When we feel like things are sliding backwards, it's hard to stay optimistic.

But what else drives this sense of hopelessness? Sure, it’s everything you see - every time you scroll through the news. But it’s more than that: our expectations and unconscious beliefs about progress play a huge part into how we perceive the world.

In my coaching, one of the questions I hear time and time again is “who am I to do something?” As if making changes in the world is only permitted by special, powerful people. As if the rest of us are just spectators in this world, with no role beyond consuming and complaining and hoping that someone will swoop down from the heavens and save us all.

I know it can often feel as if we are powerless. But we are co-creating our world every day…

Here I am again; in the UK for the third time. I have no idea what the future holds. So what brought me back here again? A little summary of my life over the last few years…

In March 2010, I left the UK for the first time. Armed with two very heavy suitcases and a couple of backpacks, at the tender age of 23 I was heading to the other side of the world - to start my new life in Japan as an Assistant Language Teacher. I had barely been outside of Britain before even on holiday, yet here I was - suitcase packed full of gifts for my new colleagues - heading onto a completely new continent…

You don’t need to have been personally affected by climate change things to feel angry, sad, fearful for the future. A recent study from the University of Bath, led by Caroline Hickman, found that 56% of young people feel that humanity is doomed. Just let that sink in for a moment.
Perhaps you’re one of those people. Staring into an unknown future that looks bleaker and bleaker every time you check the news, you can’t understand how your friends can carry on planning families and careers in a world that seems to be crashing to a halt.
In recent years, a lot of names have popped up to describe the emotions you might be feeling - eco-anxiety, climate anxiety, eco-grief.

What is the Work that Reconnects, and can it help with Climate Anxiety? The Work that Reconnects initially evolved in North America in the late 1970s, during a time of escalating concerns about nuclear weaponry and the hazards of nuclear power as “despair and empowerment work”, when its creators realised that when people share their feelings of fear, anguish or despair with others, their power to act for change is released. In the face of environmental uncertainty, climate despair, or whatever we want to call it, WTR allows us to access and honour our pain for the world, and through doing so realise our interconnectedness to the earth and all beings.

One of the most important things I’ve learnt these past few years is the importance of finding community. It is a lonely experience to sit with the weight of climate predictions on your shoulders, wondering whether you have misunderstood something as those around you carry on as if nothing is wrong.

It is easy to start feeling like you are the only one who cares, and that the burden of saving the earth rests entirely on your shoulders. That’s a burden that no solo human can possibly bear.

We can choose to ignore our feelings, let them overwhelm us, or use them as fuel to face complex challenges head-on.

Low emotional intelligence can mean that people can’t manage even small amounts of stress, are more prone to anxiety and depression, and are more at the mercy of sudden changes to their mood. When we’re in “fight or flight mode”, we are far more prone to binary thinking, meaning that everything is good or bad, black or white, us or them — not exactly what we need the most right now, when we are being called to solve complex problems and work together toward solutions.

What if your calling doesn't match current economic demands? What if your purpose isn’t out there, wrapped with a pretty bow, waiting to be found?

In this article I explore 7 myths surrounding purpose and passion, and why so many people wrap themselves up in knots trying to figure out exactly what they were put here to do.

We are excited to announce the launch of our Wheel of the Year series - eight workshops, which can be attended as a one-off or over the whole year, that incorporate nature intelligence, a return to our awareness, and the Work That Reconnects.

It seems that our society doesn’t like to talk about death and grief - we prefer to avoid it, imagining that we can be young and healthy forever. What is the result of this avoiding? What is the cost? With the Great Unravelling on our doorstep in the form of COVID-19, political instability and climate change, can we afford to turn a blind eye to death any longer?

There is a TON of research out there showing the benefits of spending more time in nature - better physical and mental health, creativity, attention, focus, even compassion increases when we give ourselves time to be in green-space.But not everybody has equal access to ‘nature’.

So how does one connect to nature in their own home when they can’t go outside?

