Ep 5: This Pain Is Not for Nothing

Joanna & Jess May 16, 2024

Episode details

Now we get to what may be the toughest part of reckoning with our planet’s situation: dealing with numbness, grief, and despair. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the enormity of the many crises around us, and natural to want to numb ourselves to the pain. 

Joanna and Jess speak with great vulnerability and candor about what it takes to navigate our darkest feelings—and the strength and beauty that can be found when we honor our pain. 

Trigger Warning: In this episode, we discuss suicide.

In this episode:

  • When it feels like our pain could swallow us whole, it helps to remember that all feelings come and go
  • Desperation can take us to dark places, but we are more than our despair
  • Numbness—Jess opens up about her familiar tactic for escaping pain
  • Our pain becomes sacred when we allow it to deepen our connection with the world
  • Bonus Exercise: Breathing Through

We recommend starting a podcast club with friends or family to do these practices together. Links and assets to help prompt reflection and build community can be found with every episode on WeAreTheGreatTurning.com.

Resources

Links, prompts and exercises to further your inquiry.

The WAGT Toolkit

We recommend starting a podcast club with friends or family to do these practices together. Learn more about how to start one here.

Meet Your Hosts

Joanna and Jess

Joanna Macy, PhD, is a scholar of Buddhism, systems thinking, and deep ecology who has been working for peace, justice, and the preservation of life on Earth for seven decades. She is the creator of The Work That Reconnects, a globally celebrated framework of practices that has helped leaders and activists for decades to serve the healing of our world in a more powerful and effective way. Joanna is 95 and lives in Berkeley, California.

Jessica Serrante is a coach, facilitator and trainer who has been supporting activists in the climate movement since 2007. She has served on staff at organizations like Greenpeace and Rainforest Action Network and worked with groups like Sunrise Movement and Extinction Rebellion. Her first encounter with Joanna’s work a decade ago changed her life, transformed her burnout, and led to a deep, abiding friendship. Jess is 35 and lives in Oakland, California.

Also By Author

Special Episode: Outrage + Optimism

Since we’ve just completed the release of our 10-part series, We Are the Great Turning, we wanted to introduce you to another podcast with a spirit similar to ours: Outrage + Optimism.

The episode we’re going to play for you is called “Our Story of Nature: From Rupture to Reconnection.” It’s the first in a miniseries that shines a light on our relationship to the rest of nature. Remembering our place in the web of life is an essential part of building the Great Turning.

Be sure to subscribe to their podcast, and give them a follow on social media @outrageoptimism.

Now that this season of We Are the Great Turning is over, naturally, the question that’s emerging is … “What’s next?” As we consider whether to do a second season, we’d love to hear more about what you got from the first. What impact has it had in your life, and what might you love to hear from us next? Send us an email or a voice note at greatturning@soundstrue.com or send Jess a DM on Instagram @jess_serrante.

Ep 10 Bonus: The Shambala Warrior Prophecy

In Episode 10, “We Are the Great Turning,” Joanna shares a story called the “Shambala Warrior Prophecy,” which was told to her by her friend, Tibetan Monk Chogyal Rinpoche. Joanna was tasked with teaching this prophecy in the West, and it’s one of her most famous teachings. 

We wanted to separate the story from Episode 10 so that you can come back to the story again and again, whenever you need the inspiration and wisdom it offers. Here is Joanna telling the Shambhala Warrior Prophecy. 

We recommend starting a podcast club with friends or family to do these practices together. Links and assets to help prompt reflection and build community can be found with every episode on WeAreTheGreatTurning.com.

Ep 10 Bonus: Callings and Resources

This bonus episode will support you to take the main insights from Episode 10, “We Are the Great Turning,” deeper into your life. 

Jess will guide you through an adaptation of the Work That Reconnects exercise called “Callings and Resources.” In it, you and a friend will take turns interviewing each other. You’ll name a contribution you’d like to make in service of the Great Turning, take inventory of the resources you have and need to achieve your goal, and clarify the small next steps you can take. 

All you’ll need for this bonus exercise is paper and pen, or a digital notes app, and a place where you can get comfortable, share freely, and listen carefully. 

We recommend starting a podcast club with friends or family to do these practices together. Links and assets to help prompt reflection and build community can be found with every episode on WeAreTheGreatTurning.com.

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