emotions and eco anxiety and other stuff several times. And it's been really exciting to follow both the development of your soon coming new book. And, of course, the great newsletter, Gen Dread, that you've been running. So there's plenty of things to talk about related to the topics of our podcast. Which is really about living in the times of the climate crisis and the ecological crisis. But how would you like to describe the standpoint where you're coming [from] Britt? I know plenty of that, but what would you like to share for the beginners?
Wray: Sure. Thanks, Panu. It's true. We met a few years ago now. Due to this work that overlaps, I actually reached out to both of you, both Thomas and Panu, for early interviews in my research for this book I have coming out. Generation Dread. Which is about the psychological underpinnings and impacts and disturbances emotionally that the climate crisis is setting into our lives in different ways – depending on who we are and how we're being exposed to it.
And I was drawn to do this work because of my own experience with really intense eco anxiety that set in several years ago, 2017-ish when my partner and I started having conversations about trying to get pregnant. And, of course, the climate crisis was nothing new to me. I had studied conservation biology in my undergrad. I had written a book about technologies to try and lessen the blow of the biodiversity crisis. I was very much on the environmental beat. But this dilemma of whether or not we [should] have a child really burst through any defenses I had left for feeling somewhat comfortable in the climate crisis.
And [it] became an existential emotional issue. Because the question of whether or not you're going to bring life into the world is of that nature, right? Especially life. A person who's not asking to be here and doesn't need to be here. And you're signing them up to witness ecological decline for the rest of their days on this planet.
And at the time, I felt very alone in those feelings. I didn't see them reflected by anyone around me. It was before this became a huge talking point as it is now. Where we've gotten op-eds about it in all the major newspapers. And we've got polls and surveys from researchers looking into this phenomenon. Then, I felt abject and deviant and strange for even connecting the climate crisis to my reproductive decision making, which made it [a] more difficult experience for me — But also something I was fascinated by and curious about.
And I thought, okay, if I'm now feeling waves of grief and anxiety, but also a lot of rage. Rage at the idea that the situation has become so bad that people in my generation have to bear the cost of not getting to know our own children. Because of [the] inaction of leaders and people put in power, who are supposed to protect us and make the future a livable place. Wow! What else is this doing to people? And people who are not as privileged and protected as me? — And are much more exposed to the direct effects already. I mean, how is this shaking down?
And I started to turn over the stones as a science communicator, because that's what I am. A science writer and broadcaster. And then I realized, oh, that's one tiny sliver of the emotional impact that the planetary health crisis is having on people. And we need to talk about this more. And so that's why I came to interview both of you and many, many others from a variety of fields. And develop a sense of how we can cope as individuals with all of this. But also come together collectively in a way of injecting our consciousness with new forms of stability and resilience and awareness for being at this time. And working collectively to try and create a better future than we otherwise expect.
So, I want to thank you both for being people out there, I could go to at that time who were already thinking about this. And, as you know, the topic has just exploded in the years since then. It's been pretty incredible to watch the relevance among the public at large spike, which we wish it wouldn't have to. But at the same time, there's a lot of momentum around understanding these emotions now, which I think is ultimately a really good thing.
Doherty: Yeah. Well, that's really well said, Britt. I mean, I was talking to a client I'm working with who's a climate change person [who] has also been doing this for years. And we were saying, you know, some folks have been in the auditorium for a long time working on this stuff, but it's a big auditorium. And now suddenly, the seats are starting to fill. You know, there's other people coming in. And so, yeah, it is .. realizing that even though we're kind of pathfinders, you know, there's a lot of people just coming on to the scene.
So I wonder, … do you chart a developmental course for yourself, even since this project? You must have come a long way personally, you know, in your thinking. I think that could be one thing we could talk about is how this project changed you. Or what you discovered. It was kind of like a rite of passage or a heroine's journey or something, right? Because I know you've had, do you have a — I don't know much about your family now. We could talk about our families too. … How do you think the project has changed you or what have been some insights, you know, that made you a better person?
Wray: It's been pretty dramatic. In terms of how writing this book has changed my life. It was - now I understand why writers say you should write from pain. You know, you should spin it out into something that you transform into beauty. And that it's this just drive within you that can give a lot. But you really go into the bottom of the U shaped curve.
I think writing the book both made me more terrified, depressed, enraged, anxious than I've ever been in my life. But also, as it broke my heart open, it also healed it. And brought me the most robust and radical forms of coping. And transforming myself into a better way of being able to deal with what's going on than I could have possibly thought of accessing before. So it holds that tension. But really, by exploring the existential fears and insecurities of many different people through the book, and reflecting on my own situation. That insight. The urgency. It really, you know, there's a moral clarity involved with paying attention to these issues, which is incredibly motivating and purposeful. And it gives a lot of meaning.
It's a meaning focused coping approach. And it brushes the bullshit aside in terms of other distractions. And things to spend one's time and energies on. And then you start getting on that soul level with other people. And meeting them. Being able to stand in the fire with them on issues that are so important. And that they might not feel like they have people to talk to about. Which then becomes this kind of social glue for repairing the social fabric in an amazingly potent way. And that injected my work with new meaning.
I realized, okay, there's a lot of people hurting out there. There's a lot of people at a loss for how to handle these emotions. We need to pay attention to how we are supporting each other and ourselves with this, so that we don't maladaptively cope. So that we don't fall into immobilizing forms of paralysis around the crisis. So that we don't, you know, ascribe to doomism, and believe it's too late to make any actions that could make a difference and be worthwhile. But that are motivating and strengthening and ways of finding new forms of connection and trust within the human species for being here at this time. I mean, all these really, it sounds so grandiose, but really, that's what this crisis does to you.
And, all of that was incredibly powerful for me such that I just finished my PhD in a totally different subject. In science communication with a focus on synthetic biology. Newly minted doctorate. Dropped that. Abandoned that. Moved into this field as a non clinician, non psychologist, non psychiatrist. You know, but did the grunt work to basically try and get another PhD level of knowledge in it. And then eventually be able to apply to do this postdoc I'm now doing at Stanford University in the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine where I research the mental health impacts of the climate crisis on emerging adults. So that I can, you know, try and contribute with all the amazing people who are doing this work now to create mental health protection and promotion strategies for this globally distributed vulnerable population that we know is feeling really anxious about the climate crisis in ways that are debilitating for many.
And then also, through finding the coping mechanisms with my research, I was able to no longer be so rattled. Not, you know, have these over-pourings of dark visions about everything that were rubbing off on the people around me, like my partner, for example. I just, I had found myself in a place where I couldn't talk about the future without overlaying a filter of apocalyptic possibility. And, you know, so I needed to find my balance. I needed to make meaning from what's going on. And I did so in a way that the original dilemma that got me into this feeling like oh, my gosh, I can't bring a kid into the situation, no longer at all became my story.
And I shifted from asking is it okay to have a child to what's required to have a child today? How do we support children in this world?And I now have a six month old who brings me tons of joy. So that wouldn't have happened without the book, I don't think. And without making new colleagues like you, and so many others that are creating avenues of radical hope in this situation. And, yeah, so long windy answer to your question. I think it changed me personally, and my family and professionally in terms of what I'm not focused on.
Pihkala: Thanks so much, Britt, for sharing that. That's very rich and profound. And [a] long and winding road might be a very apt metaphor. And what I hear you describe is a sort of existential process or a process of transformation. And, of course, I'm very glad about the end results. That after what I reckon, are many fluctuations along the way and many curves on the road. You've reached better coping skills and social connections and sort of giving yourself permission to feel all kinds of feelings. That's what this podcast is also, much about.
And then the child is here, too, which is a great source of gladness. And there's so many things to discuss here. But one that I want to ask because it's close to myself, also. I did this book about eco anxiety and hope in Finnish in 2017. And that got me into a lot of media stuff in Finland. I do remember those times that it's sometimes tricky that sort of people are looking up to you. That what should we do about this thing? And it's so huge and complex. And did you ever have, you know, feelings of the so-called impostor syndrome, or that kind of? How did you manage that part of the process where many people started asking you about what should we do about this?
Wray: Oh, gosh, yeah. That's just a normal part of my reality now. Because, you know, I have a newsletter, which explores these topics, much like your podcast does. And I have really engaged [with] readers who are amazing. And sometimes my inbox gets filled with their nightmares, you know. And holding that in a way that is supportive and containing for others, but also recognizing I'm in the crisis too. And I don't have the solutions. I have offerings of things that have worked for me and others that they can try, but it's also a gentle walk, because I'm not a clinician. And I'm not supposed to be giving advice. So doing that in a way that's professionally responsible around those items, but still seeing them as a kindred spirit. And understanding where they are and knowing what it feels like. And that they need to know they're not alone. And find that connection. And some ideas for coping in a peer support way is something that confronts me with those feelings of I can't take away your pain, you know.
But it tips over into some especially dangerous territory when I get young people writing me who are clearly suicidal around the climate crisis. Then I have to be extremely careful. And I refer to my clinical colleagues in those instances on how to best direct them in what fashion. But yeah, it's a lot. I mean, it's heavy. And this is the kind of work that I know a lot of climate aware therapists have to do. It's special in the sense that you have to process your own attachment to the source of the strain that they're experiencing and communicating to you. Because this is a universal problem.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: How does that sound to you, Thomas, as a climate therapist?
Doherty: Yeah. I'm very mindful of all this as we're talking. I mean, I just want to say, thanks, Britt. I really appreciate your work. You know, I mean, your work fills a void. It just fills a void for people. I mean the way our system works in society, therapists and mental health people aren't necessarily - they aren't, they haven't been trained to work on these kinds of societal issues. It is new. And, you know, therapists aren't trained to have podcasts or newsletters or even any of that kind of stuff or do broad public education. And so there is a natural gap in our societal system for this kind of thing. I mean, the elephant in the room, of course, is leadership in society is not doing this.
I know, in Finland, where Panu lives, the government is actually thinking about eco anxiety and even doing programs from the top. But we at least in the United States don't have that structure, you know, at all. And so it's this void. And so people do feel like climate hostages. You know, we're kind of on a train or a boat, you know, A Titanic kind of steaming toward an iceberg. And whoever's up in the captain's chair doesn't seem to share our vision of what's going on. And so that's, yeah, it's inherently political. You know, for me, it comes down to environmental identity. That's where I go with the work is like. How does, you know, our angst is an invitation, you know, to think about ourselves in a new way. And remind ourselves about our values and who we are and our eco timeline. You know, our timeline of nature and the natural world and things like that.
Wray: Right.
Doherty: And it seems like what's happening, you know, with having a child. I mean, I have one daughter. She's 14. My wife and I were very mindful. My late wife. My wife died of breast cancer five years ago. So —
Wray
Sorry.
Doherty : You know, we had a lot of, yeah, we had a lot of, you know, we were very mindful about having a child. And, you know, Eva was born in our house. In a tub in our house in the same room that she lives in now. And she's healthy. And it's great. But yeah, we were also actively thinking about a second child. And really weighing all that sort of stuff. So I can identify with this.
But I think, you know, one of the psychology angles of this is that we have eco emotions, like values of nature. Like you were working on biodiversity. So clearly, you have a side of you, that's a value about nature and the larger natural system. And then we have our altruistic values, right? About other people and people that we want to help and protect. And then we have our own egocentric personal values about our own self. And I think that's what happens with having a child: it bumps us. If people already have eco values and altruistic values, they're kind of okay with that. But as soon as you want to have a child, it moves you into this very personal set of values and yourself and your ego, which can be problematic, because then it's like, is this for me? Is this for the world?
I mean it's hard to even describe, but I think you know where I'm going, right? Because if I'm selfless, what does it mean to be self full in terms of having a child and of course, that primal urge. You know, the primal urge that people feel to create a child is so - comes out of us.
Wray: Wow. Yeah.
Doherty: So, you know, we're moving from these big values with things outside of ourselves to things inside. So it's kind of neat.
Britt Wray: I love that way of framing it. Yeah, absolutely. I think you're right.
Pihkala: Do you want to share, Britt, some of the happenings since the child has been born? You can of course, choose the level of intimacy you want to engage with here. But especially regarding, you know, eco emotions and climate emotions. It's been, again, a sort of winding road with fluctuations. We have two children, so we know that there's so many things happening that there's sort of natural fluctuations happening also. So [do] you want to share something about?
Wray: Yeah. I mean, going through the pregnancy and birth while doing the work that I do and being keenly embedded in research around eco anxiety and other mental health impacts of climate change, gave me some insights into things I think we're going to need to be aware of for women going forward. And for young people becoming parents — well, for people becoming parents, who are, you know, awake to their ecological identity and feeling these pressures, but deciding to do it anyway.
When you choose a path at the fork in the road, and decide, if you had been reproductively ambivalent or anxious due to what's going on, okay, I'm up for it. That doesn't mean that all the feelings just naturally weigh away, you know. You're gonna have to learn how to toggle between your awareness that there's a big part of you that still thinks this is a bad idea. And the part of you that is convicted and resolved. And so that was apparent to me in the disaster prone summer of 2021 when I'm in my third trimester. And I've just gone home to Toronto to be able to be around family after not being there for two years in the pandemic. And at this moment of bringing more family into the world and, you know, wanting to be with them. And it was this time of horrific flooding. In many cities around the world, there were unbelievable wildfires.
Even Toronto, my hometown, which is never ever affected by wildfire smoke ever had become affected by wildfire smoke that blew in from the east. Given all the, you know, West Coast wildfires, but also there were some in Northwestern Ontario. And had given the sky this choked gray color such that the recommendations were that pregnant women shouldn't go outside.
I mean, it was unthinkable for someone from Toronto. And there I am, inside, not going out for several days in a row fielding questions from journalists who are reading my newspaper and freaking out because the heat dome just happened. And they're asking me questions like, how do you deal with a pervading sense of existential dread? How should my readers understand how to cope with feelings that it's too late? I've looked at my children this morning in the eyes, and I've realized that they might not get to live out a full human lifetime that I previously expected for them. You know, these kinds of questions were coming in on a daily basis.
I'm pregnant. I'm stuck inside. And I can feel my baby playing the drums on my insides. And all of that going on was just, wow. This is not how I pictured this going. Interesting. Okay, that's what it means to be working in this space. And, you know, fielding what's going on in the world around you. Especially because people - there are these spikes I noticed in the summers when all the disasters start happening. And a lot of people who previously feel like privileged and protected and away from it all get awoken to their existential terror. And start asking understandable questions. And they're coming from a very reactive place. And there's that terror that sets in.
And to just be — and I remember, I was going, I was at, I was in the maternal fetal clinic talking with the doctor. The news is on. There's like wildfires all over the news. I'm talking with the OBGYN. He's looking at me being like, man, I just feel so bad for all the kids that are being born today. And they're gonna have to live with this. I mean, well, isn't it just, it's awful, those poor kids. So by the way, let's take your latest test number on this thing we're here to run on. It was just like from every angle all the time, so strange.
So anyway, that's something that I just saw unfolding. And I think it's interesting for anyone else who was in my position, thinking about pregnancy that there, you know, it might be a bit rocky. And then, you know, our son actually had a very serious lung problem when he was born. And it sent us to the intensive care. And then the NICU is just such a stressful place. And so then it jolted me into oh my gosh, other existential feelings about the preciousness of life and this primal urge to make sure that our baby is okay. And going through that was incredible as well. And then learning how to have a healthy baby at home afterwards. It's just been, you know, hugely worldwidening in all the ways.
So, yeah. I don't know. This stuff just touches the marrow. And coming back from maternity leave to then go back into eco anxiety research, it all just feels interconnected on this deeper level about why we're here. What this is about. It's about protecting life, right? It's about trying to create joyful experiences for other people and yourself along the way and reduce suffering. And it's not easy work. And yeah, so I think that there's a lot of interesting research to be done around the mental health of women in the perinatal period that I know some people are doing. As it relates to climate anxiety.
Pihkala: Yeah, it's like literally inside you. And all these conditions that you so vividly described, sort of, you can't separate yourself from it. So that's very moving. And I think you're raising up a very crucial issue, which really needs to be talked about more. And “post traumatic growth” is one framework to use for these kinds of processes. Or the Robert J. Lifton's “Survivor Mission.” I know we, all three of us, have been engaging with Lifton. I think that's what you have the chance to do now. So you have survived this long and winding road. And as you described, even though for persons of much privilege, as we all three are, it may still not be easy. Far from it.
But coming to the last five minutes of our limited time, we'd be really interested to talk with you about the coping mechanisms a bit more. And your book highlights the role of meaning or even purpose as its existential thinking in this time. But would you like to share a bit more about what kind of things actually help you in this process?
Wray: Yeah. In terms of things that I can do alone that really helped me. That includes meditation, mindfulness practices, things to soothe the nervous system that I've learned from reading, or therapists telling me about it, as I've interviewed them for my book, for example. I certainly find the social connection piece to be the most important in terms of being able to find others to talk about the rawest emotions that you need to share. And making sure that there are mirrors in terms of those people legitimizing and validating what you're going through. And being able to bear it with you. It just relieves so much.
And so, you know, I've done groups like the Good Grief Network. And I have a really savvy, climate aware therapist, which is fantastic. And, you know, those kinds of places, because even my best friends and people I love who know me so well, they don't necessarily feel this. You know, they're not necessarily looking into the abyss of the climate crisis professionally all day.
And that's another thing, you know, that it rains down on everyone, potentially, but especially on those who are professionally committed to paying attention to this, right? Those formats have been able to really help me in times of, you know, when the distress becomes more significant.
Some other fun things have been like listening to podcasts, or audio books about the cosmos. About space. About the evolution of the universe. Because it points out how insignificant this moment is. And it's just a blip in this much larger mystery that we are, you know, rocketing through space on this planet. And it's just fascinating to be able to hold the tensions between all that we don't know and then all that we do know about this moment. And that can be very easing and calming, I find.
But then it's just, it's the simple stuff. It's hanging out with my family and having fun with my best friends and hugging my baby. And, you know, all those things that are restorative. But yeah, I think when I've been at my worst, the thing that has really rescued me has been meditation. Yeah.
Thomas Doherty: Yeah, this is great. This is really great. I think we can go a little longer today, maybe another, you know, five or 10 minutes just because we're in a really rich vein. And I do want to just bring in the listeners a little bit. People that have been listening along.
And it is true. I mean, these disasters are no longer distant right? In the past climate change, for most people anyway, around the planet. It was a distant issue. And, you know, these disasters are landing where we live. So we have these kinds of climate singularities where the disaster and the emotional - all the impacts are happening simultaneously. It's like a, you know, a mortar round that's landing close to you in, if you're living in Ukraine. You know, it's this is coming right at me now. And that itself is a rite of passage that people are going through around the globe. They're living through these disasters or the smoke. So it's just important too that we're all going to feel these things. I've felt it, you know, here in the Northwest. Panu's, you know, everybody around the world that's listening is going to be going through.
We're all having a rite of passage around this stuff. And the disasters are going to come and we'll be in disaster mode. And then we'll toggle back. And have a moment where we can contemplate the cosmos. And, you know, that expanding and contracting ability is really part of the long term, you know. We can't get into it here, but even the idea of perinatal women and just, you know, specialty and climate pregnancy, is a, there must be people starting to work on this substance. That that's a mission. That's one mission, you know, survivors.
Wray: There's a lab at Columbia [University] doing that now.
Thomas Doherty: Yeah. And that's a sign of the times.
Wray: It is.
Doherty: Which is the other piece too. We all have to realize there's so many gifted people doing great work all around the world. You know, there's a lot of people working on this kind of stuff. We're not alone at all, you know. And I think that's probably, at least for me, that's been an upside of this work is I meet all kinds of great people. Like, you know, like yourself, Britt and like Panu.
And Britt, I'm sure you've been in, you know, maybe toward the end, you know, of our talk, you know, in terms of our coping, there are moments, those moments of inspiration too. When we surrender into the struggle. And get into it. And go to the frontline. Or whatever our frontline is, we start to meet comrades, you know, and get inspired and surprised. We didn't even realize people were doing things that are really great.
Wray: Yeah.
Doherty: I imagine you must have been inspired and surprised by some people you've come across in your, in your newsletter, and in your, in your research.
Wray: Oh, my gosh. So many. So many. Yeah. Definitely. The ways that people are making sense of showing up at this time. And making sense of coping with the intensity of their emotions. If that's their way in. Yeah. I've been very surprised.
And it's, you know, there's a lot of attention put on young people right now. Around how exposed they are to the distress. And how it's impairing their ability to just get through the day. But there's a lot of older people who feel unheard. And who have been grieving for a long time, as they, you know, shake their head in disgust about the state of the planet that's being handed on to younger generations. And, you know, there's a lot of wisdom locked up in those elders who are awake and aware and emotionally engaged. But also strengthened through their years, you know. So I find that sometimes I get surprised by them the most.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks for sharing that, also. And with Thomas and guests, we've often been talking about the difficulties socially that this time and these very difficult emotions sometimes get us into. And the danger if there are sort of idealized responses in a sort of binary way. That there's only one good way and one bad way to do things in these times. And sometimes that gets into people's way, also. Between the generations I think.
Thomas Doherty: You know, climate cosmopolitanism. This idea that there's a lot of languages to learn. A lot of people to know. A lot of climate change cultures to dip into. And so I think Britt, you've - that's part of your journey too. You've become a climate world traveler, so to speak. Or climate cosmopolitan person. Talking to all these different people and tapping into all these different subcultures.
Wray: Thomas, you are great at creating new terminology on the fly. You've given us climate hostages.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah.
Wray: Which was so visual and apt. Now climate cosmopolitan, I love them. Yeah.
Doherty: Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. Well, yeah. That's about new languages. New words. And new and old feelings. Right? Some of these feelings are as old as time.
Wray: Right.
Doherty: That we're having. And then that comes back to the whole privilege piece. Right? You know, people have been —
Wray: Yeah.
Doherty: This is not the first time people have struggled about whether they should have a child or not. Obviously, in the history of humanity.
Wray: Goodness no.
Doherty: And so this is our particular version.
Wray: You know, and on that point, Panu, in one of our early interviews, you clarified for me so well, what was going on. When you said, you know, waking up to the climate and ecological crisis is particularly hard for citizens of industrialized nations who are living middle class lifestyles, because it makes them realize that the world is a far more tragic and fragile place than they were raised to believe it was.
And that fragmenting can become so severe that it's an internal shattering. And there is a lack of resilience based on one's experience to date that can come with that when one is super privileged and protected for dealing for confronting those kinds of existential feelings that are terrifying. Which is very different if you're coming from, you know, a post traumatic growth scenario where you faced serious adversity before. And it was just one of those things that really landed.
And, yes. You know, and this is also why we're noticing this particular issue being taken up frequently by, you know, middle class people. And it's obviously not the story for so many marginalized and oppressed communities. It's one more layer of difficulty on top of so much trauma. And so the ways in which language is wielded around why it's important will look different. And I've shared the - you're quoted in the intro to my book talking about this. And I think it's one of those lucid explanations that helps people see what's going on. And depending on who they are, why they are reacting or not reacting in certain ways. So. So yeah,
Pihkala: Thanks for that, Britt. Very good to hear. And this existential grief researcher Thomas Attig, has this phrasing of “relearning the world”. And that's something [that] I think applies for middle class. Or the privileged people like my background, also. So that's also been related to my personal history. And in your newsletter Gen Dread. There's a fabulous website. I warmly recommend people to go there and join. You've given very good space for a wide variety of views. And you've certainly had an aim and emphasis on giving voices to people who are not so often interviewed in these matters. And paying attention to intersectional justice issues. So that's one part of your work that I very much appreciate. And I think it's very brave - this process that you've been able to walk through.
