Curiosity as a compass (and my top 5 climate reads of 2024 so far)

What these projects have in common is a guidepost for better Earth-driven engagement.

What does it mean to stay meaningfully engaged with the biggest news story of our planet? Given the obstacles of (dis)information overload, it feels vital to co-create practices that make environmental (re)connection accessible, playful, and enduring…while simultaneously countering the systemic roots of our global crises.

One approach to this ongoing balancing act is to more actively partner with curiosity, a powerful navigational tool that prompts slowing down and spending quality time with a question. We can’t build authentic relationships with anyone – people, the land, new ideas – without being a little curious.

While children have this natural urge in abundance – enabling learning and connection with the world around them – staying curious as an adult is truly a revolutionary act amidst societal norms of fast-paced consumption, productivity, perfectionism, and disconnection.

Integrating that curious mindset into more of our interactions with the world can help transform extractive economies into relational ones.

After scanning thousands of climate-themed headlines in the first quarter of 2024, I noticed the types of stories that truly fuel my vital sense of inquiry. I get really energized and motivated by stories that uplift relationship-centered approaches to climate and ecological challenges – projects that leave room (and time) for curiosity rather than quick-fix mindsets. By following my curiosity, I have created a curriculum of sorts on how to navigate my own reconnection and environmental action journey.

Here are my top five inspiring climate reads of the year so far, and their main themes I’m spending quality time with:

1. Restoring ecosystems through relationship

Many ecological restoration initiatives are being carried out with a hurried approach that is often expensive and riddled with challenges to long-term efficacy. Imagine, however, that the key ingredient to restoring our ecosystems is the return of a more patient, curious relationship with the land. Indigenous ecologists are successfully collaborating with the wisdom of underground seed banks and nature’s intuitive cycles to revitalize a variety of ecosystems (wetland, prairie, estuary, dune, savannah) across the Pacific Northwest. (Source: High Country News) *If you were going to read only one of my favorite reads of the year so far, this is the one I’d invite you to prioritize!

2. Bridging the Eldervoid

“Without elders, there is a gap in the transmission of knowledge of how to thrive with the Earth, and a weakening of the intergenerational bonds that hold communities together.” Reading about the “Eldervoid” and efforts to rebuild cultural mindsets that value elders offers a powerful invitation on the path to rebuilding sustainable relationships with our environment. (Source: Yes! Media) *This pairs well with the Grist profile on folklorists working to protect generations of knowledge that can help drive climate resilience and adaptation.

3. Empowering food sovereignty

Speaking of intergenerational knowledge-sharing, a Denver-based nonprofit is empowering Native youth to educate elders on the bioremediation benefits of fungi and how growing mushrooms can help restore the land and feed the local community. (Source: Civil Eats) *Related: Yes! Media spotlighted a project in Tucson aiming to create a network of climate-resilient and culturally rich “food forests” to address heat and hunger.

4. Crowd-sourcing climate research

An Inuit-developed climate research app evolved into a full-fledged social network – enabling Indigenous communities from Alaska to Greenland to pull together traditional knowledge and scientific data to track changes in the environment, keep tabs on local wild foods, and make community-driven decisions. The app has already supported more than 75,000 posts this year and helped inform new conservation policies. (Source: Hakai Magazine)

5. Restoring our stewardship role

Restoring humans’ natural stewardship role can help combat biodiversity loss. This story highlights how a collaborative effort to restore a traditional Japanese landscape called satoyama – a mosaic of various ecosystems integrated with moderate human activities – helped bring an endangered blue butterfly back from the brink as well as promote a diversity of other pollinators. This project is one of many worldwide that consolidates wisdom on maintaining diverse and human-stewarded ecosystems that strike a balance between overuse and underuse. (Source: Mongabay)

These stories of (re)connection and collaboration stood out to me as compelling models for how we can personally and collectively engage in climate solutions. By spending time with the feelings and ideas these stories spark, I’m more inclined to follow up on those ideas with embodied action (which I’ll share more about in future posts).

Curiosity as a compass reinforces the fact that we can’t tackle everything all at once, but we can slow down in ways that deepen relationships with our world, and in turn, transform it.