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Accidental Gods

Accidental Gods

By: Accidental Gods
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 Another World is still Possible. The old system was never fit for purpose and now it has gone- and it's never coming back. We have the power of gods to destroy our home. But we also have the chance to become something we cannot yet imagine, and by doing so, lay the foundations for a future we would be proud to leave to the generations yet unborn. What happens if we commit to a world based on generative values: compassion, courage, integrity? What happens if we let go of the race for meaningless money and commit instead to the things that matter: clean air, clean water, clean soil - and clean, clear, courageous connections between all parts of ourselves (so we have to do the inner work of healing individually and collectively), between ourselves and each other (so we have to do the outer work of relearning how to build generative communities) and between ourselves and the Web of Life (so we have to reclaim our birthright as conscious nodes in the web of life)? We can do this - and every week on Accidental Gods we speak with the people who are living this world into being. We have all the answers, we just (so far) lack the visions and collective will to weave them into a future that works. We can make this happen. We will. Join us. Accidental Gods is a podcast and membership program devoted to exploring the ways we can create a future that we would be proud to leave to the generations yet to come. If we're going to emerge into a just, equitable - and above all regenerative - future, we need to get to know the people who are already living, working, thinking and believing at the leading edge of inter-becoming transformation. Accidental Gods exists to bring these voices to the world so that we can work together to lay the foundations of a world we'd be proud to leave to the generations that come after us. We have the choice now - we can choose to transform…or we can face the chaos of a failing system. Our Choice. Our Chance. Our Future. Find the membership and the podcast pages here: https://accidentalgods.life Find Manda's Thrutopian novel, Any Human Power here: https://mandascott.co.uk Find Manda on BlueSky @mandascott.bsky.social On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/mandascottauthor/ On FaceBook https://www.facebook.com/MandaScottAuthor©AccidentalGods 2020 Biological Sciences Science Spirituality
Episodes
  • Sculpting Invisible Materials: Expanding Empathy in the Hot Mess of Now with Dylan McGarry of Empatheatre

    Sculpting Invisible Materials: Expanding Empathy in the Hot Mess of Now with Dylan McGarry of Empatheatre
    Apr 8 2026
    “I think empathy is a creative act. It’s imaginal, it’s an art-making practice, where even just listening is creating a picture and a lifeworld of the other inside yourself in order to get closer to each other.” - Dylan McGarryEmpathy is a magical thing. It lets us do more than just step into another's shoes, it opens the doors for us to step into their heart and soul with the vast generosity of spirit we'd like others to bring to us, wide as the sky, deep as the oceans, so that we can see through their eyes as the best of who they are. Obviously, we can do this with other people, but we can do it too, with whales, with elephants, with horses, and red kites and moles and spiders - and mountains and trees and landscapes… empathy is the spark that connects us to the More than Human world. There are not many people who truly understand this and fewer still who make it their life's work to open the doors in our souls with such subtlety that we only know afterwards that we've stepped beyond the boundaries of who we think we are. Our guest this week, Dr Dylan McGarry, is one of these people. Dyl works across the fields of Education, Sociology, Ecology, and the Arts. An Educational Sociologist, Cultural Ecologist, multimedia artist, artivist, curator, theatre and filmmaker, Dyl's work spans disciplines with many tentacles touching the world. Dyl holds a PhD in Environmental Education and Art, as well as degrees in Marine Science, Environmental Science, and Sustainable Rural Development.As co-founder of Empatheatre, their praxis draws from the power of public storytelling, theatre, film, and animation, as a tool for regenerative community building, proactive justice, active empathy and meaning making. Their artwork and creative practice are particularly focused on empathy, working with imagination, listening and empathy as actual sculptural materials. They are developing pedagogies for empathy, in the context of ecological citizenship, and exploring the sculptural potential of empathy, attentiveness, intuition and learning. Dyl is an astonishingly prolific, and inspiring pracademic, with a host of published papers in topics that I could easily dive into for years - like hydro-feminism... but it's the work of Empatheatre that we're really looking at today. This is a theatre-based approach to transgressive social learning, and an extra-legal alternative to democratising policy change. This in itself is mind-blowing - the plays are developed over months or years in collaboration with the communities affected by the concepts - and then when the play tours, the cast and crew facilitate conversations after each event that turn into tribunals or citizen's assemblies and the mere fact of having experienced the deep emotions of the play, had a sense of how things land with other people, can open doors that were previously closed. I've been searching for longer than this podcast has been live for people who are crafting paradigm shift in ways that are sticky, that will land and last - and this is it. Dylan says that empathy has three components: Imagination, attentiveness, and intuition. And just hearing this opens whole new ways of being for me, and I hope for you. This was such a heart-filling, generative conversation and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. People of the podcast, please welcome Dylan McGarry from Empatheatre, and so much more. ​"His sensitivity and integrity regarding valuing the knowledge, perspectives and values of others is amazing – a role model for others." Professor Charlie Shackleton, Department of Environmental Science, Rhodes UniversityLINKShttps://www.dylanmcgarry.org/https://www.empatheatre.com/Empatheatre on YouTube https://youtu.be/p_W3QBz9cPY?si=mFH4W2V7_AnObM61 Lalela uLwandle (illustrated short film)https://youtu.be/DnuZa7r0vPc?si=RX3Is2k4eN0ROO9e CWF24 TA1 Empatheatre Dylan McGarryhttps://youtu.be/sfAGXCiki8U?si=fXaqm66WlKCqO2j6 FORGE x MOTH Festival of Ideas 2025 | Dylan McGarry & Elisa Morgerahttps://youtu.be/lNm-Yf8Dt10?si=CkJW0aqePYEQAX3h Indlela Yokuphila: The Soul's Journey (ZULU)https://youtu.be/e3tUrfUXgsw?si=tQRxPTSLHgkDwckG Isitha Sabantu Teaserhttps://youtu.be/4UBubIpCWuk?si=CyVzPA7suMnmbrrr The Blue Blanket South African Puppet Company: The HerdsThe play: Isitha Sabantu - review —About Accidental Gods—We offer three strands all rooted in the same soil, drawing from the same river: Accidental Gods, Dreaming Awake and the Thrutopia Writing Masterclass Our next Open Gathering offered as part of our Accidental Gods Programme is 'FALLING IN LOVE WITH LIFE' which will run on Sunday 17th May 2026 from 16:00 - 20:00 GMT - details are here. You don't have to be a member of Accidental Gods - but if you are, all Gatherings are half price.If you'd like to join us at Accidental Gods, this is the membership where we endeavour to help you to connect fully with the living web of life. If you'd like to train more deeply in the contemporary ...
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    1 hr and 11 mins
  • Towards the Symbiocene: Building an Eco-Civilisation with thought-leader, Jeremy Lent