And now in the beginning of May, [the] Generation Dread book is coming out in print and in electronic file formats. I'm very much looking forward to reading it. And as I briefly mentioned, it has this finding purpose in the subtitle. Or extended time is also sort of running. But I was wondering, would you like, at the end of the session, [to] briefly say something about the forthcoming book? I know this is a terrible question to ask you to speak briefly of such a wide ranging book.
Wray: Thanks, Panu. Yeah, well, of course, it deals with eco anxiety from, you know, this kind of intersectional critical perspective that you've just touched on. Looking at the roles of, you know, identity and privilege and experience with adversity and climate justice topics and things like that. But also, what on a deeper, I don't use the word spiritual, but we can refer to it here. What might be going on in terms of how powerful cultures that have driven, exacerbated the climate crisis have ended up with this kind of dominating framework. And how we can try and shift as individuals within this overwhelming situation, to a mode of partnership. You know, with others and with the natural world by understanding where the severance from connectedness could have come from.
And also looking at topics like the future of mental health care. And what's required, given the scope of psychic damage that this is causing. And that we can rightfully expect to increase in enormous ways. And how we can, you know, understand what goes on psychosocially in disaster settings. Not just when we're anxious about what we're understanding and absorbing from scientific reports. And what, you know, there's coping tips and processing for individuals and collectives. But it's also interwoven with a vulnerable memoir style. You know, exploration of what's gone on inside me as I've looked around the world and tried to understand what's going on inside other people. So, yeah, I hope that it helps people feel less alone. And more connected. And understood. And also resourced for ways of going forward with these climate anxious times.
Doherty: Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. I'm looking forward to the book. And I recommend the Gen Dread site and the newsletter. I mean, you know, this idea of we're all. I mean, we're either relearning the world or we're just learning the world. We - that's the thing. We think we know the world. As I get older, I realized I, what I thought I know, I don't really I didn't really know in this limited understanding we have. So all of the people listening, we're all learning the world together. And we think we know, you know, if we're marginalized and really oppressed, you know, we think that's the world. But that's not the only world out there. And if we're privileged, we think that's the only world and that's not the only world out there, either. You know, and so we're learning together here. So. Gosh, we're all in this together in some ways, even though we have these different stories. So thanks again.
Wray: Thank you. Yeah, it was great to chat with you both. And I'm excited that you're doing this podcast, it's an important offering.
Doherty: And it takes time. You know, it takes time. All these connections have unfolded over some years. So listeners also realize it takes time for this to happen, so -
Wray: It really does.
Doherty: It doesn't happen all right away.
Wray: No. Yep, you need space and time. And actually, I think, Panu, you also chatted with me once about this. And pointed out how, in that sense, it is a justice issue too. To be able to cope well with eco anxiety you need resources. Like time and space. So that you're not just barreling through life trying to make it through your disasters. And make it to your three jobs. But you can actually process this and reorient yourself towards, you know, do the inner activism part. And connect it to external activism. And feel better about it all. So yeah, it's a doozy in that sense. It's those kinds of justice issues that pop up all the way down.
Pihkala: Yeah, I think you're absolutely absolutely right. And I greatly enjoyed once again, talking with you, Britt. And now the triad. And this has been very fascinating. And lots of topics that I definitely [would] like to talk more about. Like the role of spirituality. Which is close to me. And well, you know, the existential frameworks. Whether we talk about looking at the starry sky at night or the deeper issues there's plenty to discuss so I'm hoping for some chances in the future. But now, warm thanks for finding the time to come to talk.
Wray: Thank you. And I'll close my mouth so that we don't keep going.
Doherty: Yeah. It's great. But, you know, listeners, this is what this podcast is about. Is giving an entree into people who work on this. And spend a lot of time on this. And so you can see what it's like in our world. We're all in this together. And we're all human. So yes, this is Climate Change and Happiness. You can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. At our website, we have show notes. And descriptions of these episodes and more details. And various links of different books and authors and ideas that we referenced in these episodes. So please do check out the website as well. And think about sharing our message and supporting us. And all of us, all listeners and all of you too, have a good rest of your days and we'll talk to you next time.
Wray: Bye.
Doherty: Take care. Pihkala: Take care.
Season 1, Episode 8: Climate Change, Children and a Better World with Guest Dr. Jade Sasser
Apr 15, 2022
Season 1, Episode 8 | Climate Change, Children and a Better World with Guest Dr. Jade Sasser
Climate Change and Happiness Episode 8 begins a two-part series focusing on childbearing decisions in this time of increasing climate disruption. Panu and Thomas are joined by feminist scholar Jade Sasser whose research investigates the impacts of climate change, racial injustice, and other existential threats on human reproductive decisions. Together they explore how climate change is interpreted by potential parents and grandparents of different generations and cultures. They discover how, in Jade’s words, children “symbolize and represent so many hopes, dreams, fears, anxieties, desires to make the world better.” Thomas notes how deciding whether or not to have a child is one of the most consequential decisions an adult will make in their life. He and Panu reflect on their own parenting and explore some of the complex and blended emotions that arise for people about this topic. Jade reminds us that anxiety and fear grow the more that we feel isolated, while connection with others grows the potential for hope. Along the way, Jade counters some simplistic notions about population as a driver of climate change. Join us for this thought provoking reflection.
And, look forward to Episode 9 when Panu and Thomas have a conversation with science journalist and researcher Britt Wray who reports on how her own parenting decision-making inspired her popular Gen Dread newsletter and upcoming book.
Season 1, Episode 8: Children, Climate Change and a “Better World” with Guest Dr. Jade Sasser
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. This is our podcast: The show for people around the globe who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change, particularly their emotions. What they're feeling in their body and, you know, their feelings. How they're describing their emotions. And we go in a lot of directions here. So listeners, welcome. Take a breath. Be with us for a little bit.
Panu and I are really honored to have Jade Sasser with us today. And she can talk about herself during our conversation. But she's coming from California at UC Riverside and does some interesting research and practice on Gender and Sexuality Studies. And we're going to see where we go here. We had a little pre-talk, and we went in a lot of really fascinating directions. So, let's just keep our breath going and realize we might go into some deep topics today. But we're also going to be thinking about what it feels like for all of us. So Panu, do you want to get us going?
Pihkala: Yes, and warmly welcome Jade. And I'm very glad that you found the time to join us. And we met earlier this autumn, in relation to this Lancet Planetary Health study on children and youth[‘s] climate emotions and beliefs. You generously commented on that in a webinar and that turned into a very interesting discussion. I know that you've been working with related issues for several years. So how do you feel about this at the moment? What's on the top of your mind?
Jade Sasser: Well, what's on the top of my mind, it's really interesting. I'm just returning home from a week in Louisiana with family to celebrate Thanksgiving. And I have a three-year-old cousin, who I spent the week with. And it was really interesting. I started thinking a lot about the interviews that I've done with people who talk about whether they want to have children in the face of climate change. How they feel about the ethics and the morals of that. And I've been steeped in those conversations for so long. But spending the week with this three-year-old child was such a joy. And I have to say, I spent the week not thinking about climate change at all. And it was wonderful. So then coming back to this discussion, it, I think, is complicating my thinking about the possible range of emotions that one can experience, while also grappling with the deep challenges of climate change.
Pihkala: Thank you for sharing that. That's very interesting. Good to hear that you had such good moments. Maybe the three year old, and I'm personally a father of two sons. They are now six and eight. So I strongly resonate with this, you know, shifts in attention and mode, I should say, you know. I often work with some quite difficult climate emotions during the work day. And then I go out to play with the boys and so on. So it's an interesting mix. And that's something related to the little bit provocative title of our podcast. Climate Change and Happiness. The sort of exploration [of] how could joy be possible amidst the very awful crisis that we are living in. And, of course, different backgrounds and social factors and justice issues have a profound impact on how we experience the crisis. And also on the emotions and feelings. And I know that this is something that you've been thinking about seriously for a long time.
Sasser: I have and the thing that's been interesting for me is I don't have children. And I primarily interview people who don't have children. And so, for me, the space that I inhabit most of the time when it comes to this set of issues is the space of ideas. Because this is not a lived experience where I'm grappling with how I feel about parenting. How I feel about being a parent or becoming a parent myself. Those are not lived experiences for me. I talk to other people for whom those are lived experiences. But there's a little bit of a remove most of the time because for me, again, these are ideas.
However, I do want to say, I do a lot of interviews. And increasingly, I'm doing interviews with people who do have children. And who are really grappling with the feelings that come up for them around being parents when they're faced with the things that many of us are faced with. Heat waves. We had months-long heat waves here in the United States over the course of this summer and into the fall. Here in Southern California, where I live, we deal with wildfire. Wildfire has always been something that has been common to this region, but the wildfire season is getting longer and longer and longer. And for example, today, it's December 1, our temperature will reach 80 degrees [F], which is very hot even for Southern California for December.
I returned from Louisiana to find my house smelling of wildfire smoke because there was a fire that broke out the day that I left. And it was put out and then reignited while I was across the country. So I was checking my phone to see what was going to happen with this fire and how it would impact my home. My home was fine, but really it smelled like smoke. And it still smells of smoke a little bit. And so these are the kinds of issues that people who I am interviewing are grappling with. And they're saying and really thinking through how should I feel about having a child knowing that climate change was real? I knew that before I had a child. What are the ethical and moral concerns about bringing a kid into a planet that we know is going through all of these changes? Should I feel guilty about that? Should I feel responsible for doing something that may not be good for the planet? Those kinds of issues and questions come up all the time.
Particularly the mothers who I interview feel an added layer of guilt. I think because just in our society women's behaviors and decisions as mothers are just extra scrutinized. So motherly guilt is very, very common. Less commonly, but still really important, I would have to say is those parents that I talked to who say that their children make them feel much more motivated to actually do something about climate change. That they feel motivated to be advocates. To help educate other people to make changes in their own day to day lives. To not, you know, kind of sit back and wait for someone else to solve the problem. For them, their children are a motivator to actually create the world in the future that they would like to live in. And so I hear a really broad range of emotional experiences from the people that I interview. From grief, sadness, guilt, to intense motivation, and a desire to make a future in which their children won't come home to [a] house smelling of wildfire smoke [laughs].
Doherty: Yeah, that's really well said Jade. I mean, I think you kind of encapsulated a lot of what this podcast is about just now. All the nuances of feelings, you know. We talk about feeling different kinds of things, that, you know, nuances. Or what researchers call granularity. Like different kinds of feelings and just emotional depth, you know. And I know Panu is big on this idea too of these mixed emotions. You know, where we have tragic realism or tragic hope. Or, you know, we have this empowerment or even standing our ground and making a statement. And even a kind of a resistance. You know, joy is an act of resistance.
And so, I just wanted to just for the listeners, just really take this in because Jade has really laid out a whole palette of things that many listeners are feeling. I know you are. I know you're feeling it. I[‘ve] felt these things. And so we have a choice. We can build our capacity, I guess I would say, to feel these different things and then eventually make our decisions. And, you know, in therapy, we talk about, you know, working from our values. Like understanding our values and making actions based on our values.
And so, but I just want to just, again, put your hand on your chest and take a breath, because there's a lot. There is the smoke. I mean, in the Pacific Northwest, I've felt this. I've dealt with the same things: the temperature and the weather changes and the smoke. And all this sort of stuff. And so it's all happening. And the danger is people get out of their depth emotionally. And they get really frantic and really paralyzed. And so we want to keep breathing and keep chatting about this some more.
Sasser: Well, if I can say one thing. What I find, and this is my personal experience, but I've also talked this through with others and find that it's a shared experience. When I'm left to my own devices. Meaning when I'm left to my own emotional experiences and I don't communicate and share them with others. Or hear how others are feeling, the things that I tend to feel most are fear and worry and anxiety. And I think that partly stems from a perception that I'm the only person who feels this way. Or that I can't share this with others because they won't resonate. Or won't understand. Or that they'll minimize my concerns.
And what I find in my own experience, and in the experiences of people who I interview, is that there's a certain amount of relief that comes with being able to talk about these emotions. And to understand that many other people feel them too. That we are not isolated in grappling with a whole range of emotions. For me, the anxiety and fear grow the more that I feel isolated. But the opposite grows the potential for hope. The potential for optimism. Definitely the motivation. That grows the more I feel connected to other people who I know I can understand and resonate with what I'm experiencing, too.
Pihkala: Thanks for sharing that Jade. That's very profound, I think. And I've been just revising a big academic article on climate emotions and feelings. And I've been searching [for] a word for this feeling of togetherness and belonging and feeling connected to others. And I strongly resonate with what you said about that. And we've seen it in Finland too. This sort of isolation and loneliness. And sometimes people feel that they are some kind, in some way, weak, or unsuccessful if they feel the pressure. And then just, you know, basic validation by peer support can be really empowering for people.
Sasser: I think it's so important. In part because I, when I talk about my research sometimes, particularly with members of older generations, I do get the resistance. I do hear people saying: what? There are people who are thinking about not having children because of climate change? That sounds ridiculous. What - they [laughs] young people will look for any excuse to not want to have children. Or young people are too emotional anyway, for, you know.
These kinds of — I've heard these kinds of responses that really don't take climate emotions seriously. And I find myself having to really push back against that. Because I think that there is a generational difference in the perception of the immediacy and importance of climate change. As well as the perception of how radically it will alter the earth and, you know, our future experience on it. And acknowledging, resonating with and accepting that people's emotional experiences are true and valid, I think, is really important.
But the thing that does get older people when I put it forward. And it gets them in a very different way. It got my family this past week. We started having very different conversations after I said this. Is the point of well, there are people in older generations who would like to have grandchildren or great grandchildren. And they very well might not [have grand or great grandchildren] because of these climate emotions and the decisions that young people are making as a result of them.
And if there is no other motivator or driver on a personal emotional level, then please let your desire to have the family that you want that includes grandchildren or beyond. Let that help you understand this in a different way. In a different emotional way. And as a result of having that conversation, one of my aunts is thinking about getting in an electric vehicle. And changing how she consumes energy on a day to day basis, because she doesn't want my nieces to decide that they never want to have children because of climate change. And it's a simple thing, but I think that personal, heart-centered experience, for some, can bring the issues home in a way that nothing else can.
Doherty: Yeah. That's really neat. And it's really timely with, you know, this recent Thanksgiving holiday and people seeing their families. Yeah. And then universality is one of the terms in therapy about this idea that I realize I'm not the only person that has these issues. So we, in terms of validation, we also — it's universal. There is a sense of universality with this kind of stuff. And then Panu, you've talked about communitas, you know. This joint feelings of togetherness and things like that. That when we do open to this stuff, and I think, you know, some of the older folks, they also have different values at play.
I know some people. Well, I mean, we all know that, you know, questions about having children are not new. People have had questions about having children perennially for any number of reasons. People during the Cold War and a threat of nuclear war. There [were] questions about having children, I'm sure. I mean, it's before my lived experience, but I'm sure during World War II and enduring other cataclysms in the world people have. During the Depression, you know, people have had really valid questions about whether it's a good idea to bring children into the world. So I do think we forget that this is a human question. And I just wonder about some of these, you know, [if] older generations had other values at play. Family. Continuity. Whatever.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah. That's very true. And, of course, in many countries, the studies and surveys that have been done show that among the children and youth and young adults, there is more concern and awareness, on average, than with several other age groups. That, of course, doesn't mean that they are the only age group who care deeply.
And I know many people who, when they become grandparents, then their climate anxiety goes up. Because the issues become so real with the newborn. So it seems that both, you know, families who get the children, if they do and then the grandparents. So there are certain situations which then really bring the issue close to them. And because children are such a key thing for the human tribe, so to say, it evokes so much emotion. And so many hopes and fears involved in relation to children. So, on one hand, it's sort of logical, how difficult it is, for many people to think seriously about such a situation where a large number of young people are very seriously considering not having children because the crisis is so high. That just seems to be too much for many people.
Sasser: Yes. I would also say that childrens symbolize a range of different things. So they symbolize the future. In many instances, they symbolize hopes and possibilities for what kinds of futures we would like to have. They symbolize leaving a legacy. Some part of yourself in a future that will survive after you are no longer here. They also represent, in many ways, our values. What we find really important and what we're willing to take action on.
So for some of those who I have spoken to and interviewed, having children, again, it really changed their motivation around taking specific actions. Whether it's to consume resources differently. To vote differently. To consider, you know, political candidate's climate positions in how they vote. It, for some, changes the conversations that they have with other parents. And they talk about environmental issues and climate issues in ways that they would not otherwise. For some, it's the opposite. They really sort of pull in. And kind of gather their emotional energy. And really kind of huddle together with family and engage less with these bigger, broader issues out in the world.
To the point earlier that Thomas made about how people have grappled with these questions around whether, when, why, how to have children, that is a long standing set of concerns. It has affected different generations throughout history in different places for different reasons. So climate change is a threat to basic existence. It's an existential threat. It's not the first or only existential threat. Wars, world wars are certainly existential threats as well. A global pandemic is an existential threat, as we know. And then experiences that we've had here in the United States. Racism. Racial violence. These kinds of things are also existential threats for particular groups. So groups have grappled differently in different ways across time with this set of questions.
I do know that for communities of color in the US. Particularly for African American communities. It has become much more important to have children. And to have families. And to leave a legacy. Because family and children represent the stability of a safe community that will protect you. Emotionally and socially from the harms that would come from outside of that community. So having children becomes more important in the face of existential threat. And being able to leave a positive legacy that will survive beyond you. And in part that's shaped by a religiously impacted set of values among African Americans. Which says that we have to make sure that the world is better in the future for our children and grandchildren than what it was for us. So having children. Wanting children becomes a motivation to work toward creating that better world.
But, you know, that also has shaped inside of these broader concerns. My parents were worried about nuclear war when they were considering having me and my sister. They're children of the 50s. They grew up doing bomb drills in school. When they were in their teens, they were involved in protests, you know, against the war in Vietnam. My father's older brother, and my mother's younger brother were both drafted and they both fought in Vietnam. And their families were concerned about whether they would come back alive or not. And then, of course, you know, heading into the 70s, when I was born, this was a period of Cold War anxieties. My mother tells stories of watching the news at different times wondering if there would be a nuclear bomb dropped and thinking: should I have a baby at a time like this? [laughs] And those are very human concerns. Of course, she was concerned. I would be worried if she wasn't concerned about something like that.
So children really do symbolize and represent so many hopes, dreams, fears, anxieties, desires to make the world better. And then also real concerns about what kind of responsibility one should take toward an innocent person who didn't choose to be here. You're choosing for them to come here. Knowing what you know about conditions that are in the world right now. So it's very complicated. Very, very complicated. And the people who I speak to in interviews are grappling with all of these very complicated emotions. For many of them underneath it all there is a desire to have children. But there are really strong questions about whether that's possible from a moral, ethical, environmental, emotional, and financial position.
Pihkala: Yeah, I love the way that you complicate these issues. I think it's absolutely crucial. And reminds me of also, Matthew Schneider-Mayerson's work. Who I guess you know. And very many different dynamics that people have in relation to these climate crisis and reproduction issues. And also then thanks for sharing insights related to people of color and the situation. I've been struck by many of the studies related to climate emotions in people of color communities in the US, for example.
And that links to my work.
I've been trying to emphasize that we shouldn't do binary, you know, classifications between positive and negative as regards emotions. Because, for example, moral outrage is a very important and understandable climate emotion, also. So we need the different perspectives. And thanks for broadening.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, we have a few more minutes. This has really, really been right on point, I think, for our podcast. And I think listeners have been really. I think certain people are really - hopefully, you're feeling spoken to. And recognized out there. I mean, one of our notes for our show is, you know, having a child is one of the most intimate and consequential decisions an adult makes in their life course. Right. So it is. We are talking about some of the biggest decisions that people will make in their lives.
And this is all personal. It's personal to me. It's personal to Panu. It's personal to Jade. And to everyone out there. You know, personally, I remember a time when I didn't want to have children. I have one daughter, age 14. And I remember I didn't want to have children in my 20s. And I remember talking to one of my mentors about this when I was in my 20s. And him encouraging me to think more about it at the time. And I remember getting married. And, you know, deciding to have a child with my wife. My wife ended up dying of breast cancer about four years ago. Chelsea. And we were - she had wanted to have a second child. And I didn't want to have a second child for a number of reasons. And, you know, she ended up - the cancer made the decision for us, unfortunately. So that's an open, you know, that's a wound that I have in my life about what would have happened. You know, what would have happened otherwise.
But, and I only share that not not to talk about myself, but just to say, this is real stuff for people. You know, it's real stuff for the listeners. And so there are, you know, expression and validation is the first step. Expressing the feelings and just having them be heard and validated. Your decisions are going to go in any number of directions, as we've talked about. And, you know, one title for this might be children and a better world, you know. And like what does a better world mean? And that is different for different people. And children's, the role of children in a better world means different things to the listeners. But yeah, so it's a real thing. Yeah and we've got a couple of minutes on are you sitting on any ideas? Jade?
Pihkala: Yeah. This is such a rich topic. That there's so many possibilities. And thanks so much for sharing that. We've, of course, spoken about that. But I think it's very important for the listeners also, to hear that. Regarding the personal side, we'll put a link to the podcast website of a video conversation between you, Jade, and Britt Wray. Climate emotion research about these perspectives. And there's luckily now good material emerging. This. Your studies and Matthew Schneider-Mayerson's stuff, and so on. So the situation is very different than it was only five years ago. So that's one sort of sign of hope in this. That we are getting more material. And that hopefully avoids people from making overly binary interpretations of that.
Sasser: Absolutely. I think that's really important. Binary kinds of ideas or perspectives just don't capture the complexity and nuance of real life. And I'm finding it is very possible to feel simultaneously motivated, hopeful, anxious, worried, confused, and many other emotions as well. And with the issue of parenting, there is no way to know ahead of time whether you are making the right decision or not. But there is no right or wrong decision universally. Those decisions as you said, Thomas, they are very personal. They are lived in the context of your own life. Your own family. Your own community. What is right for one person may not be right for another person.
But I do want to leave with this point. There are some people in the environmental and climate community who want to harness the discussion of children through the lens of population. And who want to say, well, none of us should have children because the Earth is overpopulated. And, you know, population growth is the driver of climate change. And when we actually get into the nuances of that, the number of people on the planet is not a driver of climate change. The drivers of climate change, as we know, are about the extraction and consumption of particular kinds of resources. And people consume those resources very differently depending on who they are. Where they are in the world. How many resources they have, et cetera. So simply saying no one should have children for environmental reasons is - it's not. It's a false solution that some like to put forward. And it just doesn't map on to what's actually happening in the world.
Just as one example, the fertility rate in the United States has been going down for 80 years, at the exact same time that our greenhouse gas emissions have been skyrocketing. So my hope is that people can sort of steer away from that kind of simplistic conversation around population and really focus on the complexity and nuance.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: Thanks for bringing that up. And there's such a rich material here that we would need a sequel for the conversation session, also in this.
Doherty: Yeah, we'll put in our show notes. We have a nice link to an article by environmental journalist David Roberts about how he thinks as a journalist [and] he does not talk about, write about overpopulation for some of the more, you know, complex reasons Jade was talking about. So that is a topic we can follow up on. This has been a really beautiful conversation. And I really appreciate Jade your time today. And we're gonna wrap it up and get into our days. You know, we're humans and we have our lives. And Panu what are you up to after our talk?
Pihkala: Well, again, my six year old is playing with his friends. So they are gonna come in [in] something like 10 minutes. And this links with something that Jade was talking about. So regardless of what one's own position is, at least we have the possibility to rejoice of the children that are in the world. So that's the strong source of positivity for me, at least. Thank you very much, Jade.
