How to build your climate fitness
what do coral reefs
climate change and physical fitness have
in common those three things
may seem very different but each of them
in some way are controlled
by human beings i know this
because i’m a marine biologist and a
historical ecologist
it’s my job to tell the story of
ecosystems through time
and in 2016 i moved from the united
states to hong kong
a city best known for its financial
portfolio so that i could study
its marine portfolio my current research
is on corals corals are wonderful
animals
that grow and build coral reefs the most
biodiverse marine habitat
on earth more than 25
of all marine life relies on them i try
to identify their past
greatest threats so that we can give
them the best chance
for survival and especially
in hong kong corals have had to adapt to
the growing human footprint
on this earth unfortunately
my research reaffirms a global trend
corals are sick
surveys and research claim anywhere from
20 to 30 percent of all shallow water
corals have died
in the last 30 years due to human
impacts
with the greatest global impact known to
be rising temperatures
from climate change how do we get here
why haven’t we done more to stop this
we have failed to combat climate change
because our mentality around climate
change
is wrong
you see in the 60s and 70s science was
already fairly conclusive on this whole
climate thing
and governments were taking big steps to
combat our greenhouse gas emissions
but then the climate issue became
political
facts got mixed with sensationalism and
the dialogue changed from
we need to do something to it’s too late
we can’t possibly curb emissions in time
we told ourselves that we were the
problem not also the solution
and we mentally shut down and pushed
those issues
to the side awful
and statistically speaking we are part
of the problem
the 10 most affluent people on earth
create over 50 percent of greenhouse gas
emissions
emissions that are causing sea levels
and temperatures to rise
at an exponential rate we have given
the oceans a fever and because of this
much of the plant and animal life there
are dying
all right so we’ve talked about coral
and we’ve covered climate change but
what does physical fitness have to do
with this
well i’m not just a marine biologist but
i’m also a lifelong competitive athlete
and a coach i want to show you how my
competitive athletics
not my scientific background is what has
shaped
my mentality and drove me to be the
conservationist
that i am today and how i think that if
we are all a bit more athletically
minded
then we’ll all be much more climate
conscious
now my athletic mentality was birthed
being the youngest
in a big family you get that way when
it’s you versus your older siblings
and it’s always the youngest picks last
at holiday dinners
no wonder i wanted to be more athletic
but one of the first things i learned as
an athlete
was that most of our barriers are not
actually
physical they’re mental and it’s the
same
with climate change so that’s why i’m
going to work with you
right here and now in your first climate
personal training session
on how we’re going to start winning
against the climate crisis
and just like i would do with my
physical fitness clients first
we’re going to reshape your mentality
second we’re going to reform your
climate identity
third we’re going to show you how to
initiate and take action
and then fourth we’re going to teach you
how to care
because together with those steps
is how we’re going to build your climate
fitness
all right let’s get going first step on
our fitness journey
is with mentality and i learned that
fitness buffs have a much better mental
strategy for dealing with problems
than scientists how many of you have
ever had a fitness milestone
or set a health target or played on a
sports scene
anybody yeah then you understand what i
mean when i say
we become goal oriented but task focused
we use long-term goals to help us to
complete
difficult everyday tasks do you want to
climb that mountain
first you start by taking steps do you
want to win the game
first you go to practices listen i don’t
win
every weightlifting competition i do and
my ultimate goal of competing in the
olympics will probably
never be achieved but it’s important
that i look back at those days of
dedicated training
and i realize i am a better
stronger person than i was and i want to
keep improving
that is the definition of the athlete
mentality
our desire to keep working
you know what that doesn’t sound
anything like the normal conversation
around climate change everything about
the climate crisis
is framed as a failure curbing
greenhouse gas emissions
sustainable food production protecting
all the reefs
every time we talk about climate change
we tell ourselves we are failing
now i’m not saying that this is
inaccurate
but what if instead of looking at the
global climate olympics
as unwinnable we focus on our personal
everyday wins today
i recycled everything properly today
i did not eat meat today i took public
transit every time i went outside
now are these earth-shattering goals
that are going to solve the climate
crisis
no but they’re a start and they will
lead
to something bigger remember you cannot
climb that mountain until you start
big goals are built by small winds
when we start to think like that when we
start to build
that climate athlete mentality then we
will really set ourselves up
for climate wins in the future and once
we built that mentality then we can
reform our identity
how we see ourselves and when i first
started training
i saw myself as a scrawny nerd
because i was but then through
years of dedicated training and hard
work i got stronger
and built myself into what i see today
an athletic nerd
but along the way some people saw that
and wanted a similar change for
themselves
so i would spend days writing them a
tailored fitness program in hopes
that i would change their lives and many
of them would inevitably start it
get bored and tired and quit we’ve all
been there right
i needed a way to ensure their
dedication i needed
to help them succeed so the secret
i created a highly scientific
test if you wanted to train with me you
had to do
50 burpees a day every day for 30 days
straight
