Policymakers talk about plantation initiatives, but climate healing involves more than just planting trees—it involves repairing our mental ties to nature?
In Kashmir, where nature has long been romanticised as a healer, something unsettling is happening.
The skies—once calming, predictable, and part of our collective therapy—are turning hostile. A territory that has been cultivated for centuries under a temperate, well-balanced climate is suddenly struggling with strange heat waves, unexpected storms, and unpredictable seasons.
However, the psychological trauma that comes with the climate change is even worse.
The weather has evolved from being a backdrop scene to the next silent cause of stress, emotional instability, and even mental health issues.
However, nobody is actually paying attention. What if the next mental health crisis isn’t festering in our brains but rather in the sky?
When natures clock desynchronises our biological one
Just as the seasons become out of rhythm, so do we. Circadian rhythms, internal clocks that are synchronised with daylight, temperature, and environmental stimuli, control our bodies.
This clock is being confused, however, by the erratic weather patterns and rising temperatures in Kashmir, which are caused by deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions, and forceful human interference.
What was the outcome? More than a little discomfort.
The volatility of the climate is rewiring our thoughts and moods, as seen by the rise in triggers for seizure sufferers, the worsening of symptoms reported by depressed people, the escalation of seasonal affective disorders, sleep difficulties, and hormone disruptions.
In addition to trauma, the psychological landscape is collapsing due to a disturbance in the natural balance.
Kashmir doesn’t just need green policies, it needs green psychotherapies
Governments talk about plantation initiatives and environmental charters, but they don’t talk about mental health in connection to climate change.
But what if healing involves more than just planting trees—it involves repairing our mental ties to nature?
The severe weather in Kashmir exacerbates the financial difficulties, growing costs, unemployment, and family stress already experienced by the middle class. The heat wears down the body and makes survival feel like a struggle. It also aggravates tempers and depletes patience.
The effectiveness of green policies depends on green psychological solutions, such as climate-conscious psychotherapy, treatment based on environmental exposure, and community programs that integrate ecological and emotional care. We need oxygen to breathe, but we also need space to exhale psychologically.
When weather doesn’t care, who does?
Extreme heat simply persists without justification or reasoning. Its persistence brings all unresolved stress to the surface.
An already unemployed parent becomes angry. A mother who is overworked loses patience.
Students often lose their temper with their siblings when they are under stress. Not only does heat cause perspiration, but it also aggravates us.
The precariousness of our emotional ecosystems is further underscored by the circumstances in Kashmir.
What if these outbursts are a symptom of a larger, roiling pot of psychological exhaustion exacerbated by unpredictable surroundings?
The blame is frequently attributed to someone’s “bad day” or “short temper.”
The climate appears on its own initiative. This implies that we must respond quickly, efficiently, and in accordance with the weather.
It is insufficient to assume that trauma, heredity, or social struggle are the only factors that influence mental health. The most sturdy minds can be subtly unsettled by climate, a new character in the psychological screenplay.
Kashmir, with its serene scenery and lyrical weather, was never prepared for such quick transformation. It can be startling to see this contrast between what we expect from nature and what it is becoming into.
You have a mental health storm that no medication or yoga class can resolve on its own when you combine it with the everyday stress of job insecurity, family expectations, and financial hardship.
Our definitions of therapy, stress, and emotional climate need to change. Because just as the sky can change, so too must our perception of the starting point of healing.
Since many in society today are environment-conscious and aware of how it affects not just biology, but the emotional and psychological future of generations to come, there are those who are tirelessly working to spread awareness.
They understand that it’s not just about surviving the climate crisis, but about preserving the regional temperature balance that once defined Kashmir—a region now witnessing drying springs, melting glaciers, and record-breaking temperatures unseen in previous decades.
The progress is painfully slow, though, despite their ceaseless efforts to raise awareness and plant trees. How unkind is it that something that takes decades to develop can be destroyed by a single spark?
Numerous prominent environmental leaders have taken this mission seriously, bravely advocating for it and informing the public about the dire consequences that will arise if these changes go unchecked.
Kashmir is more prone to such distress, not just environmentally, but emotionally, because its people were never preconditioned for the burning summers and airless nights that now invade their once healing land.
The time to act isn’t today—it’s now, before the skies write a fate we can no longer rewrite.
Umair Ashraf holds a Master’s in Psychology and is an independent scholar in molecular neuroscience, focusing on decoding brain biochemistry and its impact on behaviour and society.