Sasser: Thank you. I've really enjoyed it too. And after this, I'm a college professor. So I'll be spending my day reading articles. Lesson planning. And getting ready for tomorrow's online classes.
Doherty: Yeah, well, good luck with that. And online classes is a whole 'nother episode. And yeah, and I'm gonna meet, I'm going to do my clinical work. And I'm actually doing some walking sessions outdoors today with some clients in a park. And I see some blue sky out there. And we're lucky that I tend to get lucky on some of the one day of the week that there's some clear skies is the my walking therapy day, so I'm really happy about that.
Well, listen, both of you take care of yourselves. I look forward to maybe some more conversations in the future. And listeners out there, please keep in touch with us. Climatechangeandhappiness.com. We'll be having more of these conversations and I hope you can join us. Take care everyone
Pihkala: Take care.
Season 1, Episode 7: Inadequacy & the Upside Down Pyramid
Apr 01, 2022
Season 1, Episode 7 | Inadequacy & the Upside Down Pyramid
When we face a challenge like global climate change, none of us is “enough.” Thomas and Panu center this episode’s conversation around naming feelings of inadequacy [in Finnish riittämättömyyden tunne: the feeling of not being enough or doing enough]. They share ways to work through this common feeling, balancing acceptance, action and rest. Panu differentiates various shades of anxiety in relation to feeling inadequate in the face of the climate crisis, including anxiety of responsibility, anxiety of freedom and anxiety of guilt. When we work toward sustainability, it’s not just an ideal or a policy. We also have to make it personal with concrete actions. Panu shares his experience at Omavaraopisto [The School of Self Sufficiency] in Finland. Thomas echoes the the importance of hands-on activities, adding “some concrete things to our very abstract worlds.” He shares the image of an upside down pyramid that he uses with his clients — a tool for restabilizing ourselves when overwhelmed and bringing our focus back to healthy daily activities — to give us energy and meaning for the long haul. Take a moment, when you can, to give some honest feedback when you notice you or someone else is being enough.
Season 1, Episode 7: Inadequacy & Upside Down Pyramid
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well, hello. This is Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I'm Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, where we talk about… climate change and happiness. And climate change and other kinds of emotions. So, this is the show for people who are feeling and thinking deeply about climate change and how it affects them in their personal life. And in their families and communities. And their roles as citizens. And so we're back at it here. It's morning for me. It's evening for Panu. I'm getting going here on a fall morning here in the Pacific Northwest. How're you feeling today, Panu? How's life going for you?
Pihkala: Thanks for asking Thomas. It's getting [to be] late autumn in Finland. So we are approaching what we call marras. That's the title for our November: marraskuu. Which means sort of the time when everything in nature looks dead. So that is the time before the relief of the snow comes. Or at least it used to come. So, it's time to think about how to maintain one's energy. And for me, for example, the time to pick up the bright lamp. Which I have on actually also; now the sun is just setting in Helsinki. How are you doing on the West Coast, Thomas?
Doherty: You know, we're doing pretty well. I love that Finnish word for November. Marraskuu. Yeah, yeah. I was celebrating some of the fall season with my daughter. My daughter age 14. And we went — what we do here in Portland, there's a farming region right outside of Portland that you can go to to go and get pumpkins, which we celebrate. And one of our traditions for the Halloween season is getting pumpkins. And taking a hay ride. And being out and on a farm. And so we were enjoying the autumn season. And so that's I'm glad you bring that up because that is a positive piece of it.
I do love this autumn season myself and our weather. We've had some really, as you know, crazy weather here in the Pacific Northwest recently, but we are having a fairly calm autumn season. [A] more traditional feeling one. And the leaves on the trees, the deciduous trees, have become really beautiful colors, bright reds. And so we're feeling that. And the leaves haven't fallen yet either. So we haven't gotten to that dead season that you described yet. So yeah, yeah.
And, you know, I was thinking about our conversation. And this idea of our podcast, you know, feelings. Climate emotions. Emotions are our primal physical sensations that we have. Feelings are the language that we use to speak to our emotions, right? And that's different all over the world. Different languages, different cultures have different words for those deep, these deeper emotions. A feeling that I came to just the other day was inadequacy. Unfortunately, that was a feeling that I was feeling which, as we'll talk [about], isn't necessarily rational. I'm doing a lot of really good work and I know you are as well. But I was feeling inadequate to the task of climate change and just doing work in the world. And I don't actually remember what prompted it in particular. It was probably an interaction of my personal to do list and, you know, my family work. And then my idea of writing and my duty. I mean climate change as a huge hyper object is interacting with my sense of my personal destiny—and what I should be doing on the planet. And so it leaves me both inadequate.
I also paradoxically felt like a “know-it-all” in a sense. That's an American term. Know-it-all. But I felt like sometimes I was trying to tell people about all the different connections with climate change. And it's partly what I do for a living. I am training counselors and I am doing this podcast. But I also felt—it wasn't so much a know-it-all. I felt the need to make these connections clear for people that weren't obviously made clear. And so that was sort of the, you know, the impulse like you and I know that people have been working on this for years. There's great ideas out there. And whenever someone invents something for the first time today as if it just happened, I say, well, that's not actually the case. People have been talking about this concept and that concept for many years. So I can be a little pedantic. But it's also this urge to name the elephant in the room in many ways. Even with justice.
We've got a senator in the US that's holding up the climate change legislation here. And it's about the coal industry because the senator is part of the coal industry. And the coal industry in West Virginia is holding up climate legislation that could change the entire, you know, trajectory of the planet. And the media doesn't talk about this. It talks about just some senator with some fiscal policy. And they're not telling the whole story. And so I think there's also that inadequacy. Like, no we have to get all the truth out, so to speak so. But anyway, it sounds like you were also resonating with that feeling from the Finnish side.
Pihkala: Yeah, definitely. I strongly resonate with that. I actually have been putting forth in Finnish a[n] emotion word or feeling term called riittämättömyyden tunne. Now, that takes some unpacking. Tunne is the word we use in [the] Finnish language for feeling and emotion. So we don't separate them in Finnish language. And riittämättömyys, it means both not being enough and not having done enough. And that may sound like a sort of ultimate shame position, but it's actually between guilt and shame. And we use the same word riittää, for example, if you pour some water into a glass, then somebody says that’s riittävästi. That means that it's enough. So it's sort of context dependent, being enough.
And I've noticed that many people, including myself, very easily feel this, riittämättömyyden tunne, inadequacy, because the ecological crisis and climate crisis simply challenges us in so many ways. It's very difficult to feel that you've actually done all that you should do or could do. So I think one of the actually most important emotional skills in the era of the climate crisis is the sort of learning to accept the ambivalence and limits but also trying to keep going. So it's a really tricky issue.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. And I think it's important for listeners. I mean, I know many people listening around the world will be resonating with this. I can just guess it. If we're feeling it, we're human, other people are feeling it, too. And so you might you, as a listener might feel like I'm not even, I don't even know anything about this area. And I'm just listening in as an amateur. And I don't feel like I'm being enough. Well, even the experts don't feel like they're being enough, either. That's the nature of the hyper objectness of climate change. It's ultimately always bigger than our perception. And it's just a huge, multifaceted area, multifaceted issue. So yes, because you are working really hard. And I know you're tired, Panu, from traveling and doing all these interesting things you've been doing. So you wanna, let's flip this over a little bit and say, why? In what way have you been being enough? What have you been doing? I know, you mentioned some interesting travels and your paper in Lancet and all this stuff. What's some of these adventures you've had recently?
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah, thanks for asking, and sort of turning it around. And sort of how to be enough. And I've actually been using for the last couple of weeks this very simple anxiety-related exercise. Or it's sort of anxiety of responsibility -related exercise. But I think that that's a very fundamental part of what anxiety fundamentally is, you know. Wanting to do something in the midst of the problems. And then anxiety of freedom. Anxiety of responsibility being a major part of that. And then the possible anxiety of guilt also. So I've been writing lists, you know, to-do lists, and then very manually, just overlining things that I've been doing. That's an advice I picked [up] from some psychologists at some point. And amazingly, because we are what we are, that also helps. You sort of get a bodily signal that you've done something when you overline it. And I just noticed another tip, which I haven't done yet, but I plan to do. Which would be to sort of write down all the things one has done in a day. I don't usually do that. But that might be another trick. But [is] this one familiar for you Thomas? Have you been doing — I'll talk about the travels more soon.
Doherty: Yeah, no, what we'd say is crossing it off the list. And, you know, there is a funny thing where I'll make a to-do list and write things I've already done just so I can cross them off. Yeah, the idea of inadequacy versus enough. But do tell me about your adventures there. I know you've been traveling. So yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah definitely. So because of the Lancet's “Children and young people climate anxiety and their views about government climate inaction” paper, there's been lots of speaking assignments and media issues related to that one. And one of them led me last week to the Ministry of the Environment in Finland. They're very interested about the paper. And one of these very high level experts, actually recommended me [to be invited]. He sort of shared a very emotional thing and said that when he read the results of the paper, the first gut reaction for him was that, “what could I do more?” So it really sparked again, something related to this feeling inadequate. And I know him pretty well. He's a person who sort of does what he can, reasonably thinking, and he knows that too. And after a couple of days, he was able to, of course, analyze them, the feelings that he got. But I think that's telling, you know, that people care about these states of the world and children and young people's reactions. And would like to do more. And are sort of struggling because there's only so much one can do and stay functioning. That's a real challenge among these times.
And then the sort of other end of my adventures was a train trip, and a bus trip to a place called Valtimo, which is Northern Karelia, quite close to the Russian border. And really in the midst of forests. It actually also already snowed a bit during the weekend there. There's a group of people who have built what they call “School of Self-Sufficiency.” A couple of old farms. And they are sort of keeping on the tradition of these ancient skills related to growing food and building houses from wood and so on. So, they were also interested about environmental emotions and climate emotions. But it was a totally different crowd and space, compared to this high-tech conference room in the Ministry of the Environment in Helsinki. And then this old, farming house in Valtimo. So that was, in many ways, rewarding and nice. But I do find myself a bit tired after the travels, I have to confess.
Doherty: Yeah. Well, that's a great example of climate cosmopolitanism, right? This idea that, you know, you can move between different climate subcultures. This is a very concrete example of that. And, you know, listeners can know that. And I've done that as well. I've done [it] in my outdoor therapy background. You know, there's subcultures of outdoor therapy that are back to the land kind of approaches. And, you know, indigenous living skills and, you know, making fire by, you know, friction fire by rubbing sticks. And making arrowheads and tanning hides, and trapping animals and things like that. And so that's a very different subculture of sustainability than your academics, you know, or policy subculture. And so, it sounds like you are able to move between those yourself fairly well. So you're, you know, practicing and exhibiting climate cosmopolitanism. And you know, you're, you can, you know, “when in Rome do as the Romans do” kind of thing, you can kind of tap into this kind of thing.
Pihkala: Yeah, that's a nice way to put it, Thomas. Thanks for that. I think cosmopolitanism can happen also in the countryside or in the woods. So it's not related to the polises [a reference to the greek word, polis, meaning a city], so but —
Doherty: Yeah, exactly. It's different cultures. That's the way I think about it. It's different cultures. And then I think you're tired. And, you know, like I say, you know, despair is fatigue in disguise. And so I think when we're tired, you know, we lose that. I guess we get “adequacy fatigue,” right? You know, our ability to feel adequate, gets fatigued. Or when we're fatigued, we start to feel like we can't do enough, because our battery is low. And so, you know, everyone listening has to think about this. When your battery's low, you know, you're going to feel fatigued, and then you're more prone to despair. And then that's the signal that you need to rest and take time out from the game. To reconnect with yourself and work on the foundation of your pyramid. You know, rest, exercise, family, diet, sleep, and things like that.
Pihkala: Yeah, Thomas, I've sometimes heard you speak about sort of the pyramid metaphor. That sometimes, you know, you're sort of building the foundations and sometimes it's like, the pyramid is weighing on you. Do you want to open that metaphor for the listeners also? I thought it was rather nice.
Doherty: Yeah, it's something that I use with clients. And, you know, Panu has been able to join my therapy training groups that I'm doing right now with mental health therapists. And we were talking about that as a coping [strategy]. And I shared that with some high schoolers that I spoke to last week as well. The image is, if you imagine a large pyramid that's upside down, so its apex is pointing toward the ground. And so it's really top heavy, it's really hard to balance and we have, you know, we feel like the world's like this pyramid over the top of us. You know, we have a very small little triangle of resources, and this huge pyramid that's infinite. It just keeps going. And there's all these different issues and things we're thinking about. You know, politics and sustainability and social movements and our lives and things like that. And it's just really an overwhelmed kind of inadequate feeling in general. And one of the mental reframes is to flip that pyramid over onto its base so it's nice and stable. And then we just focus on the foundation.
If someone I'm working with, you know, is really tired, burned out, fatigued, depleted, discouraged, you know, we say, let's get back to the foundation. You know, and everybody has similar bricks in their foundation of health. Sleep, eating good food, social relationships, their home, maybe their daily work, family, their pets, or whatever things around their home. It's a very human exercise. And then if people have unique bricks in their foundation, so they might have a certain hobby, or they might be a musician or artist, or certain daily things that they do every day. And then we try to get clear on what your foundation is. At least in theory.
Some people have a lot of missing bricks in their foundation. Like they're not doing certain things that they want. Or they just haven't been able to manifest yet. They might want to be in a relationship, and they don't have one or something like that. So it provides some goal setting conversations as well. So it's all about this idea of personal sustainability is what I call it, you know, like, let's get sustainable in your own base of your own pyramid. And then the idea is organically, you'll have more energy and ability to reach up toward the top, which is where those issues are. And there's a number of directions there. I mean the pyramid at the top is pointed. The upside down pyramid is infinite. It just extends, widens, and there's no end to it. But the pyramid that's on its basis actually has a point. And then we can start thinking about what are your priorities? And what, you know? And so it's just a metaphor, and I find it helps the ground people.
Pihkala: Yeah, I really like that one. And it's got many good dimensions, like the metaphor of bricks also, and resources and that type of thing. And it also reminds me of a young person I met at this old farm at the School of Self- Sufficiency, who talked about how earlier on he very often had this feeling of the pyramid. He didn't use that word, but anyway, resting on his head and shoulders and feeling very inadequate. And now during what they do there, he's often physically tired. But because he can physically touch things and do things in an embodied, holistic way, that helps him to feel adequate and feel enough. So that sort of dynamic I know is possible also in urban settings, when you do something with your hands and body. So I think that's also an important resource, which can help with grounding and getting [the] feeling that you've done something.
But it also takes much psychological work, I think. And then old theologian, philosopher, psychologist, Paul Tillich, has been important for me in that regard. This 1950s classic The Courage to Be, which has these two dimensions in it. Courage to be oneself, an individual. And courage to be part of collectives. But also then the more spiritual idea of accepting that you are accepted. I think that also from a secular point of view, that points to something very important. That it's not enough when you hear that, you know, everything, everybody's accepted, but you sort of have to be able to perform it yourself with the support of others. So that's the second level of accepting that you are accepted. That you're okay. But how does that resonate with you, Thomas?
Doherty: It resonates. You know, I think this idea of doing concrete action, like you were describing that person that was doing the living skills. There is something, you know, comforting about doing something that's concrete or with our hands. Doing some sort of project. Whether it be knitting or cooking or painting or woodworking or repairing our home or building something or doing some sort of skill. You know, music or, you know, some sort of handiwork. You know, like blacksmithing, or something like that.
There is obviously, you know, the sense of a flow state in terms of psychology. You know, we have a concrete cause and effect. And, you know, we can get into a flow with these kinds of things. And so I think it is a takeaway for all of us to add some concrete things to our very abstract worlds. If we're only ever dealing with abstract policy and sort of distant things, we don't get that pay off. And, I know for me when I'm working with people — that's concrete. Doing this podcast is also concrete. So I feel like, in the moment, I'm doing something. And, you know, the therapy training groups that I'm doing now, it's [a] 10-week group, you know, with mental health people. You know, that's very rewarding, because we're doing something very concrete and helping these counselors, you know, therapists learn about their own environmental identity and talk about their feelings in the way that we are doing [with this podcast].
And so when I'm working with people, it brings out the best in me, typically. My creativity and, you know, my not necessarily being upbeat, sometimes I work on really dark, dark topics. But even then I'm, you know, creating spaces, we've talked about holding space for others. And that holding space is a very, very concrete thing as well. So I think, yeah, I think one of the antidotes to inadequacy outside of just rest is doing some concrete things that we can sort of measure and feel.
Pihkala: Hmm. Yeah, thanks for sharing that. That's very important, I think. And it's sometimes also tricky, because if one recognizes that one's got a lot of privilege, as we Finns tend to have, then there's also the dimension of, you know, wanting and feeling like one also has to use that privilege to help the global dimension. Both the more-than-human world and then the suffering people around the globe. So that sometimes makes the questions of and feelings of inadequacy even worse.
Just today from social media, I read from a very experienced Finnish climate reporter who was saying that she's been totally fatigued now for one and a half years. And one of the reasons has been this privilege issue of, you know, feeling the need to do so much, that's causing it. But I was very glad that she shared about it all openly, because of course, that's something related to other areas of work life, in contemporary societies, also. Structural demands can be so high. And when you combine that with ecological awareness, it can be quite heavy indeed.
Doherty: Yeah, indeed. So naming this impulse to duty that we have. You know, we have a duty. We have, in psychology terms, a “social norm.” You know, an expectation that we should be doing something based on our knowledge and our ability to take action. You know, privilege is a kind of a touchy word. But in the sense that, you know, some people, it's not like people, you know, chose their privilege. Some people are, they're in a place where they discover that they are privileged. But what that means is that you have resources and you have abilities. You have either the ability to act or resources or choice. And that leads you to a sense of obligation, you know. A sense of duty. And so, you know, that's where the action is there. And the privilege is kind of self-loathing, some of that is it gets into self loathing. That's an action as well. So I can do self loathing as an action just to cope. But it's not a good coping skill. It's really about how do I channel some of the resources that I have in a good direction.
And again, the psychology 101 stuff, I mean, it's either egocentric values like my own personal protection and my family, or altruistic values, or biocentric values, you know, for the Earth. Earth values. And so we're going to have duties in all those directions. I have duties in those directions. Panu you do as well. We need to rest so we have the energy to get in the game and work on things like that. So yeah, we've got a few more minutes left here. Can you revisit the Finnish words that you described at the outset so we can get that more clear in people's minds?
Pihkala: Yeah. And that's been two. Of course there's Marraskuu. You know November as the death of the summer months. Then this riittämättömyyden tunne. Feeling of not being and doing enough. Feeling inadequate is the most accurate respondent meaning that I've found but it's not exactly the same either. And then there's the sort of the counter force of strength of acceptance. I've liked the stuff related to so-called “radical acceptance” that mindfulness writer Tara Brach has been putting forward, for example. Perhaps because I see so much of this riittämättömyyden tunne / inadequacy feelings among the people I meet in the environmental sectors.
Doherty: Yes. “Riittamatomuden tunne”.
Pihkala: Very nice. Thomas. You're learning your Finnish!
Doherty: Yes, yes. Yes, I'll have to get on my Duolingo for Finnish here. But yes, acceptance, radical acceptance, you know. Yes, I would, I will point out that a lot of people choke on acceptance. You know, they don't want to accept certain things. They seem to be “unacceptable.” But, you know, you could also think of it as just being open. Being open to a thing. I am open that it exists. I don't need to, you know, with some people semantically acceptance means some sort of condoning or some sort of, you know, giving permission and so. But being open, and I think that's still, in keeping with Tara Brach's idea of radical acceptance is living and being open that this thing exists. And it's with me. And it's next to me. And I'm involved with it. And I'm open to it. So, you know, from a therapeutic standpoint, just feeling open to a thing and having this little bit of a distance from it, but being present with it and open with it is also enough. You know, we typically have enough energy to do that. Like, we can be enough to be open to something. I don't have to come down on one side or the other about my feelings about it, per se. But the feeling of openness, presence, awareness.
So there's a sustainability there. The sustainability of being open as well. Sometimes I can get to a place where that's not fatiguing and I'm just open. But that's the work as well. Well, as we go, this is another one of these feeling words to add to our vocabulary list. This feeling of not being enough or not having done enough. And I want people to be, you know, listeners to be thinking about their own feelings. And talking about them with others. And finding some safe places to think about and express these things. And we're going to keep doing that work ourselves.
Pihkala: Exactly. And also remembering the sort of counter emotion of riittämättömyyden tunne, which is then you know, feeling enough. And, you know, that doesn't mean completely full or perfect, but it's just, you know, enough. And that's after the end of the day, I think that's something that we very much need. So taking a look back at the day and you know, that's that's what it is. And from many points of view, you just have to sort of look for the new morning and also remember to feel enough.
Doherty: Yeah. Riittämättömyyden tunne. Feeling enough. You know, what I say in my practice is, you know, just imagine what you would tell [your] best friend in the same situation. So when we can't pull that out for ourselves. Typically, we would be able to do it for a friend. We'd be able to let a friend know that they are enough. And if that friend had this exact same day as us, then we can transfer that energy back toward ourselves. So what would you tell a best friend in the same situation? That's a good mental hack. That's good almost all the time. So what would you tell your family or friends? Are they being enough? Are they doing enough? Some of you might feel like some people aren't and that's another conversation. But for the people that genuinely are, we need to be able to let them know. Alright, Panu well, I think you're doing enough. And -
Pihkala: Likewise. Doherty: You're welcome! Have a good evening over there and get some rest. And I look forward to chatting again soon. And listeners take care of yourselves.
Season 1, Episode 6: Environmental Identity and “Climate Flow” with Guest Susan Clayton
Mar 18, 2022
Season 1, Episode 6 | Environmental Identity and “Climate Flow” with Guest Susan Clayton
In a conversation recorded during the recent COP 26 meeting, Susan Clayton, a colleague and noted social and conservation psychology researcher, joined Thomas and Panu. Together they discussed the important role that our environmental identity plays in helping us understand our values and desires about nature and addressing environmental issues. Susan talked about her role as a psychologist serving on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and the positive emotions that arise engaging with a truly international group of gifted scientists. Thomas reflected on “climate flow” — a sense of flow and shared mission that emerges when we have the opportunity to collaborate on climate issues. Panu also recognized the “climate isolation” and “climate loneliness” that can take hold when we lack a support network for talking about climate emotions. Susan also spoke about her conservation psychology work with zoos and aquariums. This episode itself serves as an example of the flow that emerges from creative dialog with others who share our interests and values, even when talking about daunting issues. We hope you can join in.
Season 1, Episode 6: Environmental Identity and “Climate Flow” with Guest Susan Clayton
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. Our podcast. This is a show for people around the globe who are feeling and thinking deeply about climate change. Particularly the personal side. How climate change affects them and their families and their communities and their emotional responses. And we have a guest today.
Susan Clayton : Hi, I'm Susan Clayton. Glad to be with you.
Doherty : And yes, we have a special guest. Susan Clayton is — some of you in the psychology world would know of Susan and the climate psychology world. But she's a big name in our worlds in terms of understanding people's connections with nature and the natural world. And Susan will talk about herself. We'll get into her work. But she's, you know, just a little preview. She comes in through this as a social psychologist. And I got the chance to meet Susan, some years ago when I was a newcomer clinician therapist trying to break into the environmental psychology group at the American Psych Association. And Susan was very kind to me, as were others to help me get into that group. And I got a chance to work with Susan directly on the taskforce that the American Psychological Association did. The first one they did around 10 or 11 years ago. And so I got a chance to work with Susan and learn from her. And I've since followed her work. And I know Panu, has more recently been spending a fair amount of at least virtual time with Susan.
