0:00

Support for On Being with Krista Tippett comes

0:02

from the Fetzer Institute. Fetzer supports

0:04

a movement of organizations that are applying spiritual

0:07

solutions to society's toughest problems.

0:10

Learn more at Fetzer.org.

0:12

Sink into this as a way into the

0:15

conversation that follows. In

0:17

the world in which I was born and maybe you

0:19

too,

0:20

the weather was the stuff of small

0:22

talk. The seasons of

0:24

the year were the underlay of

0:26

planting and harvesting food that nourishes

0:29

and fuels our bodies, of course. But

0:32

seasons have also been the very

0:34

mundane, predictable rhythm of

0:37

our days and our lives. Now,

0:41

the loss of seasons as we knew

0:43

them, the loss of storms

0:45

as we knew to navigate them, is

0:47

an experience we are all sharing

0:49

in all the places we inhabit and

0:52

love. This is closer

0:54

to home than every fight we have

0:56

about climate and the science

0:58

around it, the meaning of it. We

1:01

feel this in our bodies, the

1:03

young among us most keenly. It

1:06

leads some of us to those fights and

1:08

some of us to retreat within, overwhelmed.

1:12

My guest today is the exuberant and

1:14

mighty Costa Rican diplomat, Cristiana

1:17

Figueres. She, as much

1:20

as anyone alive on the planet right

1:22

now, has felt that overwhelm

1:24

and stepped into service. She

1:27

is a most eloquent articulator,

1:29

both of the grief that we feel and

1:32

must allow to bind us to each other

1:35

and what she sees as a spiritual

1:38

evolution the natural world is

1:40

calling us to.

1:41

If you have wondered how to keep

1:44

hope alive amidst a thousand

1:46

reasons to despair, if you are

1:48

ready to take your despair as fuel,

1:50

intrigued by the idea of stepping into

1:53

love as a way to stepping into service

1:56

and open to immediate realities

1:58

of abundance and

1:59

generation. This conversation

2:02

is for you. I'm Christa

2:04

Tippett and this is On Being. Cristiana

2:10

Figueres was executive secretary

2:13

of the United Nations Framework Convention

2:15

on Climate Change from 2010 to 2016 and is

2:17

known as the powerhouse

2:22

who made the 2015 Paris Agreement

2:24

possible in which 195 nations worked

2:28

with their wildly diverse conditions

2:31

and points of view on the what and the

2:33

when and the why and yet

2:35

made commitments in service

2:38

of our hurting planet and the future

2:40

of humanity. She spoke to

2:42

me from her home in Costa Rica.

2:46

Hello there. Can you

2:49

hear me? I can hear you. Yeah

2:51

I'm so delighted to be talking

2:54

to you. So

2:56

Zach are we and Bill are we good

2:59

to start whenever we're ready? Okay well

3:02

Cristiana you know I've known

3:04

your name for such a long time. I followed

3:07

your work for such a long time

3:09

and it's just such a it's

3:12

such a pleasure and really an honor to be

3:14

able to have this conversation with you. So thank

3:17

you. No no no let's correct this. Let's

3:19

correct the facts here. Okay

3:22

I have known about you. I have been following

3:24

yours on being podcasts

3:26

plus many other things that you're doing for

3:29

such a long time and it

3:31

truly is humbling. Thank you so much.

3:34

Okay well here we are and

3:36

that's all you get to say about me and now we're talking

3:38

about you for the rest of this. Okay but

3:40

it means a lot. I can obey that rule

3:42

but you can cry. All

3:45

right but it means a lot and

3:48

you know you have such

3:51

an interesting personal history and

3:53

I know that all

3:55

of our personal histories come with drama and

3:57

I'm sure an interesting personal history

3:59

comes. even more drama, but that

4:02

your father, your father, was also

4:05

someone who's known as the father of modern

4:08

Costa Rica and that

4:10

you grew up partly in the president's

4:12

residence and at times and

4:15

partly on your

4:17

father's farm, on your family farm.

4:20

Your mother was a Danish immigrant and

4:23

at one point Costa Rican ambassador to Israel

4:25

and your father's also been described as a farmer, philosopher.

4:28

I mean, what

4:30

a family to be born into and also what an incredible

4:32

place to be born into, Costa Rica. Yes,

4:36

well you're right. What a family

4:38

lineage. No

4:40

pressure, right? You can imagine we grew up with absolutely

4:43

no pressure to

4:46

live up to our parents' expectation

4:48

of always being in service

4:51

and that's definitely what they passed

4:54

along to us in our

4:55

DNA is to always be in

4:58

service of others. And

5:00

I'm quite humbled actually and

5:02

thankful, especially to my father's teachings

5:05

that are so deep and

5:08

as you say, formed the Costa

5:10

Rica that we enjoy

5:11

today, a country that has no army,

5:13

thanks to the vision of my father, a

5:15

country that has 5%

5:19

of global biodiversity despite

5:21

the fact that we are absolutely tiny postage

5:24

size. I have no idea. That's incredible.

5:27

Yeah, because my father, when

5:29

he decided in 1948 to disband

5:32

his own revolutionary army that he

5:35

formed in order to protect democracy

5:37

and then he disbanded

5:39

the national army and his logic

5:42

was, why do we even have an official

5:44

army? Let's take that budget and put

5:46

it into what really counts. And so he put

5:48

it into public education and production

5:51

of nature. That was in 1948. So

5:53

a total,

5:55

total visionary. And

5:58

yeah, so you can imagine that. that growing up under

6:01

the shadow and under the light,

6:03

both, right? Under the shadow

6:06

of such a powerful

6:10

pair of parents, but also

6:12

under the light of their expectation

6:16

and their ambition

6:18

that they had already substantially realized

6:21

and their expectations for their kids. So,

6:23

yeah, not an easy upbringing, I would say. No.

6:28

We didn't spend too much time in the playground.

6:30

Right, right. Okay. Well,

6:34

and then I'm very intrigued because I'm always

6:36

interested in the spiritual

6:38

background of a childhood, however

6:41

that is defined. And I'm also quite intrigued

6:43

that there's this figure in your life of

6:45

your maternal grandfather

6:47

in a very Catholic country who

6:50

was a Christian scientist. Yeah. And

6:53

I wonder what that bequeathed to you. How

6:56

odd is that? Yes. So

6:58

my maternal lineage,

7:01

my grandparents and my mother were

7:03

Christian scientists. My grandfather

7:06

in particular, very, very

7:08

devout Christian scientists

7:11

and lived to the ripe old

7:13

age of 105 without ever

7:15

taking medicine, just, you know, and

7:18

power up his positive

7:20

thinking all the time. I

7:23

grew up as a Christian scientist until I was 16.

7:26

And more or less when I turned 16, I went my

7:29

way, way, way. Okay. There is something

7:31

really

7:32

powerful about this Christian science

7:35

practice, which is

7:37

to recognize the power of thought.

7:41

But the piece that I actually

7:43

decided I cannot stay a Christian

7:46

scientist is because my

7:48

sense is that there was

7:51

a lack of recognition of the

7:54

part of reality that had to do

7:56

with pain, that had to do with

7:59

suffering, that had to do with the pain. had to do with disease.

8:02

And because there is such an emphasis on

8:04

the power of positive thought in Christian

8:06

science, there's also a de-emphasis,

8:09

or in fact, a blind spot, I would say,

8:11

to the power of everything that

8:14

is on the other side of that disease

8:16

or any ill that

8:18

we experience in our lives. And for me,

8:20

I just needed something that brought

8:22

both of those together because I thought, actually,

8:26

I just feel more comfortable if

8:28

I can have a conceptual

8:32

structure

8:32

that allows me to hold

8:35

two realities

8:38

on equal standing at the same

8:40

time, even if simplistically

8:43

they seem to cancel each other out. But

8:46

I just need to hold them

8:48

both. Yes, so what

8:52

I also hear when you talk about those

8:54

things you wanted to hold together, kind of the

8:56

light and the darkness, right, the pain and

8:59

the healing, you

9:01

were really, even as a teenager, getting at, you

9:03

wanted to own the fullness of reality,

9:06

which equally has those things in

9:08

them. And it strikes me

9:10

that that capacity

9:13

of yours, that orientation of yours, becomes

9:15

such a gift.

