how to not lose your head
when you've lost your leg (and what that has to do with climate)
I'd like to share a story about what having one leg makes me think about climate change. It goes like this:
I was born without my right leg below my knee. In its place, I use a prosthetic. It hasn't been much of a hindrance to a good life and has taught me a lot about the world. Some of what I've learned from it affects how I think about climate change — particularly how the stories our community tells influence our state of mind, which influences our capacity to do things. I'll come back to this, but briefly, a bit about me:
Growing up, I went to Shriners Children's (literal saints in fezzes 😇) to get a new leg every year or so and consequently spent a lot of time around other kids with disabilities. (Fun fact, when I first went there, it was "Shriner's Hospital for Crippled Children" and oh man, what I wouldn't do for a t-shirt.) Over the years, I began to think of the kids there, my peers, as divided into two groups: defeated, and undefeated. It sounds harsh and judgmental, writing it down, but it’s how I thought (and maybe think) about it.
By defeated, I mean mentally broken — how badly they’d been broken had no relation to the severity of their disability. There were kids missing legs, just like me, that didn’t want to go play — tag, or throw a frisbee in the courtyard — because they “weren’t very fast” or “weren’t good at that.” While the defeated kids’ behavior was defined by inaction, the undefeated kids would just go do the thing - wheelchair frisbee, whatever. Their disabilities restricted their behavior, sure, but they just did it anyway. And, you hear about the undefeated disabled people; they sometimes famously do hard, seemingly improbable, things, often to prove to themselves and their community that they’re able to. For example:
But, if you’re physically disabled, you don’t need to do anything impressive to be an inspiration. I’ve been called an “inspiration” for attending a hot yoga class. Uniformly, people that say I’m an inspiration will not say why. It seems silly, but it's a good example of the story our community tells itself. The story here is roughly, “We expect people with disabilities will give up and withdraw from society.” Simply not giving up is a powerful statement, and therefore, inspiring.
The breaking process, the one that limits ability, is mental, not physical. The kids were defeated by the stories they believed, not their bodies. I think there are some stories that people with disabilities must believe if they are to avoid being defeated.
We must believe that we can live a worthy and good life. Within this, it’s important to communicate that success doesn’t mean the disability magically disappears. It is enough that the hard work to overcome bad situations is worth the effort.
We must believe that our personal struggles are not outliers in the wider experience of humanity. We are not being asked to do more than is reasonable, or even more than many of those that came before us.
We must believe that we are part of a long line of people who overcame hardship. This work of overcoming is our right, and we owe it to our ancestors and ourselves to do it.
We must acknowledge that shame is toxic and breeds inaction. A disability isn’t something to be ashamed of (bless you, children, for always pointing at my leg and asking what happened), and speaking openly is a blessing.
We must realize that it’s not too late — every bit of overcoming we’re able to do is valuable. There is no amount of disability beyond which it’s not worth trying, beyond which giving up is the right answer.
I think these same stories are critical to success in climate. If you replace “disability” with “climate change” above, you’ll find the story I tell myself about climate. Don’t get me wrong, I understand, we are in a bad place. We’ve done extraordinary physical damage to our planet - much of it effectively permanent. But we must be careful with the stories we tell, we must make sure mounting challenges do not defeat us mentally. We must just go ahead and do things — not give up and withdraw — and play tag in the courtyard despite our missing hands and feet. If we can keep our heads, I think we’re capable of incredible, improbable things.
Thanks for reading! I originally published a version of this story on Twitter, so follow me over there, or subscribe below!
Peter! Loved this, needed this, going to think about this often!
--From a friend from a former moment in time.