Climate Change Awareness Quotes

You lied to us. You gave us false hope. You told us that the future was something to look forward to. And the saddest thing is that most children are not even aware of the fate that awaits us. We will not understand it until it’s too late. And yet we are the lucky ones. Those who will be affected the hardest are already suffering the consequences. But their voices are not heard. Is my microphone on? Can you hear me?

The core of the ecological imbalance and global warming is the exploitation mindset. Nature is not for exploitation but exploration for better living, coexistence, co-caring, and co-growing.

I suspect that human beings were generally catastrophists at heart until their instinctive awareness of the earth’s unpredictability was gradually supplanted by a belief in uniformitarianism—a regime of ideas that was supported by scientific theories like Lyell’s, and also by a range of governmental practices that were informed by statistics and probability.

On climate change and other issues with moral implications, we tend to believe that everyone should care for the same self-evident reasons we do. If they don’t, we all too often assume they lack morals. But most people do have morals and are acting according to them; they’re just different from ours. And if we are aware of these differences, we can speak to them.

If you care about our living planet, it's time to take part in bringing awareness to our climate and extinction crisis.

The extent of the effects of climate change on individual regions will be enormous over time and will result in large scale changes in weather patterns and shifts in weather patterns. (Journal:Climate Change) By theamitkumarswords

We tend to cling to what we know and resist what is new—even when the new brings tremendous benefits. Opposition to onshore wind turbines in the UK is a good example. Even though onshore wind is now the cheapest form of energy6 (cheaper than coal, oil, gas, and other renewable sources), rural landowners have significantly resisted it, keen to preserve the appearance of the countryside. When the Conservative Party (which derives much of its support from these rural communities) came to power in 2015, it slashed subsidies and changed planning laws for onshore wind—leading to an 80 percent reduction in new capacity.7 Only now, with climate change awareness rapidly rising among the UK public, is support for onshore wind starting to outweigh an attachment to yesterday’s aesthetics.

As prison abolitionists, grassroots organizers, and practitioners of transformative justice, our vision for 2018 is one of clear-eyed awareness and discussion of the horrors of the prison system—and the action that awareness demands. As a society, we have long turned away from any social concern that overwhelms us. Whether it’s war, climate change, or the prison-industrial complex, Americans have been conditioned to simply look away from profound harms. Years of this practice have now left us with endless wars, dying oceans, and millions of people in bondage and oppressively policed. It is time for a thorough, unflinching examination of what our society has wrought and what we have become. It is time to envision and create alternatives to the hellish conditions our society has brought into being.

for the next century could raise the world’s temperature some 4°C (7.2°F), bringing serious coastal flooding and other damage.” The Conservation Foundation urged renewed funding for Keeling’s CO 2 project and pressed the National Academy of Sciences to pay attention to the subject. From then on, awareness of climate change ascended right along with the Keeling Curve. In 1971 Barry Commoner’s environmentalist bestseller, The Closing Circle, gave an early public warning about greenhouse gases. In 1978 a young congressman from Tennessee, Albert Gore, held hearings on global warming, starring his Harvard teacher Roger Revelle, who had sponsored the Keeling CO 2 research

Speaking before a joint session of Congress, President Johnson said: “This generation has altered the composition of the atmosphere on a global scale through . . . a steady increase in carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels.” It’s remarkable to note that, more than fifty years ago, an American president was already aware of, and acknowledging, human-created climate change. Johnson had been briefed on the dangers of CO 2 increases by the famous climate scientists Charles Keeling and Roger Revelle, among others. So, not only was Johnson aware of the issue, but he was already concerned enough to raise it before Congress. That single sentence in his address gives the lie to the claims of so many climate-change deniers that global warming is some kind of recent hoax.

We have dangerously warmed our world already, and our governments still refuse to take the actions necessary to halt the trend. There was a time when many had the right to claim ignorance. But for the past three decades, since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was created and climate negotiations began, this refusal to lower emissions has been accompanied with full awareness of the dangers. And this kind of recklessness would have been functionally impossible without institutional racism, even if only latent. It would have been impossible without Orientalism, without all the potent tools on offer that allow the powerful to discount the lives of the less powerful. These tools - of ranking the relative value of humans - are what allow the writing off of entire nations and ancient cultures. And they are what allowed for the digging up of all that carbon to begin with.

