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Leave the Lights On: How Joyful Decisions Can Save Our Species
How to make an impact on climate change by taking actions that bring you joy
What if the most effective ways to fight climate change made you happy?
Psychologist Elizabeth Dunn and climate behavior scientist Jiaying Zhao challenge everything we think we know about sustainable living. While most climate advice demands self-denial—eat less, travel less, want less—this groundbreaking book offers a counterintuitive you can make your life better while saving our species at the same time. The authors reveal how tweaking everyday decisions around food, travel, housing, and shopping can nudge us toward a tipping point of mass action—without tipping us into burnout.
You will discover
Joy is a powerful climate strategy. When you enjoy the changes you’re making, you’re more likely to stick with them—and spread them. You don’t have to go vegan or give up flying. Smart substitutions (chicken over beef, carry-on over checked bags) make a real dent in emissions with less personal friction.Small talk matters. Normalizing climate conversations with friends and family helps shift social norms and catalyzes cultural change.Give yourself permission to leave the lights on. Focus on higher-impact actions instead of smaller interventions.
Leave the Lights On is a bold invitation to reimagine climate action not as a burden, but as an opportunity to build a brighter future—without guilt, without gloom, and without giving up the things that make life worth living. With warmth, clarity, and a refreshingly optimistic voice, Zhao and Dunn reframe what it means to “do your part.” Because sustainability doesn’t lie in doing everything, it lies in doing something, joyfully.
What if the most effective ways to fight climate change made you happy?
Psychologist Elizabeth Dunn and climate behavior scientist Jiaying Zhao challenge everything we think we know about sustainable living. While most climate advice demands self-denial—eat less, travel less, want less—this groundbreaking book offers a counterintuitive you can make your life better while saving our species at the same time. The authors reveal how tweaking everyday decisions around food, travel, housing, and shopping can nudge us toward a tipping point of mass action—without tipping us into burnout.
You will discover
Joy is a powerful climate strategy. When you enjoy the changes you’re making, you’re more likely to stick with them—and spread them. You don’t have to go vegan or give up flying. Smart substitutions (chicken over beef, carry-on over checked bags) make a real dent in emissions with less personal friction.Small talk matters. Normalizing climate conversations with friends and family helps shift social norms and catalyzes cultural change.Give yourself permission to leave the lights on. Focus on higher-impact actions instead of smaller interventions.
Leave the Lights On is a bold invitation to reimagine climate action not as a burden, but as an opportunity to build a brighter future—without guilt, without gloom, and without giving up the things that make life worth living. With warmth, clarity, and a refreshingly optimistic voice, Zhao and Dunn reframe what it means to “do your part.” Because sustainability doesn’t lie in doing everything, it lies in doing something, joyfully.
288 pages, Hardcover
Published June 16, 2026
About the author
Elizabeth Dunn
23 books50 followersElizabeth Dunn is an associate professor of psychology at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. At age twenty-six, she was featured as one of the “rising stars” across all of academia by the Chronicle of Higher Education. Her work has been featured in top academic journals, including two recent papers in Science, and in hundreds of media outlets worldwide.
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August 7, 2026me single-handedly saving the environment and having a low carbon imprint because i’m too broke to afford steak and can’t drive
August 7, 2026
3.5 stars
I was very excited to read this book. I was intrigued by the idea of combining things that bring you joy with things that would help the environment.
They have several chapters that focus on either food, transportation, big life decisions and travel.
There is good information on this book and a lot of the data is presented on how much carbon emission they emit or save. Ie if you eat beef it emits way more carbon emission than rice or tofu, etc.
However, I felt a lot of things were not something that was easy to do, for example they really advocate for electric vehicles (which can be quite an expense) or looking to move to a low carbon place! (Made comments that there are places were running the AC is not as expensive (but again, I’m not gonna move or buy a new car. They also promote biking which is great if you are in a city where that is safe but I would argue a lot of America cities aren’t there.
Travel is also a hard one for me. Flying is bad.. but also, I live in a different country for my family so it’s a necessary evil if I want to see them at least one a year.
By the end of the book I was overwhelmed with the idea of having to look at the carbon emissions of each of my choices, likely decreasing my happiness. I also feel quite cynical with the current political environment where it doesn’t seem to matter what we do without government and big institutional regulations that will have a bigger impact on the environment.
This might be an interesting book to read in a book club as other people might have a different take than me.
I was very excited to read this book. I was intrigued by the idea of combining things that bring you joy with things that would help the environment.
They have several chapters that focus on either food, transportation, big life decisions and travel.
There is good information on this book and a lot of the data is presented on how much carbon emission they emit or save. Ie if you eat beef it emits way more carbon emission than rice or tofu, etc.
