Undaunted

At the conclusion of the 2021 COP 26 climate summit with its disappointing outcomes, inhabitants of planet Earth are confronted with the reality that by 2050, or sooner, large parts of the Earth could be uninhabitable. We are indisputably living in the Sixth Great Extinction. We know that countless humans are reeling with climate anxiety and experiencing fear, anger, grief, despair, dread, and understandably attempting to cope with the reality of potential human extinction with massive amounts of denial. This book offers an alternative to being consumed with either denial or despair. At its core is the existential issue of climate catastrophe and how to live into it with compassionate, clear-eyed, vibrant, awakened intention. While this perspective is harrowing, even more formidable is the prospect of doing so in a global milieu in which deeply divided nations and individuals are opting to abandon democratic institutions and procedures in favor of authoritarian models of governance. Undaunted offers neither phony fixes nor merciless melancholy in the face of our daunting predicament. It assumes that both the reader and the author will face moments of despair going forward, but it offers skills and practices for living undaunted in the face of humanity's most unprecedented ordeals.