Radically Imagining a Better Future
The Joy Report team wanted to take a moment to invite you all to radically imagine a better future with us, because doing so might be the exact antidote we need right now.
“As an organization, Intersectional Environmentalist is working on being the change we hope to see, by contributing to the larger movement of individuals radically imagining a better future. We want to hold space for art, joy, rest, and community, and invite anyone interested in joining us, to do so.” - @kiana.kaz
Episode Transcript
“Welcome to The Joy Report, a podcast dedicated to sharing stories about climate solutions and environmental justice grounded in intersectionality and optimism. Tune in to hear updates on all things climate, social, and environmental justice explained in a succinct and accessible way by me, Arielle King, an environmental justice advocate and attorney passionate about environmental education. This podcast aims to give you the tools you need to stay informed and take action to protect the planet.”
Episode Agenda
In this special episode, we’ll be diving into the ways we can radically imagine a better future
Topic Background Info
To be honest, it’s been incredibly hard to be joyous lately. The climate crisis has been impacting us in ways we’ve never experienced before. Not a single person can deny the extreme heat, excessive flooding, wildfires, and other abnormalities plaguing our planet right now. And on top of that, rights are being stripped away and governments are not taking sufficient action to protect people or the planet.
Fortunately, as people trying to create a better world we aren’t required to be joyous all of the time. We must give ourselves grace and time to process our feelings, then think about solutions in a pragmatic, optimistic way. From the words of Intersectional Environmentalist’s Executive Director, Diandra Marizet [Diandra reading Instagram caption from 2020]
Truman State University professor of psychology Yuna Ferguson has explained that positive thinking and optimism are predicators of resilience that can initiate action and commitment to goals, and help us more effectively cope with stress.
For these reasons and so many more, The Joy Report team wanted to take a moment to invite you all to radically imagine a better future with us, because doing so might be the exact antidote we need right now.
Some of you might be asking: what does radically imagining a better future actually mean?
One of the simplest ways to understand radical imagination is thinking to yourself, What would our world look like if we actually got this right?
A section from ecofeminist Susan Griffin’s essay “To Love the Marigold” sums this up beautifully when she explains:
Like artistic and literary movements, social movements are driven by imagination… Every important social movement reconfigures the world in the imagination. What was obscure comes forward, lies are revealed, memory shaken, new delineations drawn over the old maps: it is from this new way of seeing the present that hope for the future emerges… Let us begin to imagine the worlds we would like to inhabit, the long lives we will share, and the many futures in our hands.
And IE’s founder Leah Thomas recently shared what radical imagination means to her during our first ever Earth Sessions show in Brooklyn this April: (25:02-26:01 - https://youtu.be/4onJGlhQP50).
Physician and children’s book author, Dr. Sayantani DasGupta, once explained that in order to deal with all the social, emotional, and environmental injustices in our world, we need radical imagination. It might even be beneficial to tap into our child-like wonder and remember a time when we were unrestrained by the limitations placed upon us by society.
[Insert https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTbMjVqoWxs 3:14-3:24]
Kids approach the world with a sense of play and curiosity. They ask big questions and believe that the world can and should be better than what it is. Throughout the pandemic, Nivi Achanta, the founder of a digital platform aimed at helping zillenials learn and do more to help our planet called Soapbox Project, realized that spending more time with her children helped joy become a fundamental core value in the work she does. In a June 2022 article she recalls a time when her now eight year old was learning about climate change and coming up with ideas like, “what if we have a big kitchen where everyone goes to get their food?” Or “what if a train comes to pick everyone up at their house?” That’s the type of imagination we need to fix the biggest problems in our world. And to those questions we have to ask ourselves: why not?
Radical imagination is not just a passive action or something that simply exists within us. It’s active, it is something that we do, that we use, that we exercise and bring into existence outside of our physical being. And a large part of radical imagination is joy.
Comedian, actor, and organizer Dallas Goldtooth once said,
[“It’s so easy for us to get stuck in the pits and fully submerge ourselves with climate anxiety. In order for us to radically imagine a different future, we have to imagine and allow ourselves to experience the joys of this world and see ourselves being happy in the future. That can only manifest if you start now, if you find joy in the moment, and you use love for the land, love for our lives, and love for our people to drive us forward — as opposed to anxiety, anger, and frustration driving that.”]
Joy is an indispensable force. It can strengthen our resolve, help us uncover creative solutions, and bolster our resilience. It’s a statement to ourselves and the world that we are still here, undefeated.
When we do things that bring us joy, the brain releases neurochemicals that can relax our muscles, increase oxygen flow into our bodies, and make us feel excited, peaceful, or anything in between. A 2005 study published in the Review of General Psychology explains that while 50% of our happiness is determined by our biology and genetics, the other 50% is based on our intentional activity and our life circumstances. Of the parts of this equation, intentional activity has the highest chance of changing our happiness levels. The small things we do every day to make ourselves feel good like exercising, eating a nourishing meal, meditating, or working toward a personal goal can have a significant impact on our overall health, our wellbeing, and our joy.
Featured Story
We’ve already spent a full episode discussing how joy enhances and sustains movements, but it’s important to note how essential tending to our individual wellbeing is in ensuring that we can stay involved in movements without getting burnt out. We need everyone involved. There’s so much work to do.
[****https://youtu.be/9hE3kJQgnBE,**** 0:41-0:58]
The voice you heard was that of climate justice activist Vic Barrett. We had the privilege of showing their whole short film, titled “Reclaiming the Earth” during our second Earth Sessions concert in LA in mid-July.
Another critical element of radical imagination, and the future we hope to create with it, is community. In her book Living Beautifully: with Uncertainty and Change, Pema Chodron wrote, “We’re all in this together, all so interconnected that we can’t awaken without one another.”
We have to take time to stop and listen to the human and nonhuman world around us. What’s needed? What’s a problem that you individually can start to work toward? How can you connect with people already doing that work?
During our Brooklyn Earth Sessions show we also heard from Tony Hillery, who started a youth-centered food justice organization with a mission to inspire young people to lead healthy and ambitious lives called Harlem Grown, who provided us with a perfect example of this in practice: [ 26:21-26:39 https://youtu.be/4onJGlhQP50]
Art plays a critical role in radical imagination. Social movements depend on communication and the conveyance of a message. This is a prime space for artists and their work to thrive. Art has the power to bring alive a collective voice through activating all the senses. It also reinvigorates those on the frontlines and behind the scenes doing the work. Participating in artistic practices can be healing and rejuvenating to the body, our emotional wellbeing, and our imagination.
As an organization, Intersectional Environmentalist is working on being the change we hope to see, by contributing to the larger movement of individuals radically imagining a better future. We want to continue holding space for art, joy, rest, and community, and invite anyone interested in joining us, to do so. One way we’re doing this is through hosting earth sessions: our intimate, community-driven climate justice concerts intended to foster joy and advocate for people and planet. Our Programming Director Kiana Kazemi explains it this way: [Kiana speaking to Earth Sessions]
Social movements need radical imagination. The text “The Radical Imagination: Social Movement Research in the Age of Austerity” informs us that “without it, we are left only with the residual dreams of the powerful and, for the vast majority, they are experienced not as dreams but as nightmares of insecurity, precarity, violence, and hopelessness.”
Without radical imagination we’ll be so weighed down by the enormity of the problems we face that we might risk being stunned into inaction. And that’s the complete opposite of what we need right now.
Topic-Related Calls To Action
After hearing all this, some of you still might be wondering how to actually put this information into practice, so I’d encourage anyone who wants to tap into their radical imagination to write down a single word that will act as the pillar for the future you hope to see: maybe it’s abundance, or imagination, or freedom. Then, spend a few minutes brainstorming how you intend to hold yourself or others who share your vision accountable to that pillar. These accountability measures should be tangible, realistic, and ideally something you can integrate into your daily or weekly routine. When you’re comfortable doing so, share this goal with a person you trust and love. Then, encourage that person to engage in this same practice of writing down a single word and building on it to envision a radical, more beautiful future, and urge them to do the same to someone else. Slowly you may be able to create your own gathering of chosen-community who are holding each other accountable to practices that will help create the world we hope to see.
I would also encourage you to find and engage with one of the many organizations and resources specifically dedicated to radical imagination, or community resilience building, since the two go hand in hand.
Rapid Fire Positive News Stories
Here’s some positive climate news you should also know about:
The state of California has recently passed one of the most comprehensive plastic bans in the country aimed at reducing the amount of plastic created and increasing recycling rates in the state.
A group of researchers working in the Amazon River Delta have found mangroves growing in freshwater, marking the first time this phenomenon has been documented in deltas or costal mangroves anywhere in else in the world. This identification increases the known area of mangroves in the region by 20%, or an additional 70 square miles.
The Afri-Plastics challenge has selected its 10 finalists, including a Keynan startup that turns invasive weeds into food packaging. This competition invites companies to submit community-centered solutions to reducing or eliminating plastic usage across Sub-Saharan Africa. The winner, who will be announced in January of 2023, will receive a grant and support for the development and implementation of their initiative.
In response to increased deforestation from wildfires, insects, and other climate change-related causes, the Biden Administration has announced that the U.S. Agriculture Department will soon begin planting more than one billion trees.
IE + Community Updates
And in the world of Intersectional Environmentalist:
In collaboration with Optimist Studios, IE will be hosting a special earth sessions activation in LA on August 20th featuring yoga, breath work, sound healing, and more. Make sure you’re following our new events page at earthsessions dot ie (@earthsessions.ie) to stay up to date on upcoming in-person events.
This episode was created in collaboration with our friends at Grist. Make sure you check out the most recent Fix issue, which is all about Joy. In the issue, their team looks at why joy is so crucial right now, how to make space for it, and the surprising ways people are channeling it to do better climate and justice work. Like our team at Intersectional Environmentalist, the staff working in the Fix Solutions Lab believe that joy can strengthen our resolve, help us unlock creativity, and bolster our resilience.
Closing Statement + Reiteration Of Calls To Action
As always, remember, fighting the climate crisis is a marathon, not a sprint. We need everyone to get involved in a way that feels right for them, now more than ever.
If you enjoyed this episode, please don’t forget to leave a review on whichever platform you’re listening to the podcast if you haven’t done so already.
Tune in next episode where we’ll be diving into energy justice.
I’m your host, Arielle King, and thank you for listening to this special episode of The Joy Report
