A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO VOCABULARY AND DEFINITIONS COMMONLY USED TO TALK ABOUT OUR COLLIDING CRISES 

The world is changing rapidly, and with that change comes a growing vocabulary. This glossary offers plain-language explanations of terms commonly used in conversations about climate change, collapse awareness, resilience, adaptation, regeneration, community, and the future. Whether you're encountering these ideas for the first time or deepening your understanding, my goal is to make complex concepts more accessible, practical, and meaningful.

FIRST: A Handy Cheatsheet For Talking About Collapse, Polycrisis, Metacrisis, and More

 

• Collapse Awareness = recognizing that many of our ecological, economic, political, and social systems are under increasing strain and may not continue functioning as they have in the past.

• Polycrisis =multiple interconnected crises occurring simultaneously and amplifying one another.

 

• Metacrisis =the deeper cultural, psychological, economic, and systemic conditions that give rise to many of those crises.

 

• Predicament = a complex situation that cannot be solved outright but must be navigated, adapted to, and lived through.

 

• The Great Simplification =the long-term transition from a world of increasing complexity, consumption, and energy abundance toward one that operates within ecological and resource limits. (Nate Hagens)

 

• Enshittification = the gradual decline of products, platforms, institutions, or systems as they become increasingly extractive and less beneficial to the people they were originally designed to serve.

 

• Omnishambles = what it feels like when multiple failures, crises, and breakdowns appear to be happening all at once.

 

• Collapse Grief = the grief that arises when we recognize the loss or potential loss of familiar systems, expectations, places, or ways of life.

 

• Climate Anxiety = the fear, worry, or distress people experience in response to climate change and its impacts.

 

• Eco-Grief = the sorrow that comes from witnessing the loss of ecosystems, species, landscapes, or ecological stability.

 

• Future Anxiety = persistent unease about what lies ahead in an increasingly uncertain world.

 

• Despairalysis = the state of feeling so overwhelmed by uncertainty, bad news, and grief that it becomes difficult to take meaningful action. (Maya Frost)

 

• Post-Doom = an approach that emerges after confronting difficult realities about the future and choosing to engage with life, creativity, community, and possibility anyway.

 

• Adaptation = the process of adjusting to changing conditions rather than expecting things to return to how they were before.

 

• Resilience = the capacity to respond to disruption, recover from setbacks, and continue moving forward.

 

• Community Resilience = a community's ability to withstand challenges, adapt to change, and support its members during difficult times.

 

• Mutual Aid = people helping one another through reciprocal networks of support, resources, and care.

 

• Collective Care = the recognition that well-being is a shared responsibility, not just an individual one.

 

• Active Hope = taking meaningful action toward a better future even when outcomes are uncertain. (Joanna Macy)

 

• Psychological Adaptation = adjusting our expectations, beliefs, and emotional responses to align with changing realities.

 

• Emotional Resilience = the ability to experience difficult emotions without becoming overwhelmed or disconnected from life.

 

• Regeneration = the process of restoring and renewing the health, vitality, and resilience of people, communities, ecosystems, and cultures.

 

• Regenerative Communities = communities that actively restore and strengthen the social and ecological systems that sustain them.

 

• Deep Adaptation = an approach developed by Jem Bendell that explores how individuals and communities can prepare emotionally, socially, and practically for significant societal and ecological disruption.

 

NEXT: The New Language Of Emergence 

 

• Emergence = the process by which new patterns, possibilities, or systems arise from interactions between people, communities, and living systems.

 

• Coherence = a state of alignment, connection, and meaningful order that allows people or systems to function effectively together.

 

• Modernity = the dominant worldview and social order that emerged during the modern era, characterized by industrialization, economic growth, technological progress, and the belief that humanity can control and improve the world through reason and innovation.

 

• Hospicing = the practice of compassionately accompanying systems, institutions, identities, or ways of life that are ending, rather than denying or resisting their decline.

 

 

• Enoughness = the recognition that well-being comes not from endless accumulation but from having enough and being enough.

 

 

• Interbeing = the recognition that all living things are interconnected and that our well-being is inseparable from the well-being of others and the living world.

 

• Liminality = the experience of being between what was and what will be; a transitional space where old certainties no longer apply and new possibilities have not yet fully emerged.

 

• Sensemaking = the process of understanding and interpreting a complex, rapidly changing world in ways that help guide wise action.

 

• Stewardship = caring for people, places, resources, and systems with the intention of protecting and nurturing them for future generations.

 

• Reciprocity = a relationship of mutual exchange, care, and benefit in which giving and receiving flow in both directions.

 

• Belonging = the experience of feeling connected to a community, place, culture, or ecosystem and knowing that one's presence matters.

 

• Rewilding = restoring natural processes and relationships, both in ecosystems and within ourselves, by reducing unnecessary control and allowing life to flourish.

 

• Thrutopia = a vision of the future that acknowledges difficult realities while remaining open to positive possibilities and meaningful action.

 

• Resacralization = the process of rediscovering a sense of reverence, wonder, and respect for life, nature, and the more-than-human world.

 

• Plurality = the recognition that many perspectives, cultures, ways of knowing, and approaches can coexist without requiring a single universal solution.

 

• Kinship = a felt sense of relationship and responsibility toward other people, future generations, and the living world.

 

• Flourishing = a state of well-being in which individuals, communities, and ecosystems are able to thrive and express their full potential.

 

• The More-Than-Human World = a term used to describe all living beings and ecological systems beyond humanity, emphasizing that humans are part of a larger web of life rather than separate from it.

 

• Sacred Activism = action taken on behalf of people and planet that is rooted not only in strategy or politics, but also in love, reverence, and a sense of deeper purpose.

 

 

• Relationality = the understanding that we exist within networks of relationships and that our well-being is inseparable from the well-being of other people, communities, and the living world.

 

• The Symbiocene = a term coined by Glenn Albrecht to describe a future era based on cooperation, reciprocity, and mutually beneficial relationships between humans and the rest of nature.

 

• Right Relationship = relating to ourselves, others, and the living world with respect, reciprocity, responsibility, and care.

 

• Aliveness = the felt experience of being fully present, engaged, connected, and participating in life.

 

• Cathedral Thinking = making decisions that benefit future generations, even when the results may not be visible during one's lifetime.

• Deep Time = a perspective that views human life within the vast timescales of Earth's history and future.

• Future Ancestor = the idea of living in ways that future generations might regard with gratitude and respect.

   

 

 NOW: A Useful List Of Key Collapse-Related Vocabulary With More Context 

Collapse

Collapse is the gradual or rapid breakdown of systems that people depend on to meet their needs, maintain stability, and make sense of the world. These systems can be ecological, economic, political, social, or cultural. Collapse doesn't necessarily mean a dramatic, civilization-ending event. More often, it involves a slow erosion of trust, reliability, resources, and resilience.

When people talk about collapse today, they are often referring to the growing recognition that multiple systems are under increasing strain and may not continue functioning as they have in the past.

Understanding collapse is not about predicting doom. It's about paying attention to reality, adapting to change, and exploring how we can protect what matters while creating new ways of living, relating, and thriving.

Polycrisis

A polycrisis is a situation in which multiple crises are happening at the same time and interacting with one another in ways that make each crisis more difficult to address. Climate change, biodiversity loss, economic instability, political polarization, public health challenges, migration, and resource constraints do not exist in separate silos. They overlap, amplify one another, and create ripple effects throughout society. What might have once appeared to be individual problems are increasingly revealing themselves to be part of a larger web of interconnected challenges.

Understanding the polycrisis helps explain why so many people feel overwhelmed by the state of the world. It is not simply that there is more bad news. It is that the challenges we face are becoming more complex and intertwined. A polycrisis perspective invites us to move beyond simplistic solutions and recognize the importance of adaptation, resilience, community, and systems thinking. Rather than asking how to solve a single problem, it encourages us to consider how we can respond wisely within a rapidly changing and interconnected world.

Metacrisis

A metacrisis is the deeper set of conditions that contribute to many of the crises we see around us. While a polycrisis describes multiple interconnected problems such as climate change, economic instability, political polarization, biodiversity loss, and social fragmentation, a metacrisis asks why these problems keep emerging in the first place. It explores the underlying patterns, assumptions, systems, and ways of thinking that generate and perpetuate crises across many different domains.

