Climate change, ultras, and loving each other through the suffering
How do we navigate the challenges that are beyond our comprehension, and what role do we play in helping one another along on the way?
This weekend, I ran the Running Up for Air (aka “RUFA”) 12-hour race here in Missoula. RUFA is a climate action fundraiser series that’s taken hold in a number of mountain towns throughout the West, in Utah, Montana, Colorado, and Washington.
It was the first time/lap-based race I’ve ever done, and it was so fun getting in a rhythm and seeing friends so often throughout the day. The course was a 4.15mi loop from the bottom of Mount Sentinel up to the summit and back down, with roughly 2,000’ of climbing. I hit my goal of eight laps with just over an hour to spare—not quite enough time for a full 9th lap, so we ended with a smile and called it a day!
I was taken aback when I mentioned the race in a work call on Friday and my coworker enthusiastically asked where she could donate (admittedly, I never advertised for donations because I struggle doing that, even for a great cause). But a few hours after sending the link to my team, the contributions were pouring in—thank you, Arcbound family. My COO made an especially kind donation, and when I messaged him to say thank you, he responded with this:
“Good for you for taking action. Climate change is real and we’re fucked.”
His sentiment sent me straight back to my days in grad school the first time and became the unexpected focus of my attention on race-day.
Hopelessness and meaning-making
I moved to Missoula in 2017 for the University of Montana’s Master of Literature program, with an “Ecocriticism” specialization. (Ecocriticism is the interdisciplinary study of connections between literature and the environment.)
It was a dream come true. Literature courses were interwoven with philosophy, religious studies, environmental science, and art; we read Buddhist texts, classic and modern philosophy, environmental research, ecofeminists and the Romantics.
I wrote papers on the ethics of catch-and-release fly fishing (that was the unfortunate end of my fishing career), the ecological danger of humanity’s search for immortality (this isn’t sci-fi; check out this article on the “Transhumanism” movement—I had a full course on it), and why a sense of wonder might be our most valuable asset when it comes to being better humans.
But one of the things I’ll never forget was realizing the sense of hopelessness and grief shared by my classmates about the direction our beautiful planet is headed.
Most of them had fallen into despair about climate change and the near-inevitable loss of all we hold dear—exacerbated by the devastating sense of powerlessness in our fate. (Their despair makes sense; now-famous psychological research has shown us that feelings of helplessness make us depressed.)
I started to feel it, too.
Nihilism, purposelessness, and finding meaning
I remember searching for answers, trying to “philosophy” my way out of the muck. If climate change is all but inevitable (it’s theoretically not too late to stop it, but the odds aren’t looking good), how are we supposed to behave in the here-and-now? What matters most?
I couldn’t help but wonder whether it mattered at all on a macro level. “Does anyone but us really care whether the Earth is covered in polar bears, mushrooms, and astrophysicists, or hot lava and radioactive bacteria?”
Did the Universe rejoice when the first single-celled organism appeared on Earth, or was that just another Tuesday? How many periods of wipeout and renewal has our planet gone through before, and how many will come—independent of our meddling?
Some of this perspective was rooted in learning to acknowledge our anthropocentric (human-centered) perspective, i.e., that a desire to stop climate change is inherently human and is rooted in human desires. It’s good to recognize this reality, and to be curious about it.
But a lot of my focus on the macro level, future-oriented ethic was just my own naïveté.
At the time, I still conceived of the devastation of climate change as something that would happen “a long time from now,” in some catastrophic event, in a world beyond my own. Kind of the way we probably imagine the mass extinction that took the dinosaurs as having happened on one very unlucky day, a long time ago (whereas it was most likely a drawn-out event related to climate change, exacerbated by the rogue asteroid).
The notion of climate change to me was entirely abstract: one day Earth is covered in beautiful biodiversity, and the next, it’s like any of the other billions of planets.
Yes, the idea of that is strange and sad, but in the blink of an eye the Universe will carry on as it always has, most likely failing to notice anything particularly odd happening in our tiny corner of the room. And we won’t be here to grieve anyway.
(Was this nihilism, or denial-ism? An unconscious attempt to avoid the grief I saw wracking my classmates?)
What I didn’t grasp then is that climate change isn’t a singular event for some future time but rather a very present, ongoing process. One involving devastating loss of habitat, destruction of coastal communities, increasing wildfires and smoke pollution, and tragic, cascading effects throughout our very fragile global ecosystem.
Beyond our comprehension
Somewhere around lap two or three, I recalled a book we read in that transhumanism class, about things that are beyond our comprehension.
In Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology After the End of the World, modern philosopher Timothy Morton defines “hyperobjects” as “things that are massively distributed in time and space relative to humans,” largely describing… climate change.
Climate change, the Covid-19 pandemic, black holes, and the Florida Everglades are hyperobjects. How does one “Fight climate change,” “Explain the pandemic” or “Measure a black hole”? We can only address one small part at a time.
Perhaps that’s why, in 2018 as I tried to assess the threat of climate change, all my brain could do was contextualize it in the scope of the entire universe, from the dawn of time til the end of time. Misguided though it may have been, this searching led me to one of the most meaningful life philosophies I still abide by today.