Pihkala: Yeah, that is very, very correct. And warmly welcome, Susan also for, for my part. We are very, very glad to have you here. And, of course, I've been reading texts by both of you and also sometimes written together, like that one influential article. But then, during the last year, both Susan and I were taking part in this international research group about climate emotions, which produced a global survey research article about young people's emotions and beliefs about climate matters. And that's gotten us busy this Autumn 2021. But how are you, Susan, doing, in the midst of these strange times? That climate meeting is going on. And the climate crisis is proceeding. So how are you feeling?
Clayton: Well, it's — these are interesting times, as they say. There's always something that's going on that seems relevant to, to my research and professional interests. And, you know, so that interest is, is one way to keep a positive mindset, I think. And just before saying more, I want to acknowledge that both of you have really affected my thinking about climate change. Thomas over the years, and Panu more recently. Thomas, you were the first clinical psychologist I met who was interested in this. And so it really started me to get to start to think about how people were affected by their understanding of, you know, of what was happening to the environment. And then more recently, getting to know Panu, and just the nuance you bring to thinking about the different emotions we experience when we think about climate change. So kudos to both of you. And you really helped my thinking along the way.
Doherty: Thanks. Thanks.
Pihkala: Thank you Susan.
Doherty: Susan, well, you know, I'll have to get this and we can talk about a lot of things. But you know, environmental identity is, I think, a really big topic. I'm doing this training with mental health therapists now. And, and that's one of the big platforms of the work is helping them to understand their environmental identity and their thoughts and feelings and beliefs and values about nature. And we're using that as the basis to then put on top [of] the therapy skills, they already know. And the different therapy styles. So it's sort of like what I call an environmental identity based therapy. Or so you might say an environmental identity based cognitive therapy or whatever. So, where do you come at environmental identity these days? I mean, I know it's sort of a broad phrase, but, you know, what pieces of it are coming up for you lately?
Clayton: Yeah. So, you know, when I started thinking about environmental identity it was the idea of recognizing, based on conversations I had with people and things I heard people say, that nature was important to the way people thought about themselves. And it could really be a source of self knowledge as well as kind of self affirmation and strengths to think about how we're all part of the natural world. So I continue to think about how can we help people to have a strong environmental identity, especially as you know, we all are aware that we're in a world where it's increasingly difficult to have experiences in nature. People are more likely to live in urban areas. For one thing. Nature's becoming degraded for another thing. And, of course, most of us spend a vast amount of time with technology, which is also potentially interfering in the relationship with nature. So how in this kind of changing world, can we still find ways to, to form that connection with nature that can form a part of our environmental identity?
Pihkala: Yeah, that's most important. And we've noticed that you've been working in several parts of the world in relation to this. There's some recent research articles taking a look to the east, even further east than Finland to Russia and China. So any thoughts about that east direction.
Clayton: I have to admit that certainly, when I went when I was trained as a psychologist, it was still in the era, where we'd like to think that we were understanding general tendencies about people. And we didn't have to pay too much attention to the specifics. So I was not really very mindful about cultural differences. But the more I study, the more I realized, I don't know. And it's, it's become very clear to me that the ways in which we think about nature, as well as the ways in which we think about the relationship, our own relationships with nature, are very much culturally grounded. Probably even in a bigger differences. Thinking about a lot of indigenous peoples, and how they think about the relationship between humans and the natural world. But certainly, you know, Eastern cultures like China, and you know, slightly less far east. But still, I think, with elements of eastern, you know, Turkey or Russia. They also have different ways of thinking about nature. And it's just important in expanding my sense of what's possible, and what we take for granted.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for thanks for sharing that. And coming from Finland, it's, of course, very interesting, because we have such a long border with Russia and the Turkish people tend to see Finns as sort of distant relatives. So there's a special connection there. But also, even here, near the eastern edge of Europe, the social and cultural differences you mentioned, still play a role, even though there are some, some similarities. But you both come from North America. We've been talking with Thomas, about his history a bit, you know, doing river rafting, guiding and that sort of thing. But would you like Susan to share some of your own background? Did you have a strong connection to the natural world already when you were a child or young person?
Clayton: Yeah, I think I did. And not in maybe a dramatic way. I wasn't, you know, involved in environmental protests, except, you know, the kind of way an eight year old might come home and say, hey, we need to recycle. But I think perhaps what made a difference for me is that I was fortunate, even though I sort of grew up in the suburbs. Behind my home, there was a woods and a creek, and my bedroom window opened, facing the creek. So at night, I would hear the creek running, and I would hear the wind in the trees. And you know, maybe that had a powerful impact on me. I certainly spent a lot of time walking around the woods near my house. So even though I have to say my family didn't show any particular interest or connection to the environment, I think it may have become an implicit part of who I was. Those important kinds of sensory memories of nature.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, I think that implicit, explicit is a really good thing to think about. And listeners, you know, you all can think about that, too. There's certain things we just pick up from where we live, and we don't think about them. We just - they've become part of who we are. And then I think part of our process, even with this podcast, is making all this stuff more explicit. And of course, we're all, you know, Global North. White, light skinned people. So we have our own perspectives on this, but I want to make sure you know, listeners, you know, there's listeners around the world in this podcast, and they're all coming from different places. And I think every place has an indigenous root. An indigenous core. And no matter where you are in the world, I mean, indigenous cultures exist now, of course, it's not, they're not just an anachronism. And we have, you know, First Nations people listening to this now. And all of us can aspire to some sort of connection with place. And then there's a lot of problems and barriers too. So just to make sure that we're not missing that important point,
Clayton: I think one of the interesting things is, at least for me, it's the ways in which we think about nature. And the ways in which we think about our own relationship with nature can be so, so implicit, that we kind of don't realize that there are alternatives. And so encountering some of these alternative ways of thinking about that relationship can just be very real revealing in terms of shedding light on your own perspectives.
Doherty: Like [an] example? What are you thinking about, Susan, when you say that?
Clayton: Well, I think just thinking about the fact that it, for example, a lot of Westerners. A lot of people in the US and maybe Western European countries, tend to think of humans and nature as very separate. And if you ask them, you know, what, what is nature or what is wilderness especially, they'll define it as well, essentially a place where you don't find people and you don't find any evidence of people. And this is even embodied in the US Wilderness Act, for example. You know, there are many other cultures in which there may be no word for wilderness. You know, that nature is something to which people are related. They feel a sense of kinship with the natural world. And yeah, so just recognizing that the case makes me think, why do I think of nature as separate from human? It gives me more insight into the limits of my own perspective.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for sharing all that. And that resonates with my earlier history, also, researching Environmental Theology. And of course, the role of the Judeo-Christian worldview and religion in creating some possible hierarchies and or the mixed legacy. Of course, there were more ecological elements in that tradition, also. But my students, I still did some courses on environment and religion, they are always amazed to hear that in the ancient Hebrew, the original language of the Old Testament, there is no word for nature. Literally. There are, of course, some words that are used for, for, you know, land and so on. But they didn't have a separate concept for nature. And of course, there's a profound difference already between the Greek vocabulary and worldview and the [more] ancient, a bit more hunter-gatherer-founded worldview.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. And then we talk about Climate Cosmopolitanism. This concept of, you know, like, we got it, we have to sort of think about all these different views, even of climate change in, you know, approaches to climate change. And feelings about climate change. And strategies about it. And all that sort of stuff. So, yes, all the world. Yeah. And Susan, one of many things we could talk about is your work on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). We've got this Glasgow meeting going on. And, you know, the listeners don't get a chance often to hear from someone who's been on these kinds of committees and doing this kind of work. Do you have any anecdotes about your work? Some of these IPCC reports and things like that?
Clayton: Yeah well I -
Doherty: Or do you not want to not want to talk about that? It's up to you?
Clayton: No, it's fine. I'm sure you can definitely empathize with me when I say how gratifying it is that the people are starting to pay more attention to the impacts, the human impacts of climate change. Including the impacts on mental health. So that's just been really wonderful to see to the extent that that's happening. And I will say with regard to my participation with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, there have been a couple of wonderful things about that. I mean, probably more than a couple but one is it is such an international. A very intentionally international group. Like probably both of you, I'm in a number of organizations that try to be international, but they're almost always primarily from North America and Western Europe. Whereas the IPCC really does get people from, you know, probably every country around the world. And it's a unique experience and a very valuable one to me.
And then the other thing is, you know, we were talking getting back to the idea of emotions. You know, people often think, how do you maintain optimism in the face of climate change? How do you keep from feeling anxiety and despair all the time? And the process of these hundreds of scientists who are volunteering their time to talk about climate change. And its mechanisms. And its effects. And how we can mitigate it. And how we can adapt to it. And they're cheerful. You know, back in the day when we were able to actually meet in person, people were friendly and happy. And I think the process of working with these people who are so committed to bringing their expertise to bear on this topic is a reminder of the possibility of finding, you know, meaning and purpose and just positive experiences in talking about climate change.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks, Susan for sharing that. That sounds like many empowering experiences together with these professionals from around the world. And sometimes in [the] media one might get, you get the image that climate scientists are only depressed these days. And, of course, it's very important that the difficult emotions of climate scientists and other researchers get enough attention. And I know that you've been involved in that, as I've been in Finland, but also to bring forth that there's much joy and laughter still among people who work passionately, for a better future. So thanks for lifting that up.
Doherty: Yeah. I think it's, you know, I've been playing around with some positive ideas. You know, I think there's a sense of momentum we get when we're actually working on a project. You know, we have a sense of movement. We're engaged in something. And that itself is really psychologically healthy. To have a sense of engagement in a project of any kind, whatever, whatever kind of project it is. And I think at these meetings, I mean, people don't realize you're around people that believe in what you believe. And validate what you feel and think. And that's so healthy, you know, to be around. It's so inspiring to be around a bunch of people. Especially really gifted people that really, you don't have to explain yourself. You're all on the same page. And I think that's huge. And something, I'm sorry. I mean, for the listeners that don't get that. And I know a lot of people in fact. Maybe most people don't get that in the world. I'm lucky enough to get pieces of that even just right now in our conversation.
So I think there's even a sense of like a flow, you know. There's this flow state, right? In psychology Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, unfortunately, just passed away. And we lost this researcher, who, you know, popularized flow. But you know, I think we can even. You know, again, this is provocative, but we can get into, like a climate flow. Where like, we're working on stuff. And we're in a flow. And we're getting feedback. And we're being supported. And so that's kind of a revolutionary idea. But I don't know, Susan, have you felt climate flow like in some of these meetings?
Clayton: Absolutely. I think, you know, the idea that we get caught up in doing something that we find meaningful. And that takes some effort, but not too much. I mean, I think that's kind of the definition of flow. That it requires your resources, but it doesn't require more from you than you can, than you have to give. So, yes, I definitely experience that. And I think recognizing the sources of satisfaction that come from, from good work, is kind of what it comes down to. I also want to, thanks, thank you, Thomas, for raising the issue of how the social context for thinking about climate change can affect our experiences of it. So as you say, a lot of people may feel that. I mean, not only do they have to deal with their own emotions, but they have to deal with maybe unsupportive friends or family members or coworkers who. Or even if they don't, they're not really unsupportive. Just the worry that they might be unsupportive, can shut down some conversations before they even get started. So the ability to talk about our worries is very important. Very satisfying
Pihkala: Yes, countering feelings of isolation and loneliness. So sort of climate isolation or climate loneliness are part of this affective spectrum very much, I think too. And you both sort of testify to the possibility of experiencing both difficult emotions and very positive empowering emotions. And I always find that very important to emphasize that both can exist. It doesn't need to be one sided. But it's for the full spectrum of different colors. But you, Susan, are known as one of the forerunners in research and thinking about eco-anxiety or climate anxiety. And I want to ask you, when did you get involved with that particular topic? Does it have a long history? Or?
Clayton: No, I think it's a fairly well, it may be as much as four or five years, but perhaps less and not more. I think it arose partly out of discussions with reporters with journalists. So I had been writing about the mental health effects of climate change. Starting with a paper with Thomas. And then other papers more recently. And people would ask me, well, is this, you know, is this mental health issue? If people are concerned about climate change, does this represent a threat to mental health? So I started to think, well, I don't know, does it? You know, let's look at it, let's do some of the research and try to find out how many people are experiencing some anxiety associated with climate change. And, what does that look like? And is it a threat to mental health? And just so I don't make that dangling, I'll maybe reassure the listeners that, no, it's not necessarily a threat. Or it's not - it doesn't indicate a problem with mental health, but it can certainly be a source of stress that does, you know, it can be one thing that impacts your mental health. Especially if you feel very strong anxiety and maybe don't have a supportive social network or a feeling of efficacy.
Pihkala: Yeah, that links in my mind to this 2011 theme number of the American Psychologist where you both wrote stuff. And the models are quite advanced, actually, I think. And Thomas has been telling that it was partly theoretical at that time, because there wasn't so much evidence about the indirect vicarious impacts of climate stress for example. But I think those have stood the test of time pretty well, many of those models. And what was then discussed, without a sort of pre-word, such [as], you know, mentioning anxiety and depression and stress [without an “eco-” or “climate” prefix]. So now, during the last five years, we've seen the development of many special terms. People putting eco or climate before these words. And that has communicated value, but, of course, it sometimes also makes things tricky. That how many phenomena we put inside this sort of general word.
Doherty: Yeah. Like, it's the, you know, they say, the blind men and the elephant parable. You know, everybody's all: “Eco-anxiety is: ______. It's this, or it's this. And, you know, we have the cultural critique of our system and our, you know, capitalism and you know, media. And then there's the personal confessions. So I think, yeah, the listeners and media is both our friend and also kind of confuses things, because they're picking out different pieces of the elephant and each article trumpets on one side or the other. So it leaves people confused sometimes.
Pihkala: How do you, Susan, see the research field about anxiety and ecological matters these days? I know you get a lot of messages from people who are interested [in] researching.
Clayton: Yes, I think the research is really exploding or about to explode. It's partly because, you know, other people. Mental health professionals, clinical psychologists and others, have recognized that this is a thing. So there's a whole group of people who had not previously been thinking about climate change, [but] are now beginning to think about it more. And so they're recognizing this as a topic they want to learn more about. And not even mental health professionals just sort of public health professionals, I think. It has grabbed people's attention, hopefully, for good reasons that. You know, somebody said, and I can't remember where I read this. So I apologize for not giving an attribution. But you know, sometimes it's hard to - you don't know what you're feeling until somebody gives you a word. And then you realize that's the word that describes what you're feeling. So I think a lot of people thought, yes, that's exactly it. Climate anxiety, or eco-anxiety. And they're not all necessarily meaning the same thing when they use that word, but they are recognizing that it means something to them.
Doherty: Mmhmm. Yeah, they're validated. They're being validated. Their being is being validated.
Pihkala: Yeah, that's happened a lot in Finland. Ympäristöahdistus, which is the Finnish equivalent: literally, environmental anxiety. So, of course, different languages play somewhat different[ly]. That's one topic in this podcast. And the very thing you mentioned, of exploring possible names for these emotions or groups of emotions. That's of course a big task for this very podcast.
Doherty: Yes. Yes. We've got a few more minutes. I feel moved to just mention some of the other work that I know Susan for and, you know, around with animals and with other species. And I know that's been a big strand in your work. And I know through like Carol Saunders. One of our colleagues who kind of helped found conservation psychology, you know. And, you know, so just to name that there are other species out there as well that we have relationships with. And I don't know if that's something you want to say anything about, Susan. But I know that's something I associated with you as well.
Clayton: Absolutely. And, again, it was the sort of happenstance that I started doing some work in zoos. Gosh, probably almost 15 years ago now. Partly inspired by Carol Saunders, who happened to come up to me at an APA conference and introduce herself. And the zoo was significant to me as a place where a lot of people encounter nature. So even people who live in very urban environments are able to encounter nature. And, of course, zoos are not - they're not wild. They're not wilderness. They're, you know, arguably, they're not natural. They're managed by humans. And yet, for a lot of people, it was an important place to encounter those other species and to think about the natural world. So I'm still fascinated by that idea that people and parents will deliberately take their children to the zoo in order to expose them to some of the natural world. So it's not something that's just happening accidentally. But it's a choice that parents are making to say that nature is important to me and I want my child to have some exposure to it.
So thinking more about how those encounters can happen, about how people are defining what is nature. What counts as nature. What should it look like. And how that might affect the ways in which we take care of natural landscapes. These are just, these are just fascinating questions to me that reflect on what it means to be human. Because we define ourselves as humans in part in terms of what we're not. So how does how we think about what it means to be human affect how we think about what it means to be natural?
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks a lot for sharing that. And this interface or boundaries. However porous they may be between humans and [the] more-than-human world. That's a very crucial topic. And the recent rise in post-humanistic research has brought many of these themes into the fore. Sometimes, you know, slightly difficult language, but the subject matter is very, very important. And I just noticed that you've been writing also about the psychology of rewilding. So that's one now on my reading list.
Clayton: Yeah, I have a lot more questions than answers about it at this point. But one of the things I find fascinating, and maybe Thomas this will have some meaning to you, is that I've heard people talk about rewilding. How we need to rewire ourselves in a sort of a psychodynamic kind of sense. So I think it's an interesting metaphor, to the extent it's a metaphor that people are using.
Doherty: Yeah, I think it depends on people's culture and what's meaningful for them. But you know, our feelings are wild. So we want to be open to all of them, the hard ones and the positive ones. And, yeah, we'll have to make a point of doing a talk on wilding and rewilding in one of our episodes. I think that's a really juicy topic for people. But just suffice to say, you know, that, you know, these zoos are conservation organizations. And they're linked back to actual environments in places where people are trying to save and preserve species in their natural habitats as well. So it's a whole system. That's one thing I learned from that work was that it isn't just a menagerie of animals. It's a whole worldwide system of conservation that these zoos are just, you know, piece of. But yeah, we're coming to the end of our time. This has been a really great chat. We could always go more. And, you know, as our adventures go on, Susan, maybe we can have you come back again some time. The story is not over yet. Obviously. With all the stuff that we're doing. So I want to thank you very much, Susan, for your time today.
Clayton: Yeah, it's a pleasure. Thanks for the conversation. It's always nice to touch base and to throw these ideas around with both of you.
Pihkala: Yeah, warm thanks from Helsinki also. I really admire the width of your interest and research. So this was very, very fascinating and all the best for these many fields. Doherty: Well, thanks. On our website, we'll try to put some good links to Susan's work. And you all listening, take care of yourself. But we covered a lot of ground in our episode today about nature. And feelings. And our identities. And even this idea of support and flow. So hopefully this planted, we planted some seeds for you all. So you all take care.
Season 1, Episode 5: Synergy = Energy
Mar 04, 2022
In this episode, Thomas and Panu talk about connections and meaning-making—looking at climate feelings through the lens of synergy. They are constantly surprised at the positive energy they discover as they meet and collaborate with others around the world—such as during Panu’s work on the recent Lancet global youth study—and the validation they gain from learning about those who made similar discoveries in the past. In order to navigate this time in history with its dark ecology of overlapping crises, from climate to COVID to armed conflict, we need to open toward shared energy, efforts, and resources that sustain us. In a timely lesson, Thomas describes how to go on a “media diet”—engaging with media intentionally rather than in an impulsive and uncontrolled way—one tool for centering yourself and broadening engagement with your local place. He reminds listeners that ultimately their life is the most important news. Through positive synergies we can find meaning in the time we are given. Join us!
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I am Thomas Doherty …
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, our podcast. A show for people around the globe who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change, particularly their feelings about climate change. Their emotions about climate change. How it’s affecting them personally. How it affects their actions in the world. And we are welcoming all of you listeners to be with us and as Panu and I talk about these things for ourselves personally and in our professional work.
Panu, today I’m really struck with this concept. In one of our recent episodes we talked about holding space and today I’m struck with this idea of synergy. Of things happening that are related. I mean you and I have been having a synergy in what you’re doing in Finland and what I’m doing here in the US. A brief example, I was speaking to Beth Karlin and Larissa Dooley at the See Change Institute here in the US. Beth is a colleague of mine, a psychologist, and they’re doing behavioral change work here in the community. And they were approached to do a study on youth in California, particularly Black Indigenous and People of Color - BIPOC youth, around climate anxiety and they had reached out to me and we were chatting. I referenced the big study, the Lancet study, that you’ve been involved in.
Just this morning I got a reviewer invitation to review a journal article on someone doing, you know, psychological support groups for young people, students dealing with climate change distress, you know, in classes, in environmental studies classes. Listeners who have taken environmental studies or conservation science classes know that doom and gloom really comes into those classrooms and it can be really tough. And so, you know, there’s this positive synergy of us working together. I was able to connect Beth with Amy Lykens in Australia who’s doing research on young people in Australia around the fires in Australia and the wildfires and also research in Fiji and the Pacific Islands.
So there’s a community of us doing things. And there’s a positive synergy. And that’s just one thing that people might come across when they’re working on climate change. There’s negative synergies, and we’ll get to those too, but there’s positive ones too. Or just there are synergies and we can put away that labeling of them.
Where does that - how does that hit for you in terms of this, any synergies or what you’re experiencing in your work?
Pihkala: That’s a very interesting concept. In the Finnish language, we have many original words, but, you know, synergy with a synergia. So that’s a very literal anglicism just picking it up. Of course synergy itself comes very closely from more ancient languages than English and I do experience it a lot in my work, luckily. Of course there are also times when it seems hard to find. I’m thinking, for example, in those early years when I started to focus heavily on eco-anxiety research in 2015 and 2016. And everybody thought I was really strange to change research topics to that one, but lately and during the last three years there’s definitely been great synergy going around. And that gives you energy. You know, literally syn-ergiaa, energy, so it’s a global thing and I think it’s very important that we keep matters open and flowing.
Another thing that instantly comes to my mind is the way that in the universities, unfortunately, competition culture has grown even more intense in the 2000s. And many people blame roughly neoliberalism for it. Of course it’s easy to blame neoliberalism for everything, but there’s something there. And that’s of course something that I really detest and dislike, but I’ve rather tried always to be open to various synergies and not to be picky about sharing some ideas and research and so on.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah, so yes synergy, you know, I’m glad you made the connection with energy which I wasn’t obviously making, but it is, it is shared energy right? And, you know, that’s what we need, that’s what all of us need to survive right now is shared energy and shared direction, because that is mutually advantageous. I’m looking at the dictionary, you know, mutually advantageous conjunction or compatibility of distinct participants, you know, and so resources and efforts. So we need shared efforts, shared resources. We all need to be careful about those aspects of our life that tend to limit sharing. Limit cooperation. And there’s unfortunately a long list of those kinds of things including the kind of competition and scarcity mentality that comes, you know, in some of these kinds of capitalist, neoliberal kind of situations, you know. The fights are so bitter because the stakes are so small, you know, as they say in academia people are fighting for their funding. And that’s a piece, so I know some of you all are thinking about that.
But yeah synergy—and some of it it’s coincidence and it just happens to be. I—listeners might know, you know, I do my own counseling and therapy work as a psychologist and I see clients. And I’ve been getting more—in the old days I would say, you know, true eco-therapy clients or true clients that were coming in specifically because of the environment, nature, climate change were relatively rare, say like ten years ago. I mean they were out there and people would find me, but most people would come into the actual counseling because of a much more proximal thing like they lost their job or a relationship break up or they were depressed or anxious or had difficulties parenting. All the life, the catastrophes, the daily catastrophes of life that we cope with, you know, that’s what really brings people in for, to seek that help. But now it’s changed and people are coming in specifically because of climate and issues.