It’s 2020 — we’re in the midst of a global pandemic, climate collapse has already started playing out, and mental health issues are skyrocketing -but not everyone can afford to go to a psychotherapist. There are other reasons you may choose not to find your own therapist: trust issues, a lack of time, or perhaps you’re just not convinced that talking about your feelings with somebody else is going to be all that helpful.

If you’re looking for a way to work through difficult emotions without having to bring another person into the equation, here are the simple (but effective) things that I do.

2020 has been one wild rollercoaster, and I think it’s safe to say that very few of us are unscathed - and hey, we’re only 2/3 of the way through.

I don’t know about you, but… it’s getting harder to focus. I set goals, but then I don’t really feel like achieving them. I get distracted easily, sinking time into scrolling through my news feeds instead of sticking to what I’d planned to do. I’ve allowed myself far more junk food than I normally would, because I’m not able to relax with friends in the ways I’d normally like to. Many people have told me that they’re feeling the same.

The practice of sharing emotions in a circle is nothing new, yet few of us feel as if we can safely express our deepest emotions even to our closest friends. So when I took part in a collective ritual of sharing our grief, fear and anger over what is happening to the planet, I was surprised by the results…

In The Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle explores the way that we spend the majority of our time (mentally) in the past or the future - very rarely on the actual present moment.

He explores questions like “well, if I never think about the future, how will I plan things? Won’t I just become a bum lounging around on my parents’ sofa?” - or something along those lines.

..Yes, of course, we need to be careful not to use mindfulness or the power of Now to encourage people to put up with unacceptable situations. If your house is actually on fire, don’t just sit still and focus on the feeling of the flames burning your skin - you get the f*** out and call the fire brigade…

For years, I allowed my Inner Critic to tell me that I wasn’t talented, attractive, intelligent or knowledgable to become a coach, a writer, or - in fact - to do anything other than take low-paying, easy jobs and allow myself to be treated like dirt. The same thing happened with relationships - I put up with behaviour that I wasn’t happy with because the Inner Critic convinced me that I should be grateful that somebody nice wanted to be with me… and that I could never do better.

So what is an Inner Critic? Well, it’s that part of you that stops you from taking the next step - applying for that job, publishing that article, speaking your mind - because it’s whispering to you: “Who are you? You’re not good enough

As part of my training as a Work That Reconnects facilitator, I was asked whether I had ever undertaken any anti-colonialist or anti-racist work.

Back then, I had no idea what that really meant - I mumbled something along the lines of “well, um, I have a lot of non-white friends and I hate racists”.

I used to bristle a little at the term “white privilege” - it felt to me as if I was being accused of benefitting unfairly purely because of the colour of my skin. I felt that I was being told that I didn’t deserve any of the qualifications, possessions or respect that I had because it had been afforded to be purely by virtue of being born with white skin.

You know that feeling in your gut that tells you something is wrong?⁣ ⁣ What if, instead of trying to numb it and ignore it, you were to listen to it?

What if you invite that emotion in and ask "what are you trying to tell me?"⁣ ⁣

So many people think they are broken because they can't stop feeling the pain and anxiety of the world. ⁣ ⁣

You are not broken, my dear. You are sensitive. And that's not a bad thing, despite the many ways you may have been told over the years that you're "too sensitive".⁣ ⁣

I don’t know about you, but the first thing that pops into mine is an image of a woman in a bath full of bubbles up to her neck, candles precariously balanced around the side, a glass of red wine in her hand.

“You can’t take a break,” my Inner Critic reminds me, “You haven’t saved the world yet. Look at it - there’s still so much work to do. How can you just sit around reading a magazine and enjoying yourself? Besides - the things that give you pleasure are bad for the environment.”

Sound familiar?

When I told people I was preparing, slowly, for the oncoming forced quarantines and potential shortages of food in the supermarkets, I was told not to be paranoid. When I voiced the fact that the global stock market is crashing, that trading had even been suspended, that our money may not be safe in our banks, I was told to be more optimistic.

Well, to me, being optimistic is not about covering our eyes and ears and singing "la la la everything will be fine". That's Pollyanna-ism, denial, self-delusion, or toxic positivity - and that may have served you just fine so far, but in the end it's only going to be more painful when you realise that sometimes you have to make tough decisions and act…