What if the crises of our time are not just ecological or political, but also mythological?

Poet and author Sophie Strand joins Human Nature Odyssey for a wide-ranging conversation about stories, illness, ecology, and transformation. Drawing from mythology, religion, folklore, and her own experience living with chronic illness, Sophie explores how the stories we inherit shape our relationship to the living world—and what happens when those stories no longer serve us.

Together, we discuss death and rebirth, animism, the power of storytelling, and the art of composting old narratives so that something new can grow. From Jesus of Nazareth to One Thousand and One Arabian Nights to the ancient Greek epic of Odysseus, we explore stories not as relics of the past, but as living companions for navigating an uncertain future.

This conversation asks what it would mean to truly live in an animate world—to encounter plants, animals, rivers, and landscapes not as resources or scenery, but as relatives. At a time when many of our cultural myths are unraveling, Sophie offers a vision of belonging rooted in reciprocity, relationship, and participation in the wider community of life.

CITATIONS

• Sophie Strand's Substack: Make Me Good Soil

• Sophie Strand's Instagram: @cosmogyny

Thank you to Blindspot for sharing their original music. Check out Blindspot on Bandcamp and Spotify.

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For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast

Theme Music is "Celestial Soda Pop" (Amazon, iTunes, Spotify) by Ray Lynch, from the album "Deep Breakfast." Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI. All rights reserved.

You, me, and everyone we know were born on the Titanic.

Some are warning of icebergs. Some are shoveling coal into the furnaces. Some are jamming out while the band plays louder than ever.

In this special episode beginning Year Four of Human Nature Odyssey, Alex gathers friends together in a living room for a live-recorded podcast potluck conversation exploring civilization, collapse, climate change, community, and the strange experience of trying to live a meaningful life while the world feels increasingly unstable.

Drawing from Lord of the Rings, the Titanic, Daniel Quinn's Ishmael, ecological philosophy, and the first three years of Human Nature Odyssey, this episode becomes both a reflection on the journey so far and an exploration on what it means to "come home" to the living world.

Come join us in the living room. There's still space on the couch.

CITATIONS

Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

Ishmael by Daniel Quinn

If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Substack for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes.

For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit:
resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast

Music: Celestial Soda Pop

By: Ray Lynch

From the album: Deep Breakfast

Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI

All rights reserved.

Today Hajar Tazi joins us on our odyssey. Hajar is a poet, writer, facilitator, and self-described "ecosystem weaver." Our conversation is part of a new five-episode miniseries from Resilience that I'm hosting in collaboration with the Omega Resilience Awards.

It's called In the Rising Tide and it brings together conversations with five people from around the world, exploring the interconnected unfolding crises of our time—and how each of them is responding within their own communities. Across the series, I speak with a chef and farmer from the Philippines, an Indigenous water defender in Chile, a young organizer in Uganda resisting mega oil projects, and a narrative practitioner in India.

I wanted to include this conversation with Hajar here on Human Nature Odyssey because it touches many of the themes we've been exploring here on the podcast. Hajar has been deeply influenced by the scholar and activist Joanna Macy, and facilitates something called the "Great Weaving Game," which draws on Macy's framework of the Great Unraveling and the Great Turning to help people imagine new possibilities for the future.

If you want to learn more about Joanna Macy's work, you can check out the recent Human Nature Odyssey episode with Jess Serrante.

Today, Hajar and I explore many things: neurodivergence, eco-villages, the IMF and World Bank, surfing, political polarization, and the art of coming home.

In The Rising Tide was made with support from a grant from Omega Resilience Awards, a project of the nonprofit Commonweal. Find out more at ORAwards.org

You can learn more from Hajar at her substack Remembering the Future.

If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Patreon for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes.