I’ve just started working on a new book and it’s had me walking around in circles – metaphorically and literally for weeks now. It’s a thorough practical, political, fun and community exploration on how we can live through the climate emergency by being prepared, organised and by caring deeply for one another.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page to share your stories with me.

But how do you write a book that lays out the brutal truth of the climate emergency but also excites and inspires people to try and stop it reaching its full deathly potential? That somehow side steps the very human feeling of “oh well, it’s happening anyway, why bother trying to stop it getting worse? We’re already doomed, lets go get drunk.”

A book that doesn’t sugar coat the fact that we’ve started crossing or getting uncomfortably close to our ecological tipping points. These are the points that signal runaway climate change has started and that we can no longer control it. Where millions of people are likely to die due to the fact that we didn’t have the will power to stop it. That catastrophic loss of biodiversity and ecosystems is well underway and forecast to double down in the worst possible way.  

A book that picks people up by the shoulders, shakes them with vigorous urgency before folding them into a tight hug of shared anger and grief for everything we’re about to lose.

But also, a hug that injects stubborn strength deep in one another’s bones saying ‘keep going’.  

A hug to help remind us of everything we might save.

Of everyone we might save.

I don’t know if I know how to write that book. But I’m going to try – because that’s what I do. I look at the climate emergency, I see the enormity of the task and the unlikeliness of overcoming it entirely and then I try and help overcome it. I understand the climate science – the facts, they’re flowing through my veins – with occasional air bubbles that make me gasp in desperation. I know that we might not have success, but I act like we will. Because not trying guarantees doom and gloom. Trying, wholeheartedly guarantees possibility.

And friends, just imagine the unfiltered joy that would wash through the world if we were to preserve her verdant greatness for future life to come after us. A momentous cackle of relief, wet with tears, would ripple through our world.

So what needs to happen for that to occur?  None of us can know for sure, but I strongly believe that community, care and getting organised play a key role. And that’s where you come in. I want to learn from your experiences of living through climate disasters and/or disruptions and how your community responded. This could be about natural disasters (fire, flood, drought to name a few) or disruptions to key services such as transport, healthcare or food access. You can be anywhere in the world because the climate emergency doesn’t care where you live – it impacts all of us. Learning from one another is one of the most useful things we can do.

So to help us learn from one another and to fire up our heads, hearts and hands, I’m going have a crack at writing a book that rolls between shaking humanity by the shoulders before folding us into a long firm hug to hold us steady into whatever comes next. It’s going to be a cracker and hopefully include some of your stories to help carry and guide us through these times.

But wait, there’s more. I also want to hear how you’re helping to build climate resilience and prepared communities where you live. Because prevention is always better than cure.

Are you setting up disaster response plans, running festivals to craft community connections, running workshops to teach people how to grow food, working with vulnerable communities to ensure they’re not left behind when natural disasters inevitably hit. No approach is too small. I grow flowers and give them away for free to build links of kindness in our region, I run an annual edible garden trail to inspire folks to grow their own to help build food security, I tell stories of effective climate action across the country and host workshops to teach people permaculture. Everything counts. Everyone counts.

So please, please, please send me your stories. I will read and cherish each and every one. Just click this link below and please share widely.

With all my thanks, love and rage, Hannah x