And I happened to have two people come in. New folks to me that, one after the other, independently, both had connections with the Chernobyl radiation—the nuclear accident in Chernobyl. One person was Austrian and relocated to the US. And another person had, was also in the US, but they had been born in Belarus and had come to the US when they were younger. And both of them cited Chernobyl as an instigating factor in their environmental identity and their sense of themselves and nature because they both had childhood experiences of being afraid of the radiation. As someone growing up in the US, I don’t know anything about that. I know about it just intellectually that I know that problem happened. But they spoke to the actual, you know, experience of that. And, you know, that was an interesting coincidence as well and it brought into mind, you know, how we get primed for different, you know, when we talk about eco-anxiety and things, you know, people have, are primed. So there’s these different, different kinds of synergies.
Pihkala: Yeah, that’s very interesting, Thomas. And actually living in Finland, the place where I grew up got some fallout from Chernobyl because of the direction of the wind it came to Finland. Not even nearly as bad as in Belarus, for example, but still there’s been a long-standing discussion about the effects of the radiation. And in some areas still if you pick up mushrooms, you should boil them one extra time because they have still deposited radiation from Chernobyl, so that’s sort of close to me.
And that brings me to another aspect of synergy. Or close to it as a word is synchronicity. This old concept of two things happening roughly at the same time or in some connection with each other so that for the person there is a meaning born in relation to that connection. I think it comes from Jungian psychology. I don’t know if it has even roots. It may have, but once I was thinking about radiation and, you know, as a research theme so-called nuclear anxiety and eco-anxiety, that’s been one of the things I’ve been thinking about. And then I turned on the radio and it started with a news item about radiation and going back to the history with Chernobyl and so on. So that’s a real synchronicity which happened something like five years ago. I’m now reminded of it. And of course many of these things people can say they are just coincidences and so on, but still they are part of numerous people’s lives in complex ways.
Doherty: Yeah, so it’s a meaning, you know, so we’re all making meaning about these connections. And we live in systems, we’re embedded in systems and there’s things that are happening. So yeah so I think, you know, for everyone who’s listening, just kind of sitting, taking a moment and just thinking about yourself and feeling in the moment. Again, taking a breath and saying okay here I am. I’m embedded in all the systems of my life. And there are potential synergies that are happening. There are these bad memories. And dangers. And technological disasters that poison our lands and it's something that we have to live with. And, you know, we are making meaning by how things come to us, you know. So it’s something to be aware of.
One synergy that can be problematic is synergy of the media. Taking in media, imagery and social media and the news and being, you know, like a news junkie, as we might say in the United States, you know. That floods us with all kinds of disparate information and factoids and ads and headlines and things like that. Which can create all kinds of synergies. Some of which are really overwhelming, you know. And it overwhelms our nervous system if we take in too much, you know. If you take in too much disparate, troubling information that you don’t have any direct connection to or control over, it’s just a perfect recipe for a sense of global anxiety and global angst.
Pihkala: Exactly.
Doherty: Weltschmerz as we say. And so, there’s a synergy. Now, if I’m more mindful of what I’m taking in and directing my attention toward news or research or things that are interesting and helpful to me, then there could obviously be a positive synergy. And we can all get on that positive synergy of finding things that are really fascinating and inspiring.
Pihkala: Yeah.
Doherty: So, again, yeah.
Pihkala: I’ve heard and read from you, Thomas, at quite an early point during the 2010s this advice to limit one’s climate [media] diet. And, of course, now both in relation to COVID-19 media coverage and eco-anxiety and climate anxiety. That advice has become more widespread. But I link you with one of the early advice givings of that and I strongly resonate with this energy also in the news cycles. And there’s some conscious design, I think, especially of the American news culture that tends to suck one in and, you know, even causing some addiction and so on. It can take strength of will. That’s another thing that we might discuss more some time this old idea of strength of will. And social support can help a lot in that of course. But that’s something that I personally do also. I don’t actually usually read the news in the morning. I start my mornings more gently and do some research and reading and only then check out the news. Of course I’m in a sort of privileged position that there’s no instant threats coming my way, but many people in the world are sharing that same position. It’s not obligatory to immerse yourself right after you have woken up to the news cycle.
Doherty: Yeah. I would second that. Speaking as a clinical psychologist and a doctor I would second that very much. That prescription of not immersing yourself. No, it’s—it can be really toxic. And some people can surf that wave for a while, but I think eventually you’ll be inundated by it and it becomes an addiction. It becomes an addicting kind of situation. And, yeah, we don’t really have control of the medium. It’s a machine that’s much more powerful than us. And I don’t think, you know, our frail human psyche and our senses can get overwhelmed.
Pihkala: Yeah. I very strongly resonate with that. Thanks for underscoring that. And in the workshops and lectures that I am giving as part of what I do, I’ve, in an increasing manner, met people who are very compassionate and passionate about environmental concerns and who have trouble facing the news or staying in touch with the news. And, of course, there I’m trying from my part to share that advice for them. And sometimes people have creative solutions like one person who had sort of given the responsibility of following the news to her husband who was more okay with that. So, then the husband sort of distilled the news in a not so striking imagery fashion so that it was easier to take in. So, there’s some creativity around this but I, that’s a problem in Finland I would say too.
Doherty: Yeah. And I think teaming up, teaming up can be helpful. That example has kind of a quaint Victorian kind of flavor to it. So some of our listeners might rankle against having someone, you know, distill the news. A male, distill the news for them. But I think it’s really more about the teamwork. And the synergy. And taking the time, you know.
We should probably just spend a moment on this since we’re here at this topic. The idea of a news, what is a news fast or, like you say, a climate diet, you know. It is really about just in the same way that we would think about how we would become reflective about any other aspects of our diets, like what kind of foods that we eat. I might want to be more conscious of what kinds of foods I eat. How much sugar do I consume? Or coffee. Or caffeine. Or alcohol. Or dairy products. Or bread. Or anything like that. And we might eliminate certain things from our diet just to become aware of their effects on us. And it’s a short-term project to see what makes us healthy.
And so, that’s something to keep in mind when you’re doing a news fast. Like if you decided to not listen to the news for a day or a week. Sometimes that will happen naturally if you’re traveling or if someone is doing some kind of outdoor adventure where they’re away from, you know, from phones and the internet. But, you know, again it’s an activity to help you be healthier. And it’s an experiment. And it’s a systematic activity.
Because the first sort of voice that comes up in a lot of people’s heads is well I don’t want to be uninformed. I don’t want to be uninformed. Or somehow it’s unethical for me to, you know, let go of the news. But that’s not really the case. And if you try it, as I’m sure you’ve known Panu, I actually feel more informed, you know, when I break from the news for a few days. I’m much more informed about my life. What’s going on around me. What other people are saying. And I actually know that I will hear important events that are happening in the world through my social interactions. And so I am not, I am in fact, I feel more informed. A sense of integrity. A sense of stability, you know. So there’s a lot of ways to think about this. But you’re not burying your head in the sand. You’re actually, in some ways, burying your head in the sand when you’re just immersed in news all the time.
Pihkala: Yeah. I think that’s very well said, Thomas. And was it Henry David Thoreau who said what’s so new about news anyway? From a sort of classical humanist position, we sort of know that there’s both joy and sorrow going on. And reading Shakespeare or the Old Testaments sort of gives the basic idea. Of course one needs also to follow it but it’s not obligatory to stay there all the time.
And a sort of second advice that I usually try to give is related to what I’ve been calling binocular vision or skill of seeing two levels. Binocular vision comes from Bion. This pioneering psychotherapist. I’ve been using it in the sort of media literacy sense that focusing your eyes and senses both on the good and the bad and realizing that the news flow is geared towards the bad and threatening. For some good reasons and for some bad reasons, you know. Like trying to get more viewers and readers by showing graphic imagery of violence that’s usually not necessary in an ethical sense, for example. But so this skill of seeing two levels is something that some Finnish psychologists have picked up in their recommendations related to eco-anxiety also. So, and that there’s some commonality of the problem in more strong forms of eco-anxiety where it can easily feel that there’s nothing good happening in the world and it’s just all going down down down.
Doherty: Yes. Binocular vision. Wilfred Bion. A British psychotherapist. Shierry Weber Nicholsen in The Love of Nature at the End of the World—that’s one of my all time favorite books—she talks about that binocular vision in the therapeutic realm as well. And, again, it’s people that are counselors or therapists who know that we have binocular vision. We both hold our own thoughts and feelings within the interaction and then we’re sitting with the other person’s thoughts or feelings as well. And so that kind of observer self is a very important piece of a lot of modern, you know, therapies as well. Acceptance Commitment Therapy and things like that is having that binocular vision.
So yeah, you know, like you say Thoreau. I mean I think he said, you know, what, he wants to know “what was never old.” Is what he says I believe, right? He wants to know what was never old. And he’s railing against the telegraph in 1848, you know. It’s the telegraph and everybody suddenly realizing they have to know what’s news and what’s happened in Europe and things like that. So yeah, these issues on media are not new. Like a lot of the issues where we’re talking about are not new at all. But another thing I say is, you know, we are the news. So like we make our own news. So my life is the news. So when I am not looking at the media that means I am focusing on my own. So I challenge clients to be the news. You know, you’re the news. Don’t look out, don’t look to other places for the news. You’re the news. Your life is the news. Your family. Your children. Your work. Your community. That’s the news for you. And I think that’s another way of thinking about it to get out of this corporate, capitalist kind of thing. You know, you can own the news. Make your own news, so to speak
Pihkala: That’s fascinating. That’s fascinating. And that news is new every morning so there’s also that sort of, you know, everyday at it’s time I’m reminded of that with this emphasis on focusing on what’s close by and most important. And I do think this links with the synergy, also. And that’s part of this skill of seeing two levels is realizing how many people there are actually all over the world who are making all kinds of efforts to build better communities and better societies and to protect the environment and build more holistic relationships with the more than human world and so on.
Paul Hawken has this book Blessed Unrest which is one attempt to bring out how ridiculous a number of environmental NGOs there are, for example. And that requires a certain focus. We don’t usually come across that information. Luckily, of course, there’s been the rise of solutions journalism and journalism which brings out also the good news. In Finland we have a Facebook group called good news about sustainability. Where a bunch of people have committed to share also the many good news because otherwise it might be missing from the news cycle. But the idea that there’s a lot of synergy around and there’s a lot of people who are actually doing a lot of things and trying. So that is very comforting for me at least often.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, there is a lot, you know, that speaks to more how do we direct our search light into the news and be more selective. A couple of other practical things, you know. Analog news is different than electronic news. So reading the newspaper which I know is an older concept for people and sometimes it's even hard to get a good newspaper. But, you know, reading paper news is a different experience to our nervous system than a web news. And so, it's a great experiment to try.
Take a well-known, any well-known reputable paper I’ll just name, well reputable is questionable depending on what our listeners think about the news. But just say a seemingly known paper like The New York Times. Now it’s one thing to get on the New York Times website and drill down into all those stories, but could often leave us drained and exhausted and, you know, confused. But if I sit down with a paper and look through it, the information comes at me at a different pace and I see more of an ecology of different things going on in different aspects of the world. And there’s a pacing there. I’m not being force fed electronically into my nervous system the information. I’m taking it in and reflecting on it in real time. So, there’s different ways to take in, to take in information.
I was in another form of synergy. I was approached by a person named Chris Pallatroni who’s an entrepreneur. He’s working on an app that helps people share advice about life that they think is important about their life so others can hear it. And he’s got an idea for this kind of app. And he’s trying to reach out to certain influencer type people that might want to contribute like personal advice. Something that they do personally in their life that works for them and he’s, you know. So we chatted about that a little bit. And, you know, it’s a provocative question, you know. What do you personally do that you think is helpful and makes you a better person, you know? And so that’s a great question for our listeners and for all of us to think about.
You know, one of my news practices that I do, I have a couple of things daily. I say “No news before noon.” That’s one of my rules, personally. So I try not to look at any news, particularly any online news, before 12:00pm. So my, you know, and that works pretty well for me and I’ve learned to sort of buffer my intake of the news. So first thing in the morning I devote to other things, again, myself. And then after noon, you know, I’m free to start surfing the web, you know. But that’s just a personal rule that I have, no news before noon, you know. And I say “No irony before nine” is another one. 9:00am. So like in the morning I try not to, even if I’m listening to music or I’m doing other things I try not to get ironic and sarcastic and sardonic. Even like the music that I’ll listen to, for example. You and I are music listeners and things like that. So I’m going to choose something that is healthy and uplifting first thing in the morning. So, no irony before nine, no news before noon. That’s just a - I’m not pushing that on anyone else, but I’m just giving an example of a habit. You know, we can develop these habits.
Pihkala: Yeah. Yeah, I strongly resonate with that and habits are difficult to change. Everybody who has some habit which they deem bad know this, but then again the good side is if you manage to construct a good habit in your life, that also sticks. And I’ve seen that happening also in my relation to news and also to some other daily practices. The COVID-19 working remotely from home thing, for example, has brought me a routine of going out everyday at about 10:00am. So that’s a sort of middle break in morning work and walking in the nearby woods and so on. So that’s a habit that took some time to form it into a routine and now it happens sort of semi automatically.
Doherty: Mhmm. Yeah. Yeah, and so yeah, and listeners we’ve all developed our COVID era habits and I know you’ve got. We’re going to be talking more about COVID-19 and your research on COVID anxiety and, you know, how it’s affected our personal lives. So that’s something to look out for coming up here in one of our future discussions. Yeah Panu, and so I think I would like to keep some of these big ideas. Like holding space. Like synergy. Some of our themes because we’ll return to these. I don’t know much about the future, but I do know there’s going to be more synergies. Both negative and positive coming up here. And all of us are going to be riding those waves.
You know, you mentioned J.R.R. Tolkien and the idea of using the time that we have. And so I had to kind of go back to my Tolkien, Fellowship of the Ring, you know, where Frodo is talking about not, wishing some of these things had not happened in his time. And, you know, Gandolf’s character has that great line, you know, “so do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us,” you know. And so, yes we all wish we were seeing something else, but all we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us. And that includes our mornings, you know, how we wake up. How we greet the day. How we spend time in our community. And so, thinking in those big thoughts, you know, I think can help with some bolstering against thinking about the media and the media diet which is so trivial really in some ways compared to what’s so important in our lives.
Pihkala: That’s a great quote. That’s a great quote.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah. So great, so again, a synergy. Panu and I are having fun with this. And listeners, I hope you are enjoying our conversations as well. And it’s climatechangeandhappiness.com. Please reach out to us. Please let us know what you are thinking. We’re going to be doing more of these conversations and Panu I hope you have a great rest of your evening.
Pihkala: And thanks for the lovely discussion again, Thomas. Have a good day there where the sun is still shining a bit higher.
Doherty: Yes, we’re celebrating the equinox today and so that’s a beautiful time of the year. Take care.
Pihkala: You too, take care. And thanks to the listeners.
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Season 1, Episode 4: Acceptance, Commitment and Climate with Guest Karine St. Jean
Feb 18, 2022
Season 1, Episode 4 | Acceptance, Commitment and Climate with Guest Karine St. Jean
Thomas and Panu welcome Quebecois psychologist Karine St. Jean as their first guest on the podcast. Karine practices mindfulness and uses Acceptance Commitment Therapy (ACT) in her climate-focused work with clients in Montreal, Canada. In a wide ranging discussion, the three discuss the value of sitting with challenging feelings and maintaining flexibility in terms of sustainability action. Karine emphasizes the value in “meaningful faith” and finding “collective meaning” in honoring the positive and negative emotions that come up around issues of the environment. Thomas recognizes some important works that integrate Buddhism and ecology as well as concepts like hyper-empathy that take on added meaning in the context of the climate crisis. Panu rounds out the discussion by introducing the concept of “binocular vision” as a way to hold multiple emotions in awareness as we grapple with complex 21st century dilemmas.
Links
Karine St. Jean, PhD., Clinical psychologist and mindfulness facilitator at Mindspace
Season 1, Episode 4: Acceptance, Commitment and Climate with Guest Karine St. Jean
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello, I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. The show for people around the globe who are feeling and thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change and the climate crisis. Their emotional responses and their feelings. As you know from listening, I’m a psychologist in Portland, Oregon and Panu is an emotions researcher from Helsinki, Finland. And, today, from Montreal, Canada, we have a guest.
Karine St. Jean: Hi. Really happy to be here. I’m Karine St. Jean. I’m a psychologist here in Montreal, Canada. I’ve been interested in this relationship between ourselves and the planet and all emotions that come with it for a few years now. And I’m trying to help as many people as I can to navigate these lands.
Doherty: Bonjour, Karine.
St. Jean: Bonjour. I’m French-speaking too.
Doherty: Like Panu, je parle un peu français (I speak a little bit of French), but not enough to carry an intelligent conversation. But Karine, I know I’ve had some connection with you and I’m really proud to have you here as our guest. Our first guest on our podcast, actually. And I know you’ve been doing, as a psychologist, some interesting work in Montreal. And I just wanted to start out by asking you, you know, is this, how did this psychology and nature-climate connection start out with you? I think people are always curious about that for mental health professionals. Was it a long-standing interest? Or was it, was there a kind of trigger or an event? You know, what’s some, you know, details about how this might work out in your life?
St. Jean: It started inside. Like being worried about the state of our planet and navigating all those emotions like hopelessness, sadness, fear and struggling with conflicting values and emotions. So, it was more like a personal thing that I was juggling with and exploring. And started to talk about that with colleagues. And we started a few actions at the clinic, at work to make this whole clinic a bit more green and a bit more conscious. And somehow things kind of fell into place and I started talking about eco-anxiety. Started reading a lot about that. Reading research and at some point decided to put all those thoughts together in a book. That was my journey so far.
And, of course, being in touch with clients who are struggling with that. Like carrying the pain and very deep questions about that: like should I continue studying? Should I have children? My children - what I’m creating for them? So, all those things that were showing up in therapy. So, learning from those clients how they were navigating these emotions and helping them create a space where they could feel heard, supported, validated in what they are feeling – and unpacking all those emotions were kind of also a really significant part of this process for me.
Pihkala: That is very, very fascinating, Karine and bienvenue (welcome).
St. Jean: Merci (thank you).
Pihkala: Working in Finland there’s lots of similarities in what we’ve seen. I’m not a therapist, but I’ve been facilitating discussion groups together with therapists for people who feel rather strong eco-anxiety and so on. So, can you share with us a bit more about the methods you’ve been using in such encounters?
St. Jean: I would say the first thing that comes to mind is holding the space for all those emotions to be named and to be processed and to be okay with the pain and the suffering that comes with it. So in my, but also with my clients, like so they can trust that it can be held and named and explored. And also that we can make sense of that and eventually do something – whether it’s to take care of ourselves or, I should say and, take care of the planet too. The whole process is, of course, infused by my, I’ll say that’s my personal practice and my personal belief. I’m exploring mindfulness and Buddhism. So it kind of infuses a bit how I approach how we can help hold emotions, but also Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is also showing up in how I help people.
Pihkala: That’s most interesting. Thanks for sharing a bit more about those methods. And since I have a background also in religion and worldview research and practice and so on, so I’ve also been interested about mindfulness for a long time. And it’s fascinating to see also those books about eco-anxiety and related phenomena that are now coming out. Very many of them do have Buddhist influences and people utilize mindfulness. So there really seems to be something that helps people with these difficult emotions.
Doherty: Yeah and, you know, there was a book called Dharma Gaia that came out, you know, 20, 30 years ago [1990]. That was an early collection. Joanna Macy’s work, obviously. You know, [her] World as Lover, World as Self (1991) has gotten into this kind of work.
Yeah so, I mean, our podcast is a holding space too. So the listeners, you know, we’re holding space for our emotions and for yours as well. And then, there’s this critical tension with feeling and then action. You know, how to stay with just the feeling and with the presensing. So I’m just wondering. I just want to name that off the bat because I just think that’s an impulse. People have a hard time sitting still! And really being with these things because they’re kind of yucky. They’re yucky feelings. You know, I know that comes up in your work, Karine, and you experience it as well. What is, you know, ACT therapy - Acceptance and Commitment Therapy - is a model that I’m influenced by as well. What are some of the examples of, Karine, that you would go to when someone’s struggling with that action impulse? Is that something that you could speak to?
St. Jean: When I think of ACT therapy, so it’s Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, two things come to mind. All those emotions are really just important information. They are yucky, but they are really important because they are telling us that something that we value or someone that we value is kind of influenced or hurt by what is going on. So, they are telling us that something is important. So, finding a space to explore these values. What’s meaningful for us. And probably, like all the listeners, probably have different values related to climate and environment and the biodiversity and social inequities and injustice. So, many of this can be brought up and named so it can help in making sense of all these yucky feelings that we tend to, you know, work very hard to run away from. Whether it’s by Netflix or whatever means we choose. So, getting in touch with those values, I think it’s a way of approaching those emotions that can be a bit less frightening first.
And the other piece that I use that I find helpful in ACT is how do we relate with this mind that’s not always so helpful for us? Sometimes we can get lost and very fixed. And someone that I know used a nice word like “unbendable and unbreakable” views or perspectives. And they can become very narrow and they can create a lot of pain like at 3 am in the morning when I’m still worrying about whether I should have children? Or those poor koalas that have been burned. It’s not really helpful for me. Not saying that it’s true or not. It’s just not helpful.
So, that’s the first layer. And the second layer that sometimes I will go with exploring with people, clients is: what is this that’s going on in my mind lately? Images? Words? It’s not happening right now. It may be happening somewhere, but for me right in this moment the nature of those thoughts are just words and images associated with feelings. And it’s not - I’m not saying that in a way of, you know, just thoughts are not important, but more like “oh can I relate differently with those thoughts.” And I find this could be helpful in creating a different space to approach all that is going on when we think about our poor planet.
Doherty: hmmm.
Pihkala: That is most interesting. And a close colleague of mine in Finland, Sanni Saarimäki, who is a psychologist working with students started a sort of pioneering group in Finland for future-related anxiety among students at a technology university. So you can imagine the contradictions that people have when they become more aware of the systemic crisis and realize that partly their studies and the professions that they are aiming towards are sort of part of the problem. So it’s very complicated.
But, she’s been using Acceptance Commitment Therapy quite a lot and we’ve had interesting discussions related to it. And I think it’s very important just as I heard you say to sort of emphasize the reality of the crisis, but then also say that, you know, working with our thoughts and with our possible rumination and so on it can also help. So, it’s not necessary to discard CBT altogether in this.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah and there’s a tension between, you know, getting into the thoughts and trying to question them or just really just not tangling with them. Like they say [in ACT], let go of the tug of war with the thought. And so that’s interesting. I have a saying in therapy, you know, our mind is going to do what it wants to do. Both positive and negative, you know. Someone is really on a, you know, more positive, someone’s out dating and they meet someone and then suddenly have all these fantasies about all they’re going to be together with this person. And this is the right person for them. And they’re going to be living together. And so they start having, you know, “future tripping” as we call it. Where they’re just way out there. And I say, you know, “your horses are going to run so let them run, but just don’t ride them.” You know, so your thoughts are going to run, just don’t get on their back and ride them.
I try to do that with anxiety well. You know, our anxiety is going to run. It’s on all the time. It’s a normal, natural setting. Unfortunately we live in a time, you know, where the world keeps setting off our red anxiety light constantly. All the time. So, we can let that run. So, experientially that’s hard to do. Then it’s to the, you know, in terms of climate emotions, we can also try to think about the emotions we want to be feeling. You know, that we want to cultivate. Like I’ve been playing around with this word “faith.” Faith is often one that doesn’t come up in climate discourse very much. But, you know, allegiance, fidelity to something.
St. Jean: Trust.
