So, a climate scientist, a climate change denier and a doomsayer predicting the ‘end of the world as we know it’ all walk into a bar…
Change the setting of a bar to a media interview, and this is often how these sorts of conversations go. We have to have ‘balance’ right? Perhaps we’re past that point.
Instead, what about this as a premise?
Here are three people (or 15,000 people, which is the number of people who have joined the Deep Adaptation community) who have all accepted that we face extreme disruption to our way of life, and possibly even societal collapse.
But they are diverse: different political views, different backgrounds and cultures and socio-economic groups, and they live very different lives in very different countries all over the world.
Invitation to a Conversation
At the end of a summer where more and more people are waking up to climate catastrophe, where:
- We are two weeks away from the most important climate talks ever at COP 26 in Glasgow
- The Energy Agency Report from 13 October is subtitled “Adapt or Die”
- August’s IPCC Report subtitled “Code Red for Humanity”
- June’s UKCC CCRA#3 Report: “The UK is nowhere near prepared”
- Sir David King, Former Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK Government says: “What we do in the next 3 or 4 years will determine the future of humanity”
- September’s study from Psychologists that 75% of young people are experiencing fear about the future
A year where we saw the Amazon Rainforest becoming a net emitter of carbon for the first time.
A year where we’ve seen that the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), of which the Gulf Stream is a part, is shifting and collapsing – with massive implications for food growing.
A year where people in the UK have seen the floods, the storms, the tornadoes and the fires – and are waking up to the fact that they’re closer to home than ever before.
It’s fair to say, the era of climate denialism is largely over in the UK.
Here’s the thing though: Hardly anybody is telling the truth about how very bad it actually is – at least in public.
More than ever, we need really good information now. Surely this is the job of the media? Many people feel that the mainstream media hasn’t always done a brilliant job of this, constrained as they are by powerful interest groups and wealthy elite owners.
Take a look at the table here. It represents paradigms that summarise four stances that different people take about our predicament. Whichever column you’re in will shape your strategies, policies and actions.
There is a 5th column too, not depicted in this table – as it is still quite fringe. That of NTHE or Near-Term Human Extinction. Although it’s a certainty humans will be extinct at some point, I am not convinced this is imminent.
The interesting thing about this table is how fast it’s shifting and changing, in terms of the percentage of the population in each column.
When we talk with local councillors and politicians, we often ask them “Which column are you in?”. Their reply is often something like “Officially? Column 2”. And then we probe further and ask: “Yes, but really?”, and nearly all of them say they are somewhere between Column 3 and 4.
Essentially, Column 1 is rapidly shrinking, and Column 4 is rapidly growing. This Scholars’ Warning has now been signed by over 700 scholars, scientists and academics:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0frHoqXLB0&feature=youtu.be
The Academic Paper that went Viral
In July 2018, Professor Jem Bendell, then Professor or Sustainability and Leadership at the University of Cumbria, published an academic paper called “Deep Adaptation: A Map for Navigating Climate Tragedy”. You can read the paper (updated in 2020) here:
https://lifeworth.com/deepadaptation.pdf
It went viral and reached over a million people in less than a year. It is the most downloaded academic paper of all time.
An online community was formed to connect people around the world who sensed the truth in what Jem Bendell was saying, and whose own research had led them to a similar place.
Deep Adaptation is not NTHE (Near-Term Human Extinction). It’s not doom. Rather you could call it “post-doom”. It’s about living fully and joyfully now, at the same time as responding lovingly and kindly to our predicament, and preparing for what might be coming our way. It’s certainly not ‘giving up’ – far from it.
The Importance of Local Community Resilience
In addition, many local community groups have since sprung up – encouraging community resilience and adaptation.
Three years ago, having found some like-minded folk in Hertfordshire, we set up HEART Community Group – you can read about the first year of our journey in this blog:
https://heartcommunitygroup.org/12-months-into-our-journey/
We are also seeing the setting up of what are called Climate Emergency Centres, or Resilience Hubs, in various parts of the UK – find out more here:
https://climateemergencycentre.co.uk/
Living in Two Worlds
I know from our work in HEART Community Group that many ‘Column 4-type’ conversations are already happening across the public domain, but still quite often in hushed voices, and with others who ‘get it’. We hold out a hand to those who are feeling alone with all this.
More and more people are sharing their concerns about collapse and extreme disruption and unravelling. We’re having just a taste of it in the UK right now, with the gas prices, and the fuel shortages, and the lorry drivers, and the empty supermarket shelves.
People often talk about the intense cognitive dissonance that comes from feeling like they are living in two worlds: “Business as Usual” on the one hand, and the other world where they are pretty damn sure this society is essentially broken, and is about to get much, much worse.
