LinkedIn Presents.

I'm Maura Aaron's Mealy, and this is The Anxious Achiever.

We look at stories from business leaders who've dealt with anxiety, depression, or other mental health challenges, how they fell down, how they pick themselves

up, and how they hope work will change in the future.

Today's guest is the co-founder of a Canada-based nonprofit that supports young environmental

leaders to do their best and accelerate their careers. It's called the Starfish Canada.

We call it the Starfish Canada because it's after a story that has been adapted over the years.

It's a story about starfish washing up on a shore and a young boy

coming by and wanting to help the starfish. So he throws them back into the ocean one by one,

but there's thousands of them along the shore. And someone else comes along and says, you know,

there are a lot of starfish here. How are you possibly going to be able to make a difference and

make a dent in this?

And the boy picks up another one and throws it back into the ocean and says, well, I made a difference to that one.

And so the story is certainly about how about small actions and how they can make a collective difference.

He reached out to me because eco-anxiety is something he sees every day.

If you're like me, you carry anxiety and

grief for our planet with you. Sure, you can forget about it for days, even weeks at a time,

but it's there. And if you're like Liz Porter, who I just shared a stage with last week in Los

Angeles, you can't forget it,

because wildfires stole your house, your livelihood, and your memories. In 2021, the American

Psychological Association found that two-thirds of American adults said they were somewhat or

extremely anxious about the impact of climate change. And more than half said they were somewhat or extremely anxious about the impact of climate change.

...