When the Forest Can't Take Any More

There comes a point in a heatwave when everything feels like hard work.

I've been feeling it myself lately. My office has been ridiculously hot. The fan has been wurringly shifting hot air from one side of the room to the other, achieving nothing other than making the heat slightly more mobile. Sleep has been harder to come by and I've felt dehydrated, sluggish and low on energy. Exercise is something that would normally help me regulate, has felt as though it might result in spontaneous combustion.

But I've also noticed something else.

I'm less tolerant when I'm hot and tired. Things take more effort. Small irritations feel bigger. Decisions require more energy and my body is working harder before I've actually asked it to do anything.

And perhaps that's what prolonged stress does. It turns our inner world into a landscape under pressure.

Across the world, forests are experiencing periods of extreme heat and drought. Moisture disappears from the soil and plants become stressed. Trees conserve what resources they have, some already turning brown and the landscape becomes increasingly vulnerable. Alien to witness.

And often, nothing particularly dramatic seems to be happening.

Until it is.

Perhaps we're not so different.

Feeling the heat

We use the expression all the time.

I'm really feeling the heat.

Usually, we're not talking about temperature. We're talking about pressure.

Deadlines. Responsibility. Money. Relationships. Caring for other people. Workloads. Exams. Expectations. Being the reliable one. Trying to make the right decision. Waiting for news. Trying desperately not to disappoint someone.

Sometimes stress arrives like a forest fire. Something happens and suddenly our whole world feels different.

But often stress isn't the fire.

It's the heat that came before it.

It builds slowly.

One late night becomes several. One extra responsibility gets absorbed into an already busy week. We skip something that normally helps us unwind because there isn't time. Then we skip it again.

We tell ourselves we're fine.

And mostly, we are.

So we carry on.

The psychological heatwave

There's an old analogy about a frog sitting in water that is gradually heated. The story goes that because the temperature rises slowly, the frog doesn't notice the danger and doesn't jump out.

Biologically, this isn't true. Frogs are a lot better at self-preservation than the story suggests, but psychologically, the metaphor works.

Human beings are astonishingly good at adapting.

Unfortunately, that means we're also capable of adapting to circumstances that aren't doing us much good.

We accommodate the extra workload.

We get used to sleeping badly.

We normalise feeling anxious.

We become accustomed to carrying responsibility.

We say, It's just until Friday.

Then, It's just until the end of the month.

Then, Things will calm down after Christmas.

We sweat it out.

Meanwhile, someone or something has quietly turned the temperature up another degree.

The danger isn't always that we can't cope.

Sometimes it's that we can cope for far too long.

Results season

For thousands of families, August brings its own particular heatwave.

A-level results came out last week and GCSE results arrive this week.

For teenagers, months or even years of work suddenly become condensed into letters and numbers on a screen or piece of paper.

That's an extraordinary amount of psychological weight to place on a few characters.

And parents and carers feel the heat too.

You might be worrying about your teenager whilst trying very hard not to look worried. You might want to reassure them whilst knowing that saying don't worry is about as effective as telling someone standing in a burning kitchen to simply feel cooler.

Teenagers may be carrying their own expectations, their teachers' expectations, their parents' hopes and the uncomfortable awareness that everyone keeps asking:

What are you going to do next?

Sometimes the honest answer is:

I haven't got a bloody clue.

And that's allowed.

Results matter because they can affect what happens next.

But they don't define the person receiving them.

A result might open a door.

It might close one.

Sometimes it leaves a door slightly ajar and invites us to peer through and discover something we hadn't previously considered.

There are other doors.

There are side entrances.

There are paths around the building.

And occasionally we discover that the door we were desperate to get through wasn't actually leading somewhere we wanted to go.

When the forest can't take any more

A forest under prolonged environmental stress doesn't have infinite resources.

Neither do we.

When we're under pressure for long enough, our tolerance can shrink.

We become irritable.

We procrastinate.

We withdraw.

We can't concentrate.

Things that normally feel manageable suddenly feel enormous.

We might cry over something seemingly insignificant or snap at somebody we love.

Then we criticise ourselves.

What's wrong with me?

Perhaps that's the wrong question.

A more useful one might be:

How hot has it been in here lately?

What have you been carrying?

How long have you been carrying it?

When did you last properly recover rather than simply stop working for a few hours?

Because surviving the heat isn't the same as cooling down.

Finding the cold water

When we're overwhelmed, we're often tempted to look for a dramatic solution.

Leave the job.

Leave the course.

Change everything.

Run away to a cabin in the woods where nobody knows our email address.

Occasionally, those decisions are exactly right.

But sometimes what we need first is simply to lower the temperature.

Think of it as stepping into a metaphorical cold bath.

That might mean cancelling something.

Going to bed ridiculously early.

Putting your phone somewhere else.

Taking a walk without turning it into exercise.

Eating properly.

Drinking water.

Crying.

Sitting quietly.

Saying no.

Asking somebody else to take something off your plate.

Telling someone:

I'm finding this harder than I expected.

For a teenager waiting for results, cooling down might mean spending time with someone who doesn't want to discuss grades.

For a parent, it might mean resisting the urge to immediately solve everything and simply saying:

Whatever that piece of paper says, we'll work out what happens next.

Compassion can be cold water too.

Not indulgence.

Not giving up.

Just stopping the relentless internal commentary that insists we should be coping better.

Sometimes we need a cold shower

A cold shower is an interruption.

For a moment, everything else disappears.

Psychologically, we need interruptions too.

Something that breaks the cycle long enough for our nervous system to realise that the emergency isn't permanent.

A conversation.

A boundary.

A day off.

A change of scenery.

A good night's sleep.

Asking for help.

Changing the plan.

Sometimes the most powerful reset is simply acknowledging:

This is too much at the moment.

Not forever.

At the moment.

That distinction matters.

Seasons change

When you're living through a difficult period, it's remarkably easy to believe that the current weather is simply the climate now.

That you'll always feel this tired.

That the pressure will always be this intense.

That this result has determined everything.

That this disappointment has closed every possible route.

But seasons change.

Droughts end.

Rain comes.

The ground doesn't recover instantly. A forest doesn't become lush again because it rained on Tuesday.

Recovery is usually quieter than that.

Moisture gradually returns to the soil.

Temperatures fall.

Roots take up water.

Things begin functioning again.

We need those periods too.

Not necessarily dramatic reinvention.

Sometimes just enough relief to think clearly again.

Enough sleep.

Enough kindness.

Enough space.

Enough help.

Enough water, metaphorical and otherwise.

So if you're feeling the heat at the moment, perhaps don't immediately ask yourself how you can become better at tolerating it.

Ask something different.

Where's the cold water?

What could lower the temperature by one degree?

Who could help?

What could wait?

What expectation could be loosened?

What would compassion look like today?

Because resilience isn't endlessly learning to withstand hotter and hotter conditions.

Sometimes resilience is noticing that you're overheating and giving yourself permission to get out of the water.

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