Several weeks ago, I shared some thoughts about the teen mental health crisis and pointed to some theories about what’s causing it. (Reminder: I believe it’s a little of everything.) Since I wrote it, even more articles have come my way, many of them pointing to social media as a root cause, though as I said before, I don’t believe social media would be nearly as detrimental if other things weren’t also in play–a decades-long decline in community and degradation in our social fabric, for example. I also suspect social media may be more correlative than causal–when you’re depressed, you don’t have a lot of energy and focus for complicated tasks. Scrolling doesn’t require much from people who have very little to give. (I’m not saying it’s good, I’m saying it’s easy.)
Anyway, in discussing all this I borrowed a metaphor from my fifteen year old’s class on sustainable agriculture:
He told me there are two kinds of pollution, point source and nonpoint source. Point source is when you can identify where the pollution is coming from—a pipeline, a shipping vessel, a factory. Nonpoint comes from nonspecific places that are complicated to trace. Nonpoint is runoff. Fertilizer, that’s not all that toxic but is used over a wide enough area that it leaches into the soil and then impacts the watersheds. Nonpoint is animal waste and toxic chemicals and drainage from abandoned mines.
That’s the mental health crisis.
…We need to start getting comfortable with the discomfort that it’s twenty different things which all add up to a culture that really isn’t working great for anyone.
You have no idea how much I wish there were an easy answer, a specific pinpointed cause, because then we could just eliminate it. And one of the frustrating things about mental health is how much onus is placed on the individual. On one level, this is appropriate–the only thing we have any control over is ourselves (and even that is limited). On the other hand, self-care and healing get reduced to a series of personal decisions, with no reckoning around the societal factors that make the world a frequently toxic place to live in. (Similar to the ways we sometimes address poverty, treating it as a matter of financial literacy. If only poor people knew how to write a budget!)
I remember when the revelations came out about Instagram suppressing evidence that their product was harmful especially for teenage girls. I read a few articles basically saying, “Well it’s up to users/their parents to educate themselves and put limits around these sites.” I mean, yes. But corporations spend millions of dollars in R&D figuring out how to hack our attention to get us hooked on their product. What chance does an individual stand against that?
But we have to start somewhere. One of the key ingredients of hope is what psychologist Charles Snyder called agency thinking: a sense that one has the power to effect positive change in their life. So the world churns along dysfunctionally, and wow does it seem like we’re outmatched. But there are things we can do, individually and collectively.
Back to sustainable agriculture. Through my son, I’ve learned a new term: riparian buffers. Riparian buffers are trees, shrubs and grasses, planted alongside streams and watersheds specifically to combat nonpoint source pollution. According to this site, they serve as natural filters, reducing or eliminating pesticides and animal waste from runoff. They stabilize riverbanks so they don’t erode, and protect downstream communities from flooding. They provide shade, shelter, and food for aquatic creatures, and recreation for human ones.
How astounding, and comforting, that nature provides a way of healing nature.
And how empowering this image has been for me! As a parent, I’d like nothing more than to eliminate the pollution at the source. But if that’s beyond my control, I can at least help my kids plant riparian buffers to filter out some of the poison.
What I like about the metaphor is that it works on a societal level–our survival depends on cultivating a more verdant world–but also a personal one. I want to be very careful here, because mental illness is not a moral failing, and “you’re depressed, just go take a walk in the sunshine” is all kinds of minimizing. One of my kids really hasn’t felt like themselves for a really long time–you wouldn’t believe how long–and yet they continue to gamely show up for every treatment, every appointment, every tweak in medication. When it comes to determination and willpower, the school valedictorian has nothing on my kid. I’m not about to shame them for not doing more.
At the same time… That agency thinking, so critical to hope, means that there are always things within our power, even if what’s in our power is rest, self-kindness, and nothing more.
Along the way, our family has picked up some DBT skills, and sitting on my desk for several weeks now has been a worksheet about emotional regulation, using the acronym ABC PLEASE. (Note: DBT is wild about the acronyms)
A=Accumulate positive emotions. Do pleasant things that are possible now; long term, work to build a “life worth living.”
B=Build mastery. Do things that help you feel competent.
C=Cope ahead of time with emotional situations. Rehearse a plan so you’re prepared.
PLEASE: take care of your mind by taking care of your body: treat PhysicaL illness, balance Eating, avoid mood-Altering substances, balance Sleep, and get Exercise. (Yes, this acronym is pretty tortuous.)
ABC PLEASE is just one approach to building some individual riparian buffers. Though as I reflect on these strategies, and where we’ve been as a family, I’m aware that planting trees and shrubs is slow work. This all takes time. Trees don’t grow overnight.
MaryAnn McKibben Dana is a writer, speaker, and ministry coach living in the Virginia suburbs of DC. She is author of Hope: A User’s Manual (2022), God, Improv, and the Art of Living (2018), and Sabbath in the Suburbs (2012). She currently serves as Associate Pastor at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Herndon, VA. This post was originally posted on her substack, The Blue Room.