This treasured and unique conversation is with the legendary founders of Bioneers, Nina Simons and Kenny Ausubel. Bioneers is a cultural phenomenon - an innovative nonprofit organization that has been highlighting breakthrough solutions for restoring people and planet - for 34 years. What started as a somewhat reluctant conference in 1990 has become all sorts of other notable projects, including Bioneers Learning, and Bioneers radio and podcast. And there’s yet more to come.
Nina and Kenny also continue to be award-winning authors and filmmakers. You might even recognise Kenny from an appearance in Leonardo DiCaprio’s feature documentary The 11th Hour, for which he was also a central advisor. And when Nina’s new book landed on my desk last year, it doubled my hopes to meet them both when we reached their town. The book, ‘Nature, Culture, and the Sacred: A Woman Listens for Leadership’, is in many ways, the culmination of Nina’s life’s work to date. We hear more about this and other culminating and transformative moments in their lives here – from the ‘mystery’ illness that nearly claimed Kenny’s life as a teen (that Western medicine had no answer for), to Nina’s walk through a Puebloan garden soon after the couple met.
This was a very personal, at times riotous, and often revelatory wander through their life stories, with a literally thunderous finale. (Listen for the interplay of that storm towards the end!) It was an honour and joy to sit with them around the kitchen table of their beautiful adobe home in the mountains outside Santa Fe, New Mexico, for this rare public conversation with Nina and Kenny, together.
This episode has chapter markers and a transcript, if you’d like to navigate the conversation that way (available on most apps now too).
Recorded 20 June 2024.
Title slide: Kenny, Nina & AJ (pic: Olivia Cheng).
To see more from behind the scenes, become a member via the Patreon page.
Music:
Green Shoots, by The Nomadics.
Regeneration, by Amelia Barden, from Regenerating Australia.
The RegenNarration playlist, music chosen by guests (thanks to Josie Symons).
Find More:
A favourite episode on the Bioneers podcast: Undam the Klamath! How Tribes Led the Largest River Restoration Project in US History.
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