In the fight for planetary health, how do we preserve our mental health?

As more Canadians grapple with catastrophic impacts of climate-fuelled extreme weather, the question of how a person can keep up the fight for planetary health while tending to their mental health has extended beyond the environmental circles.

It was early May and wildfire season had already started to rage in Western Canada when seven people settled into a monthly support-group meeting over Zoom.

The facilitator, Toronto-based Kady Cowan, opened the conversation by prompting others to acknowledge any climate change-related concerns weighing on their minds. Worrying her, Cowan said in her soothing voice, were the unprecedented "zombie fires" burning in British Columbia that feed on peat and woody tree roots over the winter and re-emerge in the spring.

Discussion gradually ramped up as others on the call shared their own concerns during what Cowan calls the "climate sanctuary," a peer-support group she founded more than four years ago for people in climate-linked roles, both professional and volunteer. The rest of the 90-minute meeting was punctuated by poetry readings, controlled breathing exercises and chances to explore a constellation of emotions.

"It's not abnormal to be distressed when you're watching a world around you evaporate – the types of things that we all relied on disappearing," Cowan said in an interview. "You're not sick to be worried about that."

Climate peer-support groups, like Cowan's, are increasingly recognized as one way to help build mental health resilience in a world that can sometimes appear indifferent to the effects of climate change.

At that session in early May, several people in the group expressed a sense of relief at being able to open up with like-minded peers. That's important, said Cowan.

"A lot of people just need those feelings validated," she said.