By: Claire Butcher
Climate change anxiety has become a shared struggle for many young adults, stemming from threats posed to our environmental health and lack of control over global actionable change. These feelings can lead us to feel helpless and isolated due to its large-scale nature. It can be difficult to maintain our own mental wellness when things feel so out of our control. Here are some ways we can maintain our mental well-being while also taking action to combat climate change.Â
Boundaries, Balance, and Resilience
One way we can cope is by setting boundaries to protect our emotional health. We can do this by filtering the amount and the kinds of news we receive. With our now constant stream of news and a wider range of topics covered, it can be difficult to control our anxiety. Taking breaks from scrolling, setting limits, or turning off notifications during parts of the day can help ease your stress. Setting specific times to view news can help build a routine to finish your day with less external stress. For example, not âdoom scrollingâ after 6pm.Â
Balancing our exposure between bad news and positive events is another way to cope with climate change stress. Here are some ways we can practice self-care navigating bad news:
- Connecting with others, fostering a sense of community and shared concerns
- Logging gratitude
- Prioritizing self-care/restorative activities
- Spending time outdoors
- ExercisingÂ
- Seeking professional helpÂ
To balance our consumption of bad news, it can be helpful to subscribe to âgoodâ news sites that report positive events, such as:Â
Building resilience helps us manage hardships and challenges in life. This process takes time and effort, so even with these actionable steps, remember to be patient with yourself. Here are some tools you can implement to build resilience:
- Acknowledge your feelings without judgment or trying to âfixâ them
- Remind yourself that change is part of life, and that many events will be out of our control
- Learn how your body communicates with you to determine when you are stressed and how to take care of yourself
- Reach out to trusted loved ones for support
- Take care of your whole self (prioritizing sleep, adequate nutrition, movement, and connection)
- âReframeâ problems by seeing them as opportunities for positive change
Taking action
With so many large-scale factors out of our control, here are ways we can individually make a difference to combat climate change. Before listing individual changes, itâs important to acknowledge the impact of socioeconomic privilege that can limit peopleâs ability to logistically contribute to fighting climate change.Â
Events/Donations
- Attending climate change events
- Joining environmental organizations
- Donating to nonprofits, such as Grow PortlandÂ
Individual Change
- Buying âless stuffâ
- Consuming less meat
- Participating in peaceful climate change protests/events
- Participating in community gardens
- Not cleaning or bagging your leaves
- Volunteering to plant trees
- Trying to fix what is broken before buying new devices
- Switching from a gas furnace to a heat pump
Climate change is a silent but very real threat, giving us an opportunity to come together to build a more sustainable future and foster a community of resilience in the face of adversity. Through the balance of collective action and individual self-care and boundaries, we can confront the mental health challenges that stem from climate change.
