Heavy Weather: Balancing Joy and Despair

Published: Sept. 26, 2019, 10:49 p.m.

b'Can we still find happiness in our daily lives without ignoring the dark reality of climate chaos? Author and meditation teacher Mark Coleman recalls experiencing just that juxtaposition of joy and sadness working on an article on a ridgetop north of San Francisco during the wildfires of late 2018.\\n\\n\\u201cIt was just such a poignant moment of going into nature for refuge and solace and at the same time being reminded of the fires and the climate crisis,\\u201d Coleman says, noting the irony that he the article he\\u2019d been asked to write was about meditation and nature.\\n\\nLove and grief are at the center of Coleman\\u2019s practice for coping with climate anxiety. \\u201cWe love this planet, we love this Earth, we love all of the abundance and the beauty and the diversity and complexity,\\u201d he explains, \\u201c[and] because we love, we feel the pain we feel the grief. The grief is a natural, healthy immune system response to a problem.\\u201d\\n\\nMica Estrada, a professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the University of California San Francisco, agrees that feeling grief is a valuable coping mechanism \\u2013 even if it hasn\\u2019t always been encouraged.\\n\\n\\u201cI think for a long time that [grief] was seen as a weakness and I think we\\u2019re finally hitting an age where grief is seen as a strength,\\u201d she says. \\u201cI think we have lived in a time when the dominant culture says don\\u2019t feel too much. And I do feel like we\\u2019re finally growing up and saying listen, real strength is being able to feel what we\\u2019re feeling.\\u201d\\n\\nGuests:\\nMark Coleman, Mindfulness and Meditation Teacher; Author, Awake in the Wild: Mindfulness in Nature as a Path of Self-Discovery\\nMica Estrada, Associate Professor, Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, UCSF\\n\\nThis program was recorded at the Commonwealth Club of California on September 5, 2019.\\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices'