The Climate Crisis and Mental Health
As the climate crisis continues to unfold, we must find ways to stay informed while trying not to become immobilized by the grief and fear that are natural responses to loss and existential threat. Additionally, as concerned and responsible citizens there is an imperative to meaningfully engage and act both individually and collectively to protect our common home and the lives of those who are most at risk.
Waking Up to What Is Happening
In the Summer of 2018, Seattle was blanketed in smoke from wildfires in Eastern Washington and British Columbia. The sun was turned a dramatic shade of red by a smoke cloud so thick it could be seen from space, and residents were cautioned to stay in doors because of the health risks. For many the experience was eery and disconcerting, but for those who have been following environmental impact reports over the past few decades, fears may have extended to what the weather phenomenon signified.
As droughts become more common in the United States and temperatures warm, forest environments are becoming more suitable for large wildfires (https://www.fs.usda.gov/pnw/pnw-research-highlights/new-normal-empirical-estimates-future-fire-environments-pacific-northwest). When looking at data over the past three decades, wildfire frequency is increasing and forecasts show that what is considered a “normal” fire environment will expand to include more forest across all Pacific Northwest eco-regions in years to come.
Similarly, in my home country of Australia, scientists warn that this season’s bush fires are without parallel on several fronts. An earlier than usual bush fire season has already burned through five million hectares of land (approximately twelve million hectares this year in total), devastating wildlife and ecosystems and creating dangerous living conditions in many parts of the country. Though some reporting on the situation suggests that this is “more of the same” in our bushfire prone country, experts disagree, marking differences in the extent of the area burned, underlying dryness due to lower rainfall, air quality and the type of ecosystem that is now vulnerable to fire danger.
What we are seeing in Australia, as in other parts of the world, aligns with scenarios projected by climate scientists. For some, this has induced a shift away from unawareness or denial towards taking the threat more seriously. Since 2013 there has indeed been a stable trend towards increasing concern and growing belief in the data that supports the idea of a warming (or more technically accurate “heating”) world. Shifts in public perception and opinion can be consequential for national and international responses to the crisis.
Eco Anxiety and Climate Grief
Hearing record breaking figures reported, being bombarded with apocalyptic images and viscerally experiencing the impact of the blazes is very confronting. But for those who care about what is happening in the natural environment, what this means for our shared future is perhaps the source of a greater distress.
When thinking about the consequences of the climate crisis, it is important to consider how unequally distributed these impacts are and will continue to be. Though many in the industrialized West will have access to resources to keep themselves physically safe and emotionally supported, we must understand that coping resources amongst marginalized communities in the West, and in less wealthy and developed nations around the world are less accessible. This issue is connected to justice.
The impacts of the climate crisis on one’s mental health can be the result of a direct experience of climate related extreme events which include PTSD, depression and anxiety, substance dependency and survivors guilt. But psychological symptoms of distress may also come from vicarious experiencing, where one may experience a range of psychological and physical symptoms connected to what we witness and perceive as the climate crisis unfolds. Impact can also be understood as indirect when it refers to disruptions to resources (like food, water, shelter, finances) due to changing conditions (Hayes et al 2018).
In the wake of this crisis, we must give ourselves time to process the range of grief responses like anger, denial, hopelessness, guilt and solastalgia that may be evoked. Grief is a natural reaction to the experience of loss, and can be applied to environmental change and ecological loss because humans are deeply connected to their natural world. The challenge in managing emotions is maintaining an attitude of trust and curiosity about their range of responses while not getting hijacked by the distress or negative thought patterns.
How Do We Cope?
A colleague recently reminded me of Dan Siegel’s theory of the window of tolerance and how this might be applied to climate change and mental health. Siegel suggests that, through self-regulation, humans have strategies for staying within a window of optimal arousal but can be tipped into states of hyper-arousal (fearful, flooded) or hypo-arousal (depressed, dissociated, numbed out). Either state creates great difficulties in living. Because of the magnitude and complexity of the Climate Change phenomenon, people can easily become activated beyond what is optimal — however tools like mindfulness, grounding, breathing and cognitive restructuring can help a person’s capacity for self-regulation.
Frequently, I hear people talk about the feelings of disempowerment when it comes to responding to what they hear and see as it relates to health of the planet. There’s a feeling of smallness, a perception that one cannot make a contribution to a cause they care so deeply about. However, to resign ourselves to a reality in which what we do doesn’t matter would represent a denial of values, a surrender, a giving up. For some this attitude simply maintains distress, for some it can curdle into apathy. Existential writer Victor Frankl reminds us that to instill meaning in life’s events, no matter how bleak, can transform suffering. To find meaning and direction amidst the backdrop of traumatic experiencing can build resilience and help one psychically survive.
Giving human experience meaning changes one’s perception of the experience and in the case of the Climate Crisis it may help generate ideas about how one might newly engage or re-engage with the issue. As soon as we are able to identify the ways that our carbon rich lifestyles and habits of consumption and waste impact our shared planet, we can begin to reflect on what we might be willing to give up in order to make meaningful change. This process is highly personal, and the ways that one contributes to the effort will no doubt be influenced by their own resources, capacities, skills and readiness. For some it activism or organizing, for others financial or other donations, for some it is learning sustainable farming and for others giving up long haul flights or changing consumer habits.
For all of us though — concerned citizens and heads of state alike — change comes at a cost. But to deny or to ignore the situation, to continue with business as usual bears out a greater cost in the end. We must do work alone and in community to cope with what is already here and what is to come. Recognizing how we and other humans and species are impacted, thinking about meaningful engagement and action and uniting are all important tasks in not only surviving a crisis but developing resilience so that we can go on living fully and adaptively.
If you are looking for support, here is a collection of resources put together by a colleague from the Alliance of Climate Therapists Northwest: https://www.climateandmind.org/
