We have just experienced for the first time an episode of heat wave in June. It has complicated the operation of many businesses and the lives of many parents who have not been able to send their children to school because the temperature there was too high. And it was hard to live with, physically, for a lot of people.
franceinfo: But is such an episode also difficult psychologically?
Claude Almos: A heat wave like this, and what it leads to fear, is difficult to live with, psychologically, for everyone. Some people are well aware of this, and we talk about them as “eco-anxiety”. Others are not, but they are affected nonetheless, because what happens in society constitutes, even if we do not perceive it, a kind of backdrop against which our personal lives unfold.
And therefore a background either of a collective optimism which supports us, or of an ambient concern which, without our knowledge, weighs on us, and weakens us to face our individual problems (family or others).
What effects did this heat wave have on us?
It had effects that were all the greater in that it made us relive things that we had already experienced during confinement. First of all, the feeling of powerlessness, both personal and collective. As if Covid-19 and climate change brought us back to a world before science, where the only solution was to try to escape a nature on which we could not act. And then an uncertainty as to the future (for oneself, and one’s children) which is very distressing.
And the effects of this heat wave (like confinement, by the way) have been aggravated by the living conditions, and particularly for people who are poorly housed: in a “thermal sieve”, the heat reminds you physically, and every second, your financial situation. The reality of global warming has therefore imposed itself on many people, in a very brutal way, and without escape, because we can succeed in convincing ourselves, like the “conspirators”, that the Covid-19 does not exist. not. But denying the heat, when it crushes you, is more complicated…
What can we advise people who are worried?
We must advise them to transform their concern into action, because, even if we are sent back imaginarily to times when science did not exist, today it exists. It explains the causes of global warming, and what to do to fight it.
We can therefore participate in actions in relation to the climate and, in this way, “heal” reality, but also heal ourselves, coming out of a position of powerlessness and loneliness, where we can only suffer, and worry. We can join others to, by struggling with them, become aware of the power we have to reverse the danger. And it is the best remedy against the depressive feelings that it can give rise to.