How to Navigate Climate Change
Getting through the tough times ahead
If you don’t believe in human-caused climate change, guess what? You’re gonna die. Secondly, if you’re one of the smart ones who knows climate change is a real thing, you’re also gonna die. The question is, how are you going to live your life until then?
A Principle: Climate Change itself is Common Sense. The biosphere on our planet is a closed system. We keep heating it up and filling it with poisonous gas. Imagine if you had a fish tank, and started gradually heating it up and filling it with poisonous gas. Would the heat and gas just… go away? Really, human-caused Climate Change is so obvious that choosing not to believe in it is literally stupid.
So the question becomes: what do we DO? What can we actively, actually do, on the ground, in the face of Super Storms and fires and droughts and floods, other than learn to tread water and breathe smoke?
Ask a lot of people and they’ll tell you, “buy a more fuel efficient car! Fly less! Use less air conditioning! Eat organic!” Which, sure, okay, but come on now. Most people aren’t privileged enough to afford to make all of these changes. Many of us can barely afford conventional food, let alone organic. And flying less sounds lovely but it’s hard to fly less than “I can’t afford a plane ticket.”
The Paris Accord is toothless. The head of the Environmental Protection Agency is literally on a Mission from God to destroy the planet. The real, visceral impacts of Climate Change are happening far, far more quickly than even many climate scientists anticipated. Tough times are ahead, and it’s really easy to feel powerless, especially since so many of us are just trying to make it day-by-day.
However, we are not powerless. There are a few universal things we can do to get through difficult times, and to increase our chances of withstanding the difficult times ahead….
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