Yale psychologist: How to cope in a world of climate disasters, trauma and anxiety

Climate change is changing how human beings live on the earth as floods, wildfires and extreme weather change the land and destroy property.

“Rates of child abuse and intimate partner violence and things like that tend to increase in the aftermath of disasters, as well as extreme heat, so that’s another form of trauma that happen in the aftermath of disasters.”

Living with climate change as a constant threat on the horizon has also changed how human beings think about their own existence.

Both kinds of distress — the acute trauma of immediate disasters and the background sense of existential doom — require different responses, both personal and from society…READ ON

How to help your employees be resilient

Why is it important to have resilient employees? While the pandemic, looming natural disasters, and the economy are today’s issues, there will always be hardship. Resilient employees will be able to adjust and cope with whatever hardship they encounter.

Employees who feel safe and are mentally well also perform better on the job and are less likely to get physically injured. See our stress and mental well-being in the workplace page for more information…READ ON

Building the capacity to become resilient

Among the many buzzing words that have made their way to the corporate lingo in the past 20 months is ‘resilience’. Sure the term existed and was being used extensively even pre-pandemic. But the past 20 months have shifted resilience from being a mindset of a few, to a necessity for survival, for the masses.

In her book, ‘Ordinary Magic: Resilience in Development’, author Ann Masten, a professor at the University of Minnesota College of Education and Human Development, describes resilience as [t]he capacity of a dynamic system to adapt successfully to disturbances that threaten system function, viability, or future development of the system.”

 “Our research clearly shows that merely investing more dollars into well-being related benefits isn’t enough. In order to attract and retain talent and sustain financial success, the time is now for companies to embrace a corporate-wide focus on organisational health at all levels.”

Josh Bersin

While the corporate world tries to weave conversations around adapting to these disturbances and creating an environment that suggests ‘it’s ok to not be ok’, the push to become resilient for survival continues. Can one afford to not be ok amid the growing push for resilience? Is the push to become resilient causing greater damage to employee well-being…READ ON