Climate of Emotions
Climate of Emotions (COE) is a leadership training program for young climate activists to build emotional skills – so they can be more effective in their work on climate action and build the inner resilience required for long-term work on environmental sustainability.
Supported by an international coalition of organizations, Six Seconds launched Climate of Emotions in 2020 & 2021 to address the emotional aspects of the climate crisis. We’re excited to announce a series of trainings and activations leading up to COP30 in Belém, Brazil in November, 2025.
Young people stand in a moment of despair about the climate crisis.
They are disillusioned by inaction on climate, and are locked out of most conversations governing the future despite being disproportionately affected by these issues. Passionate, impatient, hyper-connected and loud, young people are ready to take decisive action.
- How do they get their voices heard?
- How can they participate in solution-building as allies and stakeholders?
- How can they harness their despair to create the change they wish to see?
By addressing the emotional dimensions of the climate crisis, we aim to empower youth leaders to improve wellbeing as they create meaningful change toward a sustainable future. With the right tools and support, young people can develop skills to transform difficult feelings into fuel for allyship, advocacy and action.
Will you join us?
Eco-anxiety fuels youth mental health crisis
The climate crisis presents not only environmental challenges but also profound emotional impacts. Eco-anxiety is a growing concern globally, with the World Health Organization identifying various mental health impacts of climate change, including climate anxiety, solastalgia, and ecological grief. Like many people in the world, the youth feel helpless and overwhelmed by their inability to promote and foster change. A landmark global study of 10,000 young people across 10 countries from 2021 found that 75% of youth find the future frightening because of climate change, and 56% feel ‘humanity is doomed.’
This experience is becoming entangled with an overarching mental health crisis among young people. Addressing the climate crisis and mental health crisis can be achieved by helping young people develop specific skills associated with resilience, awareness, compassion, and systems thinking.
The difference between this climate program and others? COE puts youth & emotions at the center. Most climate programs and activations prioritize policy, data, and optics, not people’s shared humanity. Emotion is the current that fuels us. It is our renewable resource. Information does not move people. Emotions do.
Climate of Emotions (COE) brings climate, youth, equity and emotions together.
“Emotions are a form of renewable energy that can power people to change self and our world. To create a healthy global climate, we’ll need new approaches – and if we can deeply connect at an emotional level, we get the energy we need. Starting at the micro-level of connecting heart to heart, we can catalyze the changes we need at a macro level.”