Navigating climate and environmental distress
According to the American Psychological Association, 68% of American adults report experiencing at least some climate anxiety, and nearly half (48%) of young adults aged 18-34 feel stress about climate change in their daily lives.
Here are resources that can help you learn to cope with climate distress—and even cultivate a sense of meaning and purpose amidst the climate crisis.
WEBSITES AND ARTICLES
- All We Can Save Project x Gen Dread: Resources for Working with Climate Emotions
- Gen Dread: A newsletter about staying sane in the climate and wider ecological crisis
- Climate Mental Health Network Resources
- Climate Mental Health Network Emotions Wheel
- EcoAnxious Stories: Resources for working with climate feelings
- Moms Clean Air Force: Parenting in a Climate Crisis Panel Discussion
- WIRED: Where parents can get help with climate anxiety
- NPR: Climate anxiety is real. Here’s how you can manage those feelings.
- BBC: Climate grief: How we mourn a changing planet
- BBC: How to heal in the Anthropocene
- The New York Times: How to calm your climate anxiety
- Parents: A calm guide to climate anxiety for parents
BOOKS
- How to Live in a Chaotic Climate: 10 Steps to Reconnect With Our Communities, Ourselves, and Our Planet, by LaUra Schmidt, Aimee Lewis Reau, and Chelsie Rivera
- A Field Guide to Climate Anxiety: How to Keep Your Cool on a Warming Planet, by Sarah Jaquette Ray
- Generation Dread: Finding Purpose in an Age of Climate Crisis, by Britt Wray
- All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis, edited by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Katharine Wilkinson
- Saving Us: A Climate Scientist’s Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World, by Katharine Hayhoe
- Turn the Tide on Climate Anxiety: Sustainable Action for Your Mental Health and the Planet, by Megan Kennedy-Woodard and Patrick Kennedy-Williams
- A Guide to Eco-Anxiety: How to Protect the Planet and Your Mental Health, by Anouchka Grose
- Parenting in a Changing Climate: Tools for Cultivating Resilience, Taking Action, and Practicing Hope, by Elizabeth Bechard
- How to Talk to Your Kids About Climate Change: Turning Angst into Action, by Harriet Shugarman
- It’s Not Just You: How to Navigate Eco-Anxiety and the Climate Crisis, by Tori Tsui
- Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story From Despair to Possibility, by Rebecca Solnit
- Climate Anxiety and the Kid Question: Deciding Whether to Have Children in an Uncertain Future, by Jade Sasser
PODCASTS
- We Are the Great Turning
- The Anti-Dread Podcast
- Climate Anxiety and the Kid Question
- Climate and YOU
- Climate Change and Happiness
- Facing It: A Podcast About Love, Loss, and the Natural World
- WHY?!? A Good Grief Network Podcast
FILMS AND VIDEOS
- TED talk: How to turn climate anxiety into action, by Renee Lertzman
- TED talk: How climate change affects your mental health, by Britt Wray
- TED talk: Courage and acceptance in troubled times, by Catherine Ingram
Updated: April 2024