Feeling Anxious About Climate Change? It Might Be Time to Quit the News

Rachel Bailleau
May 23
7 min read

If you feel sick to your stomach when you read the news, you’re not alone. Climate headlines are grim, relentless, and delivered without meaningful context or potential solutions. One day, it’s record heat. The next, we hear about hurricanes, droughts, fires, and floods. Politicians backtrack on promises, biodiversity declines, and tipping points loom. It's a lot to handle with your morning cup of coffee.

For many people, staying informed feels like a duty, especially when you care deeply about the planet. If we stop reading about all the people and places that are suffering from climate change, it means we don't really care, right? I used to feel the same way. I'd find myself crying into my pillow at night because the world seemed like it was dying in front of my eyes, and I couldn't do anything but watch. (And if watching was all I could do, I'd keep doing it. Mental and physical health be damned!)

But here's another question worth asking: Is your daily dose of news helping you contribute to a better world? Or is it leaving you paralysed, and burnt out?

Why Climate News Hits So Hard

Climate grief and eco anxiety aren’t irrational. You are right that the world is changing, and you're right that this is a problem. People and wildlife are already suffering. The world's natural rhythms that we rely on for health and prosperity are becoming less predictable, and this has very real impacts on things like food security, water security, and human health. So in many ways, climate grief and eco anxiety are a healthy reaction to an unhealthy society.

But constantly exposing ourselves to worst-case scenarios, high-drama headlines, and fragmented disaster reporting can overwhelm our nervous systems. And when we're overwhelmed, we tend to freeze, shut down, or lash out. These reactions are not constructive. They don't help anyone, including yourself. There are two main reasons for this.

News articles are designed to grab your attention

It's not that journalists are trying to trick you. I've worked as a journalist and an editor of international media myself. My colleagues have consistently been passionate, courageous people ready to fight tooth and nail for a fairer and safer world. I believe that shocking headlines have their place in the world. When we report on oil spills, murdered activists or famine, we can put international pressure on corporations and governments to do something. But these articles aren't designed to make ordinary people stand up and take action. It's more like shining a light in a dark corner so that the people with power can't hide something out of sight.

Good news is slow and steady

Outrage and fear keep us clicking. Despite journalists' best efforts, new stories are often stripped of nuance, context, or progress. This is partly because it's hard to get nuance into an article that people would actually read. If it gets too long or isn't very dramatic, not many people will read it, and the newspaper will shut down with not enough funding.

There are loads of positive things happening around the world if we zoom out:

More children are growing up healthy: Around the world, more kids are surviving and thriving than ever before, thanks to better healthcare, nutrition, and living conditions.
Clean energy is booming: Solar and wind power have become dramatically cheaper and more efficient. We're rapidly shifting away from fossil fuels and transforming how the world is powered.
Wealth no longer has to cost the Earth: For the first time in history, some countries are getting richer while their forests are growing. It’s now possible to boost economies and restore nature at the same time.

But this kind of slow and steady progress isn't really "news". It's something that's happening every day, little by little. Not a big event you can send a reporter and a photographer to.

Why our ancestors never felt so anxious about the climate

Our ancestors didn’t lie awake at night worrying about climate change. This isn't because they didn’t care about nature. On the contrary, our great-grandparents often had a closer connection and appreciation of the living world than we do today. But their daily lives were ruled by more immediate, tangible threats.

If a harvest failed, they didn’t think about carbon emissions; they worried about starvation. Most families buried at least one child before the age of five. Their anxiety was grounded in survival today, not projections for tomorrow. And while climate change has been slowly unfolding since humans began transforming forests into farmland thousands of years ago, people simply didn’t have the knowledge or tools to recognise their role in larger planetary shifts. Today, we’re in a uniquely powerful (and painful) position: we know climate change is happening, we know why it's happening, and we already have many of the solutions.

