Ian MacKenzie
Ian MacKenzie is a passionate artist dedicated to weaving visions of the possible, believing that if we can’t envision a future that works for all life, we are more likely to hold on to the familiar even when it’s clear it has become obsolete. Over the last 15+ years, he has used a variety of […]
One Spirit Learning Alliance
Founded in 2001 by Rev. Diane Berke and Rev. Joyce Lichtenstein in the aftermath of September 11th, One Spirit Learning Alliance is a New York-based interspiritual education community whose vision is to inspire and advance the evolution of sacred consciousness in service to individuals, communities, and the earth. Rather than asking seekers to choose one […]
The Wellbeing Project
The Wellbeing Project, conceived in 2014 as a co-creation, works to integrate inner wellbeing and social change, recognizing that cultural and systemic transformation requires the effort, insight, and input of different groups woven into a larger whole. Today over 60 institutions worldwide co-create the Project, including leading nonprofits, intermediaries, foundations, universities, media groups, venture capital […]
Alliance for Relational Repair and Mutuality
The Alliance for Relational Repair and Mutuality invites people across race, class, and gender into the slow, courageous work of healing the wounds left by chattel slavery, settler colonialism, and systems that divide us. The organization nurtures practices and tends relationships that restore dignity, belonging, and interconnection, serving as a hub where relational repair circles […]
The Glorians
Born from a pandemic dream — a vow to create what Terry Tempest Williams calls the “Epic Documentation of the Glorians” — this essay collection defines a Glorian as an encounter with grace in the unexpected: an ant ferrying a magenta blossom across the desert floor, the sound of baby birds heard for the first […]
Disaster as a Springboard for Thriving Resilient Communities
This article, published in December 2013 by the Society of Organizational Learning’s Reflections Magazine, explores what happens when catastrophe fundamentally shifts the world we know. On March 11, 2011, the triple disasters of earthquake, tsunami, and radiation leak devastated northeastern Japan. In the aftermath, people from throughout the country began to gather not just to […]
Ashes to Resilience
Ashes to Resilience: A Guide to Wildfire Recovery is a resource developed by NewStories and Regenerating Paradise, drawing on their experiences to offer starting points for communities navigating wildfire recovery. Recognizing that what needs to happen is shaped by local culture and geography, the guide supports communities in their own journey of recovery and Re-Storying. […]
Phoenix Rising From the Ashes
Origin of This Myth The phoenix is one of the oldest mythological symbols we have, and its origins are genuinely tangled across cultures. The deepest roots appear to lie in ancient Egypt, where the Bennu—a large sacred heron associated with the sun god Ra—was venerated at Heliopolis as a symbol of resurrection and the soul’s […]
The Myth of Sisyphus
Sisyphus was a king of Corinth, legendary for his cunning—so clever and deceitful that he cheated death itself, twice. The first time, he tricked Thanatos, the god of death, into chaining himself up, so that no mortal could die until Ares intervened and freed him. The second time, Sisyphus talked his way back from the […]
Regenerating Paradise
Regenerating Paradise is a nonprofit organization formed in the wake of the Camp Fire with a mission “to weave the social fabric that regenerates us.” The organization defines regenerating as a process of rebuilding and recovery that, as in regenerative agriculture, replenishes rather than depletes. Looking to Ridge community residents for resources, Regenerating Paradise works […]
Building Resilience
Building Resilience: Social Capital in Post-Disaster Recovery by Daniel P. Aldrich examines why responses to disaster recovery vary greatly in ways not explained by the magnitude of catastrophe or amount of aid provided. The difference between resilience and disrepair, Aldrich shows, lies in the depth of communities’ social capital. The book highlights the critical role […]
Two Loops
This excerpt from NewStories Founder Bob Stilger‘s book AfterNow: When We Cannot See the Future, Where Do We Begin? introduces the Berkana Two Loops model as a practical framework for understanding where we stand in times of profound systemic change. Stilger co-developed the Two Loops at a global gathering in Slovenia in 2002 and has […]
Becoming Gaia
Becoming Gaia: On the Threshold of Planetary Initiation by Sean Kelly addresses our living in end times—climate chaos, accelerating mass extinction, and signs of civilizational collapse drawing the Earth community into a planetary near-death experience. Yet these end times also mark the threshold of a new planetary identity in the making. Drawing on scholarship from […]
Julian Brave NoiseCat
Julian Brave NoiseCat is a writer, filmmaker, champion powwow dancer, and student of Salish art and history. He is the first Indigenous North American filmmaker ever nominated for an Academy Award and the first Indigenous North American author to ever write about healing from intergenerational trauma by getting stoned with his dad in the pages […]
In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts
We’ve all wondered, at some point, what drives a person to the edge — what could possibly bring someone to a place where survival itself seems secondary to the next fix. In In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction, physician Gabor Maté answers that question not with judgment but with one of […]
Man’s Search for Meaning
Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl is a psychiatrist’s memoir that has riveted generations of readers with its descriptions of life in Nazi death camps and its lessons for spiritual survival. Between 1942 and 1945, Frankl labored in four different camps, including Auschwitz, while his parents, brother, and pregnant wife perished. Based on […]