A Changing World: The Psychological Impact of Ecological Grief

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

We talk so often about the consequences of climate change; melting ice caps, wildfires and rising seas, explaining changes in degrees, targets, timelines and risk curves. But what of ecological grief? What about the psychological impact of the loss of the world we know? Something is lost already, and it’s not a hypothetical scenario. It’s obvious in the loss of landscapes once loved, trusted seasons, and assumed stable futures. It feels appropriate to remain productive, optimistic and solution-oriented, but what if grief is not a distraction from action, but the piece that is missing.

New research suggests that climate change must not only be tackled as a physical phenomenon, but also with emotion. Most conversations about climate worry fall into two categories:

1)       Eco-anxiety – a worry about the future

2)       Solastalgia – distress over changes in one’s immediate environment

These two categories focus on the present and the future, but what of that that has already been lost?

What if there is something deeper? A psychological grief that evokes pain not unlike losing a loved one? Grief for the loss of species, ways of life and our own identities cemented in those places.

Climate change may not just be a problem to be solved, but a loss to be grieved. Failure to acknowledge grief poses one of the largest barriers to real emotional engagement and therefore meaningful action. It can be seen through real and present stories; a mountaineer watching the glaciers he loves disappear feels as though a part of himself is also disappearing, melting with the snow and ice. We often attribute parts of ourselves to our environments, how often do we feel loss when change becomes permanent?

The difference feels subtle until we are forced to sit with it, looking backward can feel just as real as what is happening in our immediate space. The question is, should grief over the loss of a forest or a glacier be on par with personal human loss? If the answer is no, what does this imply about our values?

Ecological grief can have real mental health consequences and also influence behaviour in unexpected ways. People attached to natural environments, people like farmers and outdoor enthusiasts, are at higher risk, but many of us are effected by stories and images of loss, irrespective of where we live. Unresolved grief in any form can become debilitating when unresolved, spurring withdrawal, rumination and identity disruption.

And yet, grief can also be a catalyst for meaning and action; emotions are beyond symptoms, they become signals. As climate change transforms our environments, ecological grief may be the emotional currency of that transformation. If people are given permission to feel grief, connection grows and people may no longer feel held back from action.

Giving a name to ecological grief will not immediately spur global policy, but it does allow people to acknowledge their grief, explore its psychological impact, observe how it differs from anxiety and stress and identify the difference between what is harmful and what evokes meaningful engagement.  Is it a possibility that our inaction in preventing climate change is partially due to unwillingness to confront grief?

Humanity prides its own ego in rational responses to complex problems, but rationality alone has not been able to prevent forest loss or species extinction. Perhaps we need emotional literacy to surpass the surface feeling; being willing to sit with the pain without turning away or over-intellectualising it. For professionals navigating complex systems, being aware that human responses to crises are both cognitive and emotional could be the difference between stagnation and progress. Any approach that ignores the dimension of emotion is guaranteed to be incomplete.

There is not a straightforward, tidy solution. There is no quick fix, but naming it may be the first step toward the resolution. Ecological grief is not a sign of weakness but evidence of connection, a testament to what we love, what matters and what is worth protecting.

Ecological grief does not sit in our conscious awareness. From the depth psychology lens, this unacknowledged loss lives in the unconscious, where this kind of loss always goes. It returns as anxiety, numbness or compulsive productivity. When grief is denied, it doesn’t disappear; it finds new ways to speak. What is rejected by consciousness appears in fate. In this sense, the ecological crisis may also be a psychic one as the natural world re-emerges as an inner wound, no longer an object to dominate or optimise. Our environments, the forests, oceans and glaciers become the archetypal mirrors of stability, continuity and belonging. Their erosion matches the erosion of something within the psyche. The question is not whether we are grieving, but whether we are willing to listen to what the grief is asking of us.

For the full paper published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2021, follow this link:

Ecological Grief as a Response to Environmental Change: A Mental Health Risk or Functional Response? - PMC

Follow The Heretic for discussions about environmental change and the repercussions on mental health