The New School at Commonweal

Co-presented with Pt Reyes Books Join Host Susan Grelock Yusem in conversation with David George Haskell to talk about his new book, How Flowers Made Our World: The Story of Nature's Revolutionaries (Viking). In this exquisite exploration of the role flowers played in creating the world we know today, David observes, smells, and studies flowers such as magnolias, orchids, and roses, as well as fascinating but less celebrated flowers such as seagrasses and tea. Through radical genetic flexibility, flowers turned past environmental upheavals into opportunities for renewal. This inventiveness allowed them to build and sustain rainforests, savannahs, prairies, and even ocean shores. Looking to the future, flowers offer us lessons on resilience and creativity in the face of rapid environmental change. We need floral creativity, beauty, and joy more than ever. How Flowers Made Our World combines lyrical writing, sensual exploration, and the latest in scientific research to explore some of the most consequential life forms ever to have evolved, showing how our planet came to be and how it thrives today. *** The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our soundcloud channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. tns.commonweal.org

Widely recognized as one of the most influential and beloved figures in the field of peacebuilding, John Paul Lederach embodies both the rigor of the scholar and sensitivity of the poet. A pioneer of the concept of conflict transformation (as distinct from resolution), his work has redefined peacebuilding as a moral and relational art rooted in empathy, moral imagination, and the human capacity for connection across divides. Join TNS Host Serena Bian for this intergenerational conversation exploring John Paul's enormous body of work in building the fields of conflict transformation and collective trauma healing--as well as his love for poetry and haiku. John Paul Lederach Dr. John Paul Lederach is internationally recognized for his groundbreaking work in the fields of peacebuilding and conflict transformation. He is widely known for the development of culturally based approaches to conflict transformation; the design and implementation of integrative, strategic approaches to peacebuilding; and for carving a robust integration of the arts and social change. Over the course of his career, Lederach has garnered extensive experience working with non-governmental organizations, community-based initiatives impacted by cycles of violence, and national peace process design. He has worked extensively as a practitioner in conciliation processes in Latin America, Africa, and Southeast and Central Asia. He is the author or editor of 30 books and manuals (translated into a dozen languages), and numerous academic articles and monographs on peace education, conflict transformation, international peacebuilding, and conciliation training. He currently serves as Senior Fellow for Humanity United and Professor Emeritus of International Peacebuilding at the Joan B. Kroc Institute of International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame. Host Serena Bian Serena is pursuing a life that remains attentive to the tenderness of a snail’s soft body and reverent to the miracle of its spiraled shell. She is a Chinese-American peacebuilder, storyteller, and community weaver devoted to the belief that intergenerational connection is vital for the future of our peace and justice movements. She recently completed six years as a Special Advisor in Design & Innovation to U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, bringing a spiritual and systemic understanding to the public health crisis of loneliness and isolation. She is a Zen chaplain-in-training and serves on the boards of CoGenerate and Commonweal. #commonweal #commonwealnewschool #peacebuilding #conflict #transformation #virtuouscycle #haiku Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

~ Integrating Self Through Practice~ Jeanine M. Canty, PhD, was Visiting Scholar at The New School at Commonweal in October 2025. She is a visionary scholar whose groundbreaking work illuminates the profound connections between consciousness, thought, and our relationship with the natural world. Her teaching weaves together social justice, ecological wisdom, and transformation. Within this introductory talk, her first event at The New School as Visiting Scholar, we dive into the dualities within the western human’s psyche in order to reclaim our ecological and transpersonal identities and to access pathways for healing. Jeanine M. Canty, PhD Jeanine is a professor of transformative studies at CIIS, telecommuting from Boulder, CO. Formerly the chair of environmental studies at Naropa University, she continues to guest teach at Naropa and at Pacifica Graduate Institute. A lover of nature, justice, and contemplative practice, her teaching intersects issues of social and ecological justice, ecopsychology, and the process of worldview expansion and change. She is author of Returning the Self to Nature: Undoing Our Collective Narcissism and Healing Our Planet and her most recent edited book is an expanded, second edition of Ecological and Social Healing: Multicultural Women’s Voices (2025). Jeanine M. Canty, PhD Jeanine is a professor of transformative studies at CIIS, telecommuting from Boulder, CO. Formerly the chair of environmental studies at Naropa University, she continues to guest teach at Naropa and at Pacifica Graduate Institute. A lover of nature, justice, and contemplative practice, her teaching intersects issues of social and ecological justice, ecopsychology, and the process of worldview expansion and change. She is author of Returning the Self to Nature: Undoing Our Collective Narcissism and Healing Our Planet and her most recent edited book is an expanded, second edition of Ecological and Social Healing: Multicultural Women’s Voices (2025). *** The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our YouTube channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. Find out more about The New School at Commonweal on our website: tns.commonweal.org. And like/follow our Soundcloud channel for more great podcasts.

Join Professor Arthur Colman in conversation with Host Michael Lerner about his life and work using Jungian depth psychology as a foundation to bridge individual psychological understanding with group dynamics. Arthur D. Colman, MD Arthur is a psychiatrist trained at Harvard College and Medical School and U.C. Medical Center, San Francisco where he is Clinical Professor at the Department of Psychiatry. He is a depth analyst trained at the C.G. Jung Institute in San Francisco where he is a member, founder and first editor of Connected Works, and former chair of its review committee. The author of nine books on the human life cycle, healing, and scapegoating, he has contributed to many books, professional journals and popular publications on these and other subjects including ecstatic relationships, group consultation, leadership, the psychology of war, and the psychological aspects of music compositions and musical composers. He is also a coeditor of the influential Group Relations Reader I and II and a past president of the A.K. Rice Institute which publishes and distributes them. He currently divides his time between clinical practice, analysis and consultation to leaders and organizations here and abroad. Host Michael Lerner Michael is the president and co-founder of Commonweal. His principal work at Commonweal is with the Cancer Help Program, CancerChoices.org, the Omega Resilience Projects, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and The New School at Commonweal. He was the recipient of a MacArthur Prize Fellowship for contributions to public health in 1983 and is author of Choices in Healing: Integrating the Best of Conventional and Complementary Therapies (MIT Press). *** The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our YouTube channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. tns.commonweal.org

In part 3 of this series, Host Michael Lerner talks with author Jeffrey Kripal about his book Roads of Excess, Palaces of Wisdom: Eroticism and Reflexivity in the Study of Mysticism. Roads continues and expands Jeffrey's exploration of homoerotics themes in world religion. It focuses on the inner lives of five great scholars of religion and their own engagement with the homoerotic themes in the saints and traditions they studied. Jeffrey also continues his own autobiographical experience with five "secret talks" interspersed with his five case studies. *** The New School is Commonweal’s learning community and podcast — we offer conversations, workshops, and other events in areas that Commonweal champions: finding meaning, growing health and resilience, advocating for justice, and stewarding the natural world. We make our conversations into podcasts for many thousands of listeners world wide and have been doing this since 2007. Please like/follow our YouTube channel for access to our library of more than 400 great podcasts. tns.commonweal.org