At this moment of multiple crises, we could be forgiven for asking ourselves: how did it come to this? How could we possibly have let slip our concern for our very survival as a species?

We have ignored the science that links climate breakdown directly to human behaviour – excessively consuming, extracting, flying, waste-producing. Through sheer neglect we have allowed a disrupted biosphere to release global pandemics. How could we have carried on, knowing what we knew?

There are reasons for this.We are complex human beings with emotional needs that have been harnessed by the growth economy. The same businesses that responded to the need to feed and house us all, are the same businesses that used advertising and the broader culture to addict us to their products. We are all complicit in a machine-like system that keeps us on a hamster wheel, working day and night to earn the money to buy the stuff to impress the people we barely know.

Many of the mental health problems we face arise from our trying to fit into a world that cannot meet our emotional needs with integrity. It’s not easy to fix. Not everyone is in a position to walk away from money in order to prioritise well-being or environmental health. Indra’s work as a pyschosocial therapist prepares her for the wider task of re-designing our socio-economic-political system, to help human beings live more complex, meaningful and creative lives.