A project to help Victoria-area youth deal with anxiety about climate change has helped young people in the region understand their concerns, and inform them about local efforts that are making a difference.
The project is called Eco-Anxious Stories and Next Steps, and it was made possible in part from a $50,000 grant from Island Health’s Resilience and Safety Grant program.
The project concluded earlier this year, but is hopeful to receive another grant to continue their work next year.
Island Health says that part of the Eco-Anxious Stories and Next Steps initiative was to utilize storytelling as a tool for young people to better understand their climate anxieties and give them hope for the future.
“In clinical terms, the American Psychiatric Association defines [eco-anxiety] as a chronic fear of environmental doom,” says Rachel Malena-Chan, one of the project partners and creator of the Eco-Anxious Stories platform.
“But culturally, I think the concept is used a lot more broadly, even like a kind of gateway into this more nuanced conversation about climate emotions, eco-emotions.”
Kirsten Mah, a healthy communities planner with the Capital Regional District is the one who came up with the initial idea that would see this project come to fruition.
Through her work, she noticed that climate anxiety was a growing concern in many young people.
“It came from the community, and I just consolidated it into kind of a vision and brought it together with Rachel and Julia to make it come alive,” said Mah.
The first stage of the project involved hosting storytelling workshops at two Victoria high schools for a total of nearly 100 students.
Additionally, they also hosted two workshops at the Volunteer Victoria space for youth to attend.
Most participants, aged between 16 and 18-years-old, took part in writing exercises and dialogue, all the while sharing their stories and emotions about climate change.
Island Health says some of these youth described feeling overwhelmed, frustrated, resentful and angry.
Despite these emotions, many felt a sense of hope amid the current climate crisis, which was inspired by community connections, growing global awareness and the urgent sense of a need for change.
“I think the climate conversation has been very much trapped in that space of technology and policy and things that don’t feel very relatable to an everyday young person,” said Malena-Chan.
“But when we flip it to be about our emotions and our values, our sense of identity and our place in the world, and our future, our personal experiences – essentially what’s most meaningful to us as human beings – that’s when people start to light up.”
The project’s second phase saw students participate in tours and presentations to find out about local eco-oriented initiatives.
These included:
- Exploring Indigenous perspectives through a guided walk at Elk/Beaver Lake
- Learning about watersheds on a tour of the Sooke Lake Reservoir
- Learning about waste management, reduction and diversion as well as the role of hawks and raptors in the area on a tour of Victoria’s Hartland Landfill
- Focusing on local seaweeds, their health benefits and exploring cooking with seaweed in an interactive workshop put on by Dakini Tidal Wilds
“It has been truly incredible and encouraging to watch youth harness their eco-anxiety and turn it into something productive, to turn it into a storytelling tool that is positive and isn’t overshadowed by dread and doom,” said Julia Harrison, a mental health program coordinator for Volunteer Victoria and another key project partner.
“I’m particularly proud of this project allowing youth to talk about their anxieties surrounding the status of our environment without feeling as though their generation is ‘in charge’ of making these changes and ‘changing the outcome.’”
If the Eco-Anxious Stories and Next Steps project is awarded another grant, they will continue to provide climate anxiety support in the region in 2025.
