Climate Anxiety: How Therapy Can Help You Cope with Environmental Stress
In recent years, more and more people are experiencing climate anxiety—a deep sense of worry, fear, or sadness about the state of the environment and the future of the planet. If you’re struggling with feelings of eco-stress, you're not alone. As global concerns about climate change grow, more individuals are turning to therapy for climate anxiety to learn how to cope with these overwhelming emotions.
Whether you’re feeling overwhelmed by environmental grief, anxious about future climate disasters, or simply unsure of how to process your thoughts about the planet’s future, therapy for eco-stress can offer you the support and tools you need. In this post, I’ll explain what climate anxiety is, how it impacts mental health, and how therapy can help you manage eco-anxiety and find peace in an uncertain world.
What is Climate Anxiety and Eco-Stress?
Climate anxiety refers to the fear, sadness, or worry individuals experience in response to climate change and its potential consequences. These feelings can stem from:
Fear of environmental destruction: Concerns about extreme weather, rising sea levels, and the potential loss of ecosystems.
Guilt or helplessness: Worry about personal actions contributing to environmental degradation, or feeling like there’s nothing you can do to make a difference.
Eco-grief: A profound sense of mourning for the loss of nature, wildlife, and the health of the planet.
Physical symptoms of anxiety: Including insomnia, fatigue, headaches, or chest tightness triggered by the stress of climate change.
If you're experiencing any of these feelings, it’s important to acknowledge that eco-anxiety is a natural and valid response to the current climate crisis. However, when left unchecked, these emotions can lead to chronic stress, depression, and burnout. This is where therapy can be a valuable resource.
How Therapy Can Help You Cope with Climate Anxiety and Eco-Stress
I work with clients who are struggling to manage their climate anxiety and eco-stress, and have seen this issue become more prevalent recently. Therapy provides a supportive environment where you can explore your feelings, process your emotions, and develop healthy coping strategies. Here’s how therapy can help you cope with eco-anxiety:
Understanding Your Climate Anxiety
The first step in therapy is understanding the emotions connected to your eco-anxiety. In our sessions, we’ll explore your fears and worries surrounding climate change. Whether it’s the future of the planet or the emotional impact of environmental destruction, I’ll help you process these feelings so that you can make sense of them.
Recognizing that your anxiety is a natural reaction to the overwhelming global crisis can be the first step in reducing its intensity. Understanding the root of your emotions can also empower you to take control over them, rather than feeling controlled by them.
Developing Effective Coping Strategies for Eco-Stress
Coping with climate anxiety requires tools that help you manage your emotional response to environmental stressors. I’ll teach you evidence-based coping strategies that can reduce feelings of helplessness and anxiety. Some of the techniques we might use include:
Mindfulness: Staying present and grounded in the moment can prevent you from spiraling into worry about the future.
Breathing exercises: Simple but effective techniques to calm your nervous system and reduce physical tension.
Cognitive-behavioral therapy: Together, we’ll challenge negative thought patterns, like believing that individual actions can’t make a difference or that the planet is beyond saving.
Grounding exercises: Reconnecting with your body and the present moment to reduce the physiological symptoms of anxiety.
These tools can help you manage your anxiety more effectively and allow you to approach climate-related stress with calmness and clarity.
Reframing Guilt and Helplessness
Many people I work with experience guilt and helplessness when it comes to their environmental footprint. You might feel that no matter what you do, it won’t make a meaningful difference, or you may feel burdened by the environmental crisis without knowing how to act. Therapy can help you reframe these feelings by shifting your focus toward empowerment and action.
Together, we’ll explore small, meaningful changes you can make to align your actions with your values, such as:
Reducing your personal carbon footprint.
Supporting sustainable businesses.
Advocating for climate-friendly policies.
These actions, no matter how small, can give you a sense of agency and purpose, reducing feelings of helplessness.
Building Resilience and Emotional Flexibility
Resilience is the ability to bounce back from challenges, and therapy is a great place to build it. In therapy, we’ll work together to enhance your emotional flexibility, helping you to stay resilient in the face of eco-anxiety. This involves:
Self-compassion: Learning how to treat yourself with kindness, especially when you’re feeling overwhelmed by the state of the world.
Gratitude: Shifting your focus to moments of joy and beauty in nature, no matter how small they may seem.
Connection: Building a sense of community with others who share your environmental concerns. This can create a sense of solidarity and reduce feelings of isolation.
Developing these tools will help you build emotional resilience and regulate your emotions when the weight of climate stress feels too heavy.
Taking Meaningful Action to Combat Eco-Anxiety
Therapy isn’t just about coping with climate anxiety—it’s also about finding meaningful ways to take action. Taking positive steps towards environmental sustainability can alleviate feelings of helplessness and guilt. Together, we can explore ways to advocate for change, such as:
Participating in environmental movements.
Volunteering for green initiatives.
Educating yourself and others about sustainability practices.
By channeling your anxiety into purposeful action, you’ll feel a greater sense of control and hope for the future.
Seeking Support for Climate Anxiety
If you’re struggling with climate anxiety or eco-stress, therapy can offer the support you need. I offer a safe, non-judgmental space where you can explore your feelings, develop coping strategies, and work through your emotions related to climate change. Whether in person or online, therapy can help you manage the stress of living in an uncertain world.
About the Author
I am a licensed clinical social worker and owner of Victoria Smith, LCSW, Inc., an online and in-person therapy practice focused on helping young professionals heal from anxiety and burnout, and quiet the critical internal voices of perfectionism. If you’re a California resident, schedule a free consultation call to learn more!
The reality of climate change is daunting, and it’s completely normal to feel anxious, sad, or overwhelmed by it. However, you don’t have to navigate this anxiety alone. Therapy offers a space to process eco-stress, build resilience, and take meaningful action. Together, we can explore your feelings about the climate crisis, identify ways to manage your anxiety, and help you develop a sense of hope and empowerment.
If you're ready to take the first step towards healing from eco-anxiety, I’m here to help you move through it and find peace. You don’t have to carry the weight of the world alone—let’s work together to create a path forward.