As a society we are only now getting close to where Dogen was eight hundred years ago. We are watching all our most basic assumptions about life, the universe, and everything come undone, just like Dogen saw his world fall apart when his parents died. Religions don’t seem to mean much anymore, except maybe to small groups of fanatics. You can hardly get a full-time job, and even if you do, there’s no stability. A college degree means very little. The Internet has leveled things so much that the opinions of the greatest scientists in the world about global climate change are presented as being equal to those of some dude who read part of the Bible and took it literally. The news industry has collapsed so that it’s hard to tell a fake headline from a real one. Money isn’t money anymore; it’s numbers stored in computers. Everything is changing so rapidly that none of us can hope to keep up. All this uncertainty has a lot of us scrambling for something certain to hang on to. But if you think I’m gonna tell you that Dogen provides us with that certainty, think again. He actually gives us something far more useful. Dogen gives us a way to be okay with uncertainty. This isn’t just something Buddhists need; it’s something we all need. We humans can be certainty junkies. We’ll believe in the most ridiculous nonsense to avoid the suffering that comes from not knowing something. It’s like part of our brain is dedicated to compulsive dot-connecting. I think we’re wired to want to be certain. You have to know if that’s a rope or a snake, if the guy with the chains all over his chest is a gangster or a fan of bad seventies movies. Being certain means being safe. The downfall is that we humans think about a lot of stuff that’s not actually real. We crave certainty in areas where there can never be any. That’s when we start in with believing the crazy stuff. Dogen is interesting because he tries to cut right to the heart of this. He gets into what is real and what is not. Probably the main reason he’s so difficult to read is that Dogen is trying to say things that can’t actually be said. So he has to bend language to the point where it almost breaks. He’s often using language itself to show the limitations of language. Even the very first readers of his writings must have found them difficult. Dogen understood both that words always ultimately fail to describe reality and that we human beings must rely on words anyway. So he tried to use words to write about that which is beyond words. This isn’t really a discrepancy. You use words, but you remain aware of their limitations. My teacher used to say, “People like explanations.” We do. They’re comforting. When the explanation is reasonably correct, it’s useful.

As the future draws ever closer – with speedy travel, immediate communication and almost-instant trade – the historical past can seem more remote, like another world, rapidly receding. And whilst we may be increasingly aware of cultures other than our own, the genuine understanding that allows us to connect through what we share, and also to respect our differences, does not always come naturally. But at a time when misunderstanding can easily escalate, it is vitally important that we seize opportunities to learn – both from our global neighbours and from our collective past. If we consider an age of unexpectedly changing political landscapes, with regions of cosmopolitanism alongside those of parochialism, when developments bring a better quality of life to many, yet the world remains vulnerable to serious threats such as disease, poverty, changing climate, violence and oppression, we might well recognise this as our own age. It is equally true of the 10th century, on which this book focuses. The centuries surrounding the second millennium saw enormous dynamism on the global stage. Influential rules such as those of the great Maya civilisation of mesoamerica and the prosperous Tang dynasty in China were on the decline, while Vikings rampaged across north-western Europe, and the Byzantine Empire entered its second-wave of expansion. Muslim civilisation was thriving, with the establishment of no fewer than three Islamic caliphates.

Then there were those who were thrilling to Senator Sanders, who believed that Bernie would be the one to give them free college, to solve climate change, and even to bring peace to the Middle East, though that was not an issue most people associated with him. On a trip to Michigan, I met with a group of young Muslims, most of them college students, for whom this was the first election in which they planned to participate. I was excited that they had come to hear more about HRC's campaign. One young woman, speaking for her peers, said she really wanted to be excited about the first woman president, but she had to support Bernie because she believed he would be more effective at finally brokering a peace treaty in the Middle East. Everyone around her nodded. I asked the group why they doubted Hillary Clinton's ability to do the same. "Well, she has done nothing to help the Palestinians." Taking a deep breath, I asked them if they knew that she was the first U.S. official to ever call the territories "Palestine" in the nineties, that she advocated for Palestinian sovereignty back when no other official would. They did not. I then asked them if they were aware that she brought together the last round of direct talks between the Israelis and Palestinians? That she personally negotiated a cease-fire to stop the latest war in Gaza when she was secretary of state? They shook their heads. Had they known that she announced $600 million in assistance to the Palestinian Authority and $300 million in humanitarian aid to Gaza in her first year at State? They began to steal glances at one another. Did they know that she pushed Israel to invest in the West Bank and announced an education program to make college more affordable for Palestinian students? More head shaking. They simply had no idea. "So," I continued, "respectfully, what is it about Senator Sander's twenty-seven-year record in Congress that suggests to you that the Middle East is a priority for him?" The young woman's response encapsulated some what we were up against. "I don't know," she replied. "I just feel it.