But awareness comes at a cost. Unlike past generations, we’re plugged into a constant stream of global grief. Every disaster, every extinction, every injustice flashes across our screens in real time. Our ancestors dealt with sorrow within their village or community, and even that was overwhelming. Now, we’re expected to carry the weight of the world without flinching. It’s no wonder we feel anxious. But this global perspective is also our greatest strength. For the first time in history, we can act together as a planetary community. We can demand justice, share solutions, and shift systems. But if watching the news makes you turn away from the world's problems instead of contributing to a solution, there's really no point in tuning in.

The Time I Quit the News

Six years ago, I stopped reading the news for three months while wild camping around Scotland with my boyfriend. (He's since been promoted to husband) The world didn’t end. And guess what? I still had a pretty good idea of what was going on. Because if there’s something worth knowing, someone will tell you.

The few times news impacted my life, like when a storm was coming in that night, I heard about it from a fisherman as I sat perched between crates of lobsters on the back of his truck. On those couple of nights, we slept in a youth hostel or a kind stranger's barn instead of out on the heather.

And even the bad news that made no practical difference to my life trickled through to us. Snippets of school shootings from the radio as we hitchhiked across the islands. Gossip about politicians overheard in the pub. No matter how much you intend to take a break, you're not going to escape the news entirely.. But you can choose not to top yourself up with misery constantly. You can get your information from the people around you, from real conversations: not just endless headlines that make you want to curl up in a ball and cry.

Having that break from terrible headlines gave me some headspace. I realised how important it was for me to be connected to a community. So I started looking for a place I could call home, and ended up building an off-grid home in the Hautes Pyrenees.

What Happens When You Step Away?

You might worry that tuning out of the world's catastrophes means giving up. But quitting the news doesn’t mean giving up on the world. It means choosing to engage with it on your terms. You’re still allowed to care. You’re still allowed to act. You’re just choosing to protect your mental health and focus your energy in ways that actually make a difference, instead of letting it get sucked out my horrific headlines you have no control over.

When you take a break from the flood of negativity, something shifts. Your nervous system calms down. You feel more present in your own life. You start to notice the good around you again. You realise that while the big picture is messy, there are things in your immediate world you can influence. And from that healthier place, you may even find renewed motivation to take action.

How to Take a Healthy Break from the News When Feeling Anxious About Climate Change

If you’re considering a news detox, here are a few tips to help you:

Notice how it makes you feel: Start taking a second to check in with your body. After reading or watching the news, how do you feel? Do you want to roll up your sleeves and take action? Or does everything seem pointless and doomed?
Set boundaries: If you're not sure about whether you really want to quit the news, try setting some boundaries. You could choose to check the news only once or twice a week, not daily. You might have to set a screen time limit on your phone for certain news sites, as you may be opening them automatically several times a day without noticing. You can also keep news to certain physical places. Don't check it in bed, for example. Noone needs to start or end the day with faraway drought victims on their mind. You may also want to unfollow people on Social Media if they tend to share bad headlines on their stories. You can always follow them again later if you decide you're ready to come back to the news.
Choose your sources carefully: If you want to stay informed, pick slower, more thoughtful journalism. Look for publications that explore solutions, science-based reporting, or community stories, not just clickbait and catastrophe. Personally, I try to check Positive News when I feel compelled to look at the headlines. Sure, a new thrift shop isn't as big a deal as the invasion of another country. But it can scratch the news itch. And like I said earlier, good news tends to be slow and steady change over decades, not one big announcement.
Replace the habit with something nourishing: Let's say you check the news with your morning cup of coffee. What could you do instead? You could start writing down 10 things you're grateful for every morning or do a ten-minute meditation instead. This can help you set the tone for the day and soothe your eco-anxiety so you've got more energy to contribute to a better world.

Still Caring, Without the Chaos

Feeling anxious about climate change is understandable. We are simply not designed to doomscroll. But quitting the news doesn’t mean you don’t care. It means you're creating space to care better, to recharge your batteries and act more effectively, to grieve, love, and contribute without drowning.

You are allowed to protect your mind and body while you fight for a better world. You are allowed to rest, to choose stories that lift you up, and to seek out connection, not chaos.

There is still so much good in the world. But you have to look up from your screen to see it.

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