It’s not just climate change of course. Our globalised society is becoming increasingly fragile:
- Climate Change – and associated extreme weather events
- Collapse of bio-diversity and eco-systems
- Zoonotic diseases (e.g. Covid)
- Economic fragility
- Increasing social injustice
- Resource depletion
- Crisis of Meaning
- Disconnection and Polarisation
The changes that are coming are huge – and we need to go way deeper than simply improving flood defences, or insulating our homes. Our current ideas and policies about adaptation are mostly woefully shallow.
Adapting involves both inner and outer dimensions. A great deal of the inner work is about letting go of our stories. Stories about what the future will look like, what it means to have a ‘good life’, or to be successful or happy, and even who we really are.
What’s Most Important Now?
If we really face into what’s happening already, and what’s likely to come our way as a result of overshoot, and our obsession with infinite growth, we realise that we no longer have time for a gradual transition to a better, greener way of life.
The 4Rs Framework of Questions
The 4Rs is a framework initially suggested by Jem Bendell, and covering Resilience, Relinquishment, Restoration and Reconciliation/Reconnection.
RESILIENCE
What is it that we most value and how can we keep that? How can we build and sustain our resilience – both inner and outer? What’s MOST important now?
RELINQUISHMENT
What can we give up (even if we value it) in order not to make matters worse?
RESTORATION
What can we bring back that has been lost?
RECONCILIATION/RECONNECTION
What can we do to make peace with, love and support others? How can we live with kindness and joy in our increasingly TUNA world? (Turbulent, Uncertain, Novel and Ambiguous)
I would argue that asking and answering the 4R questions is a pretty good way to live – no matter what may be coming our way!
The questions are the important thing – it’s important to start by looking within.
The 4R questions are not about “How can I turn all this around?” – but rather “How can I deeply adapt to what is likely to be a very different future?”
I’m not officially ‘speaking for’ the Deep Adaptation community in this blog. In any case, it’s not a campaigning or pressure group – or a doomsday cult!
There are a huge variety of perspectives amongst the 15,000 members globally.
For me, it’s about being able to stand tall and look our predicaments in the face – from a place of resilience, wellbeing, courage, clarity and compassion.
And I’ve experienced massive personal growth as a result.
So, what’s available in the Deep Adaptation Community?
For many, Deep Adaptation is an oasis in a desert of denial.
You can watch a video here of several people talking about what they ‘get’ from the DA Community (including me):
(543) DA Hotspots – Transition U.S. Testimonials – YouTube
This is a truly beautiful interview between Dean Walker, another elder in the DA Community and a particularly empathic radio journalist called Timothy Regan:
https://archives.kpfa.org/data/20211003-Sun1900.mp3
The Deep Adaptation community also offers useful validation that there is an alternative to ‘business as usual’, and we’re not going bonkers – especially if our family and friends haven’t yet woken up to our inter-connected predicaments.
Being deeply seen, heard and accepted no matter what. A safe place, where we can show up with all our human-ness. Deep connection, learning, nourishment, and a source of creative ideas.
Learning how to be more comfortable, courageous, resilient and present in the face of radical uncertainty. Learning how to navigate without the maps we may have constructed and relied on throughout our lives.
A place to cry and grieve with others when that’s your experience.
A place to celebrate new possibilities with others from all over the world.
A place to share our love for humanity and all of Life – and to rest deeply in this present moment.
A place of kindness, belonging and a loving community.
Maybe even transformation.
For many, it’s like coming home.
Yes, But What Should We Do?”
We’re so conditioned to rush into action aren’t we? To believe that we are in control, and we can fix any problem with our big brains.
Many people believe that a fundamental paradigm shift is required – depicted in the following image:
From CONSUMING to CREATING
From STUFF to MEANING
From ANTHROPOCENTRIC (Human-Centred) to ALL LIFE CENTRIC
From GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAINS to LOCAL SUPPLY CHAINS
From NATURE AS COMMODITY to WE ARE NATURE
From INFINITE GROWTH to STEADY-STATE
From BIGGERMENT to GRATITUDE
From INSTANT GRATIFICATION to PRIORITISING what’s MOST IMPORTANT
From ME to WE
Pause. Reconcile and surrender to reality. Reflect Deeply.
It starts with asking ourselves the 4R questions. Really getting clear about what’s most important now.
Find your thread to pick up – whatever that is. How are you called to make a contribution?
Deep Adaptation is not a community with a powerful leader who says to the rest of us: “I know what we should do! Follow me!”
Beware of anybody who claims to have all the answers – that’s part of what got us into this mess in the first place!
Rather it’s a community of shared wisdom that encourages all of us to follow our own “nudges” and to pick up our own thread.
It’s not just a comfort-blanket to hide in for those struggling with eco-anxiety or climate despair. For me, it has been like a “trampoline that inspires and enables people to engage anew in Life on Earth” (one of the hopes expressed by Jem Bendell recently)
And we are slowly learning that crucial lesson that the whole of humanity so needs to learn – how to come together and do something important with a disparate group of people who may not always agree with each other.
Kimberley Hare
October 2021