9:18

It becomes one of your gifts to the world, and in

9:20

particular, one of your gifts to this reckoning,

9:23

this

9:24

ecological reckoning, this, you

9:27

know, I try not to overuse the word climate,

9:29

which I probably, I think you probably understand because it's

9:31

not just about climate, right? I mean, climate is the thing

9:33

we end up talking about, but it is the ecological

9:35

reality that we've come to at this

9:38

point. Ecological crisis. The ecological

9:40

crisis, and it is our ecological

9:42

presence, and there are callings and reckonings

9:45

to it. So it's just so, I

9:47

just want to kind of note that, that I feel like

9:49

that orientation is something you brought

9:51

into this work that you could not possibly have known

9:54

you would have done when you were a teenager. And

9:57

also something that strikes me about

9:59

your early.

9:59

life is

10:01

your childhood was also

10:03

implicated in the life of a nation, right?

10:05

Like you and your family in a

10:08

way belonged, as you said, you

10:10

probably didn't get enough playground time, but

10:13

you belonged to the

10:15

wider world. And yet

10:17

the story you tell of what turned

10:22

you towards what I would say became

10:24

your calling was your

10:26

sense of loss of

10:29

a small creature, a species

10:32

of frog. I mean,

10:34

is that right? That was a really

10:36

kind of beckoning to this particular

10:39

work you walked into. Would you tell that story?

10:42

Yes, absolutely. And you know, I've since

10:44

become aware of how this loss

10:47

in my life has marked so many chapters

10:50

in my life. But that was

10:52

perhaps the first one that

10:54

really opened

10:56

a completely different door for me. So

10:59

I was a recent mother, I had

11:01

just had my two children

11:03

which followed each other very quickly.

11:06

And I

11:09

wanted to imbue them with so much. And

11:11

one of the things that I really, really wanted

11:13

to seed in them

11:16

was the love

11:17

of nature, the love

11:19

of nature, the thirst for being in

11:21

nature. And

11:22

I remembered that when I was much younger,

11:25

because I followed my parents to every

11:27

corner of the country on their political campaigns,

11:30

I had gone to Monteverde, which

11:32

is a

11:33

rainforest reserve in

11:35

Costa Rica. And I had seen this

11:37

tiny little golden toad

11:40

that was absolutely glorious.

11:43

I mean, you just cannot believe that nature

11:45

creates something as beautiful as

11:47

this. And

11:49

you know, quite to my misery,

11:52

I discovered that by that time that

11:55

species had gone extinct, because it only

11:57

existed in that one rainforest.

12:00

forest in the world. That was it. And I

12:02

was I was heartbroken. I was horrified.

12:05

I was

12:06

also very intrigued.

12:08

And that was my introduction

12:10

to begin to ask scientists

12:12

and begin to read myself into the

12:15

topic of climate change. And

12:17

ever since, since the 90s,

12:20

I have devoted my life to

12:22

addressing climate change. Because

12:25

Krista, I am above all,

12:27

I am a parent. I am a

12:29

mother to my own children and mother to

12:31

future generations. That's the way that I think

12:34

about myself. And I thought, okay,

12:36

if I as a mother have received

12:38

from my parents, a planet

12:40

that had X number

12:43

of species in it, and now I am

12:45

turning over a planet diminished with

12:48

less species to my two

12:50

daughters, how can that be a

12:53

responsible terms of reference of any

12:55

mother or any parent?

12:57

And I think,

13:00

you know, one thing I think about a lot, in

13:03

general, with the great, I

13:05

want to use that language again, kind of the callings and

13:07

reckonings of this this young century, is

13:11

how what we're

13:13

all standing before the work we're standing

13:15

before is at one and the same time,

13:18

intimate and personal

13:20

and civilizational

13:21

and kind of at a species level.

13:23

And

13:26

one of the ways I look out

13:29

at what we're

13:32

facing with climate, with ecology,

13:34

I see

13:37

human beings individually

13:40

and collectively acting

13:42

as human beings do when we are

13:45

afraid, right? Like

13:47

on some level, there it's

13:49

that simple. And we know what those

13:51

different patterns are. And you write about this, right?

13:53

We fight, we deny, we

13:56

get paralyzed.

13:59

else that I'm really, I'm seeing now, I don't

14:02

know where it fits in that paradigm, but I'm sure it's part of

14:04

it is we normalize, right?

14:07

And I think this is something that our bodies and brains

14:09

do and I understand it. But just

14:11

how quickly, just in these recent

14:14

years,

14:15

you know, we've lost, you

14:18

know, I when I was growing up, when

14:20

you were growing up, the weather

14:22

was the was a matter of small

14:24

talk, right?

14:26

And the weather and the seasons had

14:28

a predictability that was a rhythm

14:30

of our lives, and how quickly

14:33

that has shifted. And, and

14:36

we just kind of like so

14:39

interesting to me and a little bit terrifying

14:41

how we so quickly move into accepting that

14:44

there's fire season, right? But,

14:48

but what I want to also say about you

14:50

is that you really

14:52

bring into focus, and you do

14:54

speak eloquently about all of that. And I want

14:56

us to talk about that. But you also bring into focus

14:59

the bigger picture that

15:01

the old world that you know, as you say

15:03

that you were born into is not

15:05

the world that your children and have inherited.

15:08

It's not the world that our children collect if you're in here

15:10

that that the old world is passing and a new

15:12

one is being born. And part of the job

15:14

right now is to really

15:17

step into name

15:20

step into kind of claim that

15:22

reality.

15:23

And how painful that is,

15:25

how painful

15:28

it is for everyone.

15:33

But I would argue, especially

15:35

for those who have been

15:37

at the front lines

15:39

of this for years and decades,

15:43

those who have been personally

15:45

affected continue to be affected,

15:48

those in the lying states,

15:52

those who you know, really

15:54

depend on their, on

15:57

their

15:59

planting. and reaping to

16:01

survive, it's actually a

16:03

poly crisis that we're facing. But

16:07

as you mentioned before, it just

16:10

reaps fear. It just, you know, we just

16:12

go into fear because... Which

16:15

is understandable, right? Which is reasonable.

16:17

Which is reasonable. Right. But

16:20

the way we respond is not helping

16:22

us. Yeah. And,

16:24

you know, the way we have responded as

16:26

human beings for since

16:29

we developed as human beings, as a

16:31

species, is we either went

16:33

in the face of threat, we either go into

16:36

flight or freeze or fight, as you said.

16:39

Yes. And how do we do it better,

16:41

right? Because flight or getting distracted,

16:44

the moment you turn on the news and you see,

16:46

you know, more wildfires as well, then turn

16:48

the channel so I can look at something else. Right?

16:51

And so that's the flight piece. Let

16:53

me get distracted from this so that I

16:56

can think about something else. Or

16:58

how many people, Krista, especially

17:01

young people are into burnout

17:04

because they are so pained

17:06

and they go into freeze mode

17:08

because they can't ask, they pull

17:10

the covers over themselves because of the burnout,

17:13

because of the fear and the pain and

17:15

the grief and the loss that they cannot manage.

17:18

And so they just go into burnout

17:19

and they freeze. Or

17:21

the others,

17:23

you know, just

17:25

to bring the third in, those who fight,

17:28

they go out there and they, you know, start

17:30

blaming people

17:33

for things

17:34

that are sometimes justified and sometimes

17:36

not. And so the question for me is,

17:39

how do we get out of this flight,

17:41

freeze, fight triangle

17:44

that we have developed as a species

17:47

for thousands of years?

17:50

How do we manage our emotions better? And

17:52

how do we get to the point where

17:56

we can choose to act? out

18:00

of being grounded in our emotions,

18:02

which means understanding,

18:05

embracing the pain, not looking

18:07

away, definitely

18:09

embracing the pain, the suffering that comes

18:12

to us every single day. And

18:14

at the same time, understanding

18:17

that that pain and that fear and

18:19

that grief is what I would call

18:22

an alarm bell.

18:23

It's an alarm bell to not

18:26

sink into the bed covers again, but rather

18:29

jump out of bed and generate the

18:31

clarity of what needs to

18:33

be done. And it is that

18:35

grounding in our emotions that

18:37

again, puts those two things

18:40

side by side. Yes, I am

18:42

in deep pain. And yes, precisely

18:45

because of that, I am committed to

18:47

do everything within

18:49

my fear of influence.

18:51

And what you're starting

18:54

to point that when you speak in this

18:56

way, you know, so I, as

18:58

much as I mean, I've, I've interviewed across

19:00

these years, just incredible people who are doing

19:02

an incredibly beautiful, deep

19:05

work to

19:07

heal, heal our planet, right in different spheres.

