I enjoyed the last couple of days @CommunicateConf - the best environmental communication conference out there! Here's a thread of my favourite take home messages from the event...

1. Personal actions on climate change are currently flatlining even though awareness is raised significantly right now. There is a problem with action paralysis.

2. It's important not to give people a 'menu' of things to do for the environment. What people need is a 'cooking class', that is, we need to show them how to find the information to do those environmental actions. Move away from a menu approach & towards a solutions approach.

3. Having #ecoanxiety is actually a sign of mental health, not mental illness. The fact you care and have empathy is a sign that your mind is healthy.

4. Unless we engage with our darker feelings around #climatechange we are not going to get through the climate crisis. Engaging with our pain and rage will ultimately push us towards action. It will empower us to change.

5. 12 years to save the planet is an unhelpful narrative because it's already too late for some people, cultures and species.

6. We are naturally finding the climate crisis difficult to think about because we have no cultural memory of surviving this crises, unlike war and natural disasters, where we have a cultural memory of events and have learnt how to deal/prevent with those events over time/history

7. Narcissistic entitlement is hurting us emotionally.

8. @hubbubUK seem really cool! They are helping to make systemic change and have an excellent and often humorous way of doing it. Check them out!

9. If you want to engage with hard to reach communities, you must look at the relevance of what you want to say to them against the relevance of what the community is actually interested in. Find out what makes that community tick - it's values, goals and what success looks like.

I'd like to say a massive thanks to the organisers of this year's conference, it was really great and very thought provoking. Cheers! Also lovely to meet so many awesome people working in environmental comms - keep on keeping on!