Campfire Podcast

Support the Campfire Podcast on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonWhat if many of the problems we face today – from ecological breakdown and economic inequality to loneliness and the loss of meaning – have more in common than we think? Helena Norberg-Hodge has spent decades exploring these connections. As the founder of Local Futures and a pioneer of the localisation movement, she has worked to strengthen local economies and communities around the world. Her understanding of these issues grew out of her experiences in Ladakh, in the Himalayas, where she witnessed a way of life that challenged many of the assumptions we take for granted in the modern West.In this conversation, we explore how the global economy has reshaped our lives, from the food we eat and the work we do to the time we have for one another. Helena argues that the relentless pursuit of growth and efficiency has enriched giant corporations while undermining local businesses, communities and ecosystems. We talk about free trade, technology, time poverty and the growing sense that we must run faster and faster just to break even.But this isn't simply a conversation about what has gone wrong. Helena describes the many people already moving in another direction: rebuilding local economies, reconnecting with nature, and finding ways to live and work together. We discuss the importance of slowing down, making time to care, and shifting from individual responsibility towards collective action.What can we learn from cultures that have not followed the same path of development? And how might we begin to reclaim the time, connection and sense of belonging that make life meaningful?IN THIS EPISODE• Helena’s life-changing experiences in Ladakh • Globalisation, free trade and the power of giant corporations • The hidden costs of economic growth and technological progress • Time poverty, loneliness and the loss of community • Localisation, food systems and resilient local economies • Climate change, war and the wider roots of our multiple crises • The role of artists and filmmakers in a time of trouble • Moving from individual action towards collective efforts • Five words for a different direction: reconnect, rethink, resist, renew and rejoiceLINKSSupport the Campfire Podcast on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonExplore Helena’s work and writing: https://www.helenanorberghodge.com/Discover Local Futures and its work on localisation: https://www.localfutures.org/Watch Trade Gone Mad, the short film recommended in our conversation, along with The Economics of Happiness and The Real Economy: https://www.localfutures.org/films/Watch A Simpler Way: Crisis as Opportunity, the Happen Films documentary featuring Helena: https://www.happenfilms.com/films/a-simpler-wayListen to Helena Norberg-Hodge on Charles Eisenstein’s podcast, A New and Ancient Story: https://soundcloud.com/charleseisenstein/helena-norberg-hodge-local-is-the-future-e36Watch all the films at Campfire Stories: https://www.campfire-stories.org/The Campfire Podcast is hosted by documentary filmmaker Mattias Olsson and is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles — and the beginnings of a different direction.These films and conversations are freely available.Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonMaria Westerberg | The Involuntary ActivistMaria Westerberg never set out to become an activist. She became one because she saw forests disappearing — places she loved, places that were part of her home and her sense of belonging. Their destruction felt like a physical loss.Maria is an artist, a twig poet, and a forest activist. In this conversation, we begin with her childhood and her search for a way of living that felt true to her. We talk about forests as places of refuge and freedom, the curious figures she creates from twigs, and the difficulty of finding our own way in a world full of expectations about who we should be.We also talk about what happened when the forest around Maria and her husband Johannes was devastated by drought and bark beetles. Rather than simply clearing the damaged land and starting over, they began an experiment in ecological restoration — moving thousands of trees from places where they would otherwise be removed, restoring wetlands, and allowing a more diverse forest to emerge.Along the way, we explore industrial forestry, biodiversity, the value of working slowly, and what it means to act from love rather than opposition. Maria reflects on how working with the land has given her something that years of campaigning against destructive forestry never quite could: a tangible sense of possibility.Perhaps our relationship with the living world can be about more than protecting what remains. Perhaps we can also learn to repair what has been damaged, and discover a different role for ourselves among the other creatures with whom we share this Earth.This is the first episode in a new series of the Campfire Podcast — conversations with people finding their own ways towards a more alive, regenerative and meaningful world.IN THIS EPISODE• Maria’s relationship with the forest, from childhood to the present• Becoming an involuntary activist• Twig art, poetry, freedom and the value of doing things slowly• Industrial forestry, clear-cutting and the loss of biodiversity• What bark beetles can teach us about forests and ecological resilience• Restoring a damaged forest by moving thousands of trees• Wetlands, rewilding and working with the land• Vandana Shiva’s ideas about acting from what we love• Finding hope through practical acts of regeneration• Rethinking human work and our place in the living worldLINKSSupport the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonDiscover Maria and Johannes’s work at Romantics Reserve:https://www.romanticsreserve.com/Watch Kinfolk, featuring Maria Westerberg and Vandana Shiva:https://www.campfire-stories.org/kinfolkWatch A Tale from the Woods, my first film with Maria:https://www.campfire-stories.org/a-tale-from-the-woods-filmListen to Vandana Shiva on Cultivating Fearlessness:https://www.campfire-stories.org/vandana-shiva-on-cultivating-fearlessnessWatch the films at Campfire Stories:https://www.campfire-stories.org/CREDITSMusic: Arvid RaskSound mix: Boris LaibleThe Campfire Podcast is hosted by documentary filmmaker Mattias Olsson and is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles — and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonVandana Shiva | On Cultivating FearlessnessHow do we find the courage to stand up for what we believe in, even when the forces we face seem overwhelming? And how do we keep working towards a different world without falling into despair?Dr. Vandana Shiva has spent decades challenging powerful corporations and defending farmers’ rights, seed freedom and the living diversity of the Earth. A physicist by training, author of more than 30 books, and founder of Navdanya, an organisation working to protect seed diversity and promote ecological