However, I felt a lot of things were not something that was easy to do, for example they really advocate for electric vehicles (which can be quite an expense) or looking to move to a low carbon place! (Made comments that there are places were running the AC is not as expensive (but again, I’m not gonna move or buy a new car. They also promote biking which is great if you are in a city where that is safe but I would argue a lot of America cities aren’t there.
Travel is also a hard one for me. Flying is bad.. but also, I live in a different country for my family so it’s a necessary evil if I want to see them at least one a year.
By the end of the book I was overwhelmed with the idea of having to look at the carbon emissions of each of my choices, likely decreasing my happiness. I also feel quite cynical with the current political environment where it doesn’t seem to matter what we do without government and big institutional regulations that will have a bigger impact on the environment.
This might be an interesting book to read in a book club as other people might have a different take than me.
July 14, 2026
There are two things that I just love about this book:
1) It champions a cultural narrative where personal happiness and the environment aren't at odds but rather support and follow each other.
2) The book is delightful.
I think a lot of the time when I think about climate change, the predominant cultural narrative is kinda framed in terms of a trade off between your own wellbeing and the wellbeing of the Earth - Like I can take a shorter shower to save water or turn off the air conditioner or not have a kid or write to my local representative and like these are all things that I don't want to do? Under this narrative, the actions I'm supposed to take are framed as personal sacrifices to my happiness that maybe I'm supposed to make if I'm actually committed to reducing emissions; the environment's wellbeing and my personal wellbeing are at odds.
I think that narrative is actually pretty damaging because it encourages a feeling of futility? Like sure I personally know that I took a certain action but I'm not going to see its positive impact.
Elizabeth Dunn and Jiaying Zhao deconstruct that narrative. In its place is a thesis where they argue that choices which encourage personal happiness and choices that are environmentally responsible are often one and the same, and our misconceptions about what's good for the environment can often prevent us from taking actions that would benefit both our own happiness and the Earth's wellbeing.
To illustrate, an example that kinda struck me was that the environmental impact of someone's diet switching from beef->vegetarian to beef->chicken/pork is pretty similar. That is to say if you look at emissions produced from all three diets, if your starting point is regularly eating beef then switching to chicken/pork has a similar magnitude of emissions reduction as going vegetarian. Though not all the points in the book are that level of surprising, the book is chock-full of that kind of insight which, for me at least, really alleviates the guilt I have about a lot of choices which have environmental consequences, which is kind of a lot of choices.
The book is also just accessible and fun, which I thought was a funny contrast to the 32 pages of sources in the back of my copy. I think my favourite quote was in the section where they talk about how communicating heat pump uptake within a community can encourage other people to also adopt a heat pump, and they write that it's "worth thinking about ways to pimp your pump." Happiness experts really leading by example.
So yeah I'd recommend this book to anyone who's been feeling jaded or doomer-y about the environmental movement and maybe wants to stop feeling bad about their environmental impact. It's information packed, it's practical, the ideas were novel (to me at least maybe I'm just like uninformed), and it promotes a joyful way to fight against one of the most existential threats to humans. And what more can you really want in a book?
1) It champions a cultural narrative where personal happiness and the environment aren't at odds but rather support and follow each other.
2) The book is delightful.
I think a lot of the time when I think about climate change, the predominant cultural narrative is kinda framed in terms of a trade off between your own wellbeing and the wellbeing of the Earth - Like I can take a shorter shower to save water or turn off the air conditioner or not have a kid or write to my local representative and like these are all things that I don't want to do? Under this narrative, the actions I'm supposed to take are framed as personal sacrifices to my happiness that maybe I'm supposed to make if I'm actually committed to reducing emissions; the environment's wellbeing and my personal wellbeing are at odds.
I think that narrative is actually pretty damaging because it encourages a feeling of futility? Like sure I personally know that I took a certain action but I'm not going to see its positive impact.
Elizabeth Dunn and Jiaying Zhao deconstruct that narrative. In its place is a thesis where they argue that choices which encourage personal happiness and choices that are environmentally responsible are often one and the same, and our misconceptions about what's good for the environment can often prevent us from taking actions that would benefit both our own happiness and the Earth's wellbeing.
To illustrate, an example that kinda struck me was that the environmental impact of someone's diet switching from beef->vegetarian to beef->chicken/pork is pretty similar. That is to say if you look at emissions produced from all three diets, if your starting point is regularly eating beef then switching to chicken/pork has a similar magnitude of emissions reduction as going vegetarian. Though not all the points in the book are that level of surprising, the book is chock-full of that kind of insight which, for me at least, really alleviates the guilt I have about a lot of choices which have environmental consequences, which is kind of a lot of choices.
The book is also just accessible and fun, which I thought was a funny contrast to the 32 pages of sources in the back of my copy. I think my favourite quote was in the section where they talk about how communicating heat pump uptake within a community can encourage other people to also adopt a heat pump, and they write that it's "worth thinking about ways to pimp your pump." Happiness experts really leading by example.
So yeah I'd recommend this book to anyone who's been feeling jaded or doomer-y about the environmental movement and maybe wants to stop feeling bad about their environmental impact. It's information packed, it's practical, the ideas were novel (to me at least maybe I'm just like uninformed), and it promotes a joyful way to fight against one of the most existential threats to humans. And what more can you really want in a book?
September 26, 2026
The authors have good intentions and no doubt will push climate efforts in a better direction than doing nothing. Their major point is that fear and guilt will not get people to take action as well as optimism and joy can. If you make things easy, attractive, social and eye-catching people will take action. I won't dispute any of that and it will move the needle in the right direction.
The thing is climate disruption is not easy. Almost all the ideas in the book are business as usual, with some changes that will make a difference. The problem is that a growth oriented industrial consumer society is unlikely to be sustainable, and the suggested actions will only make things less bad while it feels like the authors suggest their ideas will fix everything.
The authors say they’ve done the wrestling with uncertainty about the science for us. They do acknowledge the replication crisis regarding research studies, but I’ve heard that somebody has done the math before. The most glaring example of why I don't completely trust them is when they talk about vegans. The primary reason vegans don't eat meat is due to the cruelty to animals. A plant based diet can be for multiple reasons and it's pretty clear what the difference is between them with some basic research. I'm not sure why they missed this point, but it doesn't inspire me to accept all the other claims as 100% accurate.
Their messaging is inconsistent. They say you can leave the lights on forever and it's not going to make much difference. Then they talk about the programmer that did an algorithm saving less than 1% in fuel, but it ultimately made a big contribution. The whole point is that every effort is needed. How about we do turn off the lights, but don't be a dick about it.
They also seem (as most people do) to ignore equity. It's great to fly with only a carry on luggage, but what would happen if everyone in less developed countries decided (and were able) to fly at the same rate as Americans do? What if everyone in the world had a car like the US even if it were electric?
Unfortunately I think AI is our only hope to lessen the worst impacts of climate disruption. Humans have overcome barriers over and over, but we should not count on a technological fix.
The thing is climate disruption is not easy. Almost all the ideas in the book are business as usual, with some changes that will make a difference. The problem is that a growth oriented industrial consumer society is unlikely to be sustainable, and the suggested actions will only make things less bad while it feels like the authors suggest their ideas will fix everything.
The authors say they’ve done the wrestling with uncertainty about the science for us. They do acknowledge the replication crisis regarding research studies, but I’ve heard that somebody has done the math before. The most glaring example of why I don't completely trust them is when they talk about vegans. The primary reason vegans don't eat meat is due to the cruelty to animals. A plant based diet can be for multiple reasons and it's pretty clear what the difference is between them with some basic research. I'm not sure why they missed this point, but it doesn't inspire me to accept all the other claims as 100% accurate.
Their messaging is inconsistent. They say you can leave the lights on forever and it's not going to make much difference. Then they talk about the programmer that did an algorithm saving less than 1% in fuel, but it ultimately made a big contribution. The whole point is that every effort is needed. How about we do turn off the lights, but don't be a dick about it.
They also seem (as most people do) to ignore equity. It's great to fly with only a carry on luggage, but what would happen if everyone in less developed countries decided (and were able) to fly at the same rate as Americans do? What if everyone in the world had a car like the US even if it were electric?
Unfortunately I think AI is our only hope to lessen the worst impacts of climate disruption. Humans have overcome barriers over and over, but we should not count on a technological fix.
July 11, 2026
This is an excellent companion piece to Hannah Ritchie’s “Not the End of the World.” A lot of the material is similar, but “Leave the Lights On” is more actionable, and also brings in the dimension of psychology. Dunn and Zhao argue that fighting climate change and building a more sustainable future doesn’t need to entail deprivation or doomerism – in fact, it can’t. The only way we’re going to succeed is by doing things that are both good for the planet and that make us happy. For each of a number of areas (food, travel, spending, etc.), they focus on what changes are more high-impact and which don’t actually matter that much, and also show how those changes can be made joyful, social, and eye-catching. For example, when it comes to food, you don’t need to go fully vegan – cut cutting out (or cutting back on) beef will have a major impact. (This is, in fact, one of the changes I myself have made since learning more about the impacts of various foods on the climate.) My one quibble with the book is that it’s very individual-focused, as opposed to suggesting changes at the governmental level, like regulations or carbon taxes. (It’s discussed briefly in the final chapter, but not much more than that.) However, that’s not really the point of the book. Bottom line, an excellent book for people who are trying to figure out how to lead a more sustainable life without feeling miserable and deprived about it.