19:10

And as much as anyone

19:12

I could interview, you know, you, you

19:14

are a person who has stepped up, you've played your part

19:16

on a global stage, you, you were critical

19:19

to the Paris Accords, which remains the most

19:21

significant agreement that we

19:23

have made to date that has commitments and goals attached

19:25

and imperfect because everything human beings

19:27

do is imperfect, but it's the best we've done

19:29

so far. And

19:32

what you just said to me about the

19:35

critical, like elemental

19:38

underlying work that we each

19:40

of us and collectively have

19:43

to do that I feel you've come to this point, you're

19:45

talking about

19:46

grounding in our emotions, but you're

19:49

also talking about rising

19:52

to this, to this crisis,

19:54

to this calling at a spiritual

19:57

level. And, and that without that,

21:59

to

22:01

be again part of nature

22:03

as we always were, but from a much

22:06

higher understanding, which was not lost

22:08

by the way by most of the indigenous

22:10

cultures of the world. That consciousness

22:12

has existed, but it wasn't... Has

22:15

existed, but it has not been

22:17

the predominant mindset. And

22:20

we are hopefully getting back to that.

22:39

I'd like for you to also talk

22:42

about how you started to think

22:44

in this way, because my

22:46

understanding is that actually while

22:49

you were in that process of building

22:51

towards the Paris Accords in

22:53

the 2013, 2014, 2015, you're overseeing 500 people, you're working with 195 nations, you fell

23:02

into a deep despair.

23:04

And

23:05

it was out of that despair

23:08

that a new kind of spiritual inquiry,

23:11

and perhaps you might even say personally

23:13

a spiritual evolution, began for you.

23:16

Yes, that was, I would say,

23:18

my second huge loss in

23:21

life.

23:22

I hadn't been married for 25 years. I

23:25

actually thought I was in what

23:27

I would call picture book marriage, picture

23:29

book family, doing

23:32

everything to give the family

23:34

and my daughter is the strongest

23:37

underpinning for their life

23:40

in terms of values and principles.

23:43

And then one day I was

23:45

completely

23:46

surprised by an announcement

23:48

on the part of my former husband that

23:52

just

23:52

completely destroyed the marriage. And

23:55

that was,

23:58

I just felt like, whoa, you know.

23:59

I've been

24:01

hit here by a two by four

24:04

that I absolutely did not

24:06

expect. And as

24:08

you say, my day job was to

24:11

continue to lead

24:13

the negotiations toward the Paris Agreement.

24:15

So it was a pretty

24:18

difficult situation. I didn't

24:20

want to let my colleagues know that I was

24:22

in this terrible traumatic situation.

24:26

I didn't take one day off from work. I cried

24:28

myself to sleep for a whole year. And

24:30

then I woke up the next morning, had

24:33

a shower, put my smile on my face and went

24:35

to work because I had told

24:37

all my colleagues we have to work with love and

24:40

with joy if we're going to get anywhere.

24:43

And so I was living two realities, right? One

24:45

at night and one during the day. And

24:47

after a while, Christian just became completely

24:50

unmanageable. And I,

24:53

well, I have said before publicly,

24:55

so I don't have any need to hide it. I

24:58

started having

24:59

suicidal thoughts because

25:01

I just couldn't manage this contrast

25:04

between me at work and me

25:06

at home or me with my professional

25:08

colleagues and me with myself. It

25:10

was just too painful, too difficult.

25:14

And it was in that desperation that

25:16

the universe led me to

25:19

Thich Nha Khaan, who is a Vietnamese Zen

25:21

master. I was

25:23

living in Germany. I went without

25:26

knowing anything about Buddhism or anything

25:28

about the belief that I was going to guided

25:31

by the universe. I went

25:33

to the monastery that was close to

25:35

my home and started a

25:38

study that has lasted over

25:40

the next 10 years up until now. And

25:43

I have become very active

25:46

in that community in the Plum

25:48

Village

25:48

tradition

25:50

because A, it helped me so

25:53

very, very much to understand

25:55

my pain and to ground it much

25:58

better not to walk away from it or did it.

25:59

deny it, but also not

26:02

to

26:03

be controlled by it, but

26:05

rather it helped me to be able

26:07

to regain sovereignty over

26:11

my personal circumstance.

26:12

And

26:14

then I discovered, oh my gosh, it

26:16

is so helpful for my professional

26:18

life because, you know,

26:20

the truths that I was learning

26:23

apply to me as an individual,

26:26

but also apply to everyone else

26:28

collectively and above all applies

26:30

to all levels of the system. And

26:33

I honestly think that if I had not had

26:36

that guidance and those teachings, I

26:38

don't know how we would ever have gotten the Paris

26:40

Agreement because it was just

26:42

so fundamental. Yeah.

26:44

And as I think, you

26:46

know, I interviewed Thich Nhat Hanh Thai

26:48

in 2003 or 2005, so early in

26:53

this adventure and it's

26:55

meant so much, right? It was indelible.

26:59

And I mean, so when I read you

27:02

writing about or speaking about being

27:04

what you learned at Plum Village, and you're just saying

27:07

that now that there was so much that in fact

27:09

had incredible pragmatic

27:11

value. I love to

27:13

just tease out some of those ingredients.

27:15

I mean, one of them I think that I have

27:17

seen you talking about is, you know, that again, went

27:20

into your work as a diplomat and a global

27:22

negotiator. It's

27:24

like deep listening.

27:25

Deep listening. Yeah.

27:29

And I think that this deep listening as

27:31

you learned it at Plum Village

27:34

and in this particular Vietnamese and

27:37

Buddhist lineage is so connected

27:39

to quality, qualities

27:42

of presence and a quality

27:44

of silence. Yeah. I don't know. I'd

27:49

love for you to get more granular

27:51

about these spiritual practices

27:54

that you brought into

27:57

your diplomatic work.

27:59

You're right, Krista. It really is about

28:02

the quality of presence because I think

28:04

it's perhaps

28:08

too simplistic

28:08

to say, but let me say it anyway, that

28:11

anything can be mundane. Any

28:14

experience, any interaction, anything

28:16

can be mundane. And anything

28:18

can be spiritual. The very same

28:20

interaction, the very same experience

28:23

can be either mundane or spiritual.

28:27

The only difference between the

28:29

two

28:30

is how I live

28:32

it.

28:33

What quality of presence

28:36

do I bring to it?

28:39

And that is true about our

28:41

experiences. It is also

28:43

very true about our mindset,

28:46

about our narrative and our action.

28:49

And to understand that mindsets

28:51

lead to narrative, lead to action, and

28:53

above all, that every

28:56

single action of ours

28:58

carries our signature.

29:00

And that is true for a conversation. It's

29:03

true for an interaction, whichever

29:05

way I interact with, I don't

29:07

know, with my neighbor, with my daughters,

29:09

with the person where

29:11

I go and buy my vegetables.

29:14

That conversation, the way that I

29:16

walk in to that place

29:20

where I go and buy my vegetables, if I just

29:22

go like, okay, I have to buy two tomatoes,

29:23

one onion, and three avocados. That's

29:26

one way of walking in. The other way of walking

29:28

in is to pause, take

29:30

a breath and go, wow, this

29:33

little shop is run by four

29:36

sisters who inherited

29:38

this little shop from their father. And

29:41

their father had this immense,

29:43

beautiful ambition that the four

29:46

of them would do this together. And

29:49

every single tomato, every single

29:51

onion in here is an expression

29:54

of their love for their father and their collaboration

29:57

among

29:57

the four siblings. Now

29:59

I'm having

29:59

a completely different experience about

30:02

the tomato. Right. Right.

30:05

And this really leads

30:08

into

30:09

just a fundamental conviction

30:11

you have that I also think is

30:13

there

30:14

in that spiritual worldview

30:17

of Plum Village and in the great traditions

30:20

that, and you said it, with

30:22

our thoughts we create the world. Maybe that's

30:24

a way to tie it. Yes.

30:27

Interestingly, I heard you say something very

30:29

similar about your Christian science grandfather,

30:31

right? That there's this powerful

30:34

belief in thoughts in a way that science is

30:36

now validating. Yes.