    Towards the Symbiocene: Building an Eco-Civilisation with thought-leader, Jeremy Lent
    Apr 1 2026
    Jeremy Lent is a long time friend of the podcast. His new book, 'Ecocivilization: Making a World That Works for All' is coming out at the end of April 2026 and so we got together to discuss what an Ecocivilisation is, why we so badly need to become one, and how we might get there. These questions have animated all of Jeremy Lent's writing, from The Patterning Instinct, through The Web of Meaning and now to his latest in this seminal trifecta: Ecocivilization: Making a World That Works For All. We spoke to Jeremy back in Episode #301 to lay the foundations of the book, to explore the ways the current system is not fit for purpose and then to leave the door open for this episode, which is timed so that you can pre-order the book in plenty of time - it's out on the 26th of May in the US and the 28th in the UK. This is a genuinely Thrutopian book in that it lays out pathways - route maps - towards a future we'd be proud to leave behind. Nobody is pretending these are the only routes, but I think we are all agreed that the values and beliefs underpinning the new system will have to be coherent in the same way the values of power-over and beliefs in separation, scarcity and powerlessness are core to what Jeremy called Wendigo Inc. and we tend to call the Death Cult of Predatory Capitalism. I'm sure Jeremy needs no introduction to anyone in this field, but there's always someone for whom this is the first podcast - you're so welcome here, thank you - and so for those to whom some of the people and ideas are new, Jeremy Lent was born in London, has a BA in English Literature from Cambridge University, an MBA from the University of Chicago, and was a former internet company CEO. Now, he is an author, speaker and founder of the Deep Transformation Network, a global community exploring pathways to an ecological civilization. He is the author of the three books we mentioned, and is helping to co-create an EcoCivilisation Visioning Forum and various other umbrella seed-banks to help bring his ideas into being. He is one of those people who has given his life to the emerging of a system that will work for all life. Jeremy's Website: https://www.jeremylent.comJeremy's Blog https://patternsofmeaning.comJeremy on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremy-lent-ba153017/Jeremy's YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@JeremyLentDeep Transformation Network https://deeptransformation.network/feedTOUR DATES: []Guardian article on global tipping point https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/oct/13/coral-reefs-ice-sheets-amazon-rainforest-tipping-point-global-heating-scientists-reportBooksThe Patterning Instinct https://www.jeremylent.com/the-patterning-instinct.htmlThe Web of Meaning https://www.jeremylent.com/the-web-of-meaning.htmlEcoCivilization - pre-order here: https://www.jeremylent.com/Previous Episodes#102 - Weaving the Web of Meaning https://accidentalgods.life/weaving-the-web-of-meaning/#38 - Fractal Flourishing https://accidentalgods.life/fractal-flourishing/#310 - Eco-civilisation - Part 1 https://accidentalgods.life/eco-civilisation-the-future-we-deserve-and-how-we-will-get-there-with-jeremy-lent/—About Accidental Gods—We offer three strands all rooted in the same soil, drawing from the same river: Accidental Gods, Dreaming Awake and the Thrutopia Writing Masterclass Our next Open Gathering offered as part of our Accidental Gods Programme is 'FALLING IN LOVE WITH LIFE' which will run on Sunday 17th May 2026 from 16:00 - 20:00 GMT - details are here. You don't have to be a member of Accidental Gods - but if you are, all Gatherings are half price.If you'd like to join us at Accidental Gods, this is the membership where we endeavour to help you to connect fully with the living web of life. If you'd like to train more deeply in the contemporary shamanic work at Dreaming Awake, you'll find us here. If you'd like to explore the recordings from our last Thrutopia Writing Masterclass, the details are hereManda and Louise both offer one-to-one Mentoring Calls. Manda is fully booked just now, but if you'd like to contact Louise, details are here.
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    1 hr and 13 mins
  • The Joy of Becoming Lost: Maps, Myths and Navigating the meta-crisis with Sam Crosby of Recalling Fire