Doherty: Faith in our values. Yeah, you know, and how do we kind of play with that growing feelings. You know, growing the feelings we want.
Pihkala: Yeah. It’s like the FBI [US Federal Bureau of Investigation], you know. They have words behind the abbreviation. I think it’s “Fidelity, Bravery, Integrity.” Well, I’m not commenting about the actual FBI and these, but it’s a nice combination of three values and virtues. And fides, the original word linking both with faith and trust as you, Karine, said. So, does this sort of faith angle of Thomas resonate with you, Karin?
St. Jean: When you first mentioned it, it was, what came to mind is this combination of kind of trust and action that goes along with faith that for me makes faith meaningful. It’s kind of faith anchored in like real things. As opposed to some, you know, some of listeners and even me like when we talk about faith, as Thomas mentioned, it’s something more like I trust in something that I don’t know. Or that I don’t have proof of. Whereas, the faith that we seem to be talking about right now makes a lot of sense. Being anchored in an ability to also hold all the positive that’s being done right now. Like there are some good news. I mean I believe that much. And if we don’t read the IPCC report it’s easier sometimes to do. But there is hope and if we can anchor ourself in this, in faith that there’s something that can be done. And it makes sense.
But for some people it might be hard to allow themselves to have positive emotions. It can feel so wrong because they are so entangled in their own anxiety and fear. And it’s something that it’s worth cultivating, finding our own way of having faith in something that makes sense.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks for sharing that. And I totally agree from my own experience that any kind of healthy pride or even being content is very difficult even for ardent environmental activists because of the strong possibility of ecological guilt and shame. And the situation where basically or theoretically you could always do more. So it’s very difficult when there’s no established social norms that when, have you done enough.
St. Jean: I’ve heard people being shamed by members of their group because they were daring, speaking of something that’s positive, and there can be something of that in certain groups too. So I think it's something to explore at least.
Doherty: Yeah. And I think for listeners, it’s something we all struggle with. I struggle with this. Panu. I mean, we all struggle with this too. I work with people in groups like the Sunrise Movement. They’re taking on climate change and social justice and, you know, built in inequalities. So there’s, in every direction, there are things to be upset about. And it can really be a competition to see how bad you can feel in some ways. And so it is radical to capture the truth of our feelings. Which is that they’re also positive because they’re wild as we’ve talked about before on our podcast. They’re wild. We’re going to have positive feelings.
And this whole “hyper-empathy” is another good word that I like. We’ve been talking about our different words that we like. Hyperempathy. You know, this ability to feel sensations of others really strongly, including pain. Comes out of Octavia Butler's novel Parable of the Sower. But, you know, we do have this hyper-empathy because of technology and all the things we can see and hear and learn about. And so, it does make it difficult. But, you know, faith anchored in a real thing, you know. Like Ashlee Consolo says, “gritty hope.” It’s like hope that’s - or hope based in action. Or built hope. So I think there’s this idea we have to be - you know, the actions and emotions can work well together if we can get them in the right synch. In the right synch, but I think there’s just a lot of loss. A lot of loss and grief because our actions seem so small sometimes.
Pihkala: Do you, Karine, operate with the concept of meaning explicitly in your work? Because, of course, that’s one that’s very closely related to the subject matter we’ve been talking about.
St. Jean: I think it’s essential that we explore the meaning of what we feel. It’s, for me, a big chunk of how I can be with all those emotions. If I’m just drowning in them, it can be really, really heavy. But if I can, and I notice that too, and people even in groups like when people can find a collective meaning to their sense of grief or to their anger, it opens a door into okay, but what can I do with that? And sometimes it can be as beautifully and powerfully simple as just going out in nature and being able to feel all those positive emotions that we have to hold together because they are co-existing in that moment. Like there’s the beauty of nature, but also all the awareness of what’s going on in nature. But because we can understand all that, we can put words, we can discern and there’s a sense of yeah it makes sense.
I think it’s really, really helpful and also if I can understand what those emotions are telling me then it opens the door and what can I do? And it can be just making more individual actions, for example, reducing how much we consume. But it can also be educating people, getting invested in the community, or whatever feels right for us. But it will feel right only if we can make sense of what’s going on inside. So, I think exploring meaning is a big chunk of what’s happening when we’re navigating those emotions.
Pihkala: Yeah, I think that’s very well put. Thanks again for putting that into words. And a sort of big part of my work has been also to try to put out the argument that even amidst ambivalence, one can experience meaning. Thanks for pointing out this. I think it is quite a common experience, actually, that, for example, being outdoors there’s both joy and sadness. But if you engage with it, it’s luckily the meaningfulness can grow. So I think it’s always very sad if people often for understandable reasons stay inside and close down upon them. So that’s often a danger I think.
Doherty: And I think there’s an interesting tension between action and emotional work. I think as mental health people we, you know, our area is the mental hygiene. It’s [bringing] our most well, best self to the situation. But we are not sustainability professionals and I think we have to be careful of getting in there and making kind of, it’s kind of theater. You know, where we say “oh you know, do something, and we don’t really know. We know mental health stuff. So I think, you know, how do we, how do mental health providers just help people to be their best self in general so they can bring their best self to these issues? You know, like I say: “We have issues and we have issues.” We have Capital I issues we want to change in the world. We have small i issues: our baggage and our insecurities and our neuroses and stuff like that. And that’s where we help people to be their best self.
Yeah, because I just feel like with fossil fuel propaganda, it’s just drilled into people’s minds. You have to. It’s all your fault. You have to make the change. So I feel like in my work I have to stop. You know, name that. That’s a tough one though. Does that come up for you, Karine?
St. Jean: Yeah. What comes up for me a lot is this: Like there are conflicting things happening. Like there’s this I need my car to go to work. And like all society is built around using fossil fuels. And also there’s all the guilt of “I should.” And we live in Quebec, so when it’s minus 44 riding your bike for 20km might not be such a good idea. You may need your car. And this and also there’s all the weight of social norms and like all that stuff that we’re carrying. And it’s not so easy to be okay with finding our own space. And, like, I’m not a bad person because I have a car. It’s just choices that I need to make and allowing myself to navigate all the other conditions in my life. So it’s interesting how we can get caught up in fossil fuels are bad or shouldn’t use plastic. Never ever ever. But more like being a bit more flexible and finding what works for us because in the balance our mental health is also important. If I’m suffering a lot because I’m doing a guilt trip all the time, not so sure that that works. So, yeah those issues are like showing up.
Pihkala: Yeah. They can even be a sort of quest for purity in a sort of anthropological sense. And that’s one issue that would perhaps need even more attention. But, you mentioned, Karine, that, you know, one has to work with one’s own emotions when starting more explicitly to work with these themes. So, would you like to share some more about how did it go for you and your colleagues? You can of course choose the level of intimacy that you want to share here, but how was the process or the transition when you started to integrate more of these themes in your work?
St. Jean: Since it started, what we call like the ‘green squad’ at our clinic. So there was a guy that started this off and a few of us got along and since I was managing one of the clinics so we tried to implement those things. And so discussions were showing up. How do we feel about doing that? And how does that make us feel to do something for this? It was all good at the beginning and then we hit the “Okay, but the building doesn’t recycle.” What do we do? Like do we bring the recycling at home? But we’re all riding our bikes to work. How do we do that while carrying bunches of sheets?
So, it was quite interesting to together reflect on that. And then it shifted into how do we integrate that with our clients. These notions. That eco-anxiety. And it was like, for me, and I cannot speak for my colleagues, but for me there’s a sense of being heard. A sense of connection. Of sharing something that’s important. Knowing that I’m not alone. Feeling all the, you know, guilt, but also the anger, the fear, the sadness. And all the nuances. The shades of sadness, of anger. So, but knowing that there were people at work because when we talk about how we can help our clients, we talk about how we can help ourselves. So, it was helpful for me in that way.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, we’ve got a few more minutes here. This is really neat. One thing that I’ve enjoyed talking with Panu about is Finland and some of the values and words and customs they have there. And how nature and the natural world is talked about. And sustainability. I’m wondering - I’m really, you know, intrigued with Quebec and Montreal. And the culture there. And the Quebecois, you know, culture there. I wonder is there any, you know, Karine do you think there’s certain strengths there or certain things that come out of that culture that’s helpful? Or in terms of nature or connection with nature? The outdoors?
St. Jean: I think there’s a strong connection to nature. And in the strong connection there’s a lot of pain too because we see all our indigenous people like getting, losing their land and their way of life. It’s a lot more complicated than this, but still there’s this sense of a deep connection with earth, nature, Mother Earth. And I remember in the last election how proud I was that Quebec was one of the provinces that put the environment at the top of the list of preoccupations. And how proud I was. And I remember when two years ago when Greta Thunberg showed up for the “Walk for the Earth,” it was like hundreds of thousands of people in the street. It was the biggest walk that ever happened. And there’s this sense of yeah, we’re not alone. Collectively, we are preoccupied by that. And it’s a good thing that we’re preoccupied. That there’s a sense of a bit of fear. I think it’s and I can see it everyday. Like people bending to pick up trash in parks or so. Yeah, I feel like it’s alive. This preoccupation that’s being channeled into action. Which brings faith and hope for me to see that.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: Yeah. Thanks again for sharing. And I really like the way that you tie together the social and collective dimension with the individual one. I think that’s very crucial here. In different levels and contexts, the social dynamics shape so profoundly people’s experiences. And, coming from Finland, I can resonate with lot’s that you said. There are lots of good collective things happening. And also, of course, there’s clashes. And right this week the Extinction Rebellion (Elokapina in Finnish) has been holding an Autumn Rebellion in the center of Helsinki. And there’s been lots of discussion about that. And, so, can you share a bit more? Is there also sort contradiction between, for example, traditional, resource intensive use of natural resources and then the sort of new environmental consciousness that you described? Or is it proceeding rapidly? How is it in Quebec? I really don’t know.
St. Jean: Not so sure I understand the question, properly, but what came to mind is that in Canada we are like a big - we were a big producer of fossil fuels. And we’re the one wanting to build a big pipeline. And so like of course there’s a lot of contradiction. And Quebec we can feel it a little less. There’s still a lot of contradiction because some people are really into that and they’re, of course, we’re consumers. We’re contributing. There’s also a lot of things that are not going the right way here in Canada.
Pihkala: Yeah, thanks. You understood me perfectly. It’s always a relief when one is not a native speaker when somebody understands. So one of the skills that we’ve been discussing in this podcast is something that my friend and colleague Sanni has also integrated into ACT, which is sort of skill of seeing two levels. Or “binocular vision.” So exactly this ability to focus both on the good news and the bad news and not just one of them.
Doherty: Yeah and these conversations come down to, you know, first nations people and being indigenous. So I’m glad you brought that up, Karine. And you know first-nation folks that are listening, you know, that’s something we want to honor in our conversation. Basically how do we - it comes down to everyone, you know, feeling indigenous to a place. Place consciousness. And I think underlying the other emotions and values is I think ultimately will come down to the place and being with the place. So I think as we’ll wrap up here for today. But, you know, our listeners I’d encourage you to, you know, take into consideration what we talked about, but also be out in your place and maybe put your hand on the ground somewhere and just, you know, notice where you are. Because, you know, we hurt where we care. And so, we do care about our places and it’s why we have all this empathy. And what we look at for faith. But I look forward to some more conversations coming up. Karine, thank you very much for coming out and sharing. And Panu, as always, great to chat with you.
St. Jean: Thank you very much. It was really, really nice to be here today and the conversation was pretty interesting for me, so I’m grateful for that to both of you. And hope that our listeners will find something of value there.
Pihkala: Kiitos (thank you). Very nice to meet you, Karine. Let’s continue.
St. Jean: Merci beaucoup (thank you so much).
Doherty: Have a good day everyone.
St. Jean: Bonne journée. Have a good day.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Season 1, Episode 3: Eco-Anxiety Demystified
Feb 04, 2022
How do we navigate eco-anxiety as an idea and as a feeling? Is it one thing or many things? Thomas and Panu talk about eco-anxiety, or “ympäristöahdistus” in Finnish, as a primal emotion, as a feeling we can describe in various languages, as a cultural idea, and as a psychiatric diagnosis. They give a history of the concept of eco- or environmental anxiety in psychology research and in pop culture. Eco-anxiety predates concerns about the climate crisis to take in the Rachel’s Carson’s warnings in “Silent Spring” about human-made chemicals in the ecosystem and global anxiety about nuclear destruction felt during the cold war. Eco-anxiety is a practical emotion, and it can be debilitating at times. You are not alone with this.
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CCH), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well hello, I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness. This is our podcast and a show for people around the world who are interested in exploring their feelings about climate change, their emotions, their personal experience and well, today, our word of the day is a common one in our culture right now — eco-anxiety. It’s something Panu and I have talked about many times but this is an open conversation that we’re inviting the listeners to join in. As I say, [anxiety] is a fear wrapped in a cloud, anxiety is a normal and healthy emotion that we are hardwired to have. And when we have some apprehension about a potential threat we feel anxiety. And it causes us to think about what might happen and take some action. And it helps us to survive.
So as they say in counseling, anxiety’s job is not to make you happy, it’s to keep you alive. So, we’re going to talk about eco-anxiety and some different ways that you as the listener can — well, feel about this. I know you have a lot of feelings about this, you all, and also think about it and understand it and — Panu do you want to talk a little about your history with this feeling, with this emotion and with these ideas?
Pihkala: Yeah definitely, ympäristöahdistus, that’s eco-anxiety in Finnish. Literally that would be environment anxiety so ympäristö = environment, ahdistus = anxiety. The words are again important here because anxiety is such a loaded term. For some people, it brings into mind more intense anxiety and then for some, like you Thomas, there’s the recognition of the fundamental practical dimension in anxiety and in the Finnish language, my native language, the way we use ahdistus — anxiety, is not very pathologizing. Of course, people in healthcare in Finland might have a connotation heavily geared towards intense anxiety or even anxiety disorders, but common people also use it as a very — something is “anxieting you” and so that means that something is troubling you in a general sense. And that’s probably one of the reasons why so many Finns have resonated with the concept of eco-anxiety and climate anxiety and those have been big parts of my work here.
But originally I came across this area around 2009 or 10. Of course, implicitly I had encountered it even before but explicitly then in cooperation with environmental educators especially my colleague and friend Essi [Aarnio-Linnanvuori] who is also a scholar of environmental education. We started organizing sessions for people where they could encounter some of these difficult emotions and those related to many issues including biodiversity loss, and in Finland what’s happening with the forests was a major thing. So, it started for me as a general anxiety / distress, worry-related thing not especially related to climate and that’s been influencing my work also later — but how about you Thomas? What’s your history with eco-anxiety?
Doherty: Yeah, thanks Panu. Yeah there is history to eco-anxiety and so I think that’s a great way to get into this a little bit too, it’s not a new idea. I mean the feeling of anxiety is a primal, you know, primordial feeling. I think certainly all mammals can feel anxiety in some form and sentient beings of various kinds can probably feel some sorts of existential anxiety in terms of threats to their life, and we as humans have, you know, existential anxiety in terms of threats to meaning and how we make sense of things too.
And I’ve been tracking this for … too many years now, it goes back to my time with the American Psychology Association Climate Task Force about 10, 12 years ago and you know really exploring what we were calling then “environmental anxiety” and it’s important to realize that this idea of eco-anxiety is not — didn’t specifically even start with climate change. You know, by my reckoning the first mention of the term eco-anxiety in the media as we know it now was around 2004 [2007] and it was really about, you know, concerns about chemicals in the natural environment and chemicals in our systems — endocrine disruptors and various chemicals and things like that. That’s the article that I saw that was looking at that, so this is a long standing concern that people have.
Really to understand eco-anxiety in that sense you’d need to go back to, say, Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in the 1960s. That’s a real harbinger of this idea of eco-anxiety, so you know “eco” meaning ecological and ecological threats. You know Roszak had a great quote in his book The Voice of the Earth from the early 90’s and talking about this prefix eco being affixed to many words like eco-politics and eco-philosophy and even eco-terrorism but he said this quote “this tiny neologistic flag flies above our language like a storm warning meant to signal our belated concern for the fate of the planet. It’s often awkward connection with words from many sources, politics, economics, the arts (and therapy of course) reveals our growing realization of how many aspects of our life that concern will have to embrace.”
So you know this neologistic storm flag that was flying in the 90s, you know, was the harbinger of what we’re feeling here, today in 2021. And you know I’ve got a book here on my desk from Alan Watts The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety right and that was written in 1951, right so here we have to think about the nuclear, the Cold War, and the fear of nuclear threat so that’s another variation on eco-anxiety so people have been feeling, you know, over many eras I think we could do some archeological thinking on many eras and times people have had some sort of sense of threats in the larger systems. And so, again —
Pihkala: Exactly.
Doherty: So, I think that’s a good place to help ground ourselves. We’re not alone. This is not new, but we have our versions of it and then how does that play out in your books and research Panu?
Pihkala: Yeah, I’ve always found the historical dimension also very important. Part of that is related to my own history of doing a dissertation related to historical forms of Christian ecological theology, especially the first half of the 20th century and there definitely was distress related to ecological concerns already during that time, sometimes local or regional like during the Dust Bowl, for example. And then in a growing manner, related also to global conditions, so I think Rachel Carson is a prime example here. Even though the concept of eco-anxiety is not mentioned, that doesn’t mean that the substance matter wouldn't be there. So I think that’s very important to note and in the early 1970s, lots of people had this. And since I’ve been working with the subject, many people who were alive then and very concerned have resonated now with the concept of eco-anxiety, it just wasn’t conceptualized that way in the early 70s, for example.
But for me, it went so that in 2014/2015 I started focusing heavily on eco-anxiety research. It was very new back then in Finland. It was quite a lonely, lonely road but very, very interesting also, and partly I was home taking care of the kids during that time so it was sort of a special time. And I wrote a monograph in Finnish about eco-anxiety and hope which came out in October 2017 and that became quite well-known in Finland. Finland is after all a relatively small country, so if some of the major newspapers cover a book you do, then the information spreads. And many people started to resonate with the concept in its Finnish form and, as I mentioned in the beginning, the pathologizing aspect wasn’t as severe in the Finnish language as it has been in other places.
And then one year after, in autumn 2018, when there was serious heatwaves in Northern Europe and the new IPCC report came out and Greta Thunberg and others started these school strikes, for example, the level of climate awareness grew rapidly and with that there was also a renewed interest in my eco-anxiety book and work. So it sort of started to fly a second time one year after it was published.
But a big part of academic work has been, sort of theoretical foundations for thinking about these issues and that’s also of course one place where I was drawing on stuff that you Thomas have been doing with others like Susan Clayton and many of these ecopsychology people — Roszak is one and several others. So, one of the aims of that work is to avoid the pathologizing dimension also in other languages and to underscore that fundamentally eco-anxiety is so called “practical anxiety”, using a concept developed by Charlie Kurth, a anxiety philosopher whose book The Anxious Mind is very helpful in this regard. But of course it can become very intense and people often need support for it. And that’s why I think that Thomas, also in your daily work the subject matter comes up pretty frequently.
Doherty: Yeah, it does and this has been, you know, as I joke sometimes in a dark way the future or the present has caught up with me in terms of my, you know, you say lonely road working on some of these issues. And so any of you all listening who have been working on this or thinking about this for a long time, you know, for 10, 20, 30, 40 years. It is a lonely road in the sense of being open to these kinds of circumstances. There’s a lot of directions to go with this conversation, you know, “we hurt where we care” as the saying goes. You know the people listening that have environmental values or altruistic values or you know concern about the planet or other species or feel a sense of interbeing, you know, that they are a part of nature, part of the web of life are particularly — I share some of those beliefs and feelings and sort of knowings and that leaves us vulnerable, you know, to this kind of anxiety and also just pure education and awareness leaves us vulnerable to these kinds of anxieties.
You know, again back in 2008 when I was working on that climate task force and I plunged into the disaster research you know it was interesting to learn about the early writing on environmental anxiety, a lot of it came around chemical — people living around chemical plants and things like that — and you know what they found was that people — if you were living in close relation to a chemical plant you were more likely to have anxiety or physiological symptoms concerned about the chemicals if you could see that plant. So there was a visual piece there even if someone was living closer to it they would have less symptoms if they couldn’t see it. So what we can see affects us and so we do have a mind that’s actively working to, you know, to see these threats — so the more we see, the more we understand, then the more we’re vulnerable.
And you know to bring it up to the present day, you know why climate change is really you know channeling this eco-anxiety is because you know 10, 20 years ago when you’d think about climate change it was all kind of an abstract, distant — a distant kind of problem maybe for another part of the world — particularly for people in the Global North — Oh yeah, this is going to happen maybe in the future, things like that. So there was seen the direct impacts of disaster that we all can understand. But then there was the indirect impacts of climate refugees and ripple effects and geopolitical, you know, conflicts around, you know, climate and drought and things like that and then the — what I was really working on — was the emotional impacts, the weight, the emotional weight of sitting with all this — this stuff even if we’re not personally, you know, in harm's way.
But, you know, those categories of impacts have now started to come to be what I call a “singularity” where the disasters are coming to where we live now and the disasters and the ripple effects and the emotional things are all happening in the same place and time and that’s what’s happening for us. It’s happening for me, for you Panu, for listeners around the world and so that, that singularity is really amping up you know this anxiety and it’s beyond — we have to understand, anxiety is about a potential threat, but fear is about a real threat that we can see, so anxiety is getting more — you know, for some people it’s not, the feeling isn’t anxious it’s fear or something like that and so we, we can get into these kinds of things but again remembering that anxiety is hardwired into us in a healthy way, evolutionary way we have both a propensity to, you know, affiliate with nature and to love nature and to understand nature. But we also have - we’re wired to be concerned about threats because we’re mammals.
So again embracing this, celebrating eco-anxiety to a certain extent is really important. You know I think of books like The Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace Wells and things like that, these really scary, scary stories are also prompting people to take action. I know I just saw some research that you know natural disasters — disasters of various kinds, like heat waves and droughts, they’re, you know, that the amount of actual deaths are going down even as the disasters are increasing and we saw that with the European, European heatwaves over the successive heat waves they’ve had over the last decade or so. People - systems are, we’re getting better systems you know to deal with the problem, so again as the problems ramp up, our responses are also ramping up so we have to, kind of, keep that in mind as well.
Pihkala: Yeah that’s one, one thing that brings comfort and the concept of eco-fear has been suggested also. And it would be, in my mind, also important to realize that there is that fear component also. And worry, of course, worry is also a big word which can mean many things. It can be sort of constructive caring — you know, you have worrying about your kids who are out on the town, for example, and much of that is constructive. Then if it controls your life in the sense of negative rumination, that’s of course problematic, but I think the same kind of dynamic applies for many of these threat-related emotions and feelings: that we really need a certain amount of them to protect ourselves and our dear ones. So they have this life serving function as you, Thomas, so well said and that’s very important to keep in mind.
One of the problems with climate anxiety is that because it’s related to so many things. Overall, we have this eco-social crisis, and then climate change is related to all of the ways of production and consumption and mobility and so on, and that means that the possible triggers and stimuli, the list is sort of endless. So coming back to what you said Thomas about seeing the plant and then getting more anxiety, that’s one of the problems with climate anxiety is because you can see signs of it basically everywhere. And I remember those times when my climate anxiety was higher. I, for example, got anxiety by seeing these major construction sites in Helsinki because they are not done as climate friendly as they should be, and anyway the whole society has big problems with climate issues. Just to mention one personal example.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah. This is — we’ve got about — we’ve got some time left in our talk and I think for our listeners I want to go in a couple directions, I mean, I want to come back to that practical, that practical piece and some takeaways. You know I think one helpful thing as two people who have really spent a lot of time in this area, is how to navigate eco-anxiety because it’s in the media a lot, it’s being written about and it is, like you say Panu, it’s very personal. But then you’re talking about these big systems so I think when you as a listener, when you’re seeing discussions of ecoanxiety you’re seeing it typically talked about in one of two ways.
