Reflections on Psychology, Coping, and the Things We Shouldn't Have to Adapt To
I have spent a good portion of my career telling people to breathe…
In for three, out for seven. Slow down. Notice what you're feeling. Give your nervous system a moment to catch up.
And I stand by that advice. Breathing is useful. I'm quite fond of it myself.
But somewhere between teaching people how to regulate their nervous systems and watching the world become increasingly difficult to live in, I've started wondering whether psychology has gotten a little too enthusiastic about helping people adjust.
Adjust to what, exactly?
The cost of living? Discrimination? Violence? A workplace that expects you to be available around the clock? The general absurdity of being told to practice gratitude while trying to figure out how to afford groceries?
As a counselor, I understand the importance of helping people manage distress. As a community psychologist, I'm equally interested in understanding the conditions producing it. And sometimes those two perspectives have a rather uncomfortable conversation.
Because while I can teach someone to slow their breathing, I cannot breathe away their circumstances.
We've developed an impressive vocabulary for managing distress. We regulate, reframe, practice acceptance, establish routines, challenge negative thoughts, and remind ourselves to focus on what we can control. These are useful tools, and I use many of them in my own practice. But I sometimes wonder whether our enthusiasm for coping has distracted us from asking a more uncomfortable question: What exactly are we helping people cope with, and who benefits when they become better at tolerating it?
Imagine telling someone who works three jobs and still cannot afford groceries that they need to prioritize self-care. Perhaps a bubble bath? Maybe a gratitude journal? I'm sure they'll get right to it, somewhere between their second shift and the electricity bill.
The problem isn't necessarily that clinicians are unaware of social conditions. Most of us recognize that financial insecurity, discrimination, and social instability affect mental health. Yet our interventions frequently remain focused on the individual, even when the source of distress extends far beyond them. We help people become more functional within their circumstances, and then measure progress by how well they're functioning.
There is something worth questioning about that arrangement.
And then there's resilience, one of psychology's favorite words.
We admire resilient people. We celebrate their ability to overcome adversity, recover from hardship, and continue moving forward despite extraordinary circumstances. And rightly so. Human beings have remarkable capacities for survival, adaptation, and creativity.
But consider how often we celebrate resilience without questioning the conditions that demand it.
The single mother working multiple jobs is resilient. The refugee rebuilding a life after displacement is resilient. The community surviving generations of structural inequality is resilient.
Yes, they are.
But why are we so impressed by people's ability to survive conditions we seem remarkably unwilling to change?
As Palestinians, we have a word that frequently enters these conversations: sumud, often translated as steadfastness. It is more than resilience. Sumud speaks to a collective determination to remain connected to land, identity, and community despite displacement and dispossession. It can be expressed through resistance, cultural preservation, and the ordinary acts of continuing to live.
I've witnessed it during the olive harvest, in families maintaining connections to ancestral villages, and in the preservation of seeds, recipes, and traditions carried across generations. There is something deeply meaningful about these acts of continuity. They are not simply ways of surviving; they are ways of asserting belonging.
But even sumud deserves careful consideration.
I don't want Palestinian steadfastness to become another reason the world feels comfortable watching Palestinians suffer. There is a difference between recognizing a people's determination to remain and treating their capacity to endure as a substitute for their right to live freely.
At some point, admiration risks becoming an excuse for inaction.
People deserve more than the opportunity to become exceptionally good at surviving.
This is where community psychology offers an important perspective. People do not exist independently of their environments. Our relationships, neighborhoods, institutions, histories, and political systems influence how we experience the world. This should not be a particularly controversial observation, yet conventional psychological practice has often centered the individual as both the location of the problem and the primary site of intervention.
Someone experiences distress, and we ask what is happening within them. What are their thought patterns? Their attachment styles? Their emotional responses?
These are legitimate questions. But they are incomplete without examining the circumstances in which those experiences occur.
Liberation psychologist Ignacio Martín-Baró challenged psychology to understand human suffering within its historical and social context, particularly in societies shaped by oppression and political violence. His work invites us to consider whether what we identify as individual dysfunction may sometimes reflect an understandable response to dysfunctional social conditions.
Which brings me back to the nervous system.
We've become increasingly interested in nervous system regulation, and for good reason. Understanding how the body responds to stress and threat can be enormously helpful. But sometimes we speak about nervous systems as though they're malfunctioning whenever they respond to distress.
Anxiety becomes something to reduce. Anger becomes something to manage. Fear becomes something to overcome.
Yet these emotions can also communicate important information. Fear may indicate danger. Anger may signal a violation of boundaries or values. Anxiety may reflect genuine uncertainty about circumstances beyond our control.
Not every uncomfortable emotion is evidence of psychological dysfunction.
Sometimes it's evidence that we're paying attention.
Of course, emotions are not always accurate guides. Our responses can be shaped by past experiences, assumptions, and perceptions that deserve examination. But before treating distress as something to eliminate, perhaps we should consider what it's telling us.
I also wonder when healing became such an individual project.
Do the work. Set the boundaries. Practice self-care. Heal your trauma.
There's value in taking responsibility for our own well-being, but somewhere along the way, personal growth seems to have become another full-time job. If we're still struggling, perhaps we haven't done enough work. Another journal. Another meditation. Another podcast explaining why our nervous system is dysregulated.
At some point, even self-improvement can become exhausting.
Community psychology reminds us that healing can also emerge through relationships, collective action, cultural practices, shared memory, and the restoration of community connections. Not everything that contributes to our well-being happens in a therapy room, and not every problem has an individual solution.
Sometimes people need therapy. Sometimes they need affordable housing, safe communities, meaningful relationships, or institutions that treat them with dignity. Often, they need both.
And perhaps this is where psychology needs to expand its understanding of what it means to help.
I am not suggesting we abandon individual therapy or stop teaching people how to regulate their emotions. Quite the opposite. I believe these skills can help people navigate difficult circumstances with greater clarity and intention. But we should be careful not to confuse helping someone manage their response to an environment with changing the environment itself.
Perhaps psychology's responsibility extends beyond helping people feel better within the world as it exists. Perhaps it also involves questioning the conditions that contribute to suffering and recognizing our collective responsibility to change them.
We can encourage resilience without romanticizing suffering. We can support individual healing without ignoring collective harm. And we can recognize that sometimes anger, grief, and anxiety are not obstacles to healing but understandable responses to a world that needs changing.
So yes, take a deep breath.
Take several.
But once you've caught your breath, perhaps it's worth asking why so many people are struggling to breathe in the first place.
Because the goal shouldn't be to become so well-adjusted that we no longer notice what's wrong.
