Tourism's Climate Action Needs to Come from Within

I could not be more excited to learn of the Glasgow Declaration: a Commitment to a Decade of Tourism Climate Action, more of this, please! The commitment to be truly cooperative and dedicated to taking meaningful action is a powerful step in the right direction. I only hope that we recognize that the most impactful thing we can do is to do what travel has always done best, create real and enduring connections.

I humbly offer that transformational travel should play a vital role in tourism’s climate action response, but one that might be a little different than what you’re thinking.

The climate crisis is not new for those of us that have been in sustainable tourism for decades but when 8 out of 10 USTOA board members neglect to mention the word sustainability in their websites, it’s clear that we still have a long road ahead and sadly, we seem to be running on melting ice.

I can’t help but wonder why our attempts at informing, educating, sounding alarms, creating criteria, and introducing best practices have lacked the intended punch needed to activate change? The recent IPCC 2021 Climate Report certainly has sounded yet another frightening alarm, maybe louder than before, or maybe more people are listening as it coincides with an increasing amount of in-your-face reminders of the climate crisis, drought, wildfires, flooding, etc. that is making it very hard to ignore, yet still is.

If we don’t stop relying on fear tactics, blaming, shaming people and organizations for not being more responsible and reconsider our often shortsighted, even haughty, ‘this how you do it,’ control-based approach, that often falls on deaf ears, then the uptake will continue to lag. My kids, Quinn and Olive, don’t respond to this approach, a matter of fact, I don’t know many people that do, yet we keep trying. If we’re going to activate change at scale, deep down, we know this approach doesn’t work, so let’s stop doing it.

So maybe we should stop fighting (disconnecting) and start loving (reconnecting). I know, I know, cheesy, right, but this is truth, and I invite you to bear with me.

The time is now to take a higher consciousness approach in tourism, with reverence for the power that travel has in deepening our relations with ourselves, each other, and the planet. People protect what they love, it’s that simple, and the inside-out transformations that come from this primal place are a million times more sticky, enduring, and expansive than scientific reports, manuals, or listicles on how to do better or else. Maybe, just maybe, it is less about changing what we're doing and more about changing how we're BEING, and empowering travelers to do the same?

In tourism, like most industries, is way too reliant on a logical, mechanistic, linear, left-brain approach to solving our problems, which is important, but in this time of social and environmental crisis, we should be inviting a different type of intelligence and calling upon our intuition, imagination, ability to innovate to the conversation, ready to shake and stir things up a bit. If tourism can be more intentional and introspective, increase awareness and appreciation for universal truths, and better understand why and how we connect, why and how we love, and how they shift BEhaviors, then our efforts will be significantly more impactful and lasting. This is the difference between knowledge and knowing, we should obviously inform and educate, but right now we need to quiet the plausible and crank up the wisdom.

Travel creates such a nutrient-rich soil for learning, growth, and regeneration, it’s wonderfully fertile for planting the seeds of new perspectives, connections, and relationships that sprout and reach for the moon, the stars, and the sun. If tourism could do one thing, it would be to more mindfully create the conditions for this to occur, for every traveler, in every experience, and in every encounter, for all life thrives when the rays of conscious awareness shine through.

It is the crisis of separation that is the culprit keeping us from solving many of the challenges we face in our lives, including the climate crisis. Somehow this totally ridiculous idea that we’re disconnected from one another and all other sentient beings on the planet is the real problem at hand. And until we start chipping away at that wall between ignorance and consciousness, we will keep slipping and sliding and not gain the traction we so desperately need, and not for you and me, but for our children.

Astronauts often share this common story of when they first reach the edge of space and gaze upon the blue marble for the first time. Apparently, this “overview effect,” as they call it, is so soul-stirring that it radically expands their consciousness and they have a newfound appreciation for how sacred humanity is and deeper awareness for our interconnectedness, our interbeing. They often say that they wish that everyone could have the experience, that it would heal many of the divides between each other, our planet, and the universe. This is a shining star example of how experiences can impact our values and behaviors.

By simply inviting people to travel differently, with an eye turned inward, we will begin to water the seeds of newfound wisdom. Hidden in the glimmers of awe and wonder we often experience when we travel are refractions filled with compassion, humility, belonging, and stewardship. There are few places riper for personal change than when we travel, and in this DEFCON 1 moment, it is tourism’s responsibility to create more such moments, near and far from home, within, and without. Radical change resides here, transformations take root, behaviors shift, and life begins to flourish. So the question should be, how can we deepen these experiences and increase the frequency?

I do have hope, it is in my nature, I believe that together mother and human nature will find a way. But it will call on all of us in tourism to courageously look within and begin to unlearn how we currently approach travel and tourism and then guide and empower travelers in doing the same. If this remains too uncomfortable and we shy away from the unconscious or the unexamined, too scared to do the inner work, then I’m afraid we’re missing the whole purpose of travel, which is to stretch, learn, and grow into new ways of being and engaging the world. If tourism is going to take real, meaningful action in this crisis, it will be by intentionally catalyzing the power of travel to create connections that shift us from mindlessness to mindfulness and more compassionate stewards will surely rise to the moment. If we want people to save the planet, we need to help them long for it. To do that, we need to go beyond the scare tactics, intimidating narratives, guilt-tripping, and skin-deep, control-based solutions, and be bold and brave enough to fully open travel up as a space for healing, connection, love, life, regeneration, and transformation.

Jake Haupert