Welcome to 10 Weeks of Climate Optimism!
Based on the article 10 Ways To Be A Climate Optimist in 2022
Every Sunday for the first ten weeks of 2022, I’ll be sharing a thought + challenge to deepen, widen, and strengthen your climate optimist heart. I hope these ten weeks will be a time for growing your emotional resilience and helping you become that grounded, empowered, and optimistic climate leader you are meant to be — for yourself and for the world!
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How did it go?
Before we dive into this week’s challenge, how did last week go? Were you able to create more slow-time in your life? I had quite a busy week myself, but one morning I woke up early and, for some reason, super hungry. I usually don’t eat until later, but I listened to my body and decided to give it what it was asking for.
With a quiet house and the dark still lingering outside, I lit a couple of candles and sat down to eat a bowl of oats. For once, I didn’t write or read or look at any social media feed -- I dedicated my full self to the moment. Just me and my oats.
And it was magical. To fully recognize -- not just the flavors from the cinnamon, banana, raisins, blueberries, and pumpkin seeds, but the act in itself of nourishing my body. To listen to what it was asking for and respond with love and respect. The food tasted so good. The warm oats felt so good in my body. Tingles. Pleasure.
I was in Slow.
I’d love to hear about your Slow Moments too! Leave a comment below or send me a private message, either via email at annetherese@theclimateoptimist.com, or in a DM on Instagram!
Challenge #2 — Activate Healing
As climate activists, we tend to think of our “mission” as so grand our own health and wellbeing don’t matter, but it couldn’t be more wrong! If you want to heal the world, you must begin with healing yourself first.
Jack Adam Weber, the author of Climate Cure, says:
“Climate cure means we not only heal ourselves, but also help the rest of the planet flourish as much as possible. In this sense, climate chaos is a catalyst, an opportunity for regeneration, similar to other heartbreaks!’
When there’s chaos, there’s room for transformation. When there’s pain, there is room to heal.
You must activate that. You must become that healing. So if you care for the world, if you care for animals and other people, choose an active journey of personal healing. The more grounded and resilient you are, the more powerful you will be in changing the world around you.
We’ve been told this story where humans are the evil on Earth and that we must separate ourselves from nature to do less harm. But the truth is that we are nature, and by understanding that, we will see how important it is that we heal ourselves so that we can begin to add light and love to the wellbeing of everyone (including trees!)
“The climate movement is not about doing, it’s about healing.”
This Week’s Challenge
Before we dive into this week’s challenge, I want you to take a moment and tell yourself that there’s a chance you’re holding on to anxiety/fear/grief that you’re not yet aware of. There is a lot of negative news in our world and we’re not ever taught how to emotionally deal with that, so you may be suppressing feelings of anxiety, fear, grief, and stress.
If you’re someone who feels a personal connection to nature, it might be even stronger. To you, nature is more than just a place to go from time to time and take selfies. You care for Nature as if it was your brother, sister, or friend, and it can be extremely devastating when you connect the dots and understand that we’re killing our own blood.
Secondly, I want you to know that you do want to bring shit to surface. That’s the only way to let it go! If you keep suppressing and ignoring your emotions — if you never let yourself feel — they will continue to build up inside where they run the risk of developing into anxiety or even depression.
Anxious and depressed people tend to shut down and not engage. They fall into apathy, complacency, and give up on hope. WE CANNOT AFFORD THAT!
Right now, we need all of us to show up with as much hope and commitment as we possibly can, and that is why it is our personal responsibility (in my belief) to commit to active healing.
Acknowledging, accepting, releasing!
Climate healing relies on three pillars:
Recognizing that it’s OK to feel and letting yourself be one with your emotions. Ignoring them will not make them go away, they’ll only build up inside where they can lead to anxiety and depression. Feeling is the first step to healing.
Once you’ve recognized this, it’s incredibly important to remember that you don’t have to hold on to these feelings to make a difference. You’re not a better activist because you’re angry and worried all the time. In fact, you’ll have a much bigger impact if you choose to heal yourself and act from a place of strength and light.
Understand that you’re not alone. By talking about it with others, you activate your own healing, first of all, but also allow for others to start their journeys as well. It creates strength and bonding. When when we come together in our fear and grief, we feel like we’re in something together, and there is hope. Hope is where the action grows!
*This work is not a “one and done” thing. Healing and emotional empowerment takes effort and just like working out, you need to commit to it over time. But similar to training your body, once you’ve reached a certain physique and made strong and resilient your new normal, sticking to these habits will become second nature. It will be who you are — a healing vessel for change!
Healing Journaling Guidelines - Landing in Grief
The challenge I’ll share with you this week is a journaling exercise to help you land in and accept grief. Carve out some quiet time for yourself and put pen to paper, following the steps below. Make sure you allow yourself to feel and accept whatever comes up!
Journaling Guidelines:
Write a list of all the ways you can think of that humans are killing/hurting/destroying our planet and the natural world.
On a new page, write down how this makes you feel. Don’t hold back, be colorful — even swear if you have to! Consider it a hate letter to the world. And don’t worry, no one has to read it.
Read (quietly or out loud) what you just wrote. What do you feel? Breathe deeply and allow yourself to really feel what comes up. Don’t hold back — crying and screaming is OK! Remember that you don’t have to hold on to the fear and grief to care. In order to make a difference and fight for a better world, you need to release and heal yourself first.
After releasing, how do you feel? Do you feel lighter? More grounded? Connected? Sad? Do you feel like once you’ve released, there’s room for… hope? Spend a short moment writing it down if you have it in you.
Journaling your feelings is only one of many steps for active healing. I also suggest talking about it with others and — of course — getting to action! But I do find this exercise to be incredibly powerful so don’t skip this step.
If you want to keep going, this free resource holds more guided journaling prompts for climate healing and personal empowerment!
I hope this week’s challenge can activate some powerful healing steps for you. You can’t grow abs by closing your eyes and dreaming about them. At some point, you have to get on the floor and do some crunches!
The same goes for your emotional resilience. You can’t just tell yourself that you want to heal and feel better, you have to actually seek out the activities that activate that healing. You are special and we need your hope, courage, and strength on this journey, so please commit to showing up for this work! ✨
Here are more resources if you want to dive deeper:
Lastly… the podcast is back!
The Hey Change Podcast is back after a short break over the holidays! In episode 88, Robin and I set intentions for the new year before giving it over to our guest, where we talk about a very exciting topic — the future of cities!