Can You Feel the Pain of Earth?

BY SOFO ARCHON

When I see beauty, I tend to feel grief. That’s because it often reminds me of the beauty that has been lost—or, more precisely, that has been destroyed by humans.

When I hike through a forest, I often think of the billions of trees cut down each year. When I swim in the sea, I am often reminded of the vast amounts of plastic choking our oceans. When I come across a turtle during my morning walks, I often remember the alarming rate at which species are disappearing around the world.

Earth is hurting, and that brings me sorrow. Yet what saddens me even more is that most people do not seem to care, allowing the destruction to continue.

For years, I assumed that they simply acted out of ignorance. But over time, I realized something very different: due to the severe emotional traumas people endure throughout their lives, they tend to develop psychological defense mechanisms to shield themselves from pain. For example, some people form a hardened emotional skin that allows them to navigate the world without being overwhelmed by it. Others numb their minds with pharmaceuticals, while still others distract themselves with entertainment. Yet in doing so, they rob themselves of the opportunity to examine their pain, understand where it comes from, and effectively deal with it.

This explains why so many of us have become desensitized to the suffering in the world. It hurts to see nature and other people suffering, so we choose to turn away. Yet unless we acknowledge that suffering, how can we truly empathize with the world? And unless we empathize, how can we take meaningful action to heal it?

When we pay attention to the destruction that humans have inflicted on the planet, we also cannot help but feel profound grief for the life and beauty that have been lost. Yet grief exists for a tremendously important reason: to remind us of our interconnectedness and interdependence with everything that exists—and, hence, that by harming the world, we also harm ourselves. In other words, grief expands our sense of self, revealing who we truly are and what matters to our well-being.

Through this awareness, what the great American biologist E. O. Wilson called biophilia can be awakened within us—that is, our inherent affinity for all life on Earth and our deep, instinctive desire to interact with and protect it.