One is the broad, cultural, people are talking about this on a broad cultural level and you know often as a critique of society and our system or capitalism or things like that and so we’ve got this - similar to the writing about nuclear war, you know, it's a societal problem. So we’ve got this idea of climate change as a hyperobject you know, Timothy Morton, philosophers — it’s this big thing. So we’ve got philosophers coming in, we’ve got psychoanalytic thinkers, therapists talking about denial and repression. You know we’ve got legal scholars, you know, and the legal scholars they see eco-anxiety as a form of “self governance” right, and self protection in the absence of care by the state. So we can see that people's forms of eco-anxiety are ways to take care of themselves because their leadership is not, so it's a form of governance in a way. So there’s really a lot of interesting ways to think about eco-anxiety and climate anxiety — you know Sarah Ray has A Field Guide to Climate Anxiety, so have various environmental educators have been talking about climate anxiety, eco-anxiety because they’re seeing it in their classrooms, with their students and things like that.
So again, it gets back to this “climate cosmopolitanism” idea that we talk about that there’s many different languages — you’ll see many different languages around eco-anxiety and so it is a bit of a blind man and elephant problem like everybody's sort of seeing it from their piece, so it can be fragmented. And then there’s the personal, there’s … the personal in a lot of the writings on eco-anxiety that comes across as a kind of a personal confession. People confess their eco-anxiety because it's somehow, you know, still a little bit stigmatized to talk about this sort of stuff and that gets into the personal mental health, you know, as we were joking earlier, we, Panu and I, are parents and you know we’re privileged in our way, but we also are humans and have a life and I’m doing this early in the morning and Panu is late in the evening in Finland and I rush to get my 14 year old daughter off to her school and getting her with her lunch and all the special things she needs for her spirit week at school and then I come to this podcast and we talk about these global existential issues and so, we, and so that’s what happens, we’re in our lives, our daily lives and then we’re carrying the weight of the world and that’s are all personal experience of being planetary citizens now.
It’s a beautiful thing, Panu I think, it’s a real honor that we have this ability to understand and know — at least us, those of us who have the ability to be educated and have access to technology and things like that. But it does cause — it can cause diagnosable problems, you know, as a therapist I see this and that’s another part of the conversation.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah definitely there’s a lot to unpack here and this sort of fact that we have our daily lives to take care of, that’s on one hand a complication to encountering many sorts of difficult feelings, and on the other hand it can be a resource of course also many times. You are sort of grounded also in other issues, so the dynamics are manifold here. And one part of my work in Finland has been to advise various institutions who have become more interested to help people to cope better with eco-anxiety.
To serve those needs and workshop needs I did a short text in 2018 “10 Recommendations for People with Eco-Anxiety.” The first three ones that I mentioned was, one, “don’t feel weak or unsuccessful if you experience eco-anxiety”. The second one was to “appreciate and respect your eco-anxiety”. So echoing some of the things you said, Thomas. And third, “you’re not alone, don’t remain alone”. And back then, and in many places today, there may be feelings of isolation and loneliness, and that’s one of the reasons why we are doing this podcast of course. So to manifest that you’re not alone: there’s a great company.
Doherty: Yes indeed. Well said, Panu and you know from the clinical psychology perspective the other piece of the — this dialogue is around the medical and the psychiatric and the psychological and is eco-anxiety a disorder? And all these other things that people talk about. Most people don’t understand that, you know, how the disorder system works and the diagnosis book — you don’t need to have a special context for a disorder. Anxiety can be around any number of issues in life or depression or trauma, so we don’t need a particular “drought depression” or “wildfire distress disorder,” but we can certainly have depression or traumatic stress around these kinds of things and so we can certainly have, again we have — it’s levels for people as you think about this yourself, the listeners, there’s a normal level.
Anxiety is a normal part of our emotional repertoire and so if you feel anxious about climate change, well, join the club, we all do and it’s a big issue. And then some people have trouble managing their anxiety. Some people are more vulnerable to anxiety in general and they tend to ruminate and worry and, or have you know their body all keyed up and have difficulty sleeping and you know that can happen around climate and eco-anxiety for sure. It could get to the point of being like what we call an adjustment disorder, where people are struggling to adjust to a stressor. And then some of us might have a full-fledged depression or anxiety diagnosis because that’s just our situation. You know it's not a stigma or pathology.
And so finding our place in this is really important you know and again this is contested because some of you want to make sure that we medicalize this social issue. They don’t want to medicalize and say, oh this is just a personal psychiatric problem; this is a social problem; this is a structural problem; this is a political problem, so people fight. Some people are fighting against that diagnosis in a right way because they don’t want it to be — they don’t want it to be reduced or reductionistic. Right? But we don’t want to reduce eco-anxiety in any way. We don’t want to reduce it to just a social problem or just a psychiatric problem. It’s all of the above.
It’s a hyperobject, right, so it’s multiple things. And we can have issues and issues. So like I can have a psychological issue and issues with society at the same time, right? That’s my therapeutic work with clients. That's where I would go - what are the issues you want to work on and what are your personal issues and how do we get in sync with that — and it’s — that’s just something we all have to do and I have to do as well. Yeah. Anything else, Panu? We’re going to wrap this up in a moment. You know and, again, this whole podcast is - we’re coming at this from different directions you know. We did a talk on inadequacy, the feeling of inadequacy. I’m actually looking forward to a talk on cynicism and celebrating cynicism because I can be a very cynical person myself, so there’s a lot of directions here.
Pihkala: Yes, yes there is definitely and a theme that has been sort of implicitly mentioned here is the ability to counter the negativity bias, and we’ll return to that one I think several in times in our talks. And I might close for my part by reading the last recommendation of this old text of mine from 2018. “Accept the ‘seasons of the mind’ and practice the skill of seeing on two levels. No one will ever be perfect, just like in the natural world the human mind also has seasons. Sometimes you just have to accept and live through a period of dark, melancholy while waiting for the spring.
Difficult emotions are also part of life. Seeing on two levels means regularly focusing on both difficulties and good things. A paralyzing bout of eco-anxiety can often hide the many signs of hope that exist in the world. Remembering the good things and being grateful allows us to cope better.” Now that’s almost paraphrasing Joanna Macy, so respect for Joanna, another pioneer also.
Doherty: Yes, yeah and again the emotional work as you say for some of us is really going deep into the despair to really sit with that and be able to express that in a safe way. And others of us want to build … build bricks of positivity so we want to start with positive emotions and build - so a “broaden and build” kind of positive approach. So each, each of us are going to have our own way in dealing with these troubling emotions in general and I know just in terms of counseling and therapy, you know anxiety again it's a - what I say with clients is you need to “close the loop” on anxiety. So anxiety is a signal, it's like a warning flag and then we go and explore what the issue is as best as we can and then we take some action, that closes the loop in our mind. It activates our entire mind and ourselves and we do something with our hands so we have to try to close the loop with your eco-anxiety either by taking some action of some sort. It could be making a list, it could be reading, it could be doing research, it could be talking to someone, but that closing the loop can get it out of the rumination and the worry and into the world and into action, and then we can come back around again. But think of it as a series of loops.
I think it is helpful because if we’re just ruminating and sitting in our own stew of worry and fear and the cloud it’s – there’s ultimately, there’s a point of diminishing returns there, where we’re just becoming internalized in it and it disempowers us. So, I know this is easier said than done, but small actions make a difference – “so small things often.”
But listeners, thank you so much for joining us. This is Climate Change and Happiness. You can find us at climatechangeandhappiness.com. Please send us your thoughts and questions and we will be talking about more things. All climate, all emotions, all the time. Panu, take care of yourself and have a great evening.
Pihkala: You too, Thomas, have a good day and thanks to all the listeners.
Safe spaces are crucial for the expression of climate feelings. Thomas and Panu talk about the loneliness people feel about climate experiences. What does it take to “hold space” for climate feelings, to “stand one’s ground” and “contain” experiences of sadness, grief or rage; and to practice “climate cosmopolitanism”? Panu looks back to pioneering work by Chellis Glendinning and shares Tim Jensen’s more recent concept of “ecologies of guilt.” Thomas reminds us of the role of values and that “We hurt where we care” echoing the writing of psychologist Steven Hayes, and classic insights about the “pains of an ecological education” going back to Aldo Leopold.
In Episode 3, Thomas and Panu explain “eco-anxiety,” the history of the concept, how to manage eco-anxious feelings, and how to understand climate anxiety as a primal emotion, a cultural idea, and a mental health diagnosis. Also, look forward to guests like Québécois psychologist and ecotherapist Karine St. Jean in Episode 4, and noted conservation psychologist and IPCC author Susan Clayton, and global women’s health researcher Jade Sasser later in the season.
Transcript
Season 1, Episode 2: Holding Space
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness (CC&H), an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Well hello, I’m Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, our podcast. It's a show for people around the globe who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change including your emotions, how you feel about the issue. We know that what the research tells us is most of you listening — 70% or more — really care about this issue, climate change, and want to do something about it, but, you know, only a small percentage of you actually talk about climate change in your lives, publicly. So we invert that ratio and we talk about climate change all the time here and our emotions and mental health and our feelings and that is our job here.
Panu, today I want to, I just want to talk about this idea of holding space. This came up after our last conversation. Holding space for something. Holding space, in this case we’re holding space for emotions about climate change and I know in my work around environmental issues and psychology and ecopsychology and ecotherapy and outdoor therapy. Many times over the past years I’ve consoled myself that I’m holding space for these topics. I am creating a space, I’m trying to hold it so that we can talk about it and make it safe for others to come in. I think it's a really juicy concept for all of us.
We don’t have to have all the answers when we’re holding space, we don’t even have to have a long term direction when we’re holding space. But we know something’s important and we want to protect the space to feel and think and be about it ourselves and with others. And I’m just wondering what you think about that in relation to your work around climate change and climate emotions and all the many things that you’re doing?
Pihkala: Yeah, I think that’s a very important concept and phenomenon. So, very often at first people feel quite lonely if they recognize climate emotions in themselves especially because in most societies and communities there’s been so few opportunities to discuss or reflect on them. That is luckily changing now rapidly in many places but there’s still that condition in many places and has been in this history. So the need for safe spaces and for someone or something to hold that space so that it becomes possible to be in touch with your emotions and feelings that’s a crucial thing in our eco-emotional work I think.
Doherty: Yeah, we have so many emotions and you know they’re all happening all the time and it’s like a train you know. As I say, when we see the car passing on the train, the engine is far away, far ahead of us and by the time we catch up on one of the cars or whatever we’re feeling we have to realize we’ve felt all kinds of things previous to that and we’ll feel more after. But one of the things that comes up to me is almost a warrior energy, almost like a peaceful warrior energy. Certainly stubbornness, but more of a resolute kind of feeling that I am going to hold this space. You know, kind of a bravery, a courage, but also a toughness. You know toughness, I’m going to be here and I’m not going to be scared away, you know, by social pressures or someone looking askance at me. Certainly in academia there’s a holding space when you’re trying to start a new project. You know, so that’s something I’ve felt a lot. What kind of emotions come up for you or have seen in terms of the different emotional tones that come with the idea of holding space?
Pihkala: Yes, that idea of sort of standing on one's ground is one very interesting aspect of this. I often tend to think of holding space in relation to containment. That concept from psychology where something is able to be contained enough so that it can be faced with or without naming it. Even better if it can be named. But of course many climate emotions and feelings, for example, are so ambiguous and conglomerates of different feelings that it may be rather hard to name them exactly. But at least naming some main tones of that would be already very useful. And sadness or grief is one that comes up very often which is very understandable because there’s so many changes and losses happening around, and as we’ve many times discussed with you, it’s tricky because the societies around us are not especially attuned to validating grief and sadness. It’s more like: Be happy, don’t be sad attitude that one tends to find in industrialized countries, and often the people I meet have strong problems with ecological grief because of these cultural attitudes. Does that come up in your work, Thomas?
Doherty: Yeah, no I can resonate with that very much. A holding space is sort of a … How would I say it? Most people rush, they are impulsive about a lot of this stuff and they rush into things and they try to grasp onto certain… Whatever the certain feelings are or fit in with others, and they haven’t quite done the work, I guess, to really sort out all of their feelings. I mean one of the metaphors I use with my counseling and therapy clients is “emptying the bag, emptying the sack.” You know, we carry around this sack of all these thoughts and feelings and impressions and goals and values and it just, you know, empty it out, dump it out on the table. Let's sort out all of this and so emptying out the sack of our environmental emotions can be really helpful and it's a pre step. We don’t have to work on expressing or even understanding, but you know we create space, a white space so to speak, a blank slate and then we can empty out our sack and see what the heck is in there.
Pihkala: That’s a really great metaphor I think. Probably, usually people find many surprising objects on the table after that I would suppose.
Doherty: Yeah, there’s some beautiful seashells in there and all kinds of stuff. And then there’s also, you know, bricks that we’ve been carrying for 25 or 30 or 40 years or ten years or whatever in there as well. But yeah, how to get people to, part of this is physiological, being in your body and breathing and slowing down and being present. As our stress level rises like an old mercury thermometer, you know the mercury is rising, and our bandwidth and our creativity space is getting smaller and smaller. So by the time we’re super stressed we have a very limited bandwidth and we’re very tunnel visioned, you know, and so it's backing off on that stress level and opening up that spectrum of creativity, bandwidth, expression. To see what's all in there.
Pihkala: Yeah, that reminds me of the etymology of the word stress having to do with pressures and weight that one experiences and certainty unrecognized ecological grief can be a big part of those burdens. But then of course guilt, sometimes even shame, is a big part of that in many people’s lives that I meet. And that’s one emotional tone that really needs public recognition and holding safe spaces and it's very complex because, after all, the relationship between individual responsibility and structural responsibility — that’s a tricky one.
Doherty: No indeed, and what’s in the background in all our talks is who’s responsible and culpable for climate issues and, you know, so much of this is, you know, my term of being a “climate hostage,” people are climate hostages. Even wealthy people in affluent countries are still hostage to small groups that have kind of stymied our abilities to address the issue of climate and it's really a global injustice. And so it's that spectrum, injustice is hanging over us all the time. But the holding space, you know, as you say for shame and guilt and some of these things. And then, you know, holding space is an odd welcoming: Come on in, you know, let’s let these feelings come in and have their own value and respect. I was reading a quote from Stephen Hayes, a psychologist that’s done a lot of work around therapy creation here in the United States. He had a quote about, you know, we hurt where we care and we care where we hurt. Right, we hurt where we care, and we care where we hurt.
It’s a helpful one to think about particularly if we’re hurting. It’s because we care about something. If we’re hurting it’s because there’s a value there. You know and so again as we dig through our sack we realize underneath the guilt and the shame there’s other things there, other healthy feelings like pride and respect and health and, you know, also our values about justice and ecology and sustainability and all this sort of stuff. But yeah, so you know it's poking into these. It’s painful. Let’s just be honest, it's painful to do this work. It's not easy.
Pihkala: That's a very profound thing again that you mentioned, Thomas. There’s a couple of good books about ecological emotions which make this point I’m thinking of Tim Jensen Ecologies of Guilt in Environmental Rhetorics from 2019 where he makes the argument that even though people normally think that when they feel ecological guilt it is because they have failed, but in fact, it is because they care. So exactly the point that you were making Thomas and this can be a real discovery to many people that “hey it's actually a sign of care, empathy, compassion,” even you know love if you use that big word and the same for grief. I remember a talk that I was giving in early June to environmental educators in Finland and then saying that ecological sadness is the price of caring, and a couple of people emailed me afterwards and thanked me for saying that out loud. That was also a good reminder for me that one really needs to repeat these sort of very basic and important messages even though, you know, after being involved with this issue several years one gets so used to this, even the most important ones. But I think we really need to keep reminding ourselves and others of them.
Doherty: Indeed that’s something to take for granted and in our listeners we need to — all of us — we need to think about this. Some of you listening have been holding space for many years, maybe even longer than I am alive, and so a lot of our listeners can resonate with this and they’re holding space. So I want to honor you all — people who are holding space around the world, people who might be listening, holding space in various ways. So I want to just honor you all and thank you. So, I think it’s important to really take that in for all of us. If you’re listening you can put your hands over your heart and you can take some deep breaths and you can say yes, I’m holding space, I’m holding space just for myself, for my family, for my community, for others. You know, really just be with that, you know, and I appreciate it and you are appreciated and this is a sign of love and a sign of care.
You know, these — I love that title Ecologies of Guilt in Environmental Rhetorics — that’s a great way — you know in our intellectual work, you know, we have these ecologies of guilt but in emotions we are here and we’re present and we’re holding space, so I just kind of want to get that out there. The price of an ecological education is living in a world of wounds. Right, you know, the Aldo Leopold quote. You know again, so like you say, Panu, we have to keep coming back to these, you know, these wisdoms, these nuggets of wisdom that we might have known for a long time but we need to keep repeating it for ourselves. But also for the new generation that are coming in here.
Pihkala: Yeah exactly.
Doherty: They haven’t spent 10, 20, 30, 40 years holding space and, you know, being with this sort of stuff. It’s all new. They’re on their first run around the track here. First lap in this crazy world.
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah that’s a very hugely important point and also my strong gratitude to all of the folks around there, some who have done for a short time and some for a very long time. My earlier dissertation research dealt with environmental history and that was a time when I really learned to respect those pioneers in the late 19th century and early 20th century who already tried to make an impact. Sort of bridge building work between generations. That’s something close to my heart also. And now in 2021, when awareness about climate emotions is spreading, luckily, so then some of these early people like Chellis Glendenning, who you have mentioned Thomas yourself, who not too many people of this new generation know about. So there’s some important wisdom in books 25, 30 years old and then not to mention Aldo Leopold and those folks back then.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah Chellis Glendenning — in her book My Name is Chellis and I’m In Recovery From Western Civilization — good job Chellis if you’re out there. Yeah, I got a chance to see her speak years ago at an ecopsychology conference. Yeah, so holding space, so it’s good to honor. I’ve got a bookshelf here with just tons of books and I’ve got all these people that have been talking, you know, it's, there’s such a …I have to vent, you know, a little bit. I talk to reporters and I know you do too and they come at this issue as if it's just brand new as if it just arrived like an egg this morning from, you know, from a chicken and it’s like, No this is — come on wake up you know we’ve been talking about — people have been talking about this forever and certainly in our, you know, we’re so ahistorical in the United States. Its terrible, you know, people forget everything that didn’t happen more than a year ago and, you know, I’ve got all the ecopsychology writers and the ecotherapy writers. I’ve got books you know on ecotherapy and ecopsychology that are you know 30, 40 years old and you know people like Joanna Macy who has been doing this, you know, doing this work for years and, you know, so there’s just more people than I can name out there, and there’s a whole new generation. I’ve got books in front of me I’ve been looking at from the library, you know, this new book by Gus Speth, They Knew. It’s about the history of fossil fuel, you know, government supported the fossil fuel system in the US through all the presidential administrations going back to the 60’s. And you know David Wallace Wells, Uninhabitable Earth, you know he’s holding space. I believe I was talking to you or it could have been someone else who knows a lot of people holding space for doom. They’re holding space for gloom, doom, the worst case scenarios. I think of David Wallace Wells as doing that really in a tragically beautiful way in his writing you know. But then I’ve got Bill Gates’ [book] — a realistic but optimistic take on how to avoid climate disaster. So he’s holding space for innovation and you know clean energy and things like that. And that book that you mentioned in one of our recent talks — Healing Through the Dark Emotions – I picked that up and I’ve been looking at that, so Miriam Greenspan, a therapist, you know. Again in the therapy world people have been holding space for, you know, that is part of the therapy, a therapist’s basic job is to hold space.
An Ecotopian Lexicon by Schneider-Mayerson and Bellamy – that’s a great book where we look at all these different, you know, “eco” words.
Pihkala: Yeah, I guess one could speak of an ecology in the sense that also there’s a need for different niches and different creatures in different parts of the system. And, I also respect many kinds of writers on eco-emotions. Of course, it would be important to practice this climate cosmopolitanism, one of your terms Thomas, so that we wouldn’t require from others that others adapt the exact same approach as we do. That kind of binary thinking is dangerous. Of course, there’s room for many different kinds of takes on related matters.
Doherty: Yeah, exactly yeah. I think we can segue a bit to how do you do the holding space and a little more practical thoughts. And part of it is having that sense of what I call “climate cosmopolitanism” which is not a common term, but it's something I’ve kind of adopted, and by necessity for my own survival, because I don’t agree with every approach in the climate world. But I do recognize that we have to build coalitions and we have to work together and so climate cosmopolitanism is recognizing that we have billions of people on this planet and they’re going to approach the issue of climate change in very different ways, even if they agree that it’s a pressing crisis, and they’re going to come into their Politics of the Earth (which is another classic book), so they’re either going to come at it from technology or politics or from economics or from social movements or from spirituality or from the therapeutic side. Even within those silos there’s going to be variations on the theme, you know, in terms of the ecomodernists and back to the land people and the social justice people and all this sort of stuff. So we have to realize not everyone is going to do it exactly my way.
Pihkala: Yeah, totally agree on that point and in this research about emotions and feelings and environmental matters also sometimes people have the hope that if we would just find the right emotion, some people think that it might be fear others think it might be anxiety or anger, outrage perhaps, even you know guilt, or then pride. If we only could find the right one then we could do environmental communication right. Luckily, this has been challenged by emotion researchers that it's not so simple. In some circumstances anger or some valences of anger work. In others they don’t. In some instances guilt can get people move forward and in other instances it can paralyze them. So, I really think that we need sensitiveness to context and the very different conditions that people live in when talking about any practical dimension of which emotion or feeling we want to cultivate.
Doherty: Yeah, let’s — I’m going to — there’s an instrumental view about this. There’s okay, yeah, there’s a right key to the lock if we can just, you know, and so let’s respectfully back away from that for a moment. I’d love to chat about that in another episode but I think it's — there’s a danger of collapsing this holding space when we do that or when we violate that by saying I’m doing this for a reason, you’re just a tool. I understand why people want to find the right emotions and they desperately want to communicate this so I do understand that and I want to hold space for that. But you know I think practically holding space is — it’s always stepping back. It’s always taking one step backward and another step backward. You know one of my critiques of some of the, you know, big ecopsychology writers that I’ve read is that they’re not big enough. They have to step another back because they have their view. Anyone who has their big view of the world and why things are then they have to say and that is my view and I’m going to take one step back from that. And that’s hard to do because we get attached very much to our views, particularly if we’ve spent a lot of time nurturing them and holding space ourselves. We want them to be in the world and I want my voice to be heard, you want your voice to be heard. So I totally, I totally get that. But you know holding space is creating emptiness, it's creating, like you say, the container and it has to be a big container not a little container and it has to be as big as the issue so we have to keep, you know, backing up, backing up, backing up. You know, making more room. At the end of one of our recent talks you brought up the Greek word “thumos” and I wanted to hold that because that was really — I love when these really — thumos is an ancient concept and you know I was thinking about that in terms of holding space because I think that thumos is like, the way I understand it, it’s spiritedness, it can be anger, it could be righteous anger, but it's also just our heart and our spirit and - how do you understand thumos?
