Sterling Terrain V02 - Flipbook - Page 6
4 | Sterling College
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weather patterns – like Hurricane Fiona
in Puerto Rico – impact millions of people, they often experience indescribable
loss and helplessness as they are forced
to be at the mercy of others. It is not
hard to recognize that the typical labels
for these emotions don’t quite capture
the depth and nuance of these feelings
– especially not when we account for
the life-changing implications, intergenerational impact, threats to fundamental
human security, and the globe-spanning
scope of such disruptions.
As Albrecht worked with community
members who witnessed the destruction of large-scale strip mining on their
homescape in New South Wales, he realized there were no words – at least in
the English language – to describe the
immense feelings of foreboding people
were expressing for their sense of place.
Referred to as Earth Emotions, Albrecht
helps us name and recognize the emotions or psychoterratic dis-ease that
arises from a “negative relationship with
our home environment – local, regional
or global – that results in a loss of identity and endemic sense of place and decline in well being” through an expanded
vocabulary:
• Solastalgia: the lived experience of
distressing, negative environmental
change, impacting one’s sense of home
or homeplace
• Terrafurie: the extreme anger unleashed within those who can clearly
see the self-destructive tendencies in
the current forms of industrial-technological society and feel they must protest and act to change its direction
• Meteoranxiety: anxiety that is felt in
the face of the threat of the increasing frequency and severity of extreme
weather events
Having proper names for these unprecedented Earth Emotions is useful because
it helps us to distinguish and explain why
being human in this era feels different
and more difficult, even when our ma-
terial conditions are often considerably
better than many of our ancestors.
Additionally, some of the youngest
members of our species often find
themselves increasingly separated from
the natural world – what Albrecht refers
to as “nature deficit” – and living in an
increasingly polarized and violent time.
This potent combination of emotional experiences places a tremendous
burden on young people who sense
that they are quite unlikely to have the
same set of opportunities and comforts enjoyed by their parents and great
grandparents and are quite likely to live
through at least one cataclysm.
As this generation of students grapples
with the burden of responding to centuries-laid crises, they are also experiencing overwhelming levels of eco-anxiety and depression. Albrecht proposes
replacing peril with hope through the
genesis of a generation ready to embrace symbioses. Thus, as elders and
educators, it is essential that we make
special efforts to assist those in preparing themselves for the work ahead.
We can replace paralysis with possibility through the building of community,
problem-solving, and resilience, contributing to the to the health and wellness for our students and our planet.
Sterling represents this hope, the possibility for something better, and inspires
agency.
Climate science is daunting and makes
dire predictions. To avoid the learned
helplessness and paralysis of action that
all too often accompanies a sense of insecurity and uncertainty, one must recognize the spaces in which the individual is empowered to make difference and
from which collective action springs.
A balanced and responsible education
prepares its students to analyze information while also providing the tools
necessary to live in supportive, collaborative, and problem-solving communities. A Sterling education develops with-
in its students the strategies and skills
to overcome conditioning, re-route reactions, change communication styles
and behavior, and build resilience in
the face of challenge. Education should
value the importance of exploring with
and engaging students in frameworks of
self-knowing and self care that support
compassion for all beings in the community, as much as it values science, ethics, and critical thinking. Educators must
invest time and mentoring in building
empathy, understanding, and resilience
– all couched in the spirit of mutual respect and collaboration. And it must find
ways to curate and celebrate alternate
ways of being human together.
Sterling believes in the power of Generation S to be the change agents we
need in the world - people who understand the power of ecological thinking
and action, who are conscious about
the decisions they make and the actions
they take everyday. Individuals who are
prepared with the skills required to redefine human-to-human relationships and
those between humans and the natural
world. It is a generation willing to unmask the irony of centuries old histories
of power, destruction, and violence in
the quest for a “better life”.
The Symbiocene is not yet here – but the
people who can bring it about already
are, and many of them are working and
learning here at Sterling.