Maybe the Universe really doesn’t care whether we burn Earth down or manage to save the whales, but I know billions of humans—and many, many more non-human beings—who care a lot, are suffering, and will continue to suffer.
Perhaps, therein lies our undeniable purpose… even if we are totally fucked.
Even if the worst is inevitable, and even if it only matters to our Earthling community with lives like specks of dust in the span of time, our greatest task is to care for one another to the best of our ability as we face this uncertain future.
In fact, no matter what challenge we’re facing, the noblest and most loving thing we can aim for is to endure it head-on, with compassion—for ourselves and for those around us (non-humans included!).
Interestingly, the etymological root of compassion is “to suffer with,” from the Latin compati. And as a therapist-in-training, I’ve grown very familiar with the practice (yes, it’s a practice!). My task is to sit face-to-face with people in their suffering, knowing I can’t solve anything but I can be with them through it. This is one of the only things I don’t question—I know it matters.
I believe loving one another through struggle is one of the most meaningful and necessary things we can do.
Maybe we’ve accepted that we can’t stop the climate change train, but we can live each day of the long ride with love, compassion, and an attentiveness to the suffering of our neighbors here and now. And maybe—when we learn to face one another and our future with love—we can even put a conductor up front who, with sacrifice, wisdom, and some luck, can slow or change our course.
Climate change and ultras: One step at a time
From sunrise to sunset on Saturday, in a race created to combat climate change, I reflected on my time in school, my questions about meaning and humanity and the morals of the Universe, and how we face something so overwhelmingly complex as climate change. Did my steps matter? Did any of it matter?
Somewhere along the way, as fatigue gave way to flow, I realized something: Climate change and ultras aren’t really all that different. They’re both hyperobjects in their own way, both impossibly giant, daunting, and full of opportunity.
Trying to face these giants head-on in their entirety is futile at best and overwhelming at worst. In the aid tent, around noon, I said to my friend Sam: “I’m trying not to let myself think, I’m only halfway done.” That kind of thinking will get you in trouble in an ultra, and probably in facing climate change too.
One step at a time.
Enduring both climate change and ultras is likely to involve deep suffering, and in both, there is also the glorious possibility of feeling compassion from and for those around us. What a gift!
In facing climate change, maybe some of us show that compassion through dogged activism, while others make art that offers inspiration and hope, and others still hold the hands of those who need comforting. One step at a time. One small act of compassion at a time.
And in ultras, perhaps you get a soul-lifting fist bump from a stranger, or a volunteer tapes your blistered feet and convinces you to make it to the next aid station, or your partner holds your hand and cries tears of joy with you as you fight your way to the finish. Little moments of compassion and love get you from one step to the next, from the start to the finish.
Henry Kramer, my classmate from the program at UM and now dear friend, now teaches religion and philosophy at Hunter College in New York and has presented workshops at Harvard Divinity School. He wrote this beautiful piece about why “Love is the Answer to Climate Change,” and I want to leave you with this quote from it:
“The river, the trees, the soil, other hurting people… the more time you spend with each, the more attention you give to each, and the more you love each, the less alone in all this you will feel. It is from this place that others can be invited. That hearts may even change… Campaigning to save the Amazon is not what you should be doing… at least not first.
Learning to love is what you should be doing. That way, when you do head for the rainforest (or into your studio, or into your garden, or into your community hall), you mean it, you’re sure of it, and it’s easy.”
Whether taking on climate change or the first mile of an ultra, we face something larger than we can wrap our human heads around. We stare into the unknown and prepare for what it will bring, unsure of the journey ahead.
And so we go—day by day, mile by mile, step by step—with love.
Morgan
This is a really moving & thoughtful essay. You'd likely like The Frugal Chariot substack by Nicie Panetta about literature related to climate change. Also, as a horsewoman, I recommend "The Horse" by Wendy Williams (not to be confused with Horse by Geraldine Brooks, which is getting a lot of attention now). The Horse by Williams is an evolutionary history, and it's fascinating. It served to me as a lesson in paleontology and climate shifts; it's fascinating and helps give perspective, in an oddly reassuring way, about the span of history and what the future may hold. As for spreading love -- yes, and I do this through my kids. I feel what I can do for the world is not just take personal action, but also raise loving, smart kids who I hope will in a very small personal way make the world a better place. I know many people's reactions to climate change is to not have a child, and I totally understand and respect that and understand that population growth is linked to apocalyptic disaster -- it's terrifying to think what my kids and future grandkids may face in the world. But, it's also to me a means to immortality and a way to spread love and hope. Congrats on RUFA, you should try Grandeur Peak, I won the 12hr division in 2020 (last race before the pandemic shutdown) by going about 10.5 hours. I'd like to try the 24hr, which is neat because it starts at night so you get the nighttime out of the way in the first half and then get to slog along with fresher runners in the 12hr the next day. I've done two 24hr timed events (one-mile repeat loops, getting to 115 miles each time) and recommend it as a really different ultra experience!