There are lots of stories around of how COVID-19 emerged into humans. Secret China laboratory leak, jumping the species barrier, government engineered virus, and so on. I wrote a book about the environment called “Solar Radiation, Global Warming and Human Disease” that I first published in 2010. I was aware human disease was going to spiral out of control as the environment changed. I was not surprised a decade later we were in a global pandemic!

And how, even a few days ago, in my own childhood, the English meadows too had been alive with wings. And how quiet now was the poisoned countryside.

The constant need to consume is built off the back of you, the consumer, and your lack of awareness about your habit, and the need you have built inside you to chase a better and improved version of yourself, which you can then project to the world.

Although no more than 10 percent of Americans are dismissive of climate change, it’s these rare deniers who get the most press. In an analysis of some hundred thousand media articles on climate change between 2000 and 2016, prominent climate contrarians received disproportionate coverage: they were featured 49 percent more often than expert scientists. As a result, people end up overestimating how common denial is—which in turn makes them more hesitant to advocate for policies that protect the environment. When the middle of the spectrum is invisible, the majority’s will to act vanishes with it. If other people aren’t going to do anything about it, why should I bother? When they become aware of just how many people are concerned about climate change, they’re more prepared to do something about it.

Alienation from nature and the loss of the experience of being part of the living creation is the greatest tragedy of our materialistic era. It is the causative reason for ecological devastation and climate change. Therefore, I attribute absolute highest importance to consciousness-change. I regard psychedelics as catalyzers for this. They are tools which are guiding our perception toward other, deeper, areas of human existence, so that we, again, become aware of our spiritual essence. Psychedelic experiences in a safe setting can help our consciousness open up to this sensation of connection and of being one with nature. LSD and related substances are not "drugs" in the usual sense, but are part of the sacred substances which have been used for thousands of years in ritual settings.

But the opposite of libertarian hyperindividualism is not necessarily the Red Army kicking in the door of your father’s drugstore. It could also be a sense of social solidarity, an ethic of “We’re all in this together.” As Pope Francis said, after a closed-door meeting with oil company executives about climate change in 2018, “Decisive progress on this path cannot be made without an increased awareness that all of us are part of one human family, united by bands of fraternity and solidarity.

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I am aware that for decades there has been exploration of options and concrete plans and investments being made to look at life on another planet. We must not stop exploring. At the same time let’s preserve and enhance the life we already have on earth. Join the green revolution, plant trees, stop soil erosion, reduce carbon emissions into the atmosphere and promote recycling of waste. Become aware, create awareness, act responsibly and lead by example.

If we do not change our way of life, and fast, we will destroy ourselves by continuing to pollute the environment that sustains us, abusing natural resources, poisoning our food supply, destroying large ecosystems, contaminating the air, and perpetuating climate change.

*Breathing in, I know this is my in-breath. Breathing out, I know this is my out-breath.* It's very simple, but very effective. When we bring our attention to our in-breath and our out-breath, we stop thinking of the past; we stop thinking of the future; and we begin to come home to ourselves...Don't think this practice doesn't apply to you. If we don't go home to ourselves, we can't be at our best and serve the world in the best way... Our quality of being is the foundation for the quality of our actions. *Breathing in, I'm aware of my whole body. Breathing out, I'm aware of my whole body.* Breathing mindfully brings us back to our bodies. We have to acknowledge our bodies first because tension and suffering accumulate in the body. Breathing in this way, we create a kind of family reunion between mind and body. The mind becomes an embodied mind. ...We can't do our best if we don't know to release the tension and pain in ourselves. *Breathing in, I'm aware of the tension in my body. Breathing out, I'm aware of the tension in my body.* When we look at the suffering around us, at poverty, violence, or climate change, we may want to solve these things immediately. We want to do something. But to do something effectively and ethically, we need to be our best selves in order to be able to handle the suffering... *Breathing in, I am aware of a painful feeling arising. Breathing out, I release the painful feeling.* This is a nonviolent and gentle way to help our bodies release tension and pain. It is possible to practice mindful breathing in order to produce a feeling of joy, a feeling of happiness. When we are well-nourished and know how to create joy, then we are strong enough to handle the deep pain within ourselves and the world.