30:39

And that this belief,

30:42

this understanding of the power

30:44

of what you

30:46

just illustrated, it's not just our thoughts

30:48

and that becomes our very presence

30:51

and that becomes transformative for

30:53

us and for other people. And you also

30:56

hold this up as that changing

30:58

the story that we're

31:00

telling ourselves of this ecological

31:04

climate reality, this new world

31:06

we are already in, is absolutely

31:09

has to be such an important focus

31:12

of our energy and our imagination

31:15

and our creativity and

31:16

our work. And, you know, I saw

31:18

this, I saw you being interviewed by The Guardian

31:21

about your book, which is

31:23

wonderful that you wrote with Tom Rivett Carnot called

31:25

The Future We Choose. And

31:27

I feel like these questions themselves really

31:30

illustrate

31:31

that we're up against something in saying

31:33

that changing the story can matter, right?

31:35

So somebody said, the journalist

31:38

said,

31:40

only 11 pages or so of the book

31:42

describe the terrible consequences of unchecked

31:44

climate change while the rest talks

31:47

about the possibility of a much better world.

31:50

Why? And then there's another

31:52

question. A lot of the book is about the need

31:54

for a shift in people's consciousness.

31:57

And then here's the question, and this is

31:59

the bias. of modernity, right? Isn't

32:02

this rather grandiose or on

32:04

the other hand too vague to

32:06

make a difference in the real

32:08

world? I want to say that I love

32:10

The Guardian, but I think that this person is

32:12

representing something larger. Yeah,

32:19

I mean, I just find that very sweet,

32:21

right? Because I think that

32:23

the journalist was really trying to

32:26

give voice to the readers, right?

32:28

Are the readers ready for this? And so

32:35

I just really appreciate that intention.

32:38

But yes, the answer to the question is, well,

32:41

you know, once we wake up to the fact

32:43

that it is

32:44

our thought

32:46

that determines our word and

32:48

our word that determines our action, or

32:50

the other way of thinking about it is our mindset

32:53

when you think about it collectively, what is the

32:55

predominant mindset now? It's about

32:58

we are so doomed.

33:00

We are, you know, there's no way we're

33:02

going to get out of this mess. We are way

33:05

too late. I mean, I can't

33:07

tell you how much it pains me, Christa,

33:09

to hear that there are many young people who

33:12

think of themselves as being the last

33:14

generation, the last

33:16

generation on this planet. I

33:18

mean, that mindset, right? It's, wow,

33:21

it is so, so, so

33:24

dug into pain and grief

33:26

and loss. And it just, it gives me

33:28

the same pain and grief. Just to

33:30

listen to that, we do have

33:32

to change that mindset, not

33:35

denying the reality of the fact that

33:37

we're way late, and that we're going over tipping

33:39

point, and all the science in

33:41

which we're deeply steep, but

33:43

also to realize that precisely

33:45

because of all

33:46

of that, that's why we have to change our

33:48

mindset to a mindset of hope,

33:51

a mindset or, and I say hope

33:53

not flippantly, a mindset of conviction

33:56

that we have everything that we need to make

33:58

a

33:59

a difference in a timely fashion.

34:02

And with that mindset shift, then

34:05

we can change the narrative and we can

34:07

look for all of the evidences

34:09

of which there are many, but the media doesn't carry,

34:12

that we are changing the

34:15

energy profile of the world. We

34:17

are, you know, so many of these technologies are

34:20

on exponential growth curves, et cetera,

34:22

et cetera, et cetera. And with

34:25

that, then

34:26

the public and leaders go

34:28

like, oh, okay, well then maybe

34:30

we do have a chance. So therefore let's double

34:33

down on our action. So mindset

34:35

shift, narrative change, and then

34:38

ground that into action. And

34:40

that chronology

34:41

is really, really

34:43

important, but it starts

34:46

with

34:46

the mindset shift. It starts with

34:48

what are we thinking? Right? Because...

34:52

Yeah, go on, go on. I was just

34:54

going to

34:58

finish by saying those of us who work on climate

35:01

know that 2030 is

35:02

a very important

35:04

deadline, that we're in the decisive

35:06

decade of the twenties. And

35:08

so whether we're able to half

35:11

emissions from where we are right now to

35:13

the end of the decade really determines the quality

35:15

of life on this planet for

35:17

generations to come. But in

35:20

my book,

35:21

the way we meet

35:24

the 2030 deadline is just

35:26

as important as meeting it itself.

35:29

Honestly, meeting the 2030 deadline

35:32

without the deeper understanding

35:34

is like walking into that vegetable store and just

35:36

buying your tomatoes and your onions. It's

35:39

not just about meeting the 2030, it's how

35:41

we meet it. Okay.

35:44

Well, I want to talk about the mindset shift, but also

35:46

I just first want to note, you know no

35:49

subtleties of the way we

35:52

think about this that was helpful for

35:54

me to just get aware of, right? So

35:56

even if the question that it gets asked

35:59

or what we're focused...

35:59

on is how expensive

36:02

will it be?

36:04

Is it too expensive, too

36:06

late? Or that skews where the entire

36:10

imagination goes and

36:12

sidelines other important

36:15

questions that we'll be animating in a different

36:17

way. But even also something I know

36:19

we're so aware of is the

36:21

dystopian vision, right? The dystopian

36:24

novel, the dystopian movie.

36:28

And look, those make for great stories

36:30

and they can make for great movies. But you say

36:33

like this kind of doom is

36:35

dangerous. It becomes a self-fulfilling

36:38

prophecy

36:39

because that's how powerful our imaginations

36:42

are.

36:43

Exactly.

36:44

Exactly. That is how powerful

36:46

our mindset is. And

36:49

that then pre-determines what our

36:51

actions are going to be or what they're

36:53

not going to be. And as

36:55

you were saying before, Krista, you know, neuro-linguistics

36:58

is really now the scientific

37:01

proof of that. That

37:05

actually whatever we think and

37:07

say becomes the

37:10

reality that we create out there.

37:12

And how wonderful, right? How

37:15

wonderful that now we

37:18

don't have to assume

37:20

that there is this ridiculous barrier

37:22

between spirituality

37:25

and physical reality.

37:27

How wonderful that we can understand that

37:30

those two are actually in constant

37:32

interaction with each

37:34

other. But we think, what we feel,

37:37

what we say is in constant

37:39

interaction with

37:41

what we are co-creating out

37:43

there. And it took us a long

37:46

time to get scientific

37:48

proof, but now we have. Yeah. And

37:50

this notion of actively

37:53

orienting our intentionality,

37:56

our choice and

37:58

practice. Like this,

37:59

This runs all the way through your work and

38:02

your thinking now.

38:06

You

38:08

had a wonderful

38:09

conversation with Rosie Joan Halifax

38:10

and Rebecca Solnit and you talked about

38:12

hope. I think this maybe came from something

38:15

with Rebecca. Hope is

38:17

a verb with the sleeves rolled up. I often

38:19

talk about muscular hope. I

38:22

thought that was Rebecca's but she told me no. She told

38:24

me that somebody else's. I talk about muscular

38:27

hope. But what we're talking about is not. There

38:29

you go. We're talking about wishful thinking. We're

38:31

talking about deciding

38:33

that it doesn't have to be this way and throwing

38:36

your life behind it. So a couple

38:38

of the other mindset

38:41

shifts that you mentioned that I just want to talk about

38:43

because I think they could sound paradoxical to people.

38:46

One of them is endless abundance.

38:50

Yeah, endless abundance. We

38:53

are so programmed

38:55

to think

38:56

in scarcity terms and

38:59

in competition terms. One

39:01

of the historical roots

39:04

of that is

39:06

the unfortunate interpretation

39:10

of the survival

39:12

of the fittest by Darwin. That's

39:16

why you go into the zero-sum game that

39:19

if there's a scarcity, then either you win and

39:21

I lose

39:21

or I win and you lose.

39:24

So many ramifications of that. But that's not

39:26

what Darwin said. He said the survival

39:28

of the fit. What he meant by

39:30

that was the survival of

39:32

those species who are fit

39:35

to the

39:36

environment in which

39:38

they're living because the environment is constantly

39:41

changing impermanence,

39:42

another really helpful concept. Because

39:46

we have impermanence, the

39:48

species are constantly

39:50

adapting and those constantly

39:52

adapt to those circumstances

39:55

are more fit to those changing circumstances

39:57

and have higher resilience.

39:59

Well, that's a very important question.

39:59

very different concept than scarcity.

40:03

And the abundance

40:05

actually is our natural state of being

40:10

when we really understand what

40:13

our roots of being and acting

40:15

are.