If the polycrisis is the storm, the metacrisis is the climate that keeps producing the storms.

A polycrisis helps explain why so many challenges are colliding at once. A metacrisis invites us to examine the deeper cultural, psychological, economic, and institutional dynamics driving those challenges. From this perspective, issues like short-term thinking, disconnection from nature, extractive economic systems, misinformation, and the pursuit of endless growth are not separate problems. They are part of a larger pattern. Understanding the metacrisis encourages us to look beyond managing individual crises and consider what needs to change in the way we think, relate, organize, and live if we hope to create a more resilient and regenerative future.

Predicament

A predicament is a situation that cannot be solved in the traditional sense, but must instead be navigated, adapted to, and lived through. Unlike a problem, which has a clear solution, a predicament involves complex realities, competing needs, and constraints that cannot simply be fixed through technology, policy, or determination alone.

Thinkers such as Nate Hagens often use the term predicament to describe humanity's current situation. Climate change, biodiversity loss, resource depletion, economic instability, political polarization, and social fragmentation are not isolated problems with simple solutions. They are interconnected challenges rooted in how our societies, economies, and cultures have evolved over time. While we can influence how these challenges unfold, we cannot simply make them disappear.

Understanding our situation as a predicament rather than a problem can be both unsettling and liberating. It invites us to move beyond the endless search for a single fix and instead focus on adaptation, resilience, community, and wise action. The question shifts from "How do we solve this?" to "How do we respond in ways that protect what matters, reduce suffering, and help us navigate an uncertain future with integrity and purpose?"

Enshittification

Enshittification is a term coined by Cory Doctorow to describe the gradual decline in the quality of online platforms, products, and services as they prioritize profits over the needs of users. The process often begins with a platform offering genuine value to attract users, then shifting its focus toward advertisers, investors, or other stakeholders until the user experience steadily deteriorates.

Many people see enshittification as an example of a broader pattern playing out across society. It reflects how systems built around short-term profit and endless growth can eventually undermine the very qualities that made them valuable in the first place. In this sense, enshittification is not just a technology story. It is also a reminder that healthy systems require stewardship, accountability, and a commitment to serving people rather than extracting value from them.

Omnishambles

An omnishambles is a situation in which multiple problems, failures, and crises are occurring simultaneously, creating a sense of widespread dysfunction and confusion. The term originated in British political satire and is often used to describe organizations, institutions, governments, or systems where nearly everything appears to be going wrong at once.

Unlike a polycrisis, which emphasizes how different crises interact and amplify one another, an omnishambles focuses on the visible experience of disorder, incompetence, and cascading failures. It describes the feeling that no single issue can be isolated because problems seem to be emerging from every direction at the same time.

Many people experiencing collapse awareness use the term humorously to describe the state of the modern world. Rising climate impacts, political polarization, economic uncertainty, failing infrastructure, information overload, institutional mistrust, and social fragmentation can create the impression that we are living through an omnishambles.

While the term is often used with a dose of dark humor, it points to a serious reality: our challenges are increasingly interconnected and difficult to address in isolation.

Planetary Boundaries

Planetary boundaries are the ecological limits within which humanity can safely operate without destabilizing the Earth's life-support systems. The framework identifies critical areas such as climate change, biodiversity loss, freshwater use, and pollution, helping us understand where human activity is placing increasing pressure on the planet.

Planetary boundaries are not predictions of collapse. They are warning lights on the dashboard, helping us recognize where adaptation, restoration, and systemic change may be needed to support a thriving future on a finite planet.

Approaches and Frameworks For Responding To Our Predicament

Collapse Awareness

Collapse awareness is the recognition that many of the systems we depend on, including ecological, economic, political, social, and cultural systems, are under increasing strain and may not continue functioning as they have in the past. It emerges when people begin to see that climate change, biodiversity loss, resource depletion, economic instability, political polarization, and social fragmentation are not isolated events, but interconnected challenges unfolding simultaneously.

For many people, collapse awareness begins as a shift in perception. News stories that once seemed unrelated start to reveal larger patterns. Assumptions about progress, growth, stability, and the future begin to feel less certain. This can be disorienting. It often brings up feelings of grief, anxiety, anger, confusion, or loneliness, particularly in cultures that encourage us to believe that every problem can be solved and that the future will always be better than the past.

