All of us have some special location that speaks to our hearts. A field of corn as far as the eye can see. A mountain that draws our eyes upward. A beach or seashore where we gaze toward a far-distant horizon. A valley of wildflowers. An old homestead where even the footprint of an old structure stirs warm memories.

All of us, too, have had the experience of watching a place change in a way that destroys its specialness for us. A highway comes too close; toxic waste clogs a stream; developers cut off the top of a beautiful hill; smog obscures a distant vista. Something very important is lost to us. We feel sad.

Researchers in Australia assert that this is a new type of sadness. When parts of our landscape change in detrimental ways, we lose the sense of “home” that these locations provided us previously. A name has been coined for this phenomenon: solastalgia. Solastalgia comes from the root word that means comfort: solacium and from the root word that means pain: algia. Solastalgia is the condition when we long for a natural setting that is now changed forever. As one researcher put it, this is a form of homesickness we experience even while we are still “at home.”

It was in Wired magazine (of all places), that I came across this distinction “global mourning” and the discussion of the Australian research. The commentator in the Wired piece went on to discuss a possible connection between global warming and this “global mourning” for a lost place that felt like home. His essay made me think about how so many commitments are connected, overlap, layer one upon the other. Think of Nature Conservancy’s fierce care for the land. Think of Robert Redford’s unbending commitment to the environment and to wildlife. Think of those concerns in your local area such as development, traffic, air quality, clean water, protection of endangered species, counting of the songbirds, listening for the frogs at night. All of these are somehow related to the preservation of what is best about places that we call home.

Someone reminded me once that it was not a bad thing to be sad. That sad was an honest, authentic response to a situation that brought in its wake suffering. Sad opens up a space in which we can be truthful about what we have lost. The telling of this truth often–in a time and way appropriate for each individual—leads to the welling up of energy to work in whatever way we can to ameliorate the conditions or respond to the conditions that are causing us to feel sad.

I had that experience recently in my hometown of Austin, Texas. I live near one of the two roads in Austin that are considered to be our most “scenic highways.” Over the past several months, monstrous structures have been build along this truly beautiful corridor. A multi-story building stuck up on the pinnacle of high, rounded hill. A sprawling shopping center. An apartment complex carved into a wide and high hillside right at a curve in the road that previously brought into view one of the most awesome vistas. (The morning I saw the first building of this apartment complex, I actually cried.)

So I would certainly be a candidate for solastalgia. I am sad that my “home environment” is being so irrevocably destroyed. The sadness I feel has caused me to notice more than ever initiatives in my area that relate to my “home environment.” I’ve sent emails to the City Council about proposed changes in outdoor billboards ordinances that would affect this highway near me. My husband and I are in the process of filling out the forms to apply for our backyard to be a Wildlife Habitat. So sad is sad…and sad has also ignited energy. My heart has enlarged to include both of these honest responses.

Dr. Elizabeth Harper Neeld offers wisdom and practical insights to anyone whose life is in a time of transition, change, grief and loss of any kind. As an internationally recognized and accomplished consultant, and author of more than twenty books - including Tough Transitions and Seven Choices: Finding Daylight After Loss Shatters Your World - she is committed to work that helps lift the human spirit.