agriculture, Dr. Shiva is a leading voice in the global movement for food sovereignty and regenerative farming.We begin with the Chipko movement, the non-violent forest resistance movement in the Indian Himalayas, where villagers, particularly women, stood between loggers and the trees they depended on. For Shiva, it offered a profound lesson: when we turn towards what we love, rather than simply fighting what we oppose, we find another source of strength.From there, we explore industrial forestry, monocultures, genetically modified crops, seed patents and industrial food systems. Shiva challenges the idea that food production can be separated from the living systems that sustain it, and reflects on the importance of biodiversity, healthy soil, small-scale farming and generations of farmers’ knowledge.We also venture into the territory where ecology meets philosophy. What can quantum physics teach us about the interconnectedness of life? What might we gain by moving away from a culture of consumption towards one in which we participate more directly in creating the conditions for life to flourish?At the heart of the conversation is fearlessness. Shiva speaks about trusting the truth we stand for, drawing strength from the wider community of life, and refusing to let the scale of the challenges before us become a reason for inaction. Hope, she suggests, is something we can cultivate — just as we can cultivate fear or love.We don't have to carry the whole world on our shoulders. We can begin with the next step, taken in service of the Earth and the communities we belong to.IN THIS EPISODE• The Chipko movement and non-violent resistance• Forests, biodiversity, community and democracy• Industrial forestry and monocultures• GMOs, seed patents and farmers’ freedom to save seeds• Real food, soil health and regenerative agriculture• Biodynamic farming and living systems• Quantum physics and interconnectedness• Cultivating fearlessness in the face of ecological and social crises• Moving from consumption towards a regenerative cultureLINKSSupport the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonLearn about the Youth Initiative Program (YIP), which facilitated this conversation:https://yip.se/Watch On Biodynamic Farming, the film referenced in the episode:https://www.campfire-stories.org/on-biodynamic-farmingExplore the films at Campfire Stories:https://www.campfire-stories.org/The Campfire Podcast is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles — and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonStephen Jenkinson | From the Ruins of a GreenhouseWhat does it mean to belong to a place and a culture? How do we live with grief and death in a society that often tries to keep both at a distance? And what do we owe the generations who come after us?In the second part of this special live conversation, recorded in Sweden, I continue my discussion with Stephen Jenkinson – author, farmer, culture activist and creator of the Orphan Wisdom School. Drawing on his work with dying people and their families, his apprenticeship with a master storyteller, and his understanding of Indigenous teachings, Stephen explores what modern culture has lost sight of – and what it might take to recover.We begin with the idea of orphanhood. Stephen reflects on the history of European settlement in North America and the difficulty of finding belonging when a culture has lost its connection to ancestry and place. He explains the meaning of the Orphan Wisdom School and offers a profound account of dodem poles: a way of understanding ancestry that recognises the animals and other forms of life that made human existence possible.From there, we turn to longing, belonging and the stories that shape our lives. Stephen speaks about his experience of learning from a master storyteller, and about how that apprenticeship changed his understanding of responsibility and adulthood.The conversation also explores what he calls a death-phobic culture. Drawing on his years in palliative care, Stephen questions a society that treats dying as the opposite of living. What might it mean to live in a culture where death is understood as part of life, rather than something to be hidden away?In this final part of our conversation, we consider young people, grief and the future they are inheriting. Stephen challenges easy promises of hope and asks what it means to become worthy ancestors – people whose actions can offer something meaningful to those who come after us.IN THIS EPISODE• The Orphan Wisdom School and the search for belonging• European settlement, ancestry and cultural homelessness• Dodem poles and our dependence on the more-than-human world• Longing for a different way of living• Storytelling, adulthood and the practice of grief• Palliative care and the problem of a death-phobic culture• The difference between survival and a life well lived• Young people, the future and the responsibilities of elders• Hope, difficult times and becoming worthy ancestorsLINKSSupport the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonLearn about Stephen Jenkinson and the Orphan Wisdom School:https://orphanwisdom.com/Explore the films at Campfire Stories:https://www.campfire-stories.org/The Campfire Podcast is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles – and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonStephen Jenkinson | From the Ruins of a GreenhouseWhat does it mean to live in a world that is alive, rather than treating the land and its creatures as resources for human use? And what might a different kind of culture ask of us?In this special live edition of the Campfire Podcast, recorded in Sweden at a gathering called From the Ruins of a Greenhouse, I meet Stephen Jenkinson – author, farmer, culture activist and creator of the Orphan Wisdom School. Known for his work on grief, dying and elderhood, Stephen brings an unusual perspective to some of the assumptions underpinning modern life.We begin with farming and the relationship between people and land. Stephen describes learning to pay attention to the history of a place, resisting the urge to make everything productive, and leaving part of his farm untouched by human intervention. For him, farming involves as much watching and listening as doing.From there, we explore what he calls the poverties of our time. Stephen challenges globalisation and the idea that human differences must be overcome, and speaks about village-mindedness as a way of understanding how we live together. We discuss animism – the recognition that the world around us is fundamentally alive – and what changes when humans stop imagining themselves as the centre of existence.The conversation also turns to misanthropy, historical responsibility and the difference between conscience and self-hatred. How do we acknowledge the harm embedded in our cultures without losing sight of what remains possible in human life?Throughout, Stephen asks us to reconsider our place among other species and the responsibilities that come with being part of a living