By Rebecca Solnit
A monastic once told me renunciation can be great if it means giving up things that make you miserable.
This vision, I think, is what has been missing when we talk about the climate crisis — and how we should respond to it.
Much of the reluctance to do what climate change requires comes from the assumption that it means trading abundance for austerity, and trading all our stuff and conveniences for less stuff, less convenience. But what if it meant giving up things we’re well rid of, from deadly emissions to nagging feelings of doom and complicity in destruction? What if the austerity is how we live now — and the abundance could be what is to come?