    The Joy of Becoming Lost: Maps, Myths and Navigating the meta-crisis with Sam Crosby of Recalling Fire
    Mar 25 2026
    What are the stories we tell ourselves and each other about ourselves and each other and our place in the living web of life—and how do we shape them in service to Life? This is the central question that animates Accidental Gods: the idea that we are a storied species, that humanity lives and breathes and loves and learns by the rich tapestry of stories that shape our lives. Everything we do from picking a career to moving house, from finding our life's co-creator(s) to choosing what to have for lunch is underpinned by stories of who we are and how the world works. Often, we take these stories so much for granted that we don't even recognise they are stories - we genuinely believe the world works like this.But then once in a while, someone comes along with such great heart and deep, compassionate fluency in the many layers of our myths that they can weave magic wild enough to turn the bus that is humanity from the edge of the cliff - or at the very least, they can help us imagine what it is to be something entirely other, with no bus and no cliff. This week's guest, Sam Crosby, is one such myth-weaver. Sam is founder of Recalling Fire, the oral storytelling practice bringing ancient courage to modern leadership challenges. Guided by the work of Dr Martin Shaw at the School of Myth, fellow of the Bio-Leadership Project, mentor for A Band of Brothers and Alumnus of the Dartington College of Arts, he works with individuals and organisations all around the world, helping us to weave, re-weave the stories of our lives. Of this process, he says, '…after sharing reverential space and stories with hundreds of people as an oral storyteller and hundreds of thousands more as a consultant for culture, I believe stories and careful word choice have what it takes to guide us further down.'This conversation was rich and deeply layered. We explored Arthurian Legend (fwiw, I think A Sword at Sunset by Rosemary Sutcliff remains the best Arthurian book, though Mary Stewart's Crystal Cave trilogy was my introduction to the whole genre and while I could never bring myself to read the third book, the first two were stellar), through a story of choice and agency, through the nature of grief and gratitude, love, loss and death as a Rite of Passage to the nature of story in modern politics: everything was here in a truly generative long-hour's conversation. Enjoy! LinksSign up here for Sam's next event in May https://www.recallingfire.com/tristan-and-isolde-2026This is the Substack article we were referring to https://recallingfire.substack.com/p/essay-mythocartographyand then:Recalling Fire websiteDrop the Map Podcast1-on-1 Guidance from SamBand of BrothersSam on LinkedInSam on BlueSky Sam on MastodonClarissa Pinkola EstesDanny Deerdorff MythSinger Project—About Accidental Gods—We offer three strands all rooted in the same soil, drawing from the same river: Accidental Gods, Dreaming Awake and the Thrutopia Writing Masterclass Our next Open Gathering offered as part of our Accidental Gods Programme is 'FALLING IN LOVE WITH LIFE' which will run on Sunday 17th May 2026 from 16:00 - 20:00 GMT - details are here. You don't have to be a member of Accidental Gods - but if you are, all Gatherings are half price.If you'd like to join us at Accidental Gods, this is the membership where we endeavour to help you to connect fully with the living web of life. If you'd like to train more deeply in the contemporary shamanic work at Dreaming Awake, you'll find us here. If you'd like to explore the recordings from our last Thrutopia Writing Masterclass, the details are hereManda and Louise both offer one-to-one Mentoring Calls. Manda is fully booked just now, but if you'd like to contact Louise, details are here.
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    1 hr and 26 mins
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