From online conferences to in-person talks, there are events taking place throughout the year related to the psychological aspects of the climate and ecological crisis.

On our calendar we list our own offerings as well as relevant events held either independently by our members or through their links with other organisations.

Recent CPA events have ranged from a public panel on youth climate anxiety, to the launch of a book on Climate Psychology, to our full day summit on climate distress, trauma, ecological grief and threat responses.

Our members have been involved with a great variety of events, such as hosting experiential workshops on storytelling and eco-anxiety, running their own Climate Cafés, giving climate psychology talks for charitable organisations and academic institutions, facilitating climate fiction writing sessions and hosting webinars on ecological issues and self-care.

We invite you to use the calendar to find an event that interests you and hope to see you either online or in person at one of them soon.

The Continuing Professional Development we offer fosters Climate Crisis Awareness in the psychological professions.

We have three main CPD offerings.

• Through the Door workshops are for psychological professionals to expand their vision of work to include the climate crisis

• Climate-aware clinical practice events are clinically focused sessions for members of CPA including those providing Therapeutic Support

• Training to run Climate Cafés - see separate page for this here.
  
  

Through the Door

The climate crisis creates great change and uncertainty. How can we navigate this as practitioners? Our skills and experience are needed way beyond the consulting room.

Stepping through the door from the consulting room to the world outside might mean managing the absence of our usual authority and the vulnerability that comes from letting go of it. However, we still take with us critical skills of holding anxiety, bearing what is feared to be unbearable and thinking, or naming, the unthinkable. We attend to unconscious processes and be containers, even catalysts, for transformation.

Why take this workshop?

The workshop is an experience of feeling, thinking and imagining together that supports participants in their own version of going ‘through the door’ and finding new ways of feeling into the future that is coming towards us through the climate and ecological crises. It draws on traditional rites of passage to inspire new forms of being and doing, fit for the challenges of this uncertain time.

If you were frustrated with the political process and inaction of COP 26, then consider Through the Door. Between the desire to ‘Do Something’ and the feelings of overwhelm, is a third possibility, that of being with the unendurable feelings and engaging a different reality.

What is it like taking part in Through the Door?

“Yesterday, I was so surprised and energised by the marvellously imaginative and creative event you facilitated. I can't believe I'm saying this of a Zoom event!!! It stayed with me for the whole day. Lots of images and thoughts drifting back and forth. It felt fertile and productive but also, painful and confusing. But, above all I felt energised. I don't think it's made me feel clearer about what I should be doing, or how, but I feel inspired and alive to possibilities! The group thinking triggered not just the loss and chaos of the Crisis but also my personal story. I think this was the 'powerful' connection enlivened in me. Playful, creative and imaginative crisis! If this is what is on the other side of the door .....then, count me in” (Participant)

Still curious?

Read reflections by Chris Robertson, a founding facilitator of Through the Door.

Have questions? Contact us to discuss whether the workshop is for you.

Ready to book?

Check our events calendar or visit our Eventbrite page to find the date of our next workshop and register.

Places are limited to 18 people.

Cost : Standard tickets are £100 and there is also a 'pay what you can' option from £5 - £80.

Facilitator Team

Chris Robertson - psychotherapist and trainer since 1978, ex-CPA Chair, co-founder of Re-Vision and contributor to Depth Psychology and Climate Change and forthcoming A Matter of Life and Death. https://www.culture-crisis.net

Harriet Sams - tutor, mentor, guide and ecotherapist. She is currently researching archaeotherapy for her PhD. www.nwyfre-earth.co 

Steffi Bednarek - psychotherapist, trauma therapist and organisational consultant https://www.steffibednarek.com

Jennifer Fendya - Psychologist, Sandplay practitioner, nature & forest therapy guide, Climate Reality Project leader and CPA member, actively engaged in the creative expression of climate change-related experience. 

Rebecca Nestor - organisational consultant, facilitator and coach, based in Oxford, UK. She is a board member of the Climate Psychology Alliance, leads the CPA’s work on climate cafes, and recently submitted her doctoral thesis at the University of Essex/Tavistock Centre on leadership in climate change organisations

Climate-aware clinical practice

As we work clinically with the climate crisis we benefit from discussion with colleagues.

CPA offers a members only, monthly clinically focused event for Therapeutic Support practitioners and the wider CPA membership.This 90 minute event, runs from 19.00-20.30 UK time. The time is divided between a thematic presentation and peer supervision/intervision and either or both can be attended.

Any member interested in attending this event please visit the listings on the members only community platform or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Have you attended a Climate Café Listening Circle and found the space helpful? Were you able to share difficult feelings and would now like to support others to do the same?