September 10, 2026
I wanted to like this a lot more than I did. I just ended up feeling like the majority of suggestions either weren't actionable (we really truly cannot all just move to places where our carbon footprints will be lighter, and if we all did, that would irrecoverably change the nature of those places, including potentially their carbon impact) or were sort of... useless gestures (someone who does not currently eat vegetables could start, sure, but a reader who habitually does not eat vegetables is not probably going to change that habit just because they have been told it's better for the climate and will make them happier - we're all had the physical and mental health benefits of vegetable screamed at us our whole lives, if that hasn't motivated you already, I don't think this will change that). There were a few useful tidbits - I found the section about travel helpful, and some of the stuff on local politics is worth thinking about - but on the whole this book is better in theory than it was in reality.
July 10, 2026
My second biggest takeaway from the book was how to actually spell smorgasbord.
My first was a little harder to put into words, this book does such a fantastic job or taking you through what meaningful change looks like for each individual person's circumstances. I think it's greatest gift is just helping me realize I don't have to be burdened with this guilt of not doing enough. The mix of both what changes are actually meaningful and in what ways am I preserving/jeopardizing my happiness in spirit of these is very insightful. I think my greatest takeaway is the knowledge to help me find my own middle ground, that retains both my happiness and allows me to take sizeable actions to be green.
My first was a little harder to put into words, this book does such a fantastic job or taking you through what meaningful change looks like for each individual person's circumstances. I think it's greatest gift is just helping me realize I don't have to be burdened with this guilt of not doing enough. The mix of both what changes are actually meaningful and in what ways am I preserving/jeopardizing my happiness in spirit of these is very insightful. I think my greatest takeaway is the knowledge to help me find my own middle ground, that retains both my happiness and allows me to take sizeable actions to be green.
July 30, 2026
Spot on. A solid evaluation of how personal changes to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions can be accomplished while taking joy from our lives. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions requires individual change. These changes are accessible today - there are no laws saying we can not reduce our emissions. And yet people concerned about climate change frequently want governments to change and corporations to change (both necessary) while ignoring the personal change they can make in their daily lives - today - with no new laws.
Highly recommended book for anyone concerned about climate change living in a developed economy.
Highly recommended book for anyone concerned about climate change living in a developed economy.
August 22, 2026
I liked this book and it definitely inspired me to switch my bank and tell all my close friends and family members to do the same. I liked that it combined two topics I like learning about- environmentalism and psychology! Lots of great ideas and resources. This book I would say is more geared to people with middle-high incomes the ways it talks about getting EVs, solar panels, heat pumps. However, it does acknowledge food desserts and the impracticality of some of the ideas for low SES. Overall, I liked it and it did a good job to inspire me to make changes.
August 7, 2026
I like the emphasis on positive psychology and that individual actions can make a difference. General concepts and ideas are sound albeit most are well known by anyone who is already interested in climate solutions.
My biggest gripe is that they keep pushing the books accompanying website happyclimate.org which I found to be underwhelming and not providing what the book claims is there. This feels like a misstep for promoting future actions.
My biggest gripe is that they keep pushing the books accompanying website happyclimate.org which I found to be underwhelming and not providing what the book claims is there. This feels like a misstep for promoting future actions.
August 6, 2026
Leave the Lights On is the best book I’ve read all year. It provided such a fresh perspective on how to think about the impact of our actions on the world around us. The reframe around joy was extremely compelling, and has already directly influenced how I think about daily behaviors ranging from my diet to my commute.
August 23, 2026
One of the most approachable climate change books ive read; would highly recommend to anyone (from those well versed in positive psychology or climate research to those who are still skeptical climate change can be fixed by individual action).
Also, love that they removed the morality aspect from climate justice and focused on progress > perfection
Also, love that they removed the morality aspect from climate justice and focused on progress > perfection
Review of advance copy received from Author
A prescription for joyful climate action couldn't come at a better time. This book changed how I approach decisions big and small. I now make sure my veggies are visible in the fridge, I allow myself the occasional steak treat, and I bundle my trips to get the most out of them.
June 16, 2026
I often think of whether the authors are the right people to detail a subject. Well who better to discuss the best strategies to deal with an environmental mess than one of the world’s leading happiness scientists?
Fascinating and timely topic.
There is nothing out there like this.
Fascinating and timely topic.
There is nothing out there like this.
September 13, 2026
persuasive but irrationally optimistic. inventions are only accessible to people in higher tax brackets & ignores larger social and political influences. it is refreshing in the sense that the focus is the impact of climate action on happiness (but once again, lack of accessibility)
June 21, 2026
An easy read from two UBC psychology profs.
July 16, 2026
Really helpful book. For example, cheese is worse for the climate than chicken.
August 9, 2026
Encouraging read on how to care for our earth in positive, low stress ways.
August 29, 2026
good nonfiction!! very engaging and interesting but did not change my life
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews