Don’t Tell Me to Just Breathe
—Mental health in the context of growth-dependency and climate breakdown
A short-film animation by Swarm Dynamics in collaboration with CUSP and the Wellbeing Economy Alliance
Summary
Every society clings to a myth by which it lives. Ours is the myth of economic growth. For the last six decades the pursuit of growth has been the single most important policy goal across the world.
Yet, the economic system to which we are in thrall throws us out of balance. According to recent NHS statistics, one in four adults and one in 10 children experience mental illness, and many more of us know and care for people who do. By failing to meet our most essential needs the growth-based economy is doomed to immiserate and, ultimately, sicken us.
This timely short-film animation speaks to the spiralling levels of anxiety and depression that so many people in the UK and in other rich nations are experiencing by revealing the often silenced links between these mental health crises and the current economic system, including not only the increasing pressures upon people’s basic needs, but also the ‘capitalist realism’ that allows climate breakdown to unfold before our very eyes.
Through the eyes of a young care sector worker, the film creatively explores the interplay between the inner and outer dimensions of system change and of mental health. The second half introduces the key pillars of a Wellbeing Economy as solution set, pointing out that collective mental health can only be secured by a system that respects the boundaries of people’s wellbeing, and of nature, and where the Future is no longer sacrificed on the altar of eternal economic growth.
The project, created by Swarm Dynamics together with CUSP also encourages civil society groups to explore the potentials of communicating research into the correlations between climate change, late capitalism and mental health outcomes, to help strengthen social movements, break silos, and reduce stigma deriving from the dominant narrative of ‘personal responsibility’.
Mental health issues in a fragmented world are often not an illness, but a response. We urgently need to regain a richer, more satisfying understanding of ourselves, and our place in the world.
The video is designed as a communications tool. Feel free to share it with people and organisations that might find it useful. Don’t Tell Me to Just Breathe, including under its shorter title Just Breathe, is published under Creative Commons Non-Commercial No-Derivatives License (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0). For queries about use of this film or about its creative commons license, please contact swarmdynamics@gmail.com.
Project partners
If you are interested in joining like-minded people and organisations across the world, please take a look at the Wellbeing Economy Alliance website: https://weall.org.
Links
The artistic short-film animation is informed by rich interdisciplinary research from CUSP into the socioeconomic dynamics of consumer society, the all-encompassing growth dependencies of the system and the impact it has on the prosperity of people and planet. For further reading from us on related topics, please see below.
