Sunday Best – October 5, 2025
Oh dear friends, it’s been a week of loss – first Jane Goodall, luminous ambassador for the Gombe and our kin the chimpanzees, and then Manchan Magan, illuminator of Irish land, language, and culture. Both worked in settings where the most precious elements had been exploited and endangered, and both knew the full costs of this mistreatment and misunderstanding. Yet both came out the other side of that pain, determined to share their deepest love and understanding, sure in the knowledge that a place that is loved is a place that will be valued.
Manchan’s final RTE interview noted that we’re in a time of great change, one of reconnection with land and story and language.
Jane’s final message encourages, don’t give up.
Dear ones, let’s root ourselves in our love of the world.
Let’s reconnect.
Let’s not give up.
One of my favorite recordings of Manchan is this podcast episode where he’s in conversation with the extraordinary Tyson Yunkaporta. Manchan’s book Thirty-Two Words for Field is a favorite, as is Tyson’s Sand Talk.
Jane Goodall’s final message can be seen on her Institute’s site, and her book Reason for Hope is currently free in its e-version.
Sunday Best – September 28, 2025
I was clearing out some items at the office the other day and opened up the Top Secret envelope that my niece made for me years and years ago, which hangs on my wall so it’s always in view. No matter how many times I’ve opened it, as I unfold the intricate cutout rainbow cake that declares me the best, it perks me right up.
Later in the week I was in New York, prepping for a talk late in the evening as the restaurant closed up around me. The waiter saw me working and on my way out shouted, “You got this! It’s gonna be great!”
A tiny part of me thinks, I am the grownup, I am a professional. Of course I’ve got this. I don’t need encouragement from people 20 or 40 years my junior.
The larger, truer part of me thinks, thank you. I really needed that.
Dear ones, it can be an uphill sort of time out there.
Let’s cheer each other on.
Sunday Best – September 21, 2025
David Whyte has observed, “Poetry is a language against which we have no defenses,” and Emily Dickinson defined it so: “If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.” The best poems can reflect both of these qualities, and also make us feel like the whole world is conspiring to deliver comfort and connection.
Dear ones, may we bless our poets.
Bennacht
by John O’Donohue
For Josie, my mother
On the day when
the weight deadens
on your shoulders
and you stumble,
may the clay dance
to balance you.And when your eyes
freeze behind
the grey window
and the ghost of loss
gets into you,
may a flock of colours,
indigo, red, green
and azure blue,
come to awaken in you
a meadow of delight.When the canvas frays
in the currach of thought
and a stain of ocean
blackens beneath you,
may there come across the waters
a path of yellow moonlight
to bring you safely home.May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.And so may a slow
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life.
Sunday Best – September 14, 2025
The flight was a little delayed, fine.
The meeting prep was rushed, fine fine.
The news, oh the news. Big global news and small family news, whoo boy. But okay, fine fine fine.
Then I saw a new flower in the park and I had a perfect latte in my hand and I was able to visit with far-flung loved ones and when I scrolled through Netflix and the British Baking theme song started to play, well that was the last straw and I burst into tears, a whoosh of joy and relief flowing through my entire being.
I had not even known that I was holding my breath.
Dear ones,
let’s be gentle when we know deep down that it’s not really fine –
not all of it, anyway.
Let’s be grateful for the moments of ease
that help us catch our breath.
Sunday Best – September 7, 2025
The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.
– ralph waldo emerson
As we tilt into the fall season, it often seems the clock is ticking faster. There is the daily clock, reminding us of emails un-sent, and there is the monthly clock, reminding us of projects un-finished, and there is the annual clock, reminding us of opportunities un-seized. How can we possibly do all the things that seem to need doing?
The great and gratifying secret is, most of the things only seem to need doing. And the ones that are really important are never finished anyway – labors of ongoing love and commitment, both personal and professional. For these most devoted endeavors, we will never fully see the results of our engagement. It is all a giant leap of faith, knowing that the effort is worthy, even when the results lie way off in the cloudy distance.
Dear ones, may we trust in the acorns we plant,
hoping that unseen forests might follow.