Pihkala: Yeah, along very similar lines and sometimes it's translated quite directly as anger but that doesn’t capture it all. I think this certain whole-heartedness or feeling which in English language when somebody’s really spirited about something I think that captures important aspects of thumos and regarding this discussion about various ecological emotions or climate feelings. I think that thumos can arise as combination of many emotions but what would be really needed is that is arises because then it means that we are not locked, we haven't blocked a way to many emotional energies, but I do make a separation between you know violent rage and thumos so I am not speaking about violent rage here, I’m speaking about a spiritedness which also still has some guidelines from compassion and respect towards others.
Doherty: Yeah. Yeah, so one of these words that we can keep developing and thumos, our classical — this brings me back to my undergraduate classical, you know, classical history training and my professors Wallace Gray and Authur Danto and some of these professors I had when I was in my undergraduate program teaching us classical civilization and thumos. You know, a lot of people think of it in terms of, you know, Achilles, you know, anger of Achilles in The Iliad there but that was rageful. So, I guess our spirit can become enraged, you know, when we know when this natural spiritedness can, we wrankle against injustice and we want to stand up for, or against, injustice and that’s one way that this fire comes out. But you know when we’re wronged or betrayed it can turn into a vengeful, a very vengeful energy and even a blind rage, and so obviously there are some listeners that’ll feel that way around climate change and around the injustices that are happening here. So that is something to make space for here, you know, that we feel wronged and you know we need, we want to avenge that. So you know um, and then I was thinking of “arete,” another juicy Greek word, you know, overall excellence. You know how we balance all of our skills and really present ourselves in a really integrated, excellent way and so, you know, climate arete you know. Certainly climate thumos, people can get around that pretty quickly. I think but climate arete, about excellence, and it’s about being our best and showing our strengths. You know like an athlete showing their best and being just on time, like an athlete or a musician or something like … so anyway our excellence.
Pihkala: Yeah, that’s another great concept and linked of course with virtues and cultivation. And one of the projects I’m finishing is with anxiety philosopher Charlie Kurth and that’s about a, sort of adaptive dimensions of eco-anxiety and the sort of need to cultivate anxiety in the context of ecological crises. So eco-anxiety as a moral emotion. So that comes to my mind from that and I do think that we need more discussions about the moral emotion framing of many climate emotions and eco-emotions. So thanks for bringing arete up. I’ll have to do some checking about that too.
Doherty: Yeah. Well you know we’re into this stuff and we know these words are really magical and these feelings are magical and they get into us. So this is a really great conversation and I look forward to some more very soon. You know in our personal conversations Panu and I, we talk about our families and our life. Panu’s in the evening in Finland and I’m in the morning — I just got my daughter off to her high school. She's in ninth grade. She just started, so she’s still nervous about going and it’s a big rite of passage for her. How are your boys? Panu, do you want to just — without unpacking everything, you want to just say a little bit about what you’re coping with there?
Pihkala: Yeah, yeah I might as well so.
Doherty: Yeah.
Pihkala: So this is Autumn 2021, and in Finland where we are the situation is that as 40-year-olds, as me and my wife, we’ve had two [COVID] vaccinations shots - that’s another issue related to global justice we know - that still the variant is spreading and our youngest son caught it from pre-school so now half of the family is confined inside and I and the older son can luckily still go out to play some Finnish baseball. So it’s a sort of special time. But luckily the symptoms are mild but it’s a strange time that we are living. But luckily Autumn is coming and the beauty of the colorful leaves cheers me up.
Doherty: Yeah, yeah so Jakob got COVID-19 and he’s 11 did you say?
Pihkala: No, Jaakko (Jakob) the younger one is 5 and older one is 8 so.
Doherty: Well anyway listeners can unfortunately identify with that as well. I mean we’re dealing with all this stuff as well. I’ve been lucky in my family not to be touched directly by COVID-19 but that’s a thing. So even you, Panu, even you being vaccinated and doing your best it’s gotten into your family so I’m so appreciative you were able to make the time this evening.
Pihkala: Yeah it was lovely to discuss with you Thomas, again.
Doherty: So this is Climate Change and Happiness: Climatechangeandhappiness.com. As we get this podcast set up please reach out to us, let us know what you’re thinking and just let us know what you think about our conversations and we’ll talk more again soon. You all take care.
Pihkala: Bye bye.
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Season 1, Episode 1: Climate Change and Happiness
Jan 07, 2022
Welcome to the Climate Change and Happiness podcast. You’ll meet hosts Dr. Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala. Panu talks about his books and workshops on climate feelings, drawing on his background in eco-theology. Thomas speaks from the front lines of research into the mental health impacts of climate change, and shares insights about coping from his counseling practice. In this and future episodes, listeners learn a new vocabulary for climate feelings, drawing from different languages and insights from mental health therapy. “Climate Change and Happiness” is a provocative title. What does it mean to be happy at this time? We invite you to join us on this journey.
In Episode 2, Thomas and Panu talk about “holding space” for climate feelings, including “standing one’s ground,” and practicing “climate cosmopolitanism” by having a wide sophistication about other’s climate feelings and beliefs. In Episode 3, they explain “eco-anxiety,” the history of the concept, how to manage eco-anxious feelings, and how to understand climate anxiety as a primal emotion, a cultural idea, and a mental health diagnosis. Also, look forward to guests like Québécois psychologist and ecotherapist Karine St. Jean, noted conservation psychologist and IPCC author Susan Clayton, and global women’s health researcher Jade Sasser.
Transcript
Season 1, Episode 1: Climate Change and Happiness
[music: “CC&H theme music”]
Introduction voice: Welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, an international podcast that explores the personal side of climate change. Your feelings, what the crisis means to you, and how to cope and thrive. And now, your hosts, Thomas Doherty and Panu Pihkala.
Thomas Doherty: Hello I am Thomas Doherty.
Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala.
Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, the show for people around the globe who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change, particularly their emotional responses and their feelings.
I, Thomas, am a clinical psychologist based in Portland, Oregon in the Pacific Northwest of the United States and Panu is a climate emotions researcher with a background in theology, based in Helsinki, Finland - or nearby there. In this podcast we talk about our research and our activities and our personal experiences and our families and ways we cope with climate stress and build capacity for hope and happiness and how you can too as the listener. Today I want to get into the “why” of this podcast, you know, why this provocative title, Climate Change and Happiness, what is a climate emotion, how are we qualified, Panu and I, to talk about this, and why should people listen? So I’m going to turn it over to Panu to chat about this and we’re going to play off this idea. Morning for me and evening for Panu.
Panu, how is it going?
Pihkala: Thanks for asking, Thomas. In Helsinki, we are at the borderline between summer and autumn while we are recording this episode, so there’s already yellow and red leaves on trees, but still more green. That’s going to change relatively soon and autumn has for a long time been one of my favorite seasons - well practically I like all four of them or eight of them. It’s also interesting how various cultures have different numbers, they have given names for seasons and so on. But regarding our subject, climate emotions and climate feelings, I think autumn is a sort of special time for that also because it so starkly reminds us that things are changing.
Doherty: Yeah, so Panu, tell me about this - what draws you to this podcast? How does this help you personally, why do you think this is important for people?
Pihkala: In this podcast, we are exploring climate emotions and feelings from many angles. Of course, we can’t escape some facts - we are white males in rather privileged positions, but we really try to take an open view towards various experiences that people have in the world. Also, perhaps some experiences that the more-than-human-world have.
Emotions and feelings are on one hand sort of everyday subjects. Everybody knows roughly what we are talking about, but then actually when people really start researching emotions and feelings -- or affect as the one term that is growing in popularity-- it’s rather complex. Also myself, coming from a background in religious studies, theology, interdisciplinary environmental studies and moving more and more into studies on emotion and anxiety; I’ve been surprised how complex and, at the same time, fascinating the area of emotion and feeling is. That’s a richness and it’s also a difficulty and complexity especially when talking about emotions related to such a complex phenomenon as climate change, or the climate crisis.
But how about you, Thomas? What’s your sort of starting thoughts about climate emotions and climate feelings?
Doherty: Well Panu, you know I was really drawn to work with you because of your research. You’re one of the leaders in the world in terms of researching climate emotions and you’ve got this depth in your background of theology and eco-theology. Myself, a clinical psychologist, who was drawn into this climate work some years ago and have been immersed in it now for, you know, almost 20 years. People, I think, need a place to be with climate emotions in a public forum and it is so rare. I know I get a chance to do that with people through my personal -- my clinical work and my counseling and therapy and through teaching that I’ve done and through public groups. But it’s so rare.
I would joke that this is a show for “climate and emotions nerds” and I say that in the best way possible because we - you know you and I - are of a handful of people that can, you know, not only spell “solastalgia” but also define it and also differentiate from other kinds of feelings words and that’s really fascinating right? Solastalgia being a neologism, coined by Glenn Albrecht in Australia, you know, this stress about the changing environment around us. So, I think it is really important to have a place for people to sit and be with and hear people talk about this, right? And, you know, and to break this down, you know? What’s the difference between an emotion and a feeling, for example? Or you know, affect as a jargony word that academics use, but why would we use that term instead? So these are all things that we can get to.
You know emotions are physical manifestations of our living. You cannot be alive and not have emotions. All sentient beings have emotional responses to the world around them and feelings is the language that we developed to talk about our emotions and that’s limitless. There are so many different feelings words and feelings vocabulary. So I think I want to make sure that people come away from our talk with an increased feelings vocabulary about their experience of climate change. That would be a really great deliverable for us and I hope listeners are curious about this and starting to think about their own thoughts and feelings about climate change.
Panu say a little bit about your most recent - well you can talk a bit about, I know you’ve written book in Finnish about climate emotions and you’ve done some research; so what are some of the climate emotions that you’re talking about in your research and what are you observing and then I can share a little bit about what I see.
Pihkala: Yeah, I did these two popular science books in Finnish. The first one about eco-anxiety and hope, the second one about ecological emotions - Ympäristötunteet- for those many of you who know the Finnish language. When I did the first one in 2017, I already realized the different feelings of sorrow, sadness and grief are a big part of those experiences when one speaks roughly about eco-anxiety or climate anxiety and also, feelings of guilt, inadequacy, sometimes bordering on shame. I did mention many other emotion and feeling words in that book especially the varieties of hope, despair, hopelessness and so on were a very important part there. But, I also realized that there’s so many other shades and tones in emotional experiences and that led me to do this whole handbook of various ecological emotions and feelings, and it was a journey of exploration for myself also. I was meeting a lot of people through my lectures, leading workshops around Finland mostly - some abroad - but mostly in Finland and as a result of that, I learned to appreciate the multi-colored-ness of people’s climate feelings, or climate affect.
Doherty: Yeah, so I mean what are some juicy climate feelings words that you’ve worked with.
Pihkala: Anger is a very important emotion of course, and one of the challenges when talking about emotion and feeling, including ecological or climate emotion and feeling, is that if only one term is used for a major affective dimension such as anger or sadness, then many things tend to get lost or obscured. If we think about anger, for example, there’s a sort of silent rage that many people are feeling because of all the injustices and losses related to the climate crisis. Then there’s sort of aggressive rage over social media, for example, related to the psychosocial difficulty of these issues. But then there’s also a good kind of rage. I’ve called that “vima” in Finnish language.
Vima is an old Finnish word and [William Faulkner’s] The Sound and the Fury that was translated with the word vima. So it's kind of good fury and that’s one interesting aspect. And I see that for example in many young climate activists, for example. So they are really making an effort to be non-violent, but channel their thumos, as the Greeks would say, coming back to the nerd issue, their vima or positive climate outrage or fury into constructive action. So that’s one dimension that I’ve been fascinated about.
How about you Thomas? I bet that you meet a lot of different climate emotions or feelings as part of your therapy work, so what’s some that come to your mind?
Doherty: Yeah, well I really love this and we’ll capture the theme, this good fury. What I think is helpful, Panu, is that you’ve - again, you’re getting more nuanced in the vocabulary. You know, feelings vocabulary when it’s limited we have just a few words - it’s like a watercolor paint set and we only have, you know, five basic colors, you know, red, orange, black, blue, green — and so our painting is going to be relatively in primary colors and simplistic. Anger is a primary color kind of emotion. But there’s so many nuances in anger and you’ve been able to find value in anger and actually parse that out so, you know, because anger can be very toxic for our mind and our body and for our relationships. And anyone who’s done environmental work knows that when you get too stuck in anger it’s not good for your work or for your outlook and things like that. So you’ve been able to find this kind of righteous anger which is a very healthy and evolutionarily adaptive emotion to feel anger and to stand up for yourself. And I do think we need to hold close to that kind of healthy anger and knowing it’s very powerful and very hot and very fiery, so it’s dangerous in its way.
My work with climate feelings comes out of my work in general with my clients around all kinds of feelings about their life, and I tend to do both descriptive work with feelings where I help people to kind of name what they are feeling and the spectrum. Someone might feel stressed or fatigued, for example, but within stressed or fatigued, just say that word stress, eco-stress, climate stress, life stress. You know I might feel somewhat anxious; I might feel burned out; I might feel cranky, depleted, edgy, exhausted - I’m reading off of my feelings vocab list that I use. You know, I am overwhelmed or rattled; suspenseful, tense, tight. These are all pieces of stress and fatigue and some are more neutral like weary. To be weary is just to have a busy, full day and to be weary at the end of a day whether it’s good or bad. And it’s quite normal and healthy to feel weary if you’re living a full life and so it’s certainly normal to feel weary about climate change and weary about environmental issues and just weary, worn out, depleted. You know our battery is tapped out.
I tend to try to reserve words like burned out or things like that because that’s a more final kind of feeling. When a house is burned out, you have to basically tear it down and rebuild and so we don’t want to get to a place where we’re burned out. So we’re both working with feelings, but we’re also trying to find an optimal level and be very nuanced in our language. And I try to get people to come at some more what I call neutral or sort of middle-ground feelings like feeling “vulnerable,” for example. I think is a great word that I like to work with with clients and really sit with our vulnerability because that doesn’t imply an ultimate direction it just means that we’re vulnerable. Then once we get to that point then we have a little more choice.
And then of course we can think about feelings that we want to be feeling, you know like that good fury, or maybe present, curious, engaged. You know you talked in another conversation about togetherness and so there are other feelings that we want to cultivate. So for me it's about describing, sitting with, expanding, and then cultivating you know the feelings that we want to be feeling.
What are some other kinds of feelings - you know cultivating kind of feelings - that are coming up in your research that people might want to feel about climate change?
Pihkala: Yeah, that's a very important method in my mind what you just described. Helping people reflect about what they are seeing about what they see others feeling. I came across similar methods in a project I was doing with the Finnish Mental Health Society. It is an old organization which promotes sort of proactive mental health skills — so trying to avoid any pathologization of mental health issues -- and we had shared interests because that’s been my focus related to eco-anxiety, because fundamentally it's a very rationale reaction and it may turn up into a problem if it gets too intense.
But I really want to stay clear of this pathologizing tendency and sometimes emotional feeling words are used also for those purposes. For example, if our only word for sadness is grief and then we see even grief in a sort of medicalized way that’s highly problematic and again seeing the different shades and learning to appreciate emotions and feelings as part of life. So what you talked about you know trying to find different tones and sort of acceptance also that we have feelings and there’s fluctuations also and then there are all sorts of things that we can do to work towards the goal, where we can sort of surf better with the waves of emotion.
That’s a metaphor coming from Miriam Greenspan, a therapist from the [US] East Coast. Her book Healing Through the Dark Emotions is one of my favorite emotion books actually, and this metaphor of having recognized the force of emotion, the wave - to use the surfing metaphor, I know Thomas you are on the West Coast so I thought this might be appropriate - actually some people surf even in Finland it’s pretty cold here but yeah! So, surfing on the wave you have some control, but you don’t think that you can control the whole sea either. So that metaphor has some strength in my mind.
Doherty: Yeah, exactly and we do go surfing here. You can surf. There’s no such thing as bad weather only bad gear. So if you have a good enough wetsuit you can surf anywhere. And I love that and that’s something that all of our listeners can sit with for a moment. You know we can control our behavior on the wave but we cannot control the ocean. You know we can come into harmony with the swell and the wind, and we can certainly pick better or worse days to go try to struggle with the breakers in the ocean. And that’s what surfers do. They become very wise about timing and they’re patient. So all that said, such a deep metaphor. Some years ago I was involved with a whole seminar at the American Psychological Association at the meeting in Hawaii, we did a whole workshop on surfing and psychology. And we had several different researchers talking about surfing and there’s a rich literature on surfing about connection with nature and consciousness and all of that.
But the surf metaphor is helpful in our daily life, exactly. You know that’s another image for feelings is we have this curve, this despair and empowerment curve. We’re going to be up; we’re going to be down. As we become interested and excited about a project and taking action we get inspired and we have energy and then once we realize how complicated the project it is and how difficult sometimes we get fatigued and we lose our inspiration and even come into a despair place. Anyone who has done a project — and Panu you and I, we talk about our writing — I’m in a bit of a despair place in a project I’m trying to finish up so I feel like I’m on mile 23 of a marathon here and I just need just push it out this chapter on climate change for a clinical psychology textbook — which is great that we’re writing about this in a clinical psychology textbook. So it's a great project, but it’s also tough to pull this stuff together.
So, surfing the wave, you know I think this summer [Summer 2021] - the IPCC 6th assessment report, the 6th cycle is coming out and we’re getting the physical basis report coming out and you know with climate change we have direct mental health impacts from disasters and storms and problems, and we have indirect as all this washes over our society. Then, we have the subjective impacts of just bearing and sitting with this global problem, this global hyper object of climate change, and so we really need feelings skills. That’s why we have this podcast. We need some concrete, daily feelings skills.
You know the IPCC 6th cycle there’s nothing particularly — if you follow this and many of our listeners probably are experts on this more so than myself — but there’s nothing particularly new in the 6th cycle; there’s nothing particularly new in any of these. They’re simply becoming more clear and there is more consilience in the science about climate. Global warming exists. We know that it’s caused by human activities and not just natural activities, we know that it’s having impacts, social, humanitarian, economic impacts. Now we’re having attribution studies where we can actually link a storm or a flood to climate change and we can kind of tell how much it’s been amplified due to, you know, human centered climate change.
This research is scary to people and so I think one practical skill is to work on working with our fear. There’s a difference between being afraid, being anxious, being apprehensive, being frightened, being nervous, being panicked, paralyzed. So people have this kind of spectrum and I try to help people move from that to a place of alertness and presence and vulnerability and awareness, centering, breathing, all of these kinds of therapeutic things that we can talk about in upcoming episodes. We can have the capacity to sit with looking through an IPCC report and gleaning what we want to get out of it that is new and notable and potentially helpful for us, not simply living in fear of this knowledge that we’re creating. I mean it’s unprecedented, the knowledge that we know of climate change, we don’t want to live in fear of it.
Pihkala: Yeah, exactly. The different shades of fear and anxiety and worry. Ranging from panic to very constructive worrying which is related to proactive action also so that’s another very important topic and the workshops that I’m leading often together with various experts, many of the people who come there have a long history with environmental issues. Then there’s some more common features in those kinds of people’s experiences. For example, the danger of burning out or becoming clinical because if you love the natural world and know what’s going on there’s so many losses around and it’s difficult to make changes and sometimes it's difficult to read the good news. Media and communication is another big subject here. For some other people it may be guilt and shame are more central emotional issues and that’s made more difficult by different structural things and political action or inaction where often the responsibility is left too much for the individuals, and causing complications of guilt and shame, for example.
But despite people having very different situations and feelings and emotions, some dynamics are similar like the need for emotion skills that you, Thomas, mentioned and also, the desire to be validated by safe others in one’s emotional experiences. Validated, recognized, sometimes even, you know, held, holding in the psychological sense or containment to use another term from psychology. So that’s what I see happening a lot in these workshops also. Even though that might not be a very thorough investigation of all the emotional tones, there might just happen enough validation and holding so that it becomes beneficial for people and let’s hope that this podcast at least sometimes could function in that way also for people.
Doherty: Indeed Panu, I second that emotion there. I mean being validated and I hope everyone who is listening to us, no matter where you happen to be. You know Panu and I are separated, you know, around the globe and we do expect people are going to be listening in from any place on the planet and, you know, I do want people to feel validated and, you know, as we get this podcast set up and running, climatechangeandhappiness.com, I look forward to hearing from people and hearing questions and things that people might want us to explore.
But I do want to validate. It is just the basic point. As a clinical psychologist, I can tell that it is totally normal and sane to be concerned about issues like climate change and, you know, environmental degradation and toxins in the environment. And it's very normal to feel sadness and grief around extinction and things like that. These are a sign of health actually and a sign of values. So as we talk more, you know, we realize that we’re in pain or we’re hurting because we have values. We can get into these words and get really strong with them and really get creative with these climate words. You know one thing that Panu and I like to share is different cultural terms and words and we have fun with this. That’s where this title comes from Climate Change and Happiness. We are — it’s a provocative title I know — but we are playing with the idea of what would it mean to be happy in this world and can we claim some legitimate happiness and how new is this anyway? We talk about - you know one of the words I love is the Portuguese word of saudade and we’ve talked about weltschmerz, you know, in German. Saudade you know that sort of longing, that kind of delicious longing for something from the past, a very sensual kind of feeling of longing and missing something. How do we differentiate words like saudade or weltschmerz which is “world weariness” and “world pain"? How do we differentiate some of these words that we’ve known and lived with for years? These are parts of the human experience and how does that relates to climate change, for example?
We have neologisms like solastalgia which is a very kind of painful word. It really describes a pain and a loss and almost a ripping away. You know, of course, the term comes from Australia where those massive coal-mining projects have been tearing up the environment and people are seeing their places, you know, landscapes destroyed. So that’s a very painful kind of emotion. It’s a victimized kind of feeling. But how do we claim this and move past victimhood to more of a fully-feeling self. I know Panu, you have great Finnish words that come into play here.
Pihkala: Yeah, one example of that is haikeus which is sort of realizing that you will miss this when it’s gone and also realizing that the process is ongoing. That’s sort of related to many existential themes deep down, haikeus, and then we also have a combination of suloisen and haikea which means it's not exactly bittersweet but almost so it's sweet and haikea at the same time. That’s one of the mixed feelings that the climate crisis brings us and also one sign of health and one sign that the process has gone a bit forward. There’s always many factors affecting these emotional processes and it's not just up to the individual but luckily the individual also can do a lot in many cases and we know that people’s circumstances are very different here. So if one can also feel happiness or even bittersweetness in addition to sadness and solastalgia and all the trouble, that’s already something and testifies to the human ability for meaning-making even though the times may be very rough as they have been in human history many times.
Doherty: Indeed. So I hope this gives people a taste of what we’re coming after in the Climate Change and Happiness Podcast. Again, this is a show for people around the globe who are thinking deeply about the personal side of climate change including their climate feelings. I think we were able to get into a bit of the why of this podcast and why we would title it “Climate Change and Happiness.” The difference between climate emotions and climate feelings: Emotions are in your body, you all have them. Not everybody has feelings though until you grow them and explore them so we’re going to explore them in this podcast and we’ve had a lot to share and I think it’s a great resource for people. So, Panu I’m going to start my day here, it’s actually Labor Day here in the US so it’s a holiday - a national holiday and there’s some beautiful weather here in the Pacific Northwest and I’m going to spend some time with my daughter and I’m going to spend some time on my writing today and my life, and you’ve got an evening and some children that will be coming up to see you soon.
Pihkala: Yeah, that’s true and in our house on Monday there’s the public sauna also for house inhabitants so that’s up on my list after the boys go to bed, I’ll go to the sauna and talk with the old guys who regularly come there.
Doherty: That sounds very civilized Panu and very Finnish and I would love to be there with you, so you have a great evening and I look forward to more of these conversations in the future. Take care.
Pihkala: Likewise, Thomas and thanks for all the listeners.
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