I believe that the Last Emergency has not arrived without reason, nor are we now moving into the throes of it by accident. As the bearers of conscious self-awareness on this planet, we have failed miserably thus far in recognizing our inextricable oneness with the universe. Whether we can refine this innate capacity in time to prevent the annihilation of the Earth—a travesty in which we have consciously and unconsciously colluded, is unknown. Nevertheless, in the remaining days of our presence here, we can love the Earth and we can love all its sentient beings.

Industrial civilization has held us in a subhuman state all our lives, and we now have the opportunity to discover the powers of the universe coursing through us and our environment. Likewise, we have the extraordinary privilege as consciously self-aware humans of intentionally participating with those powers in an intimate, passionate, caring relationship with the universe.

From the Bridge” by Captain Hank Bracker The Hurricane of 1502 In the time before hurricanes were understood or modern methods of detection and tracking were available, people were frequently caught off guard by these monstrous storms. One of these times was on June 29, 1502. What had started as another normal day in the Caribbean turned into the devastation of a fleet of 30 ships, preparing to sail back to Spain laden with gold and other treasures from the New World. Without the benefit of a National Weather Service, mariners had to rely on their own knowledge and understanding of atmospheric conditions and the sea. Sensing that one of these storms was approaching, Columbus sought shelter for his ships near the Capitol city of Santo Domingo along the southern coast of Hispaniola, now known as the Dominican Republic. The following is taken from page 61 of the author’s award winning book, The Exciting Story of Cuba. “Columbus was aware of dangerous weather indicators that were frequently a threat in the Caribbean during the summer months. Although the barometer had not yet been invented, there were definitely other telltale signs of an approaching hurricane. Had the governor listened to Columbus’ advice and given him some leeway, he could have saved the convoy that was being readied for a return trans-Atlantic crossing. Instead, the new inexperienced governor ordered the fleet of over 30 caravels, laden, heavy with gold, to set sail for Spain without delay. As a result, it is estimated that 20 of these ships were sunk by this violent storm, nine ran aground and only the Aguja, which coincidently carried Columbus’ gold, survived and made it back to Spain safely. The ferocity of the storm claimed the lives of five hundred souls, including that of the former governor Francisco de Bobadilla. Many of the caravels that sank during this hurricane were ships that were part of the same convoy that Ovando had traveled with from Spain to the West Indies. However he felt about this tragedy, which could have been prevented, he continued as the third Governor of the Indies until 1509, and became known for his brutal treatment of the Taíno Indians. Columbus’ ships fared somewhat better in that terrible storm, and survived with only minor damage. Heaving in their anchors, Columbus’ small fleet of ships left Hispaniola to explore the western side of the Caribbean.” Hurricanes and Typhoons, remain the most powerful and dangerous storms on our planet. Hurricane Matthew that is now raking the eastern coastline of Florida is no exception. Perhaps the climate change that we are experiencing has intensified these storms and perhaps we should be doing more to stabilize our atmosphere but Earth is our home and the only place where proven life exists. Perhaps the conclusion to this is that we should take the warning signs more seriously and be proactive in protecting our environment! This is not a political issue and will affect us, our children and grandchildren for centuries!

It requires some courage to break a taboo [around the high likelihood of climate-induced collapse, as opposed to mere climate disruption]. It requires some courage to make people aware of darkness that they had not seen before or had turned away from. Especially when that darkness is not in the changing climate and the institutions that have damaged our world, but is also within us. Because we have all participated in both the creation of this disaster and the ignoring of it. Or being satisfied with ineffectual action that provided us with a believable myth of being a good person. As such, climate chaos is an invitation to go deeper into self-reflection and learn about why we have participated in such destruction. From that inquiry we may find ways of living that avoid making matters worse. Bringing attention to the darkness around us, ahead of us and inside of us is essential if we are then to light candles of wisdom. People who are bringing attention to the darkness are also lighting candles of wisdom. Candles only shine within darkness. As more candles are lit, so we can see each other anew. We can connect with what is burning inside our hearts and live from that truth more fully than before.

With the ever growing need to provide solutions which focus on the impact of global warming and extreme climate changes in recent years, innovative design and a greener footprint is something Crisp Air Conditioning are fully aware of, striving to achieve this on a daily basis.

The extent of climate change effects on individual regions will very over time and the resulting large scale changes in weather patterns and shifts in weather patterns. (Journal:Climate Change) By theamitkumarswords

To push the earth’s climate into the glaciated state would require a huge kick from some external source. But Lorenz described yet another plausible kind of behavior called “almost-intransitivity.” An almost-intransitive system displays one sort of average behavior for a very long time, fluctuating within certain bounds. Then, for no reason whatsoever, it shifts into a different sort of behavior, still fluctuating but producing a different average. The people who design computer models are aware of Lorenz’s discovery, but they try at all costs to avoid almost-intransitivity. It is too unpredictable. Their natural bias is to make models with a strong tendency to return to the equilibrium we measure every day on the real planet. Then, to explain large changes in climate, they look for external causes—changes in the earth’s orbit around the sun, for example. Yet it takes no great imagination for a climatologist to see that almost-intransitivity might well explain why the earth’s climate has drifted in and out of long Ice Ages at mysterious, irregular intervals. If so, no physical cause need be found for the timing. The Ice Ages may simply be a byproduct of chaos.

Alienation from nature and the loss of the experience of being part of the living creation is the greatest tragedy of our materialistic era. It is the causative reason for ecological devastation and climate change. Therefore I attribute absolute highest importance to consciousness change. I regard psychedelics as catalyzers for this. They are tools which are guiding our perception toward other deeper areas of human existence, so that we again become aware of our spiritual essence. Psychedelic experiences in a safe setting can help our consciousness open up to this sensation of connection and of being one with nature. LSD and related substances are not drugs in the usual

The virus is fostering a commonality that we weren’t aware of, a biological commonality, where someone else’s health and behavior can really affect our own—whether they have health insurance, whether they are wearing their mask. It’s a rehearsal for climate change in that we recognize that there is no escaping our predicament. There’s no other place to go. We’re coming to see that we’re really all in the same boat.

[Brian] Nosek (2007) has argued that ‘measurement innovations [such as the IAT] have spawned dual-process theories that, among other things, distinguish between the mind as we experience it (explicit), and the mind as it operates automatically, unintentionally, or unconsciously (implicit)’ (2007:184). So we have here the distinct possibility of two largely independent subsystems in the human mind, one that is familiar and one that is not. (Whether we have any ‘conscious’ awareness at all of our implicit thinking, and whether the implicit process is always truly unconscious or whether we have some inkling of the underlying evaluation, remain to be properly investigated. The fact that something cannot be consciously controlled and manipulated does not of course mean that it resides purely and totally in the unconscious.) But how does this divergence between implicit and explicit attitude manifest itself within the individual, and does it have any effect on any aspects of observable behaviour? After all, a hundred years ago or so Freud showed how unconscious (and repressed) thoughts could find articulation through the medium of everyday speech in the form of slips of the tongue. And how might this dissociation impact on people’s willingness or ability to actually do something about climate change? These are potentially important questions from both a theoretical and a practical point of view. It surprised me that nobody until now had attempted to answer them. Nosek, B. A. (2007) Understanding the individual implicitly and explicitly. International Journal of Psychology 42: 184–188.

the threat today is not western religions, but psychology and consumerism. is the Dharma becoming another psychotherapy, another commodity to be bought and sold? will western Buddhism become all too compatible with our individualistic consumption patterns, with expensive retreats and initiations, catering to overstressed converts, eager to pursue their own enlightenment? let’s hope not, because Buddhism and the west need each other. despite its economic and technologic dynamism, western civilisation and its globalisation are in trouble, which means all of us are in trouble. the most obvious example is our inability to respond to accelerating climate change, as seriously as it requires. if humanity is to survive and thrive over the next few centuries, there is no need to go on at length here about the other social and ecological crisis that confront us now, which are increasingly difficult to ignore [many of those are considered in the following chapters]. it’s also becoming harder to overlook the fact that the political and economic systems we’re so proud of seem unable to address these problems. one must ask, is that because they themselves are the problem? part of the problem is leadership, or the lack of it, but we can’t simply blame our rulers. it’s not only the lack of a moral core of those who rise to the top, or the institutional defamations that massage their rise, economical and political elites, and there’s not much difference between them anymore. like the rest of us, they are in need of a new vision of possibility, what it means to be human, why we tend to get into trouble, and how we can get out go it, those who benefit the most from the present social arrangements may think of themselves as hardheaded realists, but as self-conscious human beings, we remain motivated by some such vision, weather we’re aware of it or not, as why we love war, points out. even secular modernity is based on a spiritual worldview, unfortunately a deficient one, from a Buddhist perspective.

Governments, industries, scientists, and the public must collaborate in a concerted effort to develop and implement policies that promote sustainability, protect freshwater habitats, and mitigate the impacts of climate change. Public awareness and advocacy are equally crucial, fostering a collective commitment to safeguarding the diversity of life on our planet.

