Meet Eco-Anxiety IRL

When I wrote Eco-Anxiety: Saving Our Sanity, Our Kids, and Our Future, my publisher and I planned for a release date of September 24, during Climate Week NYC. What we didn't plan was that a devastating hurricane would be barreling towards the Southeast.

Please check out this NBC News Now interview from 9/26, where I talk about my new book, how to process and prepare for these disasters, and why they are a clarion call for climate action. This includes how to deal with the feelings of overwhelm, denial, and helplessness. I was interviewed by Joe Fryer BEFORE Hurricane Helene made landfall.

Last Thursday, I had no idea that that the impacts of the hurricane would be so personal. I have deep roots in East Tennessee and Western North Carolina, areas that never imagined destruction from a hurricane.

Please support the American Red Cross and local relief agencies. ?

COMPASSION & CONNECTION: ECO-ANXIETY RESOURCES

Eco-anxiety is real. It includes the full range of emotions caused by the trauma of the climate crisis. Young people are especially worried.

To help manage your own eco-anxiety:?

• Please check out this reel that highlights the first principle of OneGreenThing - Know You Can't Go It Alone.
• Lean into community connection and compassion as a climate solution and get to know your neighbors.
• Use the OneGreenThing "Go Kit" guide to be ready.
• Know that it's not too late to fix the climate crisis, but it will take all of us -- our best thinking, creativity, and advocacy -- to remove the political barriers to action.
• Listen to the young people in your life about their worries and also create space to focus on the helpers in this crisis and climate solutions. Check out the OneGreenThing discussion guide here.
• Please consider ordering my new book, which aims to help us process eco-anxiety and channel it into meaningful action to scale climate solutions. If you enjoyed it, please leave a review. As you likely know, reviews help with the algorithms so Eco-Anxiety reaches the widest audience possible.

CLIMATE WEEK NYC

Climate Week NYC was filled with engaging, hopeful conversations, including my book launch and conversation on Cultivating Wellbeing in a Warming World with OneGreenThing board members Chris Hill Jen Fisher and social impact expert Susan McPherson . Thanks to everyone from around the world who joined - including board members & National Advisory Council members @Dr Leslie Carr Julia Cohen MPH Gigi Lee Chang Rene Jones John Wear Dan Delurey . OneGreenThing Chief of Start Up Emily Necessary Fowler made it all happen.

You can check out the webinar here.

We went to events with CNN, Climate BaseCamp & UTA foundation, Made Safe, Sustainable Entertainment Alliance, Solutions House.

A special thanks to our amazing intern Cate Hashemi - who went around the city signing books with me. The author life is not for the faint of heart. LOL! And yes, I called my mom on pub day.

Meeting with faculty and students of the United Nations International School was a highlight of the week. We talked about the Summit of the Future and connecting the SDGs to the Service Superpowers. The creativity, enthusiasm, and passion of the students brought us such joy. We must let young people know they are not alone in climate action.

Despite the heartbreak of Hurricane Helene, we CAN create a greener, healthier, more just future. We have all the climate solutions we need. Now we need the political will.

SEPTEMBER MUSINGS

What I'm listening to

• The alt-country harmonies and songwriting of?Lindsay Lou & Maya DeVitry energize me.

My favorite #onegreenthings

• Taking long walks outside to process the devastation of Helene and the climate future if we don't scale solutions immediately.
• Making sure my friends and family are registered to vote and that their status is active via iwillvote.com.
• Taking action by donating to candidates endorsed by the Montana Conservation Voters that take climate action and protection of public lands seriously.
• You can check out your local races through your state League of Conservation Voters. More here.
• Still cracking myself up on TikTok. We can take the climate crisis seriously without taking ourselves too seriously.

If you're experiencing eco-anxiety, please reach out and turn to OneGreenThing for resources. If you are directly impacted by the hurricane, please know I'm not only holding you in my heart, donating to relief efforts, but also working everyday to help create a greener world.

?And as always, my work is about relationships, connecting, and reciprocity. Please let me know if there is anything I can do for YOU, personally or professionally! Email me at [email protected].

Heather White?is an author, CEO & founder of OneGreenThing.org, a CEO of Heather White Strategies, LLC , and nonprofit executive with more than 20 years experience in environmental law, policy & advocacy. She's a frequent spokesperson in the national media on environmental issues. Her book Eco-Anxiety: Saving Our Sanity, Our Kids, and The Future will be published by HarperCollins on September 24, 2024. Her second book 60 Days to A Greener Life: Ease Eco-anxiety Through Joyful Daily Action was published by Harper Collins on April 9, 2024. Follow her on Linked In, Instagram, TikTok, X, and Threads.