What Cristina Figueres Thinks the Climate Movement Can Learn from Buddhism » Yale Climate Connection

Christiana Figueres, a Costa Rican diplomat best known as the architect of the 2015 Paris climate agreement, has turned to a new strategy to protect the world's climate: spreading the teachings of Thích Nhất Hạnh, Thich Nhạnh was a Buddhist monk and peace activist who died in 2022.

Driven by the pain and sadness of climate change, Figueres began organizing retreats with her team at Global Optimism for those working on climate and biodiversity. The first retreat will be held in June 2022 in partnership with Plum Village, an international Buddhist practice center and monastery located in the countryside of southwestern France, founded in 1982 by Thích Nhất Hạnh and Chân Không. ism and Plum Village began organizing regional retreats around the world.

“Ten years ago I discovered a line of teachings that were very helpful in keeping me motivated and keeping my spirits up, especially when I was feeling down,” Figueres told me in a recent interview. “I think they can be helpful to other people, so these retreats provide a positive foundation for all the work we do.”

I met Figueres in the summer of 2024 in Plum Village. I was invited to spend four days at the monastery via a brief but interesting email that promised a “global climate and nature community gathering” that would enable participants to “expand understanding of global ethics of systems change.” How could I say no?

On the first morning of the retreat, a neat row of about 150 participants sat on mats in the meditation hall, listening attentively and copying on whiteboards in their notebooks. A monk named Brother Spirit introduced the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism, which deal with suffering and the path to end it.

“We can't escape pain, but we can reduce it,” Brother Spirit said as he drew a diagram on the blackboard.

Figueres then explained how she applies Buddhist teachings to climate protection efforts.

“I've been dealing with the pain and sadness of what we've seen disappear before our eyes, and the pain and sadness of so many people, and it's been, to put it mildly, very frustrating that the conference hasn't gotten to where we need to get to,” she said . “Such frustration, pain or sadness can cause those working for the common good to lose motivation.”

Figueres said the line-by-line teachings helped her gain a broader perspective on her life goals.

“For decades, I have felt it was my responsibility to work with hundreds of colleagues to address and change the trajectory of climate and biodiversity in order to leave a safer planet for future generations,” she said. “When you put this self-imposed responsibility on your shoulders, it makes the job very, very difficult because there are a lot of things we can't control.”

But she found strength in the Buddhist concept of ultimate reality: “In the vastness of reality, humans are but a tiny point in a larger, ever-evolving reality.”

“It’s been very helpful to me to understand the historical reality of what we’re working with every day, and the ultimate reality that there are other forces at work that we don’t have influence over,” she said. “I can live and work to be the best person and have the best impact, but ultimately I’m not responsible for the results.”

In the retreat hall, Brother Spirit outlined Plum Village’s theory of change: If we want to change the system, we must first start with ourselves—because we are the system. After all, climate change is man-made. Capitalism, white supremacy, overconsumption: they only exist within us. That morning, I thought to myself and realized who am I? yes climate change.

Figueres has also been thinking about the strong emotions climate change can trigger.

“How do you change the pain we feel?” she asked. “Transformation doesn't mean turning around and pushing it under the rug. But how do you really use it intentionally to, let me say, transform those feelings into something that you want to do positively in the world?

Yixingxing often uses compost as a metaphor for transformation. He summed up this idea with a pithy motto: “No lotus can grow without mud,” referring to the idea that a lotus can only take root in the soil and bloom in the soil. He taught that people spend most of their lives in a mire, wading through complex and unavoidable emotional experiences.

In the meditation hall, Brother Ling asked: “What do you think the earth wants from you?”

I step outside my usual answers about purpose and career. But then the spiritual brothers challenge us: “Not as instruments of action, but as her children.”

I had a hard time coming up with an answer at first. But then I thought about what I might want to do for my own children, and the answer was obvious: happiness. Find love in all the cities and creatures, in the cracks in the sidewalks and in the clouds on Earth. Find this love in me.

Perhaps this is what Umemura and Figueres wanted me to understand most: that the Earth is not an isolated thing that exists outside of us. We are the earth and the earth is us. Relieving my own suffering is relieving the suffering of the planet.