Daniel remains one of the few people I know who is originally of the Trauma Culture but is living absolutely integral to his land - and we couldn't keep our conversation confined to 60 minutes. So we broke at an appropriate point and came back. This is the second part - please do listen to the first if you've only just found us - we literally paused the recording, took a breath and continued…

As ever, if you're interested in Daniel's work visit his website. And if you have the means, do buy his books, they are genuinely beautiful. Stagtine, Wild Like Flowers and Dark Country are all out now and Plain of Pillars will be released in May of 2025.

By now we know that we need to connect to the More than Human world. We know we need to grow into adulthood and elder hood. We know we need to move from a Trauma Culture to an Initiation Culture. But knowing these things is not the same as living them as a reality. To get here, we need waymakers, people of huge heart and raw courage to walk away from the limited, goal-based directions of our culture and step into the ways of being where we meet in open-hearted, full-hearted, strong-hearted relationship with the land and all that lives there.

Daniel Firth Griffith is one of these people. With his wife, Morgan, and their three children, Daniel lives on 400 acres on the eastern side of the Appalachian mountains where he is steadily building relationship with the land. He lives amongst cattle, sheep, goats and horses - the latter used for logging, on land that was scheduled to be clear-cut when Daniel and Morgan first moved there. With a growing understanding that even the forms of agriculture we term 'regenerative' are still part of what I would call the Trauma Culture, Daniel and Morgan have been on a steady journey of transition through to something that feels to me entirely different. This is what we need to be. It's not clear cut. There isn't a hard and fast recipe because every bit of land is different and each of us is different and the routes to connection are unique... up to a point. But there are baselines we can learn: be human. Find what that means for you when 'human' is not simply being a wheel in an extractive system.

We had a really long conversation and we stopped at about 90 minutes in and restarted so you can listen to it in two parts. We go down rabbit holes. We tell stories, or at least, Daniel does, big, deep, tear-flowing, heart-searing stories that made both of us weep...because stories are how we learn. This conversation, or these conversations, felt like sitting at the feet of an indigenous elder and the fact that this can happen in 2025, talking to someone of white ancestry who lives on lands stolen by colonialists... this is what gives me hope. We can't undo our past, but we can grow into what the future needs of us, and Daniel, Morgan and those who visit them are doing this.

Daniel's an astonishing author as well as everything else, so please do visit his website and buy his books: as with everything else he does, they are filled with layers upon layers of meaning.

Daniel's website https://danielfirthgriffith.com/

Democracy is breaking around us in real time and a small percentage of those in power would like us to become - at best - obedient subjects in a world dedicated to the destruction of ecosystems and the annihilation of compassion, empathy and all that makes us thrive.

Clearly, we are better than this. So how can we harness the astonishing wonder of human co-creation in service to life and a world where humanity thrives as part of a flourishing web of life?

This week's guest, Jon Alexander started off his professional life as a highly successful advertising executive - until the inherent contradictions in the Consumer narrative led him on a new path, to seeing people as Citizens in his words, 'people who actively shape the world around us, who cultivate meaningful connections to our community and institutions, who can imagine a different and better life, and who create opportunities for others to do the same.' This quotation comes from his book, Citizens: Why the Key to Fixing Everything is All of Us. It's is a genuinely Thrutopian view of possibility from one of the sharpest minds, and biggest hearts in this space of all potential and I wholeheartedly encourage you to read it - knowing that it came out three years ago - and the world has changed since then.

When we first mooted this conversation over six months ago, we still thought Harris was going to win the US election, that democracy was stable and that - in Jon's words - we could affect change by creating acupuncture points in the system. And now we are where we are and none of these is possible. And yet, the cracks are where the light gets in and this is a time when we can abandon any belief that the old system is functioning any more. So what doors does this open? What new light is there at the end of the tunnel and how do we find the agency, motivation and connections to the people and places we love, to make the changes that need to happen if we're to create that future we'd be proud to leave behind?

Jon is one of the people best placed to answer this. He's co-founder of the New Citizen Project which works to help organisations and businesses find ways to enhance Citizenship in all they do. And more recently, he helped found the Citizen Collective which we can all join and which holds regular online meetings to connect people who aspire to citizenship all around the world.

This was a raw, honest conversation and neither of us is pretending we have all the answers. But we're exploring the ideas - and Jon brings such a wealth of experience to the table to open doors for all of us. I came away from this feeling that the routes forward are opening up. I hope you do, too.

Jon's website https://www.jonalexander.net/
Jon on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-alexander-11b66345/
Jon on NEXT TV in Hamburg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dvLFWTzXeU
Citizen Collective https://medium.com/citizen-collective-updates/citizen-collective-is-here-and-id-love-you-to-be-part-of-it-525f113fd8de

Join here: https://airtable.com/appIlFU7nEF8NgiMf/pagsPy8sTEAMKaZpu/form

Polis AI-based connection https://compdemocracy.org/

Our House https://ourhouseuk.org/
Stephen Green on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephenbgreene/

If what our culture most urgently needs is for a critical mass of us to grow into adults and then elders, how can we help our young people to step beyond the artificial boundaries of our old, rigid system into a world where they are fully connected to all parts of themselves, each other and the web of life. How, in effect, can we create an educational system that is fit for purpose in the emerging century?

In this podcast, I joined with Tim Logan, host of the Future Learning Design podcast, educator, part of the team at Good Impact Labs and co-leader of the International Baccalaureate's 'Festival of Hope'. Tim is a highly experienced school leader, management consultant, coach, educator and researcher, has held previous pedagogical and well-being senior leadership positions in a variety of international settings and is proud to have consistently helped to build innovative, outstanding schools, supportive relationships and powerful educational visions. He says, 'The important question for now is, can we intentionally create more spaces in our schools that provide a qualitatively different kind of 'educational' experience? Transformational shifts are happening in educational and organisational cultures around the world right now. I am incredibly fortunate to be able to play a role in this.'

I was on the Future Learning Design podcast just before the dark nights of winter with Ginie Servant-Miklos, Raïsa Mirza and Will Richardson and his podcast has become one of my essential listens of the week and had been planning to invite Tim here to talk about the transformational shifts happening in education and how they can help us lay the foundations for a world we'd be proud to leave behind. We were planning something for later in the year but we had a cancellation and he had a tech misfire and we both needed something fast to get the schedules back on track, so here we are with a joint conversation—one of those that ranges wide over the landscape of culture and learning and the 'citadel mind' and our history of optimising for everything and how we could, instead, begin to expand into a more porous mindset and look for resonance and help young people to become part of the emerging transformation of the entire web of life.

Tim on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/teblogan/
Tim's podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/future-learning-design-podcast/id1536832802
Good Impact Labs https://www.goodimpactlabs.com/about
Nick Mulvey Live from COP26 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-GBl6DeA50&t=1273s
Concerned Bird Substack https://theconcernedbird.substack.com/p/elon-musks-and-xs-role-in-2024-election

Festival of Hope https://ibo.org/festival-of-hope/
Systems Transformation Pathway at UWC Atlantic College: https://www.uwcatlantic.org/learning/academic/systems-transformation-pathway

Green School: https://www.greenschool.org/

School of Humanity: https://sofhumanity.com/

We are living through the death of democracy and the onset of Techno-Feudalism. But this is not a time when linear systems can hold and feudalism was nothing if not linear. So how can we be part of a transformative process that will let us lay the foundations for a future we'd be proud to leave behind?

Usually, on Accidental Gods, we talk to guests who seem to exemplify some aspect of the generative edge of interbecoming change that will take us towards the emergent future we need if we're not only to survive, but thrive.

But once in a while it's just Manda, reflecting on the moment and offering pointers to things that might be useful to read or watch or listen to or think about. This is one of those, and it feels timely, in part because the Oxford Real Farming Conference too place recently and was immensely heartening - and partly because of the times we're in.

This was recorded on Sunday 19th of January 2025 and if you're in the English speaking world listening to this podcast, then you'll be aware that basically democracy dies tomorrow. Though, as you'll also be aware, we never had true democracy of the people by and for the people, and certainly nothing that might have created a generative enhancement of the web of life. We had a kleptocracy at best, a kakiocracy at worst and all of it was working against the kind of future we want to leave as our legacy.

So this is a podcast of ideas, most of which boil down to: It's time each of us committed ourselves in service to life. What does that feel like? How does it work and where will it take us? Let's find out.

