How to overcome environmental fatigue

I am not proud of what I will write about now. I’m trying to understand why I gave up. Until last year, I tried to buy only organic products. They were more expensive, but I understood that the game was worth the candle. And then the crisis inexorably began to be felt. I started saving on gas and going to the nearest store. Buy products cheaper, which means lower quality. I took the easy route, promising myself that I would return to my habits later. Indeed, what good can I do to the world by stopping bathing and buying energy-saving light bulbs if the radioactive waters around Fukushima have reached the coast of California?

“We can’t go back to solving environmental problems without understanding the emotions that made us refuse to solve them,” says psychologist and writer Patrick Viveret.¹. He calls this condition “psychological regression associated with fear.” What’s the matter?

Three reasons for our passivity

1. Blame the crisis. The beginning of the 2000s was marked by the growth of environmental consciousness around the world. But with the advent of the economic crisis, issues of nature conservation faded into the background. It’s hard to think about the future of the planet when you don’t know how to feed your kids and pay your rent.
2. Ecologists are helpless. Can an environmentally literate lifestyle prevent the death of our world? Philosopher Pascal Bruckner constantly points to the inability of environmentalists to implement even one positive change. “Everyone understands that we need ways to produce with less carbon emissions, we need to reduce the harmful impact of technology on the environment,” he writes. “But the fact that ecologists are willing to voluntarily give up progress in the name of mother nature is an example of elementary ignorance. And they are driven not by concern for the planet, but by fear, presented as a cult of nature.².
3. We are disappointed in the state. A new way of life in harmony with nature is possible only with the active participation of the authorities. Who else is capable of investing in the development of renewable energy, revising agricultural policy, monitoring the state of medicine and education? Meanwhile, officials and politicians behave as if environmental problems do not exist. One gets the impression that these problems concern only caring citizens and environmentalists.

Read more:

• Let’s think (eco)logically

Not our topic?

Our main problem is the feeling of helplessness. How can we prevent an ecological crisis if the interests of the state and industrial enterprises stand in the way? It remains to be recognized that on a global scale, there is little we can change. “The topic of environmental safety and, for example, global warming is really relevant in America and Europe. Politicians there are forced to respond to the demands of society. They understand that if Amsterdam or Los Angeles floods, it will be a disaster. And citizens cannot help but worry about their future,” psychologist Mark Rozin, president of ECOPSY-consulting, comments on the situation. – In Russia, the majority is worried about something else. If you have a toothache, you will not think about whether you are eating unhealthy food, but you will think about how to pull out a tooth as soon as possible. For us to be sustainable, our basic needs must be met.”

“Working in different regions of Russia, we are more likely to see an increase in environmental awareness,” argues Tatiana Chestina, director of ECA movement development and managing partner of the Veles Green Agency. – If, for example, a valuable natural object is destroyed, local residents stand up for its protection. In the Chernozem region, they are protesting against nickel mining near the unique Khopersky Reserve, in Chelyabinsk – against the construction of the Tominsky GOK, there are many such actions in Moscow. There are more “grassroots” eco-projects, initiatives launched by people of different professions – the Internet speeds up these processes, allowing like-minded people to find each other faster.” At some point, companies really began to appear in our country that save electricity, collect batteries centrally, set up printers so that they print on both sides. “That is, they do what has long become the norm in Western companies, but in our country it seemed like an eccentricity to many,” comments Mark Rozin. “But even those efforts fizzled out in 2014. Russian macroeconomic problems have completely obscured the topic of ecology.” When barbarism prevailed in business, few people are concerned about its environmental safety, the expert is sure.

At the same time, one should not underestimate personal efforts, experts say. They “infect” those who care about the future, and as a result can develop into major changes in the entire system.

Read more:

• Psychology of ECOlogy

Act together

To change your habits, you should think more often about the benefits that these changes can bring. What world do we want to live in? How can we bring about the change we hope for? Today in Europe, their vegetable gardens, car sharing, co-working spaces and communal residences are enjoying great success. These tendencies penetrate everywhere and speak of the readiness of people to create a “brotherhood of like-minded people.”

“Unconsciously, we all feel a connection with nature, its destruction cannot but affect the quality of our life, but we prefer to think that “ecology is not about us”, especially in urban life, where we are alienated from the consequences of our activities (for example , we don’t see gigantic suburban landfills),” says Tatyana Chestina. In a crisis, everyone involuntarily becomes more environmentally friendly: we buy less things (equipment, cars), we keep track of our electricity and water bills. A healthy lifestyle trend is developing, which is indirectly related to environmental friendliness, secular awareness practices are becoming more popular, which lead to environmental awareness. Many of us better understand the relationship of everything to everything and choose a more responsible life.

An injection of joy

A new science, ecopsychology, emerged in response to the need to link the transformation of the individual with the transformation of society. “According to the postulates of this science, the outer world is a reflection of the inner world of people,” says eco-psychologist Jean-Pierre Le Danff (Jean-Pierre Le Danff). “Ecopsychology allows each of us to work on our own follies, to understand what makes us destroy the planet and mindlessly consume for self-consolation and self-soothing.”

In other words, in order to take care of nature, we must first take care of ourselves, try to get rid of the inner emptiness. “Joy is not just a state of mind,” says Patrick Vivere. This is the main condition for any change. In a society that lives on the principle of mutual dislike, being happy is already a revolution. Where fear separates us, joy, helping us to act, to experiment with new ideas, unites us with others and the universe. Isn’t that what the world around us needs?

¹ Author of Reconsidérer la richesse (L’Aube, 2013).

² P. Bruckner “Ecology, a new temperance catechism” (Liberation, 05.11.2013).