40:18

Let me put it into energy terms,

40:20

just to get out of the woo woo land. The

40:24

fact is, Krista, that we are

40:27

on an incredible exponential

40:29

curve to increase our renewables.

40:33

We can get,

40:35

by 2030, which is

40:37

the deadline that we all have in front of us, we

40:39

can triple the energy capacity

40:41

that we have right now from all

40:44

of the renewables

40:45

that we have. In

40:47

fact, if you only take

40:49

the new renewables without counting

40:51

geothermal and water and those, if

40:54

you only take

40:55

the newer renewables, wind

40:57

power and solar power,

40:59

we're currently at 12%

41:01

of all electricity in the world is

41:04

already produced by wind and solar. And

41:06

those are the new ones. And

41:09

we're on track that by 2030,

41:12

which is scarcely seven years from now,

41:15

we will be at 40% of all electricity

41:19

being

41:20

wind and solar only.

41:22

To that, you can add all of the other renewables.

41:25

So it's a question

41:27

of understanding that this is entirely

41:29

possible. It's possible from a technological

41:32

point of view. It's possible from a resource point

41:34

of view

41:34

because there is no limit,

41:36

get out of our scarcity mindset.

41:39

There is no limit to the wind and

41:40

the sun. So

41:42

let's let go of the anchors,

41:46

the mental anchors that we have

41:48

that belong in the 20th

41:49

century. I say,

41:52

let's be thankful to the oil and gas industry

41:54

that powered at least half of the world

41:56

and gave creature comforts

41:58

to half of the world. In the past, century,

42:00

thank you for that, and my

42:03

dear oil and gas industry, you are

42:05

now facing your expiration

42:08

date because we

42:10

no longer need you. We now have much better

42:12

technologies that can actually power

42:15

the whole world and not just half of the

42:17

world. And

42:20

we will very soon, Krista, be in

42:22

a world of ubiquitous energy,

42:24

cheap energy, accessible energy,

42:27

clean energy. We will have more

42:30

energy than we can possibly consume.

42:32

Okay, so there is endless abundance.

42:34

All right, I see it. Endless abundance.

42:37

I see it. I see the mindset shift

42:39

and you're not asking. And you're

42:41

not asking people to believe in things that

42:43

don't exist, right? But it is such

42:46

a pivot, an imaginative

42:49

as well as a practical pivot. And then the other

42:51

phrase that you use is in terms of mindset

42:54

to apply to this, not

42:55

just the future, but right this new world

42:58

we are now living in is radical regeneration.

43:02

So talk about that.

43:05

Well, radical regeneration, let's

43:07

talk at the

43:07

individual level, Krista.

43:09

Let's start there, right?

43:11

So with all of these fantastic

43:14

people

43:14

who are into doom, despair,

43:16

grief, loss, I mean honestly

43:19

what we're trying to do

43:21

with one of our efforts here is to

43:24

invite all of these wonderful people

43:26

to find a place

43:28

of regeneration for themselves because

43:30

there's no way that they can go out and

43:33

be the agents of change that everyone

43:35

needs to be if they're actually

43:38

in total despair themselves. So number

43:40

one, let's regenerate ourselves

43:43

and let's become much more resilient

43:46

at the individual level,

43:48

at the corporate level, etc. But

43:51

think about nature also. We

43:53

have destroyed nature. We

43:55

have depleted nature. And

43:57

so our task now

44:00

is not just to save

44:02

the bit of nature that we have,

44:05

save the old standing forest

44:07

that we have, not just to save

44:09

the few corals that are left, but actually

44:12

to intentionally

44:16

regenerate, regenerate the soil,

44:18

regenerate the coral reefs, regenerate

44:21

the forest, regenerate and allow

44:24

nature with our help to

44:26

get back to the resilience that she

44:28

used

44:29

to have, because frankly it's in our

44:31

own interest that she have

44:33

that resilience. So radical regeneration

44:36

goes, you know, all the way and I've just used the

44:38

two extremes there Krista, for the

44:41

individuals and then for the planetary

44:43

system, but it applies all the

44:46

way across the spectrum. And

44:48

those different levels of

44:51

transformation, I think I hear you saying

44:54

must go hand in hand. They have to

44:56

go hand in hand. Systemic transformation,

44:58

personal transformation, we don't

45:00

get one without the other? No, we

45:02

say systemic transformation

45:04

is deeply personal.

45:27

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46:05

I want to talk some more about the

46:08

new generations because this is also

46:10

something very much on your heart and you're in

46:13

a relationship and a dialogue with this

46:15

very understandable despair

46:19

and grief that I think younger

46:21

people really feel in their bodies

46:24

more consciously perhaps than

46:26

older people. But one

46:28

of the things, one of the moves I see

46:30

them making is claiming joy and

46:33

claiming an

46:37

abundance of relationship

46:42

and community, where

46:44

it is to be found and insisting

46:47

on knowing what they love

46:50

and on being attentive to beauty

46:52

wherever it is to be found. And

46:55

I want to use this word as fuel, right?

46:58

As fuel for the hard, hard

47:01

work

47:02

that is ours to do.

47:05

Yes, so true, so true. That

47:08

intentional

47:10

cultivating of a mind

47:13

of love and joy is so

47:16

critical to our personal resilience,

47:19

to our personal regeneration, to

47:21

our personal agency, to

47:24

our capacity to engage.

47:27

It's just a sine qua non, right? Without

47:29

it, there is no capacity to

47:31

engage in a positive manner, in

47:33

a constructive manner, in a transformational

47:36

manner with anything

47:39

outside ourselves. It just isn't.

47:43

So the more young

47:46

and not so young people realize

47:48

that yes, we are at a very

47:50

deeply painful moment in the history

47:53

of this planet and of human evolution

47:56

and that we can either succumb

47:59

to it or not.

47:59

that

48:00

or we can use that as

48:03

you say as fuel. We can

48:05

use that to intentionally

48:08

decide that we're going to stand

48:10

up using the

48:12

depth of the pain

48:14

to root us so that we're

48:16

not, you know, swayed by the wind. Use

48:19

it to root us in our determination

48:23

to

48:24

do everything for

48:27

a better world, not just for us, but

48:29

for generations to come, Krista.

48:31

And that's the piece, you know, that I

48:33

don't think that we have very clear yet, whatever

48:36

we are doing over the next seven

48:39

years, and this is no Latin American

48:41

exaggeration, whatever we

48:43

do over the next seven years

48:46

is really going to determine the quality of

48:48

life on this planet for

48:51

generations to come. Hence

48:54

the alarm clock. This is an

48:56

alarm clock. It's an alarm clock about speed and

48:58

scale, but it's also an alarm clock

49:00

about

49:01

quality of mind, as

49:03

you say, cultivating the mind

49:06

of love and joy.

49:10

And that our love

49:12

for this planet and for the beauty that's

49:14

around us and the places we come from, that that

49:18

is as much a motivator as what

49:20

we have to fight. You

49:22

know, I watched you

49:24

at an event at TED in Scotland,

49:27

and I wish we could spend about an hour

49:30

talking about that, and we can't, but it

49:33

was very moving.

49:36

You ended up kind of very expertly

49:38

leading a panel on which there

49:41

was the CEO

49:43

of Shell Oil, and

49:45

then a young woman who was

49:47

carrying her

49:52

pain, right? And letting that

49:54

pain into

49:55

the room and also expressing

49:58

her difficult

49:59

at being on a panel with the CEO

50:02

of Shell. And her anger

50:04

is what I would say. Her anger and her

50:07

intolerance of that

50:10

we are at this point. And

50:13

with the participation of powerful,

50:15

powerful places. And I

50:18

will say also that I could see this CEO

50:21

really being present and thinking

50:24

and wanting to be responsive. But

50:27

what I watched you do, and I'm kind

50:29

of driving to this because I

50:32

think you can do this also for everybody who's going to be listening

50:34

to this across time and space. And

50:38

I felt like you yourself

50:41

had been on this trajectory

50:43

of understanding that this

50:45

was something you needed to invoke.

50:48

It's just inviting

50:50

everyone on that panel and everyone

50:52

in that room to

50:55

stand before the loss

50:57

and the grief and let that

50:59

pain itself

51:01

be some of the connective tissue across

51:04

these differences. If nothing else, that

51:06

we share.

51:08

Exactly. Exactly.

51:11

So just for correctness, it's the

51:13

former CEO of Shell because

51:16

he is no longer CEO. But

51:19

the case still stands, right? The more

51:21

radical

51:23

conversation, if you will, was the one

51:26

between, as you say, the former Shell

51:28

CEO and the young activist

51:32

who spoke and acted out

51:34

of deep pain, anger,

51:37

blaming, all of which is completely

51:40

justified. All of which, right? And

51:43

then

51:45

all of a sudden,

51:46

almost literally threw herself

51:49

off the stage onto the shoulders of her

51:51

colleagues that were waiting for her.

51:53

It was quite a dramatic

51:55

moment.

51:56

It was quite a traumatic

51:59

moment. because there

52:01

we were with the pain

52:04

and the trauma of years right

52:06

on stage in front of us. And

52:09

what I did not want to occur

52:12

was for the audience to

52:15

divide itself up in which

52:18

of these two points of view am I going to support? Am

52:20

I going to support the Shell CEO because

52:22

we have a whole bunch of corporates in the room who think

52:24

that XYZ, or am I going

52:27

to support the very eloquent

52:30

climate activist because

52:32

Shell has to be blamed and shamed?

52:36

So what I did not want

52:37

is for the audience to

52:39

fall into that simplistic division

52:42

between what they, all

52:44

of us think is what is right and what is wrong. And

52:47

I wanted to keep everyone

52:50

in their own pain because

52:51

we all have the pain. Every

52:54

single one of us, no

52:56

matter what, we have this pain because

52:58

we're aware of the loss that

53:01

we are witnessing. So I

53:03

did call for everyone to take a

53:06

moment,

53:06

breathe and get into

53:08

the pain and avoid

53:11

the immediate blame and

53:13

shame because that is where we

53:16

would have gone very quickly. Now

53:18

fast forward, Kristin. How

53:22

moving was it for me that

53:25

just a few weeks ago, we

53:28

held

53:29

a retreat in Plum

53:31

Village in France for climate activists

53:34

and climate leaders who seek

53:37

to find better ways

53:39

to manage their emotions and

53:42

to be grounded in their emotions

53:44

so that they can act from a deeper

53:46

sense without having to just react,

53:49

right? So get away from the fight,

53:51

flight, freeze to much

53:54

more of a grounded, clean

53:56

action. How moving for me was

53:58

it

53:59

very climate activist who threw

54:02

herself off a stage,

54:04

came to that retreat with

54:06

most of those young people who were

54:09

waiting for her there and held

54:11

her and then they marched out. Most

54:13

of them came to this retreat.

54:17

How moving was that for me? And

54:20

the fact that after six days

54:23

of really intensive study

54:28

of the Dharma teachings, but more than

54:30

anything intensive digging

54:33

in

54:34

into self and into the pain

54:37

and learning how to turn

54:39

the pain into strength,

54:41

how moving was it for me that these

54:43

young people emerged transformed.

54:47

We committed to continue to working

54:50

on climate change

54:51

from a space of possibility

54:54

and love and joy. Honestly,

54:56

a

54:57

long time since I have felt so

55:00

much gratitude

55:01

for the power of these teachings.

55:05

You know, I sense

55:08

that so there's that. And

55:10

also I hear you saying in your

55:13

writing and in your speaking, do not

55:16

give up on people. Do not give up

55:18

on this language even of climate

55:20

denier, right? That's

55:22

a label and that's a drama in

55:24

our midst. But to me, it's just another side

55:27

of, again, we all feel the disarray

55:29

and the disrepair of our

55:31

natural world of which we are part in

55:33

our bodies and whether

55:36

that's at the level of awareness or not,

55:38

we have different ways of responding to that same

55:41

fear. And you say, don't

55:43

give up on climate deniers. Again,

55:45

I hate the label. I

55:47

feel like the people you're really impatient

55:49

with are people

55:52

who are making a choice

55:54

to be indifferent. Indifferent.

55:56

Yes.

55:59

That's the piece that

56:02

I really have to extend

56:05

my compassion to by, you know, to

56:07

extent that I'm not quite there yet,

56:11

to people who are indifferent.

56:13

How can you be indifferent? How can

56:15

you be indifferent to everything

56:18

that we're witnessing today? And

56:20

especially because you know the consequences

56:23

of today on tomorrow. How

56:26

can you stand in indifference? That's

56:28

the piece that I

56:30

have a, yes, you have identified

56:32

that very well. I have a very hard time. Well,

56:34

and this can be subtle as well, right? Because

56:36

it can be, and I'm going to say I fall

56:39

into this too, is it can be, well,

56:41

it's

56:41

just all over anyway, right?

56:43

Like I mean, just there's news as we're

56:45

speaking and the same news will recur

56:48

that the ice melting and the Antarctic is

56:50

much, is happening at a much more

56:52

rapid pace than was

56:55

once thought. And so what

56:58

we're calling indifference can just be

57:01

a resignation which feels

57:03

itself to care, but

57:06

can't care any more.

57:07

So it's complex,

57:10

right? It's as complex as we are. Well

57:13

is it? Is it? I

57:15

mean, we just talked a little while ago about

57:17

self-fulfilling processes, right? So

57:20

if we say it's all over anyway,

57:22

and we really stand in that

57:25

quote

57:25

unquote reality, then we

57:28

actually will create that reality. Then it

57:30

will be over anyway. And that's the

57:32

choice, that's the piece, Krista.

57:35

This is a choice. It's a

57:37

choice of attitude. It's a choice

57:39

of mindset. It's a choice of thought. It's

57:41

a choice of words and narratives

57:43

and actions. It's a choice. It's a

57:46

daily choice. So yes, of course

57:48

the easy thing is to go like, well, you know, it's too

57:50

late anyway. Bye.

57:53

Yeah. Hello?

57:54

Really? Is that

57:57

the way? You know, I mean, for those people

57:59

who take that?

57:59

I just I just wonder

58:02

how are they going to answer their grandchildren's questions?

58:05

What did you do?

58:06

All our grandchildren will be asking us. What

58:09

did you do?

58:11

And everyone is gonna have to answer that question

58:15

What did you do?

58:17

Because nobody can say I didn't know

58:19

nobody can say that anymore. My parents can

58:21

say that Yeah, yeah, but I my

58:24

generation cannot say that anymore. So

58:26

the question that we have to get

58:28

ready for

58:30

And that is already being asked by many

58:32

young people to their parents. What

58:35

did you do?

58:38

You know you said at one point

58:41

That it is the nature of evolution That

58:44

is the nature of this world the way it works

58:46

that creatures are constantly adapting

58:49

that the environment is constantly evolving that

58:51

we as well as other other creatures

58:53

are constantly adapting to the environment

58:55

and that is the nature of vitality

58:58

and The conditions

59:00

of our time and you use

59:03

this language of exponential curves, right? Like our

59:05

world is on so many exponential curves

59:08

The natural world is on so many exponential

59:10

curves as you say also the possibilities for very

59:13

new realities are also an exponential curves But that's

59:15

ongoing. It's not realized wherever

59:18

it's not visible. It's not the dominant

59:20

story yet And

59:23

it is hard. It is hard

59:26

for us as creatures to

59:29

live with this kind of Uncertainty

59:31

it's very challenging

59:34

at a physiological as well

59:36

as a spiritual level And

59:39

but I don't know I guess I'm kind of ending up circling

59:41

back to where we started, you know

59:44

in in your book the future we choose

59:46

you have You have ten

59:50

Are they actions? Yeah,

59:53

yeah and the first one

59:55

it's a thought action right it is

59:57

let go of the old world,

1:00:01

which sounds so

1:00:03

massive, right? But

1:00:05

I think,

1:00:07

I don't know, I guess I want you to talk about how

1:00:09

that is a beginning and

1:00:11

how that can be a beginning,

1:00:14

a step, a step, an

1:00:16

action in and

1:00:18

of itself.

1:00:20

Yeah, let go of the old world

1:00:22

is actually, I mean, now that I think

1:00:25

about it a little bit more, it's almost

1:00:27

like a funny invitation

1:00:29

because the old world is gone anyway.

1:00:32

And so,

1:00:34

you know, what's the point of hanging

1:00:36

on to something that has already gone by?

1:00:40

But that's what we do. That's what we do. But

1:00:42

that's what we do. I know, but you know, we

1:00:44

have to laugh at ourselves that we do that, Krista,

1:00:46

right? Because it makes absolutely

1:00:49

no sense. It makes no sense. And

1:00:51

when we understand that everything is in constant

1:00:53

change, when we understand that we

1:00:55

have,

1:00:56

if there is anything that

1:00:58

is certain,

1:00:59

it's uncertainty.

1:01:01

If there's anything that is permanent, it is

1:01:03

the reality of impermanence. But we structure

1:01:06

our lives to be in

1:01:08

denial and to push that back,

1:01:11

right? We feel like that's our power.

1:01:15

I know. I mean, how funny is that? You have

1:01:17

to see that with a sense of humor.

1:01:19

The fact that we

1:01:21

know that everything is in constant change. I

1:01:23

mean, you and I are not the same people that when

1:01:26

we started this conversation, I certainly was

1:01:28

not the same person than yesterday, et

1:01:30

cetera, et cetera, et cetera. You know, our relationships change.

1:01:32

Everything changes all the time. The

1:01:34

world is changing all the time. And so

1:01:37

we're in constant flux

1:01:39

and constant uncertainty. We,

1:01:41

you know, the past is past. We can't do

1:01:43

anything about it. The future

1:01:45

we cannot really guarantee.

1:01:47

We can try

1:01:47

to influence it for the best and

1:01:50

for good, but we can't really control

1:01:53

it. So I think there's a heavy dose

1:01:56

of humility here to understand that

1:01:58

the past is gone.

1:01:59

The future is uncontrollable.

1:02:02

We don't know

1:02:03

where things will go We

1:02:05

have to be able to develop

1:02:08

that muscle that you were talking about

1:02:10

them What would you call it muscular muscular

1:02:12

hope muscular hope? Well in this

1:02:14

case, it's you know The muscular

1:02:17

capacity

1:02:18

to understand that we're

1:02:20

in constant sway in constant

1:02:22

uncertainty and Have

1:02:25

the humility

1:02:26

to truly deeply deeply

1:02:29

know we

1:02:30

Don't know how it will go. We have

1:02:32

all kinds of Scientific,

1:02:34

you know projections and predictions

1:02:37

and that's science, but let's

1:02:39

not

1:02:40

Confuse the map with the territory. That's

1:02:42

the map. We don't really know what

1:02:44

the territory is, right? We

1:02:46

don't know how for

1:02:48

sure for certain We don't know how

1:02:51

it will go because for one thing it'll depends a lot

1:02:53

on what we do but in the meantime

1:02:58

The question that is most important for

1:03:00

me is

1:03:02

How do I want

1:03:03

to be in

1:03:05

the meantime? How

1:03:07

do I want to turn up in the world

1:03:10

in the meantime? During the

1:03:12

time that I'm here, which is a blink

1:03:15

in

1:03:16

the history of 4.5 billion

1:03:19

years of this planet.

1:03:21

We're here as a blink. What

1:03:23

kind of a blink do we want to be? Who

1:03:26

do I want to be? How do I want to turn

1:03:28

up in the world? The answer to that

1:03:30

question Does not

1:03:33

guarantee any success

1:03:35

or any achievement, but it does

1:03:37

influence the direction

1:03:40

that we move in You

1:04:08

There's another question that I've seen you

1:04:10

ask that feels helpful to me. Because

1:04:13

I think, you know,

1:04:16

using words in a slightly

1:04:19

new way, asking a question in a slightly

1:04:21

new way, can just be

1:04:24

a spark to our imagination. So this question

1:04:26

you ask is, what is it that we

1:04:28

bring to bear? What is it that I

1:04:30

bring to bear?

1:04:33

Is an interesting question to walk around

1:04:35

with in this context of this world

1:04:38

in which even the weather, right, which

1:04:41

everything about the ground we stand

1:04:43

on and the air we breathe is

1:04:45

in a terrible flux.

1:04:47

It is in a terrible flux. And, you

1:04:50

know, what do I bring to bear

1:04:52

is

1:04:52

a question 24 hours a day, right?

1:04:55

What do I bring

1:04:57

to bear to

1:04:58

my conversation with you, to

1:05:01

my, you know, the way that I greet

1:05:03

my little vegetable ladies? It's

1:05:06

anything that we do, any conversation

1:05:09

that we have, especially with

1:05:11

younger people,

1:05:11

what role modeling are

1:05:14

we having

1:05:14

for young people? Because they're looking at us. They

1:05:18

are definitely looking at us. So

1:05:20

how do I want to be

1:05:21

in that conversation?

1:05:23

Who do I want to be? What is my

1:05:26

full presence? What is the highest

1:05:29

interpretation of myself

1:05:31

that I can bring

1:05:32

to any circumstance?

1:05:34

I've

1:05:35

heard you use this phrase

1:05:38

that ever since I heard you use it, I've just

1:05:40

been walking around with it. And I'm so intrigued

1:05:42

by it. And that is that

1:05:45

this transformation, if we are

1:05:47

to flourish rather than merely survive,

1:05:50

that we need, this world needs spiritual

1:05:53

infrastructure as well

1:05:56

as the other kinds of infrastructure with

1:05:58

which we've known to build.

1:05:59

Would you just say some more about what is connoted

1:06:02

in that for you? And do you see that

1:06:04

spiritual infrastructure emerging

1:06:08

from where you sit?

1:06:08

You know, I do see

1:06:11

that spiritual infrastructure emerging

1:06:13

and strengthening and building itself,

1:06:16

or we are building it. I see

1:06:18

it constantly emerging. I see so

1:06:20

many young people who are asking

1:06:22

that same question. Who

1:06:25

am I? What am I capable

1:06:28

of?

1:06:28

What is my role while I'm here? How

1:06:31

do I react to the thought? How

1:06:34

do I react to the pain, to the grief that

1:06:36

I'm not telling? How do

1:06:39

I

1:06:39

contribute

1:06:41

to a much broader scaffolding

1:06:44

that has to go beyond myself? Scaffolding

1:06:47

the

1:06:47

spiritual infrastructure that we have

1:06:49

to build is yes, at a personal

1:06:51

level, for sure. That's where it starts. But

1:06:54

it goes way beyond that because it's

1:06:57

not about what in

1:06:58

one individual is going to be able to

1:07:00

do.

1:07:01

Hold on, I have to close the door because of course they decided

1:07:03

now to cut the grass. Okay.

1:07:10

The real world breaking into our conversation

1:07:12

appropriately. Appropriately.

1:07:15

Yeah. So

1:07:18

how it is about

1:07:20

the recognition,

1:07:21

Krista, of collective

1:07:24

impact, collective wisdom, collective

1:07:27

leadership. That's how we build the

1:07:29

spiritual infrastructure because we

1:07:32

sow the seed individually, but

1:07:35

germinating the seed and being

1:07:37

able to grow it so that we can harvest

1:07:40

from it requires a

1:07:42

collective

1:07:42

effort. And I

1:07:44

think also spiritual language for that,

1:07:46

which you also use, would be for the same

1:07:48

thing, but which again kind of orient is a different

1:07:51

is accompaniment, right? Or that

1:07:53

notion of presence, like bringing

1:07:56

presence, a quality of presence

1:07:58

to walking alongside.

1:07:59

working with others.

1:08:02

Absolutely. Yeah,

1:08:05

and you know, and getting away from this individualistic

1:08:08

thing, the number of, I

1:08:11

don't know myths that we have convinced ourselves

1:08:14

of, you know, scarcity being one, individualism

1:08:17

being another, extractivism, but

1:08:19

at this point, individualism, when

1:08:22

did we

1:08:22

come up with that? How

1:08:26

helpful

1:08:26

has that been? Well,

1:08:29

and my body and yours have

1:08:32

more microbial cells in them than

1:08:35

human cells, right? So even physiologically,

1:08:39

we're not individuals. Exactly. So

1:08:42

why, you know, this myth, this

1:08:44

myth that we have been cultivating,

1:08:47

so unhelpful. Yeah. And

1:08:50

you've pointed out that

1:08:51

we're in this astonishing moment where science

1:08:55

is exploding that myth and it's

1:08:58

knowledge that was always in our spiritual traditions

1:09:00

and in ancient indigenous

1:09:02

traditions. And it's just becoming

1:09:05

ununseeable. I mean, I think I want

1:09:07

to end with...

1:09:09

Can I just say something about that? Yes,

1:09:11

yes. Honestly, I am so excited

1:09:14

about being alive right now. I

1:09:16

have to tell you, Grista, I mean, here

1:09:19

is the amazing, amazing thing,

1:09:21

right? Okay. I

1:09:23

mean, the list is long, but I will try

1:09:25

to keep it short. We have

1:09:28

most, if not all of the technologies

1:09:30

that we're going to need for this transformation.

1:09:33

We have the capital collectively.

1:09:36

We have the capital. We know what the policies

1:09:39

are. Science

1:09:42

is confirming to us that

1:09:44

this is, yes, about technology,

1:09:47

capital, and policy,

1:09:50

that it is also about how we

1:09:52

think about ourselves and our impact on the

1:09:54

world. And we

1:09:56

are at a moment in time in which

1:09:59

electrification...

1:10:00

meets AI, meets

1:10:03

digitalization, meets, you know,

1:10:06

glocalization, both global

1:10:08

and local. And

1:10:11

all of this put together, I mean, if you put

1:10:13

all of this in a pot and stirred around, this

1:10:16

is like the most

1:10:18

magical potion you

1:10:20

could possibly ever have

1:10:23

dreamt of. And it is leading

1:10:25

to change that is beyond

1:10:27

anything that we could possibly,

1:10:30

possibly imagine. So I

1:10:32

am so excited about being alive

1:10:34

right now. Right, like you

1:10:37

are able to see some of that being realized that the rest

1:10:40

of us don't have visibility to. Yeah.

1:10:43

Oh, well, but wait, no,

1:10:45

I won't take

1:10:46

that. I won't take that as a thought. It's

1:10:50

not that we're not able

1:10:52

to,

1:10:52

it's choice that we make

1:10:55

in what information we let in.

1:10:57

Okay. If we go out

1:10:59

there into the world and we say, right, I am going to let

1:11:01

in positive, you know, proof

1:11:04

points of exponential

1:11:06

change, you will see them. So

1:11:09

I am not going to take it as a fact that

1:11:11

people cannot see this change. It

1:11:13

is about our internal attitude and how

1:11:16

we show up in the world, what information we let

1:11:18

in, and then we can all see this change. And

1:11:20

honestly, don't we all want to

1:11:22

be part of that change? Yes. Yes.

1:11:28

Oh, we're so strange, aren't we? We're

1:11:31

actually hilarious. I just think it's so funny.

1:11:32

We are hilarious. You know, something

1:11:35

I'm thinking about a lot right now, and

1:11:38

this is also just gets our strangeness and

1:11:40

it's very bittersweet is

1:11:43

everything feels so precious to me

1:11:45

now, right? In a new way, right? When,

1:11:48

right, this, when I have a passionate

1:11:50

experience of beauty in the natural world

1:11:53

or a beautiful weather day,

1:11:55

right? Or even just

1:11:57

the feeling of kinship with other people.

1:11:59

It all feels so precious because it's

1:12:02

endangered, right? That's also a

1:12:04

way we roll. And I'm

1:12:07

wanting to be conscious of

1:12:09

that. And I listen to you also

1:12:12

have a conversation that feels connected to this

1:12:14

to me with Rebecca Solnit

1:12:16

and Roshi Joan Halifax about something

1:12:19

Rebecca's written a lot about and talked about

1:12:21

on this show is, you know, there

1:12:23

is this thing that happens when the worst

1:12:26

happens, that the best

1:12:28

of human nature also rises up, right?

1:12:31

We find our capacity

1:12:34

to care wildly in

1:12:38

those moments of disaster

1:12:40

and catastrophe. And so

1:12:42

that's this thing that happens in an

1:12:44

acute emergency. This is your

1:12:47

language. And I think if we kind of

1:12:49

come back to where we started here about, you know,

1:12:51

your vision that not

1:12:54

just what could happen now, but what

1:12:56

in fact this climate, this

1:12:58

ecological rupture

1:13:01

may be calming us to, may enable

1:13:03

us to is another phase

1:13:06

of human evolution, an evolution of

1:13:08

spirit and consciousness. And,

1:13:10

you know, I think about Dorothy Day, 1906, watching

1:13:14

in the middle of the San Francisco earthquake,

1:13:16

Rebecca writes about this too, like watching,

1:13:19

or she's nine, six, nine,

1:13:21

watching people coming

1:13:24

across the Bay who've lost everything

1:13:26

and seeing all the adults around her, knowing

1:13:29

exactly what to do to step in and

1:13:32

be of service and to care

1:13:34

for strangers and to just expand,

1:13:37

instantaneously expand that web

1:13:40

of human relationship and care. And

1:13:42

the question she asked was, why can't

1:13:44

we live this way all the time? Yes,

1:13:47

exactly. And I

1:13:49

feel like you asked this question in this context,

1:13:51

you know, and I wrote this down, you

1:13:53

said, how do we nourish a deep well of

1:13:56

yearning to be with each other and

1:13:58

to be helpful to each other? in

1:14:00

the absence of an acute emergency,

1:14:02

where what we have is a chronic emergency,

1:14:05

we have a new reality that

1:14:07

is going to unfold ahead of us as

1:14:09

long as we can see. Maybe

1:14:13

that's a good place

1:14:15

for us to end, for you to just reflect

1:14:17

on

1:14:18

how you imagine that,

1:14:20

what that means to you, that question.

1:14:25

Well, I

1:14:27

don't have the answer to that question. It's

1:14:30

an inquiry that I

1:14:32

take with me everywhere. And

1:14:35

it's an inquiry, as

1:14:36

Rebecca has many examples,

1:14:39

but we all share the example of the pandemic, don't

1:14:41

we? Where we saw just

1:14:44

so many examples

1:14:47

of caring and compassion

1:14:48

and support for

1:14:51

strangers in so many ways that

1:14:53

might have been unthinkable without the pandemic.

1:14:56

So we are as human

1:14:58

beings, we are entirely capable

1:15:00

of it, as we say there, in

1:15:03

the face of an acute

1:15:04

emergency. Now, how

1:15:06

do we expand that? So

1:15:09

it's not about creating

1:15:12

something that is not there. It's

1:15:15

about watering a seed

1:15:18

that is already

1:15:20

in our fertile ground, and

1:15:22

watering it to the extent

1:15:25

that it can carry over

1:15:28

longer periods of time

1:15:31

and geography, so

1:15:33

that we can feel the

1:15:35

responsibility toward future generations,

1:15:37

and we can feel responsibility toward

1:15:40

people in other corners of

1:15:42

the planet. And

1:15:44

so the beginning of

1:15:46

an answer, but it's not the

1:15:49

full answer yet, Krista,

1:15:51

is

1:15:52

it's the watering of that seed. It

1:15:55

is an intentional watering

1:15:58

that we have to do.

1:16:00

every day that we have

1:16:02

to choose to do every

1:16:04

day because that seed bloomed

1:16:07

and gave fruit during the pandemic.

1:16:10

And that was fantastic. But the seed

1:16:13

is still there. So can we intentionally

1:16:16

water it? That is the

1:16:18

best of humanity. Those

1:16:20

actions, that compassion, that

1:16:23

solidarity, that helping

1:16:25

each other, that responsibility

1:16:27

intergenerationally, that is the

1:16:29

best of humanity.

1:16:30

Can we continue

1:16:32

to water that seed so

1:16:35

that we build our muscular

1:16:38

capacity to do so

1:16:41

over space and time? Because

1:16:44

we're not there yet. But can we do

1:16:46

it? I think so.

1:16:48

Yeah, those are the moments when

1:16:51

we look at ourselves and

1:16:53

others, including strangers, and

1:16:55

we think how beautiful

1:16:56

we are as a species, right?

1:16:59

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

1:17:01

Yeah.

1:17:03

So beautiful.

1:17:18

Christiana Figueres is the former

1:17:20

executive secretary of the United Nations

1:17:23

Framework Convention on Climate Change,

1:17:25

and she led the process that secured

1:17:27

the 2015 Paris Agreement. Her

1:17:30

book, written together with Tom Rivet Karnak,

1:17:33

is The Future We Choose. She

1:17:36

is founding partner of the organization Global

1:17:38

Optimism and co-hosts the podcast

1:17:40

Outrage and Optimism.

1:17:50

The

1:17:50

on-being project is...

1:17:59

Colleen Sheck, Julie Seipel, Gretchen

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Honnold, Pedro Gautama, Gautam

1:18:04

Shrikashan,

1:18:05

April Adamson, Ashley Herr,

1:18:07

Amy Chatelain,

1:18:08

Cameron Moussar,

1:18:09

Kayla Edwards, Tiffany Champion,

1:18:12

Juliette Dallas-Fini, Vanessa Hale,

1:18:14

and Andrea Prevost.

1:18:16

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Find them at Fetzer.org. Calliopeia

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