The Importance of Feeling Our Eco-Anxiety and Grief by Liana Yip (Clinical Director)

Jun 30

Photo Credit: Mayur Gala

How does one hold all the terrifying news of the world and still go to the grocery store to pick up bananas? This question, or variations, has been on my mind for quite some time now. We need to eat, work, socialize, and participate in activities of daily living to satisfy basic human needs. The horrifying and the mundane must coexist lest we cease to function. And yet, it does seem odd that things continue, in many ways, business as usual. We go about our day-to-day lives while the soil is dying, species are going extinct, the rainforest is being eradicated, the ice caps are melting, there are up to 269,000 tonnes of plastics in our oceans, natural disasters escalate, the oceans are acidifying, the temperatures are rising, and wars are raging. The list gets ever longer as more bad news is pumped into us every day. How does one digest it all? How can our psyche hold such news without throwing up our hands and saying to hell with it, we are too far into this mess for anything to make a difference?

Eco-emotions such as anxiety, fear, grief, and rage are very real, however, for many of us they are incredibly difficult to feel. There are defense systems on top of defense systems in place that protect us from feeling these feelings. Fear may exist that if we allowed ourselves to truly take it all in, we would be consumed or destroyed. We are experiencing serious trauma as a species, and as a planet, it is understandable that a trauma response would kick in when confronted with our collective situation. In our day-to-day lives, we need to be engaging in constant splitting and numbing. How do we reconcile knowing that the plastic that we use contributes to the death of countless beings? The lightswitches we flick on, the cars and transit that we take contribute to global warming, the food that we buy travels 1000’s of kilometers to make it to our bellies? We are entangled in an inextricable, uncomfortable web of participation.

From a depth psychology point of view, when emotions are repressed or split from, they can take on a powerful life of their own through symptoms. In our time, we see rampant depression, anxiety, perfectionism, and addiction. Our befitting responses to a world in crisis are considered personal pathology within our current societal systems. What if generalized anxiety was an appropriate response to a looming 6th mass extinction? What if our despair, grief, and depression were valued as showing our deep love and caring for the world, what if our symptoms woke us up to how we felt and helped us come together to muddle our way out of this mess?

If we are bearing witness to what is happening to and in the world, some form of anxiety and depression are to be expected.

In the first half of this year, I completed a certificate in Ecopsychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute. I was forced to confront the complexity of emotions being stirred by what is happening in the world but could not bear to be with for long periods of time. While I crawled out of this immersive experience feeling more than I had ever allowed myself to feel about the state of things, I also felt greater connection to the web of life, a renewed aliveness, and a validation that I am not alone.

Ecopsychology attempts to marry the split between psyche, nature, and society. Seeing them not in separate silos, but in relationship to each other. Recently, the power dynamics seen in colonialism, capitalism, racism and patriarchy are bubbling up to the surface. These systems that are based on a power-over dynamic contribute to the way that we treat other humans, animals, and the environments in which we live. Within power-over systems, nature is seen as “other;” trees, minerals, and water as resources to be extracted at the expense of many living systems. Some frequent parallel otherings include people of colour, women, folks with disabilities, and the parts of ourselves that are hard to look at.

The largely western narrative that we are separate from each other and the earth has meant that we feel increasingly isolated in an ever more technologically connected world. From a depth psychological perspective, psyche (aka soul) does not live within us, we live within it. We exist within the Anima Mundi, otherwise known as the soul of the world, and what we do to nature and to other beings, we do to ourselves.

It is no surprise that while the earth is being carved up and dominated, that society is being divided politically and socio-economically. Women’s bodies and health are increasingly held under governmental control, our internal worlds are becoming more fragmented and conflictual. While internalized patriarchy drives us to unattainable perfection, berates our weakness, and pushes ever on to higher peaks of “success” and progress, we are severed from our inherent connection to the forests, winds, and waters, as we are severed from our intuition and deep knowing.

How much of the modern neurosis that we feel is stemming from the imaginal split between nature and human, from internal and external power-over dynamics? We are traumatized generations of people living in a world rife with ongoing traumatic events. It makes sense that our fears and vulnerabilities would be protected by defense systems so strong that they mask as business as usual. Addiction to social media, entertainment, food, and substances can act as numbing agents seemingly protecting us from total collapse. The more fear and hopelessness that we feel, the more defended our vulnerabilities become and the more likely we are to act in ways that disregard the threat.

So all this is pretty depressing, what can I do?

Healing these divides can be complicated. As a preamble to the rest of this blog post, I don’t have the answers we need to find our way out of this mess, nor is it my intention to over-simplify things. The following are suggestions for ongoing practice to get the ball rolling in another direction, perhaps towards a sense of belonging and a connection to the great web of life.

