Towards an Ecopsychotherapy

Psychotherapy invites us to tell the story of our human relationships; ecopsychotherapy expands this to include our earth story, the context or continuum in which our human relationships sit. Ecopsychotherapy is not simply a technique to be applied in therapy: it involves a change in perspective. While practising therapy outdoors is a radical shift that can support and facilitate the healing process, it also acknowledges that our relationship with the earth is both inside and outside ourselves. As climate chaos quickens and increasing numbers of people are waking up to the seriousness of our environmental crisis, we are becoming more aware of our dysfunctional relationship with the earth - the body on whom we depend for everything. Ecopsychotherapy can help to support our reconnection with nature and to discover hope in turbulent times.

Mary-Jayne Rust is an art therapist and Jungian analyst. Alongside her private practice she writes, lectures and facilitates workshops in the field of ecopsychology. In the 1980s she worked at the Women's Therapy Centre with women with eating problems; this led to a wider interest in the roots of consumerism, the connections between body and psyche, land, and soul. Two journeys to Ladakh in the early 1990s alerted her to the seriousness of the environmental crisis, and gave her a brief glimpse of an almost intact traditional culture. On return she joined the PCSR ecopsychology group. This group of ten therapists met monthly for five years, discussing theory and exploring the practice of ecopsychology. She grew up beside the sea and is wild about swimming. Now she lives and works beside ancient woodland in North London.