Climate Stories Ambassador Workshop – Week 1
This week, I began attending a workshop offered by the Climate Stories Project (https://www.climatestoriesproject.org/) called the Climate Stories Ambassador Workshop. The goal of the workshop is to create more Climate Stories Ambassadors, people who are wanting to go out and encourage more people to share their climate stories and engage more people on climate change. Over the 3-workshop course, we will be learning how to weave our own climate story as well as learn how to interview others about their climate stories.
Since we were given time to answer a few prompts to begin to create our stories, I wrote them all down and thought it would be something that would be interesting to share on my blog. We only had 10 minutes so they aren’t long answers, but I thought it might spark thought if others read my questions and ponder their own answers.
What do you care about in your home, place, or community? How is it threatened by climate?
As a kid, I spent lots of time camping. I remember lush green forests, swimming in flowing rivers, and sleeping under the stars. Those memories are precious to me and I want my kids (and all future generations) to be able to camp in and enjoy those kinds of places. Now I live in Hawaii and we have so much nature worth protecting, not to mention the native people and cultures, for whom climate change unfairly impacts. You really see the impact on the ocean with the coral reefs dying and the fish and sea life dying with it, or in the forests that are drying up (if they haven’t already been cut down for housing).
What are your emotional responses to climate change?
I feel anxiety that not enough is being done fast enough, and that most people have no idea the magnitude of the problem. I feel like we’re all walking happily straight off a cliff, or more accurately, right into a furnace. And it feels like no one cares. It’s frustrating and sometimes feels hopeless. At other times, I do feel hopeful that we will turn it around and mitigate at least some of the damage before climate change goes too far.
Why are you motivated to confront climate change? How can you contribute?
I want to be on the right side of history. After I’m gone, I want my legacy to be that I saw a problem with my eyes open and decided to try to do something about it, whether I accomplish that or not. If we ever stop climate change and all the other environmental problems we face, I want to be able to proudly say I was one of the many people who helped stop it.
The Workshop
The workshop itself was a lot of fun! It was a lot of people who are very passionate about influencing on climate. Over 50 people showed up for the workshop and we got to break out into little groups of 3-4 and talk about the answers to our questions. My group was me and two people from Nepal, and both had very moving stories about the very real and worrying damage they are seeing to their own neighborhoods and towns (plastic waste, polluted water, and decreased crop yields).
We also learned a lot about how to start crafting our stories and were given homework to start to draft our climate stories based on some guidelines. Next time, we will share our stories, get feedback, then learn how to start prompting others for their climate stories and how to handle an interview where we ask people about their climate stories.
It was a fun experience and was very helpful as it ties in very well with my Initiative project. I’m looking forward to the next workshop! I will probably post my climate story as well, so be on the lookout for that. I’ll be looking for advice on it!
