Finding hope in a time of eco crisis
Is hope realistic, or possible, in these eco-anxious times? We ask Kiwis at the conservation and climate frontline and discover surprising things. By Sarah Heeringa.
The word might be falling out of currency, but when I was growing up people with unjustifiably optimistic attitudes were called Pollyannas – and it wasn’t a compliment.
Hope is an optimistic state of mind, based in the belief of the potential for good to happen. Now more than ever we need to pull together to tackle global climate change challenges. Given the fractured state of the world and with the COP27 climate summit having limped to a disappointing close, is a hopeful outlook realistic – or possible, even?
I asked Kiwis at the conservation and climate frontline, and discovered some surprising things about hope.
Some anxiety is a sign of sanity
Dare to look around and there’s certainly plenty to get sad or mad about. Today’s climate change news can feel like a rolling maul of catastrophe. There are recordbreaking milestones of the worst things: like deforestation, animal habitat and species loss. And on the human front just as many heart-wrenching stories as people’s lives are upended by droughts, famines, floods and fires.
In short, it can all be a major downer. But don’t beat yourself up if thinking about this stuff makes you feel angry or panicked – eco-anxiety is not a sign you’re going crackers, but ‘a completely rational response to a very real, existential threat’, say Australian Psychological Society experts.
Start by giving yourself a break
For Kenya Ashcroft, this means getting out of the city sprawl and into the bush ‘‘to resensitise myself to nature, and fall back in love with the ecosystems I first wanted to study and help protect’’.
Ashcroft has been engaged in a number of conservation and activism projects dating from planting with Trees for Survival as a seven-yearold. As a teen she sailed to the Kermadec Islands with
Blake NZ and while studying environmental