Decolonize your psyche

Tend to your inner and outer landscapes by addressing internalized patriarchal narratives (by all means, not an easy undertaking!) Where do the power-over dynamics within you reside? The voices that are telling you that you are not good enough, that you do not look good enough, that you are not successful enough. The voices that tell you that you do not do enough, are not productive enough, that you need to consume to be better. These are sneaky and manipulative voices that are not ours, they are introjected into us from the culture from a very early age. Usually, these voices are so normalized and mirrored to us by the culture that we take them as absolute truth. Start to find other voices, other parts who have not had space to exist. These othered psychic parts usually have been shamed, judged, verbally abused, and oppressed by internalized colonial voices. This is the process of reclaiming power from the internal psychic colonizer and giving power back to the othered ones existing within.

Practice shifting from yang to yin consciousness

Traditionally, from a depth psychology perspective, these energies have been named masculine and feminine, with all genders having both. This can be confusing as these terms can easily be equated with the sex of the person. Anyway, whether you call this energy masculine and feminine or yang and yin, slowing the eff down is the name of the game. Our culture is based on hyper yang attributes, inflated ideas of productivity and improvement. The practice of shifting into yin consciousness can be very hard as it often goes against very powerful narratives that we need to do more. Take that slow walk through the woods, take a break, taste your food, breathe.

Intentionally go into nature

Not for the purpose of recreation or exercise, or any other reason but to really be with the trees, the water, the roots, the other beings. Listen.

Feel your feelings

Give yourself permission to feel, really feel! Allow the emotions to move through you. There can be a belief that if we allow ourselves to really feel the pain and vulnerability, that it will be so powerful that it will overtake us and we will be stuck there. The nature of emotion is that it arises and dissipates, the paradox is that if we allow ourselves to feel, the feelings can pass through us rather than avoiding them which leads to them being stored and stuck in our bodies. Can we honour the pain that is letting us know that we are not separate from the world?

Feeling our feelings may require us to increase our capacity to be with shadow and difficult feelings. We need to feel the uncertainty and tension in order to keep us awake. Author and teacher Joanna Macy (2012) reminds us that we may feel like we are weak to feel big feelings, that this is not a weakness, it is a love for our fellow human and more than human beings.

Move into your body & practice presence

Embodiment work is key to being present with and bearing discomfort. Marion Woodman reminds us, “Instead of transcending ourselves, we must move into ourselves.” How can we face this crazy mess without being in our bodies and present with it? If we are to truly allow ourselves to feel, we need to be in our bodies. Much spiritual work encourages us to transcend to rise up and out of ourselves, so does patriarchal culture. The familiar adage “mind over matter” encourages the power-over split that fuels our disconnection from our bodies and from the earth. Practice bringing yourself back down into your body, notice how your body responds to different people and situations. Dance, move, or be intentionally still. Go for a mindful walk in the woods. Take in all the colours, smells, and sounds around you.

Practice noticing the momentum of positive change happening

News media reports on what gets the most clicks, watches, or listens. Fear breeds fear. Of course feeling fear is a natural response to what is being reported, however when was the last time you heard the news media report on major movements into restorative business practices and the positive momentum building on the flip side of the doomsday coin? While bearing witness to the horrors, practice gathering evidence for positive change.

Ask: What is my next step?

Looking at the big picture when contributing to positive change can be overwhelming, if we break it down to bite-sized pieces, it can be more digestible. How can we act on behalf of life on our planet in our mundane everyday choices? In particular, pay attention to the internal voices. Noticing patterns of defense internally can allow more space to make choices externally that we would not normally. We belong to an intricate web of life, every action that you take has unknowable ripples. Ask: What is my next (baby) step?

Practice non-attachment to the outcome

When we make choices, it is natural to be attached to an outcome. However, the work of turning this sinking ship around is long term, long long term. There is a possibility of not seeing the fruits of our actions for generations. Or perhaps we will. Perhaps what we do will be enough, maybe it won’t be. The important thing is that we are aligned with our actions in the present. This is not easy! It is far easier to say, “what I do won’t make a difference anyway.” Be gentle with yourself.

Cultivate community

Connect with and cultivate community. We cannot do this work alone.

Learn about the lands you inhabit

It is hard to feel connected to lands that we know little about. Look into the stories of the lands you inhabit. Respectfully connect with and learn about indigenous relationships with the land. If you are not indigenous to the land, for most of us we have been uprooted from our ancestral land. Connect with your ancestral lineage, get curious about the lands they inhabited and their rituals and customs. Connecting with our ancestors can help us grow roots and a sense of belonging to the world.

I see your eco-anxiety and grief because it mirrors mine. May we know that our eco-emotions are valid and so important to feel to cultivate connection and to allow us to walk the knife-edge of uncertainty together, for it is this knife-edge that will keep us present and alert. May we recognize our place in the great web of life and connect to an inherent impulse to tend to its soul. May we remember that our pain is due to our deep caring, and our caring is because we belong to this world.