We need to be aware that when we insist, as part of foreign aid packages, that the developing world align with our climate priorities, we are enacting a kind of imperialism.

As Augustus basked in self-praise, he became aware of a movement beyond his reflection, beyond the glass. At first he saw the flicking tail of the yellow goatfish, then a blue and gold tang, then a school of pearl wrasses. As he refocused his eyes into the tank he realized that all of the creatures of the aquarium were just across the glass, all of them staring at him. What on Earth is going on here, their expressions seemed to say. Augustus shook his head, suddenly uncomfortable. “Youse all there in the fish tank,” he growled, pointing, “youse can go stuff yerself for all I care! I’m done here.

Changing consciousness wakes us up not only to our world and its complexities, but to the complexity of ourselves. there is a lot more in all of us than one identity, one viewpoint or one life. Just as the climate crisis alerts us to what has been ignored, forgotten and marginalised in the world, it can also wake us up to forms of knowing that have been buried within ourselves, such as nature relatedness, body awareness, intuitive knowings and spiritual connections.

I am aware that I’m an imperfect messenger on climate change. The world is not exactly lacking in rich men with big ideas about what other people should do, or who think technology can fix any problem. And I own big houses and fly in private planes—in fact, I took one to Paris for the climate conference—so who am I to lecture anyone on the environment? I plead guilty to all three charges. I can’t deny being a rich guy with an opinion. I do believe, though, that it is an informed opinion, and I am always trying to learn more.

we are all aware of the consequences of climate change.

All that fuel disappears over the course of the journey as if by magic, right into the atmosphere. I sometimes wonder whether we’d have climate change if people had to lug their own fuel, or if CO2 was hot pink and easy to see—either way everyone would be aware of just how much stuff they were dumping into the atmosphere. As it is, we pump it effortlessly, invisibly, and mindlessly into our tanks, and it comes out our exhaust just as effortlessly, invisibly, and mindlessly, allowing us to avoid knowing the material nature of our fuel, its sheer bulk. Out of sight, out of mind.

A few weeks after our meeting, Adam sent me this message: I have been doing a little research on Mumbai storm surge risk. There seems to be very little written about it. I have found a number of vague acknowledgements that the risk exists, but nothing that quantifies it. However, are you aware of the 1882 Mumbai cyclone? I have found only very brief accounts of it so far, but the death toll appears to have been between 100,000 and 200,000, and one source says there was a 6m storm surge, which is enormous, and I presume would account for much if not all of that! This was in one paragraph of a book that seems to be out of print. I haven’t quickly found any more substantive sources online—most are single-line mentions in lists of deadly storms. I wonder if you have ever seen anything more in-depth? It is very spooky indeed that this storm is not mentioned in the various academic studies I have dug up on storm surge risk in India.

That’s the opposite of what utopia means. Utopia is an ideal. Our world is a communist—” “Communist? Who told you that?” Niloux laughed. She couldn’t help herself, even though she knew the argument was getting ugly, and was aware of children watching. She put her finger down on the table to emphasize each word. “Our world is a pacifist, nomadic, subsidiarist, anarchist gift economy that evolved in response to rapid, catastrophic climate change.

1. The coercive style. This “Do what I say” approach can be very effective in a turnaround situation, a natural disaster, or when working with problem employees. But in most situations, coercive leadership inhibits the organization’s flexibility and dampens employees’ motivation. 2. The authoritative style. An authoritative leader takes a “Come with me” approach: she states the overall goal but gives people the freedom to choose their own means of achieving it. This style works especially well when a business is adrift. It is less effective when the leader is working with a team of experts who are more experienced than he is. 3. The affiliative style. The hallmark of the affiliative leader is a “People come first” attitude. This style is particularly useful for building team harmony or increasing morale. But its exclusive focus on praise can allow poor performance to go uncorrected. Also, affiliative leaders rarely offer advice, which often leaves employees in a quandary. 4. The democratic style. This style’s impact on organizational climate is not as high as you might imagine. By giving workers a voice in decisions, democratic leaders build organizational flexibility and responsibility and help generate fresh ideas. But sometimes the price is endless meetings and confused employees who feel leaderless. 5. The pacesetting style. A leader who sets high performance standards and exemplifies them himself has a very positive impact on employees who are self-motivated and highly competent. But other employees tend to feel overwhelmed by such a leader’s demands for excellence—and to resent his tendency to take over a situation. 6. The coaching style. This style focuses more on personal development than on immediate work-related tasks. It works well when employees are already aware of their weaknesses and want to improve, but not when they are resistant to changing their ways.