Stories Sustain Us #20 – Grieving as a Process of Reconnection

In this conversation, Ari Simon shares their journey from New Jersey to California, detailing their early fascination with urban planning and the impact of significant life events, including the tragedy of 9/11 and the loss of friends. They discuss how these experiences shaped their identity and career path, leading them to work in climate justice and community engagement. Ari emphasizes the importance of addressing grief and loss within communities and how these themes have influenced their work and personal growth. During the conversation, Ari and Steven explore the profound connections between grief, community action, and eco-anxiety. Ari shares personal experiences that led to the creation of “Grief at Work,” a program designed to help individuals and organizations navigate grief in a supportive environment. They discuss the importance of acknowledging various forms of loss, including environmental losses due to climate change, and how grieving can serve as a vehicle for reconnection and resilience. The conversation emphasizes the need to break the taboo surrounding grief and create spaces for open dialogue about difficult emotions, ultimately fostering a more compassionate and understanding society.

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Transcript

Steven (00:00)
Hello and welcome to Stories Sustain Us, the podcast where we share stories of those working to make a positive impact on our world. I'm your host, Steven Schauer, and today we're diving into a conversation that intertwines personal loss, professional growth, and the power of community. My guest, Ari Simon, is a trailblazer in climate justice and a compassionate advocate for navigating grief in our lives and workplaces.

Ari's journey begins with an early fascination with cities and takes us through pivotal moments, including the life altering impact of 9-11, personal loss during college, and finding identity and purpose in Los Angeles. From these experiences, Ari has cultivated a profound understanding of grief, how it shapes us individually and collectively, how it's tied to our environmental challenges, and how it can inspire resilience and connection.

Whether through their professional focus on climate justice, their work creating safe spaces for grief and organizations, or their insights into eco anxiety, reminds us of the importance of honoring our shared humanity. Let me tell you a bit more about Ari before we get into this genuinely personal conversation about the power and purpose of grief and loss. Ari Simon is a facilitator, community engagement specialist, climate policy convener,

grief guide, leadership coach, and spiritual care practitioner. Ari's work equips people, organizations, and communities to recognize loss as a gateway for transformation rather than a liability. Their landmark program, Grief at Work, brings grief honoring and loss competent approaches to workplaces, policies, and programs, particularly for people working to address the climate crisis. Ari Weaves

a background in climate policy planning and management with a training in contemplative care, coaching, and end of life loss and support. They apply navigating loss and change to a myriad of personal, professional, and policy realms from one-on-one coaching to grief school classes and workplace trainings to government agencies. Ari's work is centered in Southern California and has reached thousands of participants across North America, moving leaders,

communities and teams forward on issues such as climate action and adaptation, mental health and wellbeing, queerness and gender inclusivity, and grief and loss. This episode is a heartfelt exploration of how loss, when acknowledged and embraced, can transform communities, foster healing, and inspire meaningful action. So settle in for an enlightening and deeply moving conversation with Ari Simon.

as we uncover the intersections of grief, sustainability, and hope for a loving future. Here on Stories Sustain Us, where we are inspiring action through the power of storytelling.

Steven (03:09)
All right, well Ari, welcome to Stories Sustain Us. Thank you so much for taking time to join me and talk with me a little bit about your story and some of the work that you're doing. I've been eagerly waiting a chance to speak with you, so thanks for joining me.

Ari (03:25)
Yeah, thanks for having me. It's nice to be here.

Steven (03:28)
And as I mentioned in the introduction of you, I came across your work in a Natural Resources Defense Council article from earlier this year. And I can't wait to dive into that and get into some of your work, but let's dive into your life first. So if you don't mind giving us your life story, where did you grow up and how did you get to where you are?

Ari (03:52)
Yeah, so I am originally from New Jersey, though parents, grandparents, even some great grandparents all from New York and New York City. so that really feels almost in some ways like like an ancestral home. I can't say I have all I don't. It's hard to sort of trace my connections to what's now Poland and Ukraine and we know what was Prussia. So.

Steven (04:19)
Wow, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Ari (04:22)
New York is kind of where I come back and root in my like, right, yes, this is the place that I know best. But I've been living in Southern California now for 16 years. And yeah, really kind of came originally to do my undergrad in urban planning and public policy. And so I think what was really fun is like, even though I grew up with kind of New York as my

concept of like a city and I loved cities growing up so much. I was so fascinated by them, especially New York, but then I got to learn this whole world of planning and policy and land and like even sort of ecology from this kind of California perspective from this, especially LA and Southern California perspective that just really in some ways expanded my imagination.

also made me have to sort of wrestle with maybe things I thought were the right way or, you know, that actually there's kind of no right way. Yeah. And so, you know, when I first kind of came to Los Angeles, I was just, I was really excited about downtown LA in particular because I just, really wanted that kind of dense urban

Steven (05:24)
Sure.

You

Ari (05:46)
center kind of life. I didn't even realize that was possible in LA. And I think what I'm very grateful for about downtown Los Angeles is that it's kind of just this, it's like a Petri dish of some of the greatest sort of urban challenges of the 21st century. And so really just getting to dive in and having it be my job on some level to sort of just know everybody's everything.

Steven (05:49)
Yeah.

Ari (06:16)
and really look at like, do we address the issues that come up in this place was kind of this amazing experience in my 20s. That, you know, then I think along the way, and especially in more recent years, I've like looked back on that time and just realized how much loss was kind of this underlying thing.

of so many of the issues happening there. But somehow in my work at City Hall and a lot of my work in the communities, like I just, I never felt equipped to have that conversation. We definitely didn't talk about it in our workplace. Yeah, it was just kind of this elephant in the room. And yeah.

Steven (07:02)
Yeah.

Kind of back you up a little bit in time to maybe understand a little bit more about your journey from New Jersey to LA. you're in middle school, high school over there on the East Coast. What was that like for you as a kid growing up there? You said you were always kind of fascinated by cities. What was that childhood draw to that urban environment or that interest in?

urban planning in city. Where did that start for you?

Ari (07:38)
Yeah, so I have an aunt who's like my second mother and she lived in New York City. And so I would spend weekends in the city all the time. My dad also commuted into New York City. yeah, so many, so many of my earliest childhood memories are like walking around her neighborhood in the Upper West Side and walking through Central Park and taking the subway. And it was just so stimulating. And it was

kind of outside of my sort of New Jersey suburb. It was like where I got to see life, life-ing. Just, I loved going to the Met. You I loved just like, yeah, the art and people. And it was the 90s. So was like roller skaters in Central Park. And yeah. And when I was a kid,

I had lots of different very sort of nerdy pastimes. And one was that I would just, I would draw this map. It was a totally imaginary, fictitious place. And I would take an eight and a half by 11 piece of paper and I would draw like a city grid. So there'd be some streets and buildings, cars, parking lots, subway stations, whatever. And then I finished that one eight and a half by 11, I'd flip it over.

tape another piece to it and it just got longer and longer and longer until it's, I still have it in my garage here at the house. And it's, mean, it's, I can't even hold it. It's so, and it's in many pieces and, but it's, know, at one time in late elementary school, we stretched it out around my entire elementary school. And I think it, you know, it was probably over a half a mile long. So I think,

Steven (09:02)
Yeah.

Awesome.

Wow.

Ari (09:28)
You know, my map and visiting cities and places was like, I guess my map and the drawing practice is how I made sense of the world. So if I would go to different places or I saw, you know, and I look back in my, you know, I was doing this map from age six till maybe 11. And so it's very, it's just my silly kind of imaginative regurgitation of what I was seeing, right? There's.

Steven (09:35)
Yeah.

Okay.

Sure.

Ari (09:56)
sprawling shopping centers and there's some skyscrapers and it's like this kind chaotic mess of things but I already was very concerned with like what forms made sense next to each other that like okay this place is gonna have a lot of density and this place is gonna have more farms this place has a lot of like targets and Starbucks's and you know like so yeah

Steven (10:15)
Yeah. So you were already envisioning the practical as well as the aesthetic. You were kind of putting those pieces together already.

Ari (10.27)
Yeah, I clearly was. It was just a sponge. And then this was my way of kind of getting it out and making it sort of my own or having my own personal kind of connection. Yeah.

Steven (10.29)
That's wonderful. Yeah, that's wonderful.

Sure, making sense of it. yeah. That's wonderful. I appreciate it. Thank you for sharing that story. Yeah, that helps me kind of see the early formations of where you moved on to later in life. So you stopped doing this around 11, you said, did you transition into something else that kind of kept that spirit of urban planning of cities alive or did you do like most teenagers and you were...

Ari (10:46)
Yeah.

Steven (11:09)
like a teenager and you moved on to exploring other things.

Ari (11:13)
Yeah, I think 11 was really a sort creative blockage point. A lot shifted. That was a really big year of shift in my life. I'm really aging myself, but we're in the reverse. I was 11 when September 11th happened. And I think just that time period was so like the kind of collective end of innocence.

Steven (11:31)
9-11 happened. Sure, sure, sure, sure.

Sure.

Ari (11:43)
I feel like was my literal like 11 year old also end of innocence? so, yeah, I was kind of a lonely middle schooler and by high school found my way to making sort of more friendships and social connections. But I think I always felt really different during that time. And just, yeah, it was kind of.

Steven (11:47)
Sure.

Ari (12:10)
probably thirsting for something else that I didn't know how to name or how to ask for that just felt like it had more depth, had more kind of, yeah, I was always sort of searching for the deeper meaning in things. But yeah, I think that was like not a cool or normative thing to do or be like as a middle schooler or high schooler. And so, yeah, I kind of just.

Steven (12:16)
Sure.

Yeah.

Ari (12:40)
tried my best to go with the flow. But yeah, you know, was like, and then I think was sort of felt like I could explore like music or art, like, but I couldn't do it. I couldn't be the artist. I couldn't be, I could appreciate it, but I had to have some distance. Yeah. Yeah.

Steven (12:55)
Mmm. creative blockage was real. Yeah. Yeah. That makes more sense to me because that choice of words, that your creativity was blocked by 9-11. That's a... And then just...

Ari (13:12)
Yeah, and just, you know, like being a, yeah, being a middle schooler, being like a overweight, not cool, you know, just like dealing with other kids, not knowing my place in the world. Yeah.

Steven (13:18)
Yeah, just...

Yeah.

Yeah, I can appreciate that. mean, my younger years, was a soccer player. You know, that's kind of where I maybe expressed my creativity was on the field. But the idea of being an artist or, you know, writing poetry, I kind of did that quietly on the side, you know, didn't let anybody know that that's what I did until much later in life as an adult. Because, yeah, it was just kind of hard to hard for me to

address some of those things with the young mind that was just trying to make sense of the world. So yeah, I can appreciate that. You're part of your story. So how did you decide?

Ari (14:09)
Yeah, well, and I feel like that's, well, I was gonna say that's such a key piece of getting me to like Los Angeles in some way too, right? Is that.

Steven (14:12)
Be please.

That's what I was gonna ask. How did that happen?

Ari (14:22)
Right, so my said aunt who lived in New York moved to Southern California. So I started going out there every summer and just loved it, loved the palm trees and just, yeah, I think they're just, I kind of caught the California bug. But I think once I was there, it was almost like I finally had this place where I could bring these sort of...

Steven (14:27)
Okay?

Ari (14:50)
abstract ideas or things that I tended to vary by myself or alone and could actually start kind of exploring and experimenting with, whether that be kind of learning about, you know, different kinds of urban planning forms and seeing them in action in all these different ways around LA to being in a community of like artists and writers and creatives and

seeing myself as like not separate from that and getting to explore that. yeah, it also really allowed my own sense of identity to flourish as a queer person. just, yeah, really like, I mean, it feels so cliche, but just kind of, you know, there was like, I grew up with a lot of like sort of Northeast liberal elite kind of values that, you know,

Steven (15:20)
Right on.

Yeah.

Ari (15:46)
are have a lot of ideas about what belongs on the shelf, what doesn't, what's the successful things to be, what are not, you know, and I think the world that I got to just kind of dive into in LA was just really rejecting that model and really, or like messing with it in other ways. And yeah, that felt so, I think just like,

Steven (15:51)
Mm. Mm-hmm.

Ari (16:16)
exciting, kind of like a breath of fresh air. And it felt, really helped me feel like I could start to figure out like who the hell I am and what am I doing with this life?

Steven (16:25)
Sure, sure. Sounds like you're describing to me like a liberating experience, know, kind of finding yourself and finding some freedom in that. So I don't know if I'm putting words to it that you're not meaning, but that's what I'm interpreting from what you're sharing. So where did you end up going to school then? Was it UCLA, or what did you end up doing? which?

Ari (16:46)
Yep, got it. was an undergrad at USC and yeah, I will be polite and say that I had a great college experience. I could talk for hours in a very critical way of USC, I will, but my overall experience there,

Steven (16:59)
You don't have to be.

Ari (17:14)
was a really good one because of how kind of challenging and dynamic it was. so kind of a pivotal piece of that is that, so my sophomore year of college, my best friend and roommate died in a car accident. And our other best friend who's still a dear friend of mine was his girlfriend at the time. And they were like, you know, they lovers from

first site and she was driving and it was just a horrific accident. And so, I think before that, I spent my freshman year just being a really excited 18 year old, 19 year old on this campus and being involved in tons of stuff and getting involved in like environmental sustainability stuff on campus.

Steven (17:46)
Yeah.

Ari (18:12)
And I think my sophomore year already I was struggling of just being like, wait, what is LA? Why am I here? This is so, why can't I walk the kind of places that my friends who are going to school in New York are doing? like, wait, this is, you know, why did I choose a school like USC when I'm so much more interested in like the liberal arts? And so then I think when my best friend and roommate died, it just like really

was such a big shift to really be like, what really matters? Like what really matters and seeing just how much actually like community matters and how life is really short and precious. And I think honestly, that was like a big, it was almost a big coming out experience. I don't think I've ever described it that way before, but it just really was like.

Steven (18:55)
Yeah.

Mmm.

Ari (19:09)
You know, I, wasn't like I necessarily changed my sexuality label, but I, all of a sudden was just like, you know, as someone who was assigned male at birth, like I just, and was still identifying as as a man at that point, I just kind of gave myself permission to like date other men and experience things that I don't know if I would have really let myself experience if I hadn't had that kind of,

Steven (19:31)
Yeah.

Ari (19:39)
like really coming to a head kind of tragedy of like how unpredictable life can be. And the other piece I'll speak to about it, cause I do feel like it's really relevant to what I do with my work now is that I also just saw how little to no support me and my community got from the university. And at the time,

Steven (19:45)
Yeah.

Yeah.

And just for clarity, I'm following you. The queer community, I want to make sure I'm attaching what community are we referencing so I can make sure that I'm following you, what support you didn't get.

Ari (20:09)
I didn't know.

no, I'm just... Sorry, yeah.

Sorry, in the wake of this death of my roommate and friend, that those of us who were affected by this loss, yeah, that just...

Steven (20:30)
Just your community of friends. Right. Okay.

Thanks for clarifying that, wanted to make sure I was following your story.

Ari (20:35)
Yeah.

Totally. We just so, so did not receive the kind of care, support, et cetera, that I think anyone going through that on a college campus deserves, anyone going through that kind of anywhere deserves. But at the time, I was 20 years old and I had no idea, like we don't know what we don't know. And I didn't.

Steven (20:55)
Sure. Sure.

Right, right.

Ari (21:08)
even know like what I could have asked for or how to advocate for myself or and I think that has really shaped just so much about how I kind of see the world and that like yeah that just this was like not okay and actually we deserved way better and

Steven (21:32)
Yeah.

Ari (21:35)
especially it's, you know, I was at an extremely well-funded university with lots of resources and, you know, one of the top ranked social work programs in the United States. So of all places, like, it's not like the resources weren't there or procurable. It just, you know, it's just that idea that like,

I don't know, our systems and institutions still so often don't know what the hell to do when loss arises and when grief enters the chat.

Steven (22:10)
Yeah. So how then did you start to evolve your career? I mean, that does sound like it's such a pivotable and powerful part of your life story. I'm my deepest condolences for the loss of your friend, but clearly that was also a pivot point in your life where, you know, that is kind of tracked along with you, it seems like in your career. So from this...

20 year old figuring life out and not knowing what you don't know to your career path. How did that sense of the significance of grief and being having safe places to talk about, identify it, name it, speak about it. Like how did that kind of follow you in the ensuing years until you get to where you are now that that's kind of what you're really trying to help others understand.

Ari (23:05)
Yeah, I feel like I love the way you described it as if it like, has this been this kind of thread that's always been with me or following me? Because yeah, you know, for a lot of years, I wouldn't have been able to even name how much it impacted me. Because I spent a lot of my 20s, you know, always finding my own ways to like resist and be my own weirdo. But like also,

Steven (23:21)
Sure. Sure.

Ari (23:32)
following suit, I still wanted the job at City Hall on some level. I still wanted to like be at all the public events and galas and be at the community meetings. And that's really how I kind of linked to my self-worth for most of my 20s. And so I think it's what shifted is then just a lot of kind of aha moments that I'd say started in.

kind of 2017, 18, maybe even earlier a little bit. I'd say in 2016, just so many of the people in my orbit were starting to get really engaged in the Black Lives Matter movement. that summer just brought a lot of particularly horrific deaths at the hands of police violence. And this was four years before George Floyd, but you

Steven (24:03)
Okay?

Mm-hmm.

Ari (24:31)
Philando Castile and others, Eric Garner had just been the year before that. And so I just, think there was like this, that kind of was a big opening of like, right. There's like so much, and I'm working for the city, you know, and there's this tension of right. I worked for a city council member running a field office for downtown LA.

Steven (24:51)
Yeah, what were you doing for the city at the time?

Ari (25:00)
So kind of everything constituent services, everything kind of troubleshooting and being out in the community for downtown LA was like me and my teams purview. so I'd say like getting sort of a little more politically thoughtful. And then really just, I'd say kind of having a pretty difficult experience working at the city where

Steven (25:00)
Okay.

Yeah, yeah.

Ari (25:30)
yeah, the politician I was working for was like not a very trustable human being. he is now awaiting his prison sentence. which I didn't know the degree to which like that was going on at the time, cause it was really shielded from us. like it, I can look back and be like, yeah, of course, this is like a really corrupt system. and I think just starting to then.

Steven (25:39)
Mm.

Sure.

Ari (25:58)
After I left City Hall, my first big project was working on LA County's Countywide Sustainability Plan. And I started kind of just, everything started shifting around 2018. started, I worked with an amazing life coach. I was starting to sort of deepen my practice in Zen Buddhism and doing meditation a lot more. I moved to a little cabin in the woods with my ex-partner. Still kept my place in LA, but was like,

Steven (26:17)
Yeah.

Ari (26:28)
just starting to really shift what mattered most to me. And I think starting to do climate work and then getting to directly work with these community-based organizations and nonprofits that are really on the front lines of climate justice was like this, door opening of like another piece of the puzzle revealed to me of like, right.

When we're doing climate policy work, loss is just like one layer deep rather than maybe in other policy arenas, it's like four or five or six layers deep.

Steven (27:07)
Sure. Yeah, I like the way you described it. I couldn't agree more. Yeah.

Ari (27:12)
I'm like, cool. We're getting to get into some like existential shit together of like, you know, like, like what are the ramifications of land use and the ways that they have put, you know, cause major harm on people's lives about where power plants and oil extraction and all these kinds of things happen or where freeways are put and how that affects air quality for, you know, and like all of sudden it was like, right, right, right.

Steven (27:36)
Yeah.

Yep.

Ari (27:41)
And I just, it was like, I could feel how much my heart was sort of coming back online. It was like, yep, yep, yep. You love this. You love being able to like have these kind of deep personal conversations. And I loved that at my work at City Hall too. It was my favorite part. My favorite part was just getting to show up with community members and like make them feel heard and troubleshoot.

Steven (27:51)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Ari (28:08)
and use this language of policy and planning to try to sort of bring some, you know, answers or actions to the table.

Steven (28:16)
It's trying to help, right? Right.

Ari (28:19)
and then, yeah, that kind of just, but 2018 and 19 was this very sort of like, I couldn't have even told you at the time what was happening, but, I also started doing some hospice volunteering in my new town I lived in, which I still live in. And I, and then in 2019, my cousin Tess died, riding her bike to work in San Francisco. And that was such a pivotal.

Steven (28:36)
Yeah.

Mm.

Ari (28:49)
moment for me because I got to show up in the Bay and see how her community mourned that loss and grieved. And that both looked like the most like beautiful memorial service I've ever been to that just totally stretched my imagination of like how we can memorialize in a way that really looks like someone's life honors their life rather than this kind of prescriptive top-down

Steven (29:18)
Sure.

Ari (29:19)
kind of ways that I'd always seen it growing up. and her communities and like all of the different communities that she was a part of organized so quickly and took so much action and like took to the streets, literally. mean, and, before she died, there were no separated bike lanes in the Soma and even most of the mission neighborhoods in San Francisco, basically anything south of market street. And,

you know, mayor at the time London Breed, even named test by name when the city agreed that they would put in separated bike lanes. And so I think I just had this like, I'd already seen it again in like, the Black Lives Matter movement, I'd already seen it in these couple places, I'd already seen it in climate justice, but then really to just see it in my own life and in my own extended family and just see the ways that like, right, when we actually

Steven (29:57)
that they needed to do that, yeah.

Yeah.

Ari (30:17)
tend to grieving on a shared community level, like shit can transform. There is really, this is a very potent vehicle for action. And I just, again, it was another, my heart was like, yep, like this is what matters to me. This is what I'm here for. So yeah, I got like a little lovely arts grant based in LA to do a...

Steven (30:28)
Yes.

Ari (30:47)
extracurricular convening called Queering Death, where I just, I decided I really wanted to get people together to learn and talk about the intersections between death, dying and grief, and queer identity and LGBTQ lives and history. And by crazy coincidence, our first day of what was supposed to be our in-person cohort was March 13th, 2020.

Steven (30:57)
Yeah.

Ooh, what happened that day? I don't remember.

Ari (31:14)
What happened around then? History lesson for anyone listening far into the future. That's the day that we plunged into lockdown for COVID-19.

Steven (31:19)
Wow. Yes.

Everything shut down, yes.

Ari (31:30)
And so all of sudden, I was doing some more consulting work in the climate planning world at the time, but losing some of my contracts due to COVID. But all of a sudden, just had this coaching practice and this incredibly just amazing community container that I was getting the honor to facilitate, where we were really just directly like,

Steven (31:41)
Sure, sure.

Ari (31:56)
The intention was to be learning together, but really, I mean, we were just my god. We were just kind of holding each other's hands through March, April, May, and June 2020.

Steven (32:03)
Yeah, holding each other up. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Ari (32:08)
So, yeah, that's kind of the journey that really was the universe kicking me in the butt that was like, this is it. Like, keep going.

Steven (32:20)
Nice, nice. Well, thank you for telling that story of how you got from, you know, the little kid drawing maps and creating cities in New Jersey suburbs of New York to who you are today, helping people with grief workshops and your organization, your program, Grief at Work. Do you want to talk a little bit about that? And then, you know, we can probably sprinkle in

discussions around kind of what spurred this conversation, climate anxiety, eco anxiety, and just the significance of honoring, naming and honoring grief so that we can be more resilient. I love the tie because it's real. It's my personal experience I can appreciate. That's why I've been so eager to speak with you because I want to absorb some of your

knowledge as well. what does grief at work? What is it and what do folks need to know about it?

Ari (33:27)
Yeah, thanks for asking. yeah, would say grief at work is kind of my primary offering, which is really sort of, know, in some ways it's almost more of a modality than anything else that I use about how I show up when I do consulting and facilitation work with workplaces and teams and communities, which kind of sometimes that looks like staff trainings.

Sometimes that looks like one-off workshops or even like a retreat. And sometimes that actually just looks like a sort of loss, honoring grief-informed planning process or strategic planning process. But either way, it's really getting to this sort of what I believe is reality. And thankfully, I have a lot of thought partners and other people who agree that like,

that our only way forward is to really let loss and grief stop being so taboo and just accept it as sort of part of the conditions of what make us a human and what can actually really bring us together and connect us and move us forward rather than it being some liability that it's actually something that we can move towards with each other that has all kinds of, you know, healthy benefits.

Steven (34:55)
Well, so tell me a little bit about what it is then that if someone, know, hires you to do a one-off workshop or maybe something more extensive with their staff, you know, what are some of the things that you do to help folks starting, I guess, let me back up one second before I get to that question, because I think what I'm thinking right now is in my own journey, I'm...

I'm coming up on 19 years sober and have worked for a lot of these last two decades on getting comfortable being uncomfortable, like learning how to feel my emotions. I didn't know how to do that. didn't know how to have a human experience. I just didn't know how to process that, which is why alcohol and, you know, was such a

a great thing for a little while in my life because it shut down the brain and shut down the higher functions and those kinds of things just kind of numbed it out. that's not healthy for many reasons. And eventually, thankfully, I figured that out and got onto this sober journey. And I'm so grateful that as part of my journey, I've been able to know more emotions than just happy, sad, and mad.

giant lovely spectrum of emotions and some of them are comfortable like joy and awe and some of them are hard to feel like grief and despair but they all make up what I am which is a human and I don't want to miss any of them. So being able to name an emotion and sit with an uncomfortable emotion like grief, know, anxiety and not shoot away, not stuff it, not pretend it's not there.

but to be able to name it, identify it, and be curious about like, why are you here? What information are you trying to share with me and how is it helpful? Or how can I be helpful with that feeling? And I'm just curious because of that background in me, is that what you kind of help people do is try to break down that taboo of let's talk about the hard stuff.

find safe places to explore those feelings that, you know, maybe you were taught to not talk about, but that's, let's talk about it. Let's talk about these things that are hard and that are uncomfortable and, and hurt. Is that kind of what you do or, if not, tell me what you do.

Ari (37:36)
Yeah, some, yeah, yeah. Well, I'll just, I just want to reflect that like, hmm, I'm just, I'm just really appreciating your own journey and like how much it sounds like you've, yeah, I love the way you spoke of like getting comfortable with the uncomfortable. And I think it's even, I think I have that line somewhere on my website, like creating comfortable spaces to get uncomfortable.

Steven (38:03)
Yeah, yeah.

Ari (38:03)
And so to me, guess, like, you know, I'm such a big picture, Aquarian weirdo that like, I, I take it from an even sort of bigger place where it's like, why is this uncomfortable? Like, let's kind of, can we look at that layer? Like, as like, who taught us that, that grieving is inherently uncomfortable?

Steven (38:15)
Okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Ari (38:33)
Now I'm not suggesting it's not. In fact, it's like, it can be really fucking brutal. But, you know, like, yeah, like even just this idea that it's like, well, now we need to get uncomfortable. It's like, actually, some of my favorite moments in this life and my most like comforting or comforted moments is when I'm like, you share humanity with me. we're like, we both were feeling this similar thread or wow.

Steven (38:39)
Right.

Yes. Yes.

Ari (39:02)
I never felt the way you did, but I'm learning so much from what you were experienced. And actually, can we see how comforting and thus comfortable that can be? So that sometimes is part of it. But then sometimes, course, workplaces and planning processes, you know.

Steven (39:15)
Yes.

Ari (39:27)
I think it can feel like a liability to get in the fields or to, know, this isn't therapy, this is work. so it's, I, I do want to be clear that it's like, I have held processing spaces where we really just talk about the grief that's in the room. But this also can look very applied and you know, it's also totally appropriate for

colleagues to like not share every detail of their personal lives with each other. We don't have to that either. It's more about like, like, especially and this is why primarily I do this in the climate arena, but I've done this elsewhere too, but it's like loss is inevitable. And what are we doing with that? Are we acknowledging it when it arises?

Steven (39:57)
Of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Ari (40:21)
Do we have a process for how it works when someone needs extra time and space because of that loss? Do we have mechanisms for that where we support each other in that way? Again, this is like, I think how it ties back to my college experience, Versus I feel like what our status quo so often is, is we just, no, no, we're not gonna talk about it, shove it under the rug. And then,

Steven (40:33)
Sure, yeah,

Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep. Hide it and march on.

Ari (40:49)
Right, and then guess what? It's not going anywhere. And so, you know, I think sometimes resistance I get to this work is they're like, well, we don't want to open up a can of worms. Because if we start letting people feel sad and angry and really, you know, and they're, and I, right. And I just, was just having a meeting with someone earlier where we talking about this. And I said to her, I was like, the worms are already here. Like.

Steven (41:05)
start letting people be human.

Ari (41:16)
The aluminum can between you and the worms is very flimsy. it's, they're already worms. So what do we want to do with that? Like, and actually the best thing to do is like get in touch with the worms, free the worms, like let them go. So I think, you know, a lot of times it's just another piece of this that I think is important. It sounds like a,

sidebar, but it feels really related is that when I work on grief and loss with workplaces and teams and communities or in planning processes, I'm not just talking about death. Death is a huge, and that's part of what I think I offer in these kinds of you described, like what's a workshop look like? And so we talk about how, of course, death and bereavement is a major loss that makes a huge impact on our lives. And

Steven (41:48)
Yeah, please tell me.

Ari (42:14)
it is so not the only loss that requires grieving. And really, you know, just my own, definition I use for grieving is grieving is just this natural, necessary, psychological and somatic embodied process for how we repair and reconnect after loss. Because loss, going through a loss, and this is like very, you know, proven in the neuroscience and trauma world,

Steven (42:31)
Yeah, party, yeah.

I like that.

Ari (42:44)
Loss creates a rupture. So when we experience major loss, like our inner working system experiences this disconnect, which is why like if when we experience the death of a loved one or we get, know, last week was the election and for many of us that was a very upsetting, shocking, hard to deal with event. Clearly for other people it was not.

But I will just name that last Wednesday, I definitely did not have the ability to work very well. I lost my sense of appetite. And I really didn't have a good sense of what time it was that day. Because that's what happens. That's literally like we... And so expecting our workforce or things to just keep going in motion when that rupture happens is cruel. And it's...

Steven (43:30)
That's your rupture, right?

Ari (43:43)
faulty to kind of, you know, think that that's possible anyway. And so grieving is just this mechanism that helps us reestablish connection with ourselves, with others, and move forward in this kind of, you know, resilient way, rather than that rupture just becoming permanent. And that permanent rupture is trauma.

Steven (44:04)
Yes.

Let me play off something that you just said, this idea that grief doesn't have to necessarily be about death, that it's this loss. In the article, the NRDC article that I kind of discovered you in, they talk about a 2017 American Psychological Association definition of eco-anxiety.

And that's described as a chronic fear of environmental doom that can affect wellbeing through the loss of social identity and cohesion, hostility, violence, and interpersonal and intergroup aggression. So I think that kind of gets to what you're talking about. It's not necessarily death that is all that grief is about it. It is this loss and in the realm of eco-anxiety, it's, I feel

you know, a species, you know, I just had this week, a show was about the monarch butterflies. And there's, you know, certainly people that are worried about that creature, maybe not being with us, you know, because of climate change and its habitat being damaged or destroyed or not available for it in its life cycle. So is the monarch butterfly going to remain a species with us or not? And there's loss around that for those who

may care about that species. So it seems to me you're tying your work into not just death, but in the realm of climate anxiety or eco anxiety, it's helping people grieve those things that they may be losing because of climate change. Am I articulating that accurately?

Ari (45:54)
A hundred percent. I actually just two months ago got to do an event at Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn, which is one of my favorite places. Anyway, just such an amazing intersection of kind of like public space and parkland and nature and also death and grief honoring. And they do amazing arts and cultural program. And so they brought me in for NYC Climate Week.

to do an event on memorializing ecological loss. And it was such an interesting both conversation with some panelists, so grateful to bring together with then this really fun kind of group activity where we were all designing kind of memorials and monuments and almost imagining like, what would a planetary cemetery look like to us? Right, and so that even is just an example of, right, like we're...

Steven (46:23)
Mm, yeah, right on.

Yeah.

Ari (46:52)
There are so many different kinds of losses, in the sense of climate change, to me, eco-anxiety is a kind of anticipatory grief. So if we have a strong belief that a major loss is going to happen or that we are going to experience, we will start grieving. Not intentionally, but just the body and the mind will start doing.

Steven (47:22)
Sure.

Ari (47:22)
And so, you know, I think, and then when unattended to, of course, it can look, you know, not like, you know, like very difficult kinds of and sometimes not very loving and sometimes even potentially harmful kinds of kinds of experiences. But yeah, it's, you know, I think so, like, how do we address eco anxiety to me is kind of

grieving is necessary in how we address eco-anxiety. Again, if we just are like, don't feel that, well then it's not going anywhere. And there's kind of this, know, it's not to make a false binary, but there's kind of a two-fold path of like, it can help spur us to take action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and make our, you know, to actually like address climate change. And the reality is that climate change is happening.

there is going to be species loss and there is going to be habitat loss. It's already happening. And so rather than, you know, then like we need some kind of grieving processes for that. That's why I loved this idea of like the planetary cemetery, right? Like how are we going to grieve the species that no longer is or even

Steven (48:23)
Yeah, is species loss happening already. Right, right.

Ari (48:44)
the place you used to go as a kid that no longer looks like how it used to look like when you were growing up, or a place that people you knew lived that now is too threatened by sea level rise to be able to kind of hold human dwellings. And I think there's so much that traditional ecological knowledge and First Nations and indigenous leaders can teach us on this. I think there's like really

Steven (49:11)
Yeah.

Ari (49:13)
There's amazing voices like from Joanna Macy's work to I love Robin Wall Kimmerer and Braiding Sweetgrass. There are these amazing people who are really thinking about that sort of like, do we be in right relationship with landscapes, habitats, species, and even humans that are changing all the time.

And I think, yeah, again, like grieving doesn't mean that the loss goes away, but it does mean we have some kind of process for reconnecting.

Steven (49:53)
Reconnecting, right. That's where the, how do we adapt and how do we strengthen our resiliency by acknowledging and honoring the grieving process. Cause we may not get back the things that we lost. how do we, know, honor each other's sorrow, if you will, but then adapt and move forward and make better choices, healthier choices and.

demonstrate resiliency. I think that's what I'm getting out of your work as well that's so powerful. It's not just simply, as I understand it, let's just focus on the grief, but it's this bigger picture of we have to focus on the grief so we can then adapt as we move forward. And I love the reconnection part that you're talking about because that's being disconnected from ourselves, from a community.

from our larger community, our world, that's gonna lead us nowhere more positive. So we need those connections. I think I'm seeing the bigger picture of your work of honoring grief so that we can adapt to reconnect and move forward in a resilient manner. Is that kind of the process that you're describing?

Ari (51:09)
Yeah, because I think to me, like grief is an emotion and experience, you know, but to me, grieving is a vehicle. Like grieving is a, it's a process. It's almost like, and I almost wanna almost push back on it being an emotion. It's to me, like I'm grieving is akin to saying like,

I'm pregnant or I'm aging. It's like, it is an active process of becoming. And of course, I think especially akin to aging, like aging is not something a lot of us want to become or do. It's hard, it's scary, it's vulnerable, and it's inevitable, and there's no escaping it. And it's really obvious when a lot of people in our world

Steven (51:48)
yeah I like that

Ari (52:07)
try to not do it. you know, I think that often creates a lot more suffering. And so similarly, it's like, right, like I'm we're grieving is it's here. It's here anyway. And I think it is this just right. It's just a really powerful process to kind of just bring us back online, back in connection together again, trusting each other more.

Steven (52:13)
Right, right.

Ari (52:36)
with our hearts, our whole selves. And I think for me, this is why I do believe in the public sector. I do believe in government. Some of my friends are more anarchist than I am. We have a lot of shitty systems that are totally because they were designed with oppression baked in.

And then there's also, but there's also always going to be systems like, and I'm really grateful that I get organic produce on my table and I'm grateful that my lights turn on and I'm grateful that I flush the toilet and it goes somewhere like, and I would adapt if I didn't have those things. like, you know, I think what really concerns me though is just seeing, and this is why it was so great to partner with NRDC and do some workshops with our staff is that like folks that are working

Steven (53:15)
Right.

Ari (53:32)
on climate policy and on climate issues, desperately need to be able to talk about and feel into this and support each other through this. Because what so often happens is just, yeah, it's like, again, it's like, we don't really talk about feelings in the workplace, no. But then they're looking at horrifically distressing data. They're hearing about or on the front lines of disasters and

Steven (53:41)
Yeah. Yeah.

Ari (54:02)
major climate emergencies. And then, you know, if there's like no, if there's no process and there's no sort of workplace community around those experiences, then like, of course they're not gonna serve communities very well if they themselves can't really be in their own process of processing grief.

Steven (54:18)
All

Right, or they'll get to the point of overwhelm or burnout, which in either scenario requires you to shut down and stop doing it because there just comes a point where you just can't keep pretending you don't have feelings.

Ari (54:39)
Yeah, or that like loss is here. And again, I think, like, I never want to make light of loss and I never want to make light of injustice. But I also firmly believe that we need to and deserve to approach this from a playful, curious place and actually see, again, it's like, I...

Steven (55:00)
Sure.

Ari (55:08)
I take great comfort in grieving. I, it's like how I, and this is why from the very sort of beginning, it's like, it's not like I'm so obsessed with death. It's just that I want to have, I want to get into the real stuff with you, you know? Like, I want to like, I want to really know like, why did you wake up this morning and what keeps you going? And clearly this is exactly what you want to know too. It's why it's so cool that you bring.

Steven (55:26)
Right, right.

Ari (55:37)
all of us in to like share our stories that sustain us. And I think this is like, this is how we do that. So it can feel good. It doesn't have to just be this like dark, horrible, shitty thing. I think actually it can feel very.

Steven (55:51)
Right. I think that's the power of paradox, right? I can acknowledge this hurts and it's hard and it's beautiful and wonderful at the same time. mean, some of the most amazing conversations I've ever had with people is when we've developed that trusting relationship over time that we can be truly vulnerable with each other and say,

these are the things that are really hurting me or that I'm grieving or that I'm afraid of or whatever that uncomfortable feeling may be. But because I have an outlet for that with someone that I trust in a safe space to talk about those things, it's so amazing and so beautiful and so powerful to have those conversations about real things. I love it. I could keep...

I'm talking to you for hours. Ari, I'm loving this conversation, but I also want to be respectful of your time and we're getting pretty close to an hour and I want to make sure I give you a chance to do a call to action now that hopefully folks who've listened to this or watching it feel inspired and moved and want to do something. So what can people do? What's your call to action for folks?

Ari (57:14)
Yeah, so, you know, like, we got to be in this together. And I think for anyone who's feeling like really misunderstood in their workplace, or like they're holding all these feelings that just don't seem to be sort of visible. I just, you know, you're not alone. And, and like,

the fact that we're aware of this to me is a good sign. It's a good sign that we're having this conversation. So I would say, some call to actions are on a couple of different arenas. There's like, if you wanna get sort of playful and curious about grieving, I am just.

loving this now it's been over a year that my collaborator, Kwon Yen and I have been doing grief school. It's just this like really sweet special space. kind of do these six week cohorts and just to really, yeah, be better grief guides for ourselves and others. It's a really loving, mostly online though we've been kind of popping up. We popped up in New York city this summer and hopefully doing another in-person one in a few months and.

And you know, and then also like be that person who brings this up at work. And if you need support in that or some talking points in that, you can just literally reach out to me. And there's a lot of us out there who can sort of support folks in that. And I think we also just have to really get our hands in the dirt and like hug a tree and take note of the birds and just like remember that we are just

little beans in this big planet and this planet is gonna outlive us. And that's hard pill to swallow sometimes, but it also can sort of be a place of comfort. Yeah.

Steven (59:22)
get out and hike every chance I get. I couldn't agree more with your get outside and put your feet in the grass or hug a tree or just take a hike, ride a bike, just do something to be outside whenever you can. It's such a powerful thing. Ari, what's your website? I want to make sure people know how to get in touch with you as well. We'll put it in the show notes as well, but just while I got you and people are listening and watching, why don't you tell people how they can get in touch with you?

Ari (59:52)
Yep, you can learn more about my practice and all the weird, wonderful things I do around grief and climate and facilitation and coaching at ari dot fyi. So it's ari.fyi.

Steven (1:00:07)
Perfect. We'll get that on the show notes as well for folks to follow up with you. All right, so I got three questions. We've been talking, I love your description about how this uncomfortable thing doesn't have to be uncomfortable. So I appreciate that. So I'm gonna say we've been talking about some things that are not uncomfortable, but some folks might think they are. And I always like to end the discussions talking a little bit about hope. So I'm gonna ask you.

three questions about hope and using kind of the clinical understanding of hope being you can have a vision for a better future. There's a plan, there's steps to take to effectuate that future and you feel you have a sense of agency that you can do something about it. You might not get there, you might not be successful, there might be failures along the way, definitely might be hard, but there's a vision.

a plan and you feel a sense of agency around it. So I'm just gonna ask you three quick questions about what you're hopeful for. So just kind of, don't spend too much time thinking about the answer. Just give your first kind of inclination of what you think. So the first question for you Ari is what is your vision for a better future? And it could be for you personally, professionally or for the world.

Ari (1:01:30)
My vision for a better future consists of one where we...

just find a way more loving way to do everything, period. And where we can, yeah, grieve together, honor things together, memorialize together, learn from each other, and just really, like, really commit to seeing that, when we, like, there's always gonna be stuff, there's always gonna be disagreement.

But I really think we can do this life in a more, in a less harmful way. And so like, just, yeah, realizing that like, we can just love each other and do our very best to cause as little harm as possible, I think is, that's my prayer hope.

Steven (1:02:28)
Nice. See, you touched on this a little bit in your answer, but just as a follow up to give you a little bit more space to explain, tell me why that's your vision.

Ari (1:02:39)
Hmm

You know, my Zen Buddhist teachers really come to mind on this and who really, I'm so grateful for this framework to really look at the oneness of all things and that there is no separateness and so much of what makes us suffer is this idea that you're you, I'm me, I'm not your stuff, you're not my stuff, them, those people there, that country, that, you know, and just like...

Steven (1:02:57)
Yep.

Ari (1:03:12)
It's literally killing us. so I think just, yeah, like, how do we not? I wanna see a world that finds its ways to navigate and move past suffering.

Steven (1:03:29)
Last question. Imagine we're there. Imagine the future that you just described exists today. How does that make you feel?

Ari (1:03:42)
I mean, the problem is it's delusional. Because there's always going to be suffering. But what do we do with it? I know, leaving you with such a like, of course, the Greek is like, suffering either way. But yeah, it's like, I think

Steven (1:03:57)
That is a Buddhist.

No, no, it's beautiful.

Ari (1:04:12)
Even if we're all aware that just like, okay, like suffering either way and we still are gonna do our best to end suffering, that leaves me just kind of laughing and with a smile and with this like, what a messy, weird, beautiful life this is.

Steven (1:04:31)
That's very hopeful. Laughter, smiling, even among suffering, that's beautiful. That's beautiful. Well Ari, thank you so much for joining me. I really am grateful for your time. I'm really grateful for the work that you're doing and the way you're trying to help make the world a better place. It's so important. I appreciate all that you're doing and everything you've said. So I'll leave you with the last...

word. So thank you for your time today, Ari.

Ari (1:05:03)
Thank you, Stephen, and thank you everybody listening. And yeah, we can do this.

Steven (1:05:11)
Perfect way to end. Thanks, Artie. Bye.

Steven (1:05:12)
What an incredible conversation with Ari Simon. I'm so grateful for this conversation with Ari and thank them for their time, expertise, and compassionate work. Ari's journey from New Jersey to California, shaped by pivotal events like 9-11 and the personal losses they endured, offers a profound look at how grief and resilience can transform not just our individual lives, but entire communities.

Through their work in climate justice and creation of grief at work, AHRI has shown us the importance of addressing grief openly, whether it's the loss of loved ones or the environmental losses we face due to climate change. Their insights on eco-anxiety, community engagement, and the power of grieving together remind us that even in the face of loss, there's an opportunity for connection, growth, and healing.

Ari's message about breaking the taboo around grief and creating safe spaces for meaningful dialogue is one we can all take to heart. It's a call to honor our shared humanity and to build a more compassionate and understanding society. You know, I mentioned in the discussion with Ari, my own personal journey, at least parts of it, in coming to get to a place where I've learned how to be comfortable being uncomfortable.

learning, how to be a human, like how to acknowledge that I have emotions, identify what they are, and be curious about them and what they can tell me and how they can help shape, my choices and my decisions. you know, I, in my past was someone who certainly identified with this idea that humans are rational and we occasionally have emotions that get in the way. I have

done a 180 on that and I've come to understand that in essence, humans are these emotional beings that occasionally have rational thought. So learning how to name and identify the whole wide array of emotional experiences that I can have as a human and learning how to develop and cultivate relationships and safe spaces.

to speak with others, friends, families, therapists as the case may be, but to be able to just identify name and talk about my emotional experiences, even the ones that are difficult or hard, has really led to this beautiful life that I get to live today and really led to me making better choices about how I can take care of myself and others in a kind and compassionate and loving way.

I really appreciated Ari's perspective on grief and loss in their reframing of grief, kind of breaking that taboo that, it's something that we shouldn't talk about. And it's something that should kind of be hidden in the dark. And Ari's perspective that no, in fact, we should talk about grief and loss in safe spaces, of course, with people that are, you know, trustworthy of that.

depth of a conversation and that vulnerability, but in having those conversations, those real conversations, that might be hard and difficult and painful. I really appreciate Ari's reframing of that to let's stop describing that as something that is, you know, bad and let's call it what it is. This is a part of being human and it's an important part of being human. And it is a way.

to develop and strengthen our resilience as humans, to go forward and make better choices and honor our shared humanity, honor our own personal humanity, and in doing that with others, connecting with others. I love that idea that he shared, that they shared about trauma and grief and loss being this disconnection. And by coming together and

Sharing our stories and talking about our grief and loss with others That brings us back together that creates that connection and we all need that connection, right? We're you know, humans are social creatures. We need to be connected to other people So if we're not honoring grief and loss and some of those other emotions that might be difficult to face We're not fully connecting with each other

And we need that, I think, in order to move forward and develop more sustainable, healthy ways to live together on this planet, the only place we can call home. So with that, again, I want to thank Ari for sharing their story and wisdom with us today. Ari's journey and work inspires me to approach grief with courage and to transform it into a force for positive change.

To the audience, to my audience, to those of you listening and watching, thank you for joining me and Ari on this emotional and enlightening episode. I hope like me, you were inspired by this conversation and will continue your journey bringing positive change to your community. If Ari's story resonated with you, please, I encourage you to share it with someone who might benefit from hearing it. And please be sure to subscribe, rate, and leave a review.

You know it. I really love all the support I've been getting for stories sustain us And with that, know what I started this show earlier this year not really knowing what to expect and with a personal goal of getting to 20 episodes and Today's discussion with Ari is episode number 20. So this is a bit of a milestone for me and the show

I'm grateful for each of the guests I've had the privilege to speak with during this first season of Stories Sustain Us. And I'm grateful for each of you for coming along on this ride with me. I've really been enjoying it. I hope you have been too. So as we approach the holiday season, I'm going to reshare a few of the top episodes from season one of Stories Sustain Us while I start gearing up to kick off season two in January. I already have some great interviews lined up.

And I'm excited to share some more inspiring sustainability stories with you. So next week on November 26, I will reshare stories sustain us episode number 13, the importance of awareness and support for HIV AIDS with guest Roy Hudgens. This will be available at storiessustainus.com wherever you listen to podcasts and on YouTube. And as always, let's keep working together to create a more sustainable.

Until next time, I'm Steven Schauer. Please take care of yourself and each other. Take care.