We run a training programme  for anyone who would like to develop the confidence to set up their own Climate Café Listening Circle. These are simple, welcoming, empathetic spaces where fears and uncertainties about our climate crisis can be safely expressed. 

A Climate Café Listening Circle (CCLC) is a simple, hospitable, empathetic space where fears and uncertainties about our climate and ecological crisis can be safely expressed. 

It is essential that you have attended a CCLC as a participant before doing this training. Please see more about this below. 

Why do we need climate listening circles?

As it becomes more evident that climate and ecological breakdown are a clear and present danger to our safety and wellbeing, we increasingly need to talk about what our changing world means for us in terms of impacts at personal, family and societal level. To have these practical conversations many of us need first to be supported in exploring some complex feelings and thoughts which may often be taboo and hard to talk about.

With sturdy enough support structures in place, most people can sustain challenging feelings without either dissociating and numbing or going into blind panic. They can engage with difficult truths whilst staying connected and grounded.

A climate café listening circle aims to be such a structure - a container that is strong enough to allow the exploration of fear, anxiety, and other emotions such as anger, helplessness, sadness, grief or depression.

We use the word ‘cafe’ to evoke the simple friendliness and warmth that happens when humans share food and drink together (or imagine doing so, in an online setting). In this friendly setting, the circle:

• focuses on feelings rather than action
• is not a space for discussing or debating climate policy, climate science or climate action.

The design of our climate cafe listening circles owes a lot to the pioneering work of Jon Underwood and Sue Barsky Reid, who set up the Death Cafe movement based on the ideas of Bernard Crettaz. We have adapted and developed their model drawing on our deep experience of climate psychology. 

What happens during a climate listening circle?

The focus of discussion is participants’ thoughts and feelings about the climate and ecological crisis. There are no guest speakers and no talks, and it is an advice-free zone. Whilst the climate and ecological crisis is usually the main focus of the circle, we realise that other related preoccupations need a space to be explored. This can happen here too.

Do I have to attend a Climate Café Listening Circle to join the training?

Yes, it is important to have been a participant before you undertake the training, to experience first hand what it is like to engage in this sort of space before facilitating one yourself, and to have the space to explore your own climate feelings. If you can attend more than one, even better.

Follow this link to go directly to our Eventbrite page or check our events calendar for dates for circles taking place in the next few months. It is not essential to have attended a climate cafe listening circle led by CPA but it will need to be one that has a very similar structure and ethos.

This will need to be a CCLC that 

• focuses on feelings rather than action 
• is clear that it is not a space for discussing or debating climate policy, climate science or climate action.

If you cannot get a place on one of ours via our Eventbrite listings or our calendar, an internet search or a browse on Eventbrite should produce some. You can check with the organiser if it meets the criteria above or get in touch with us. Please do join our waiting lists as spaces regularly become available at short notice.

If you have any questions about this get in touch and we will be able to advise you.

What does the CCLC Facilitator training consist of?

The CPA CCLC training programme is divided into three sessions, over 7.5 hours, for closed cohorts of 16 people, which will help you to build a community of peers for ongoing support. You will have the same CPA facilitators throughout.

Session 1: 3 hours

After you have attended a Climate Café as outlined above, this session provides another CCLC, this time followed by reflection and discussion in small groups. This gives you the opportunity to more fully process the experience of being a participant, what it is like to share, and how you feel during and afterwards. It will also help you to get to know your cohort peers better. The post Café session format will be interactive, working in pairs and small group breakouts, and large group discussion.

Session 2: 3 hours (usually 14 days after session 1)

Prior to this session we will send you some reading materials – these are optional but will be very useful for you to build greater understanding so we do encourage you to read them. 

The session will explore facilitation and other skills, the underlying climate psychology upon which the CCLC structure and approach is built, creating an environment of fairness, safety, and belonging, and some of the practical aspects of setting up a CCLC, in person or online. Again the session format will be interactive, working in pairs and small group breakouts, and large group discussion.

Session 3: 1.5 hours (usually one month after session 2)

This session is a chance to regroup and reconnect, share any new thinking you’ve each had, or CCLC hosting experiences, and explore any new questions that have come up.   

Terms and conditions

To participate in this programme we ask that you commit to:

• Going to a Climate Cafe before you start this programme, as described above.
• Attending the 3 sessions in full; this is a closed cohort, aimed at helping you to build a community of trusted peer CCLC facilitators for support, buddying, and potentially collaboration*  
• Informing CPA before the first session if you can no longer participate because spaces are subsidised by CPA and we have a waiting list – please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and we can allocate your place to someone else.
• Keep the Zoom link private – this is personal to you. It helps to keep the space safe, and with the appropriate ratio of participants to facilitators. 
• Have support for your CCLC hosting / facilitation work. This could be by having a facilitator buddy from the cohort to talk with, or getting regular supervision, independently, or for CPA members, through our free, regular CCLC supervision sessions. 

*If you unavoidably miss a session we are unable to give you a refund; however we can potentially allocate you to another cohort for the missed session, subject to numbers on that cohort. 

Who will deliver the workshop?

Two lead facilitators will deliver the workshop and they will be supported by two from our team of fifty who will hold mini Climate Café Listening Circles within the workshop.

Our lead facilitators are:

Linda Aspey is a coach, facilitator, therapist, activist, supervisor and speaker working on culture and climate change. She is a board member of the Climate Psychology Alliance. 

Gillian Broad is professor of social work at the University of Sussex and an experienced facilitator of reflective groups including Climate Café Listening Circles.

Janet Castellini is a climate aware therapist and works with responses to climate change. 

Ewan Davidson is a counsellor, supervisor and consultant using the person centred approach. 

Rebecca Nestor is an organisational consultant, facilitator and coach, based in Oxford, UK. She is a board member and co-chair of the Climate Psychology Alliance, and her work and research focuses on supporting people in facing the climate crisis.

How much does it cost?

• Non-member rate: £130
• Member rate: £60
• Reduced rate: £40

To see our current listing of training workshops and listening circles follow this link to our Eventbrite page or check our events calendar. If the date of your choice is fully booked please join the waiting list as places do become available at short notice. The waiting list also helps us understand the level of demand.

Feel free to contact us if you have any questions or concerns.

A climate café listening circle is a simple, hospitable, empathetic space where fears and uncertainties about our climate and ecological crisis can be safely expressed.

 

Why do we need climate listening circles?

As it becomes more evident that the climate and ecological breakdown are a clear and present danger to our safety and wellbeing, we increasingly need to talk about what our changing world means for us in terms of impacts at personal, family and societal level. To have these practical conversations many of us need first to be supported in exploring some complex feelings and thoughts which may often be taboo and hard to talk about.

With sturdy enough support structures in place, most people can sustain challenging feelings without either dissociating and numbing or going into blind panic. They can engage with difficult truths whilst staying connected and grounded.

A climate café listening circle aims to be such a structure - a container that is strong enough to allow the exploration of fear, anxiety, and other emotions such as anger, helplessness, sadness, grief or depression.

We use the word ‘cafe’ to evoke the simple friendliness and warmth that happens when humans share food and drink together (or imagine doing so, in an online setting).

In this friendly setting, the circle:

• focuses on feelings rather than action
• is not a space for discussing or debating climate policy, climate science or climate action.

The design of our climate cafe listening circles owes a lot to the pioneering work of Jon Underwood and Sue Barsky Reid, who set up the Death Cafe movement based on the ideas of Bernard Crettaz. We have adapted and developed their model drawing on our deep experience of climate psychology. 

What happens during a climate listening circle?

The focus of discussion is participants’ thoughts and feelings about the climate and ecological crisis. There are no guest speakers and no talks, and it is an advice-free zone. Whilst the climate and ecological crisis is usually the main focus of the circle, we realise that other related preoccupations - personal, social or political - need a space to be explored. This can happen here too.

Our circles are open to anyone aged 18 or over who is worried about the climate and ecological crisis. 

If you are under 18 and need support, please follow this link for resources that we hope may help, including access to our list of practitioners offering three free sessions of therapeutic support to those who feel they would benefit from it. We have also been developing programmes of support for young people. You can find out more about those here.

If you are a parent/carer of a child or young person, you may wish to check out our Parent/Carer/Guardian Climate Circles which are currently running once per month.

 

Who will be leading the Climate Café Listening Circle?

Two people facilitate each circle - they come from a pool of more than fifty facilitators from within our membership.

Training and ongoing supervision for our facilitators is provided by a small, experienced team headed by Rebecca Nestor, Gillian Broad and Linda Aspey, who lead our organisation’s Climate Café Listening Circle offering.

How do I book a place?

Our climate café listening circles are held online. Follow this link to our Eventbrite page to find a date that suits you or check our events calendar which also lists listening circles held by CPA Scotland, and other independent offerings from our trained members. If the date of your choice is fully booked, please join the waiting list as places do become available at short notice and we endeavour to hold additional circles simultaneously when we can. The waiting list also helps us understand the level of demand.

If you have any questions or concerns feel free to get in touch.