Importantly, collapse awareness is not the same as doomism, fatalism, or giving up. It does not require believing that civilization is ending or that catastrophe is inevitable.

Rather, it involves becoming more honest about the challenges we face and more willing to question assumptions that no longer match reality. It is an invitation to look directly at what is happening without turning away and without becoming consumed by despair.

Many people who become collapse-aware eventually discover that the experience is not only about loss. It is also about clarity. When we stop investing our energy in maintaining illusions, we can begin asking different questions. What is worth protecting? What skills are worth developing? What relationships matter most? How can we contribute to the well-being of our communities and the living world during a time of profound change?

For some, collapse awareness becomes a catalyst for psychological adaptation, community resilience, and meaningful action. It can deepen our appreciation for what remains, strengthen our connections with others, and inspire us to participate more fully in shaping what comes next. Rather than focusing solely on what is ending, collapse awareness invites us to pay attention to what is emerging and to consider the role we want to play in that unfolding story.

The Great Turning

The Great Turning is a term popularized by Joanna Macy to describe the profound societal shift from an industrial-growth society toward a life-sustaining civilization. Rather than focusing solely on what is breaking down, The Great Turning invites us to pay attention to the countless ways people are already creating more regenerative, compassionate, and resilient ways of living together.

According to Macy, this transformation is happening through three interconnected forms of action: slowing the damage being done to people and the planet, creating practical alternatives to existing systems, and changing the underlying values and worldviews that shape our behavior. The Great Turning is not a prediction or a guarantee. It is an invitation to participate in the transition toward a future rooted in ecological health, social justice, community resilience, and a deeper sense of belonging to the living world.

Deep Adaptation

Deep Adaptation is an approach developed by Jem Bendell that encourages people to prepare emotionally, socially, and practically for the possibility of significant societal and ecological disruption. Rather than focusing only on preventing crises, Deep Adaptation explores how individuals and communities can build resilience, strengthen relationships, and find meaning in a rapidly changing world.

The framework explores questions of resilience, relinquishment, restoration, and reconciliation. In practical terms, it asks us to consider what we want to keep, what we may need to let go of, what wisdom from the past could help us move forward, and how we can strengthen our relationships with ourselves, one another, and the living world.

For many people, Deep Adaptation provides a way to move beyond denial and despair toward meaningful action, community, and purpose in uncertain times.

The Great Simplification

The Great Simplification is a framework developed by Nate Hagens that explores how humanity may adapt to a future shaped by ecological limits, resource constraints, and the end of perpetual growth. Rather than seeing this transition solely as a crisis, The Great Simplification invites us to reimagine what a good life looks like by prioritizing community, resilience, meaningful work, and a healthier relationship with the living world.

Doomism

Doomism is a worldview or belief system characterized by the conviction that catastrophic outcomes are inevitable and that efforts to change course are largely futile. Doomism tends to focus on predictions about the future and often assumes that decline, collapse, or disaster cannot be meaningfully influenced.

People who embrace doomism may disengage from action because they believe the outcome is already determined. In this sense, doomism is less about what is happening and more about the conclusion that nothing we do matters.

Doomerism

Doomerism is more often used to describe an emotional, psychological, or cultural stance of cynicism, hopelessness, and resignation. A "doomer" is someone who believes the future is bleak and who may feel powerless, disengaged, or emotionally detached as a result.

While doomism refers more to the belief itself, doomerism often describes how that belief shows up in a person's attitude, behavior, or identity. Someone can experience moments of doomerism without fully subscribing to a doomist worldview.

Emotional, Psychological, And Cooperative Responses To Our Predicament

Solastalgia

Solastalgia is the distress people feel when their home environment changes in unwanted ways while they are still living there. Unlike nostalgia, which is homesickness for a place you've left, solastalgia is the grief of watching the place you love change around you.

Collapse Grief or Collapse Despair

Collapse grief/despair is the emotional response that can emerge when we recognize that familiar systems, expectations, or ways of life may be changing or disappearing. It often includes sadness, uncertainty, anger, and a longing for what has been lost or may never come to pass.