Oxford Real Farming Trust https://realfarming.org/programmes/land-based-wisdom/

CFOSA https://consciousfoodsystems.org/

Animate Earth Collective https://animate-earth.org

The Wild with Indy Johar - the why

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/wild-with-sarah-wilson/id1548626341?i=1000677521024

Changing our Civilisational Model - Michel Bauens on Substack https://substack.com/inbox/post/155005488

And then at the macro level, Dark Matter Labs on Governance https://media.licdn.com/dms/document/media/v2/D4E1FAQFRu6lmVVqBvw/feedshare-document-pdf-analyzed/B4EZQsP1m3HAAc-/0/1735909140676?e=1738195200&v=beta&t=8kAX6cLW_kf4Lsvw8dYn2_9FG644-bWKa6SZy1QTXKk

What happens when people with chronic, unstable diabetes eat food grown in local, regenerative farms? Erin Martin talks to the Accidental Gods podcast about the dramatic and spectacular improvements in health her group FreshRxOK saw in Oklahoma when they instigated a 'Food as Medicine' programme, offering real food with good nutrient density to diabetic patients in some of the poorest communities.

An Oklahoman on track to be a lawyer, Erin’s first job in a retirement community inspired her to pursue a degree in gerontology instead. During her Masters program at USC, Erin ran a team of advocates serving over 700 low income older adults in the Southern California area. She was troubled by how little support people get as they age. So Erin founded Conscious Aging Solutions, a company dedicated to helping older adults navigate health and social systems so they can age successfully. As Erin’s work focused on strategies for longevity, she found that food—access to quality food—had an enormous impact on our life spans.

As her interest in food grew, she became certified in Regenerative Soil Advocacy. Erin moved back home to Tulsa during the pandemic to find that the supply chain disruptions had only intensified what was already a food system problem in the city. Lack of access to nutritious foods was contributing to poor health outcomes and high mortality rates for Tulsans, especially those with chronic conditions.
In 2021, Erin co-founded a prescription produce program called FreshRx Oklahoma. The program’s success has launched her onto the national stage.
Now Erin champions food as medicine to promote the longevity of underserved communities, decrease food insecurity, support the environment, revitalize the agricultural economy, and decrease system-wide health care costs.

Recorded on the day of the US Presidential Inauguration, we talk about the shift from a sickness service to a health service and how food can help us move towards a more regenerative system. Most particularly, we talk about the truly spectacular health improvement indices in the diabetic patients who benefit from the FreshRxOK programme.

Erin's website: https://www.erinwmartin.com/
Erin on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@erinwmartin
FreshrxOK https://www.freshrxok.org/
FreshRxOK on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@freshrxok

How can we bring wisdom to those with power and power to those with wisdom? If we were to step into elder hood and bring the best of ourselves to the table, could we create governance structures that would help to heal our cultural divides, create equity and guide is wisely through the coming crisis?

Jenny Grettve believes we can and has set up a global council to make this happen.

Jenny is a good friend of the podcast. She joined us in episode #228 to talk about designing and building a school along Doughnut economic lines and then again in episode #249 to talk about the evolution of a Mothering Economy based on the values of compassion and care for future generations. Jenny is an author, philosopher, systems thinker and designer, author of several books, most recently the Mothering Economy that we talked about the last time we met. Then, she was leading WhenWhen, a new feminist design agency that creates system demonstrators to test ideas generated by global researchers working with the climate crisis and sustainable life. She was still working there last November when Donald Trump managed to take the US Presidency again. Amidst all the shock and horror of that moment, I saw a post Jenny put up on LinkedIn, proposing the creation of a Global Council of Women as a way to bring forward the values that our world needs at this moment of total transformation. I signed up on the spot and then asked Jenny to come and talk to us about it, so that the idea might spread in the Accidental Gods spheres. And then as I was doing the reading for this episode, I found that Jenny had started the year in a new post - that she is now Head of Transformation at a European Council funded organisation called EIT - that's European Innovation and Technology - Culture and Creativity. Which means Jenny is now taking the wisdom of creativity right into the heart of the bureaucracy that sustains the super organism, at least in the EU. So here we are, considering the nature of wisdom and elder hood, how we might overcome the gender divides that so assail us in service to life - and how to bring creative ideas deep into the heart of machine. Please know that the Council is not only for women - the first meeting is exploring whole, healthy masculinity and how it can be prioritised in this world. Which feels like such an integral part of our thinking now. So please do join - the link is below.

Women Council https://www.womencouncil.world/
Jenny Grettve https://www.jennygrettve.com/
EIT Culture and Creativity https://eit-culture-creativity.eu/
Jenny on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennygrettve/
EIT Culture and Creativity on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/eit-culture-creativity/
Jenny in Episode 228 https://accidentalgods.life/evolving-education-building-a-doughnut-school-with-jenny-grettve-of-whenwhen/
Jenny in Episode 249 https://accidentalgods.life/finding-the-courage-to-care-ways-to-build-a-mothering-economy-with-author-jenny-grettve/