Dear Climate Therapist: how can I reconcile my destructive urges?

On holding tension without breaking

This week we’re exploring a question from a reader who shares their conflicted feelings in the days before Hurricane Milton made landfall in Florida. While horrified by the potential devastation and suffering, they also admit to a fleeting but unsettling hope that such destruction might finally serve as a wake-up call about the climate crisis. Our resident Climate-aware Therapist, Caroline Hickman, responds with empathy, invoking the concept of needing both a "dream and a nightmare" to face the climate crisis. She reframes the writer's so-called "destructive urge" as a reflection of external systemic failures, while encouraging building the spaciousness required to hold the necessary tension between hope and horror. 

                                                          Design by Gen Dread. 

Dear Climate Therapist,

As hurricane Milton approached Florida, I struggled with a very uncomfortable feeling. There is a small part of me that truly wanted the worst impact possible. I saw the storm's rapid intensification and the track it took that may have devastated Tampa, and I cheered it on because maybe, *maybe* if the storm was bad enough, Americans would finally wake up to the climate crisis. Surely if Tampa was flattened, we could no longer deny climate change, right? I'm not actually that naive, but I have to hope that someday there will be a tipping point that leads to consensus and action, kind of like the moment when an addict hits rock bottom. Of course the rest of me is horrified by that feeling. The suffering is going to be immense, and borne disproportionately by people who don't have the resources to evacuate easily or to rebuild. My heart breaks, especially for the children. They've done nothing to cause this catastrophe but will live with the consequences. I care so deeply about climate work precisely because I care about humans and other life on this planet. What do I do with this destructive urge? Is it even a good idea to publish in GenDread? I can see the headline now: "Climate activists hope for more death and destruction." But it's exactly the opposite. I hope for collective action, a planet-wide climate mobilization to *prevent* these kinds of disasters for our children and their children.

- Horrified by Hurricanes

Now over to Caroline.

Dear Horrified by Hurricanes, 

I sympathise with you! It is so hard to tolerate the increasingly awful events we are witnessing and to bear the feelings of hopelessness and powerlessness that come from feeling that ‘maybe this time it will wake people up’. At the same time, I also understand feeling horrified by this thought because of course we don’t want that to happen. Yet we do have to face our fear that perhaps no single climate disaster might ever be enough to move societies toward urgent, systemic change. 

I can hear the stress of the two desires in you, towards hope and redemption, then into the awfulness of wanting this to create a tipping point, and at the same time the inhumaneness of even thinking that. I am reminded of something that Sally Weintrobe said: ‘we need a dream and a nightmare’ to help us navigate the climate and biodiversity crisis’. I think this is perfectly summarised. We need both. But of course, we must find a way to hold the tension between these desires that pull us in opposite directions. And how can we face that destructive part of ourselves being seen?

The short answer is that we must reach this point, I think, over and over again, to feel that ‘surely this time people will wake up and understand’. And then bear the disappointment, get up from our own despair, and find a way to keep moving forward. We must be compassionate to the wish that we could be relieved of having to tolerate these competing desires, and of holding the tension between them. It’s exhausting! 

We need to stretch our hearts wide enough to make room for all these feelings, because this is when we are at the edge of our own sorrow and frustration. Then we must take a deep breath and stretch further, again and again. Without breaking. You call it a destructive urge; I see it as a congruent and healthy response to what is happening in the world. You are mirroring the destructiveness that you see happening when others (with more power) fail to act on climate change. It’s not you, it’s them, I’m afraid. You make perfect sense. It’s healthy to encounter destructive desires, just do not act on them (perhaps take a baseball bat to a pillow instead).

-Caroline

And an invitation:

Britt is doing an event with KPMG that is open to the public on December 12th. Called “Managing Climate Anxiety”, this presentation and interactive session will provide an overview of what we know so far in the research and practice fields about climate anxiety, unearth strategies for helping ourselves and others confront this distressing topic with more ease and strength, and allow for an embodied experience of our own climate-and-polycrisis emotions alongside the sense of connection that comes from witnessing another person in theirs’. For more details and to register, visit https://bit.ly/4dTvJvC

If you liked reading this, feel free to click the ❤️button on this post so more people can discover it 🙏🏼

---

‘Till next time!

>Britt & Gen Dread