Climate Change, Grief, and the Rise of the Feminine
A Depth Psychology Apprach to Honoring What Hurts, and Healing What’s Lost
There’s a kind of grief many of us carry but struggle to name. A quiet, aching sorrow that lives in our bones when we read about vanishing forests, melting glaciers, or animals pushed to extinction. Climate change isn’t just a scientific or political crisis—it’s a rupture in the soul. Something in us knows we’re losing more than ecosystems. We’re losing a sense of home.
And yet, most of us don’t know what to do with that pain. We scroll through the headlines, feel that punch of helplessness—and then move on. Because what else can we do? The weight of climate grief is too much to hold alone. So we tuck it away. It turns into anxiety, numbness, irritability, or burnout.
But just because we push it down doesn’t mean it disappears.
When the Earth Hurts, We Hurt Too
The grief of the planet doesn’t just live out there. It lives in here—in our bodies, our dreams, our relationships. The anxiety that spikes when the wind shifts strangely. The sense of dread we can’t quite name. The heaviness in our chest when we see the orange sky during fire season. These are not just personal feelings—they’re collective ones.
In depth psychotherapy, we recognize that what we don’t process consciously will surface in other ways. And climate grief is no different. It shows up in our emotional fatigue, in our longing for something real and connected, in the way we sometimes feel like we’re living in a dream we can’t wake up from.
We weren’t meant to carry this alone. And we don’t have to.
Demeter and Persephone: A Map for Our Grieving
There’s a myth I often return to in this work—the story of Demeter and Persephone. When Persephone is taken into the underworld, Demeter—the Earth mother—grieves so profoundly that nothing grows. Her sorrow is world-changing. It halts the cycle of life itself.
This myth speaks to something we all feel now: a world that feels out of balance. Too much has been lost. Too much has been taken.
In this story, Persephone represents all that’s been pulled into the dark—beauty, balance, innocence, connection. And Demeter’s grief is not weakness. It’s an act of love. A refusal to pretend everything is fine. A cry for what has been taken.
We’re living in a time when the Earth, and something within each of us, is crying out in the same way.
The Rise of the Feminine: A Different Way Forward
The grief we feel isn’t just for the planet—it’s for a way of being we’ve lost. A way of relating to the Earth that’s rooted in respect, reciprocity, and care. The dominant systems around us—extraction, domination, control—have left the world wounded, and us disconnected.
But there’s something rising in response. A return to the feminine—not as gender, but as a quality of being. A deeper listening. A slowness. A softness. A remembering that the Earth is alive and that our grief is sacred.
This isn’t about fixing everything. It’s about learning how to feel again. To grieve without shutting down. To care without collapsing. To honor the pain without rushing to escape it.
Grieving as a Sacred Act
To grieve the Earth consciously is an act of resistance. It’s a way of saying: I will not go numb.
I will not look away.
I still care.
Depth therapy gives us space to do this. Not by offering easy answers or forcing hope, but by helping us stay present to what’s real. It’s not about pretending things are okay—it’s about building the emotional and spiritual capacity to be with what’s not. And from that place, something new can grow.
Grief, when tended to, softens us. It deepens our capacity for love, for action, for presence. It reconnects us to ourselves and to the world we’re a part of.
Maybe we can’t save everything. But we can choose to be awake to what’s happening. We can choose to feel. And from that feeling, we can live differently.
You Don’t Have to Carry Climate Grief Alone
If your heart aches when you think about the Earth, you’re not broken—you’re awake. And if that grief feels heavy, I’m here.
I offer grief counseling in Oakland, CA, and online throughout California. If you’re longing for a space where your grief can be honored—where your sensitivity is seen not as a weakness but as a gift—I would love to hear from you.
Let’s begin where you are. There’s still beauty to hold. There’s still meaning to make. Contact me today.