Highlights
From the “5 stages of climate grief,” to the “choose your own catastrophe!” flowchart, to the author’s “meetings with remarkable hopers & doomers,” browse some of the book’s best bits…
Peek Inside
Read selections from the book:
Contents
Acknowledgements
Prologue: It’s the End of the World. Now What?
IMPOSSIBLE NEWS
We are where?!
Why it’s so hard to hope these days.
Interview: Guy McPherson — “If we’re the last of our species, let’s act like the best of our species.”
Interview: Tim DeChristopher — “It’s too late — which means there’s more to fight for than ever.”
Should I tell people how bad I think it is?
THE FIVE STAGES OF CLIMATE GRIEF
You have to go through all five stages of climate grief, except they’re not stages, there’s more than five, and you might have to walk backwards.
1. Denial: The wisdom of denial.
2. Anger: We can! We must! We won’t?!
3. Bargaining: Is it now yet?
4. Depression: Despair is our only hope.
5. Acceptance: We must awaken to our burdens.
6. The Sixth Stage: Gallows humor.
Interview: Meg Wheatley — “Give in without giving up.” Can I get my Buddhism with a side of strategy, please?
EXISTENTIAL CRISIS SCENARIO PLANNING
It’s not the end of the world; it’s only the end of our world.
We have to learn how to die as a civilization.
How do you want to decline?
Welcome to the future — all four of them.
Don’t worry, we’re not heading off a cliff, just down a sharp slippery slope.
Houston, we have a super-wicked problem.
What’s a meta for?
The road to catastrophe is paved with other catastrophes.
Extreme Sisyphus.
I want a better catastrophe.
Interview: Gopal Dayaneni— “We’re going to suffer, so let’s distribute that suffering equitably.”
Same storm; different boats.
HOW TO BE WHITE AT THE END OF THE WORLD
How do I sing my story?
Can I lose hope when other people can’t afford to?
IS THERE HOPE?
Flowchart: Is there hope?
Pessimism of the intellect; Optimism of the will!
You don’t need to “save the world”; it’s already made other plans.
I dedicate myself to an impossible cause.
Interview: Joanna Macy— “Be of service not knowing whether you’re a hospice worker or a midwife.”
“What aileth thee?”
Interview: Jamey Hecht— “Witness the whole human story through tragic eyes.”
Your job at the end of the world is to become a happier person.
The climate crisis is an existential Rorschach Test
WHAT IS STILL WORTH DOING?
What would Paul Kingsnorth do?
It’s never too late to fail to save the world.
We have met the enemy and he is us. No, them! But also us. But mostly them.
No need to choose between mitigation, adaptation, and suffering; just get good at all three (especially suffering).
We need to do the impossible, because what’s merely possible is gonna get us all killed.
Interview: adrienne maree brown— “How do we fall as if we were holding a child on our chest?”
Dystopia: If the Zombie Apocalypse comes the Day After Tomorrow will Max still be Mad?
Utopia: Our Afro-Indigenous-Trans-Eco-Socialist Futurism can beat up your Capitalist Realism!
Interview: Robin Wall Kimmerer— “How can I be a good ancestor?”
EXPERIMENTS ON THE VERGE
What do I love too much to lose?
Step into the river.
Line graph your way beyond “Progress.”
Give pessimism a chance.
What would Marcus Aurelius do?
Vent your contradictions!
Imagine your utopia.
Hold a group meeting in the halfway house of your soul.
Are you a YES or a NO kind of person?
Let the eyes of the future bore uncomfortably into your skull.
Should I bring kids into such a world?
ANOTHER END OF THE WORLD IS POSSIBLE
Hope and hopelessness, both.
AEOTWIP!
Epilogue: Now Is When You Are Needed Most
Epi-Epilogue: Passing the Torch
Appendix: Stuff You Can (Still) Do
Figure References
Flowcharts Bibliography
Notes
Index
About the Author
About New Society Publishers
Choose Your Own Catastrophe!
Take a guided journey through our possible climate futures, and the many dilemmas and decision points along the way
The author searches out eight leading climate thinkers and asks:
“Is it really the end of the world? and if so, now what?”
Dr. Guy McPherson
Award-winning scientist and one of the world’s leading authorities on abrupt climate change leading to near-term human extinction. Professor emeritus of Conservation Biology at the University of Arizona, he has published 16 books and hundreds of scholarly articles, been featured in television, radio, and films, and co-hosts his own radio show, “Nature Bats Last.”
“If we’re the last of our species, let’s act like the best of our species.”
Tim DeChristopher
Environmental activist, founder of the Climate Disobedience Center, and founder of Peaceful Uprising, an organization dedicated to creating livable futures and empowering nonviolent action. He is best known for an act of civil disobedience where he disrupted a government oil and gas lease auction in order to protect fragile land in southern Utah and served nearly two years in prison. Called at the time “America’s most creative climate criminal” by Rolling Stone, he is now a farmer in Maine.
“It’s too late—which means there’s more to fight for than ever.”
Meg Wheatley
Consultant, co-founder and president of The Berkana Institute, Buddhist wisdom teacher, and bestselling author of nine books including Perseverance. She has held workshops on climate grief, transcending hope and fear to continue in the face of seeming futility.
“Give in without giving up.”
Gopal Dayaneni
Teacher, writer, activist and leading voice in the Climate Justice movement. Serves on board of Movement Generation: Justice and Ecology Project, rooted in vibrant social movements led by low-income communities towards a Just Transition. He is a trainer with the The Ruckus Society, an adjunct professor of Urban Sustainability at Antioch University and at San Francisco State University’s Race and Resistance Studies program.
“We’re going to suffer, so let’s distribute that suffering equitably.”
Joanna Macy
Environmental activist, author, scholar of Buddhism and deep ecology, and founder of despair-to-healing-to-action collaborative transformation process called The Work That Reconnects. Best known for her book Coming Back to Life and Active Hope, and for the Great Turning initiative.
“Be of service not knowing whether you’re a hospice worker or a midwife”
Jamey Hecht
Psychoanalyst with a private practice, member of the New Center for Psychoanalysis, and a PhD in English and American Literature. Author of many scholarly articles and five books, including extensive writings on collapse awareness and psychological approaches to climate anxiety.
“Witness the whole human story through tragic eyes.”
adrienne maree brown
Writer, doula, activist and facilitator. Former Executive Director of the Ruckus Society. Co-founder and former Director of the United States League of Young Voters. Best known for her books: Emergent Strategy, Pleasure Activism, and We Will Not Cancel Us.
“How do we fall as if we were holding a child on our chest?”
Robin Wall Kimmerer
Teaching Professor of Environmental and Forest Biology and Director of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry (SUNY-ESF). Author of numerous scientific articles, and the books Gathering Moss, and Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants. She is an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation.
“How can I be a good ancestor?”