and if you completed that task i’d coach
you
now who knows anything about burpees
they’re pretty awful right yeah but
most people can do them and this test
worked for that one
simple reason because really it wasn’t
about the burpees they were just a decoy
but because most people can do them but
they were
easy enough to get through and that was
how it worked
because after 30 days of this task
people started to feel different
and after 30 days of this challenge
people started to identify
as someone who could do the fitness
thing
now listen i can’t make you do burpees
for climate change
as much as i really want to but here is
your 30-day
very achievable task every day for the
next 30 days
do one thing that actively improves your
climate fitness
maybe it’s actually using that reusable
water bottle and cutlery
maybe it’s cutting me out of just one
meal a day
maybe it’s always taking public transit
when you need to get somewhere
anything do it i don’t care and you know
what
just like those burpees i know they’re
going to be tough at the beginning
but every day you do it see yourself
doing it
build a routine and through time you
will start to
identify as someone who can do the
climate fitness thing
and for the record i’m not perfect
i still struggle every day with both my
climate
and my personal fitness my biggest
weaknesses are
i eat too much meat i have really poor
ankle flexibility
but i recognize this and i am also
working at this
every day to try and better myself
because even i can use a reminder of
hey i do the climate fitness thing
all right session recap we’ve talked
about your mentality
and your identity now it’s time to
initiate action
it’s time to use these hands and i
believe we are the best athletes
at the sports we enjoy and it’s the same
for our climate fitness so after your 30
day challenge you’re going to start to
identify as a climate athlete
i want you to take that feeling and
harness it and then use it
to build a community around you and with
that community
continue to do climate actions in a way
you
enjoy do you like the beach organize a
beach clean up
do you like to cook cook using local and
sustainable foods
are you crafty make stuff you need out
of recyclable
and reusable materials but building a
community around you is important
because the community is like a gym
membership or running club
first it’s a group of people that holds
you accountable
and expects you to be there but second
it’s a group of people that surrounds
you and that
you are growing with and learning from
and can support
and those daily tasks that were small
individually
then become impactful community-wide
all right now we’re at the tough part of
our fitness journey
because now i need to convince you to
continue on your own
i need to get you to trust and care
about your climate fitness
why because there comes a point in
almost all athletes careers where they
no longer have
regular coaching when they need to find
the personal motivation to continue to
change on their own
this is the part of that fitness talk
where i say you have to trust
the process that i just laid out for you
and i know i can see some people rolling
their eyes
but it’s true and athletes will
understand this
because in order to achieve their goals
athletes are more willing to
trust and follow expert advice
most athletes are not highly scientific
they did not need to understand all the
peer-reviewed literature before they
were ready to make a change in their
lives
i have never had a client come up to me
and say
i just read a fascinating paper on type
1 versus type 2a and type 2x muscle
fibers and i want to incorporate that
into my training
no most of my clients have simpler goals
i want to lose weight or i want to get
stronger
why is it that simple because they
understand what they want
and they trust a process to get them
there
so why can’t we do this for our climate
fitness
what’s ironic is most of us know more
about climate science than we do about
exercise science
we’ve known for decades what greenhouse
gas emissions are doing to our planet
emissions that get trapped in our
atmosphere and create an earth blanket
that is heating the earth at
temperatures too fast for things to
adapt
emissions that are human driven meaning
it’s both our fault
and up to us to fix it
so why is this climate information so
difficult to turn into climate action
well jane goodall once said only if we
understand
will we care and only if we care
will we help and there’s
the gap we understand about our personal
fitness
if i lose weight i will fit into my
favorite pair of pants again
it’s personal of course we care but we
don’t understand
what our climate fitness can achieve
what’s personal about climate change
what if i told you that your climate
fitness
saves lives in the 2019 study
a team found that on average one future
premature climate related death will
occur for every 1 000 tons of carbon
burned
that’s about the annual emissions of
just the electricity
of just one of hong kong’s 42
000 buildings and what’s more
is this is likely to affect people that
are living in developing or high-risk
countries
not those living in buildings like this
that’s one
billion climate-related deaths in the
next one to 200 years
that averages to 10 deaths 2-3 families
a minute
that’s just human deaths we still don’t
have a great understanding
of the indirect impacts to global
biodiversity
but judging from my corals it doesn’t
look good
i cannot think of a more personal reason
to care
our climate fitness saves lives
who wouldn’t want to identify as someone
who saves lives
and just like those burpees you did the
process to get here
wasn’t really that tough was it and that
is exactly the point the road
to your climate fitness is not actually
that steep
remember first all we have to do is
reshape our mentality
next we just reform our identity and
then third
we’ll learn to take and initiate action
because after those three steps
we will understand about our climate
fitness and we will care
because yes the global climate olympics
is a mountain but your
personal journey is about finding the
mentality
to be willing to climb it it just takes
one step at a time
but we can do it team we just have to
start
thank you
[Music]
you