Climate Anxiety

Climate anxiety is the worry, fear, stress, or distress people experience when thinking about climate change and its impacts on the future. While it can feel overwhelming, it is often a reasonable response to real environmental challenges rather than a sign that something is wrong with you.

Climate Grief

Climate grief is the sadness, anger, heartbreak, or mourning that can accompany awareness of climate change and its consequences. People may grieve damaged ecosystems, lost futures, disrupted communities, or the changes already affecting people and places they love.

Eco-Anxiety

Eco-anxiety is a broader term for the emotional distress people feel about environmental destruction, biodiversity loss, pollution, habitat degradation, and ecological instability. It reflects our awareness that the natural world we depend on is changing in significant ways.

Eco-Grief

Eco-grief is the sorrow that arises when we witness the loss of ecosystems, species, landscapes, or natural places we care about. Like all forms of grief, it is a response to loss and a reflection of our connection to the living world.

Anticipatory Grief

Anticipatory grief is the grief we experience in advance of an expected loss. This is commonly used to describe the sadness people feel when a loved one is dying. People may feel anticipatory grief when contemplating future climate impacts, ecological decline, social disruption, or changes they believe are likely to occur.

Future Anxiety

Future anxiety is the persistent worry or unease people feel about what lies ahead. It often emerges during periods of uncertainty when familiar assumptions about stability, security, or progress no longer feel reliable.

Despairalysis

Despairalysis (a term created by Maya Frost) is the state of feeling so overwhelmed by fear, grief, uncertainty, or bad news that it becomes difficult to take meaningful action. It combines despair and paralysis, creating a sense of being emotionally stuck despite deeply caring about what is happening.

Active Hope

Active Hope, as described by Joanna Macy, is the practice of taking meaningful action toward a desired future even when outcomes are uncertain. Rather than waiting to feel hopeful, Active Hope invites us to participate in creating the conditions we wish to see.

Adaptation

Adaptation is the process of adjusting to changing conditions rather than resisting them. In the context of climate change and societal uncertainty, adaptation involves developing the skills, relationships, and strategies needed to navigate a changing world.

Psychological Adaptation

Psychological adaptation is the process of adjusting our thoughts, expectations, and emotional responses to changing realities. It helps people move from denial or overwhelm toward acceptance, flexibility, and constructive action.

Resilience

Resilience is the capacity to respond to challenges, setbacks, and disruptions without losing the ability to function, learn, and grow. Resilience does not mean avoiding difficulty. It means developing the flexibility and strength to move through it.

Community Resilience

Community resilience is the ability of a group of people to adapt, recover, and continue functioning during times of disruption, uncertainty, or change. Strong relationships, shared resources, trust, and local knowledge all contribute to resilient communities.

Emotional Resilience

Emotional resilience is the ability to experience difficult emotions without becoming overwhelmed or disconnected from life. It involves developing the capacity to navigate fear, grief, uncertainty, and stress while remaining engaged and responsive.

Collective Care

Collective care is the practice of recognizing that well-being is not solely an individual responsibility. It involves creating cultures, communities, and systems where people actively support one another's physical, emotional, and social needs.

Mutual Aid

Mutual aid is the practice of people supporting one another through shared resources, skills, and care. Unlike charity, mutual aid is based on reciprocity and the understanding that everyone has something to contribute and everyone may need support at different times.

Regenerative Communities

Regenerative communities are groups of people who actively contribute to the health and vitality of the social and ecological systems they depend upon. Rather than simply sustaining what exists, they seek to restore, renew, and strengthen relationships between people and the living world.

Bioregionalism

Bioregionalism is an approach to living that encourages people to organize their lives, communities, and economies around the characteristics of the places they inhabit rather than around political boundaries or global markets. A bioregion is typically defined by natural features such as watersheds, ecosystems, climate patterns, landforms, plants, animals, and the human communities that have adapted to those conditions over time.

At its heart, bioregionalism asks a simple question: What would it mean to live as if this place mattered? It encourages people to develop a deeper relationship with their local landscape, food systems, water sources, culture, and community. In a world shaped by climate change, ecological limits, and increasing uncertainty, many people see bioregionalism as a pathway toward greater resilience, stewardship, reciprocity, and a renewed sense of belonging to both place and community.

This list is not static. New words and phrases will be added as they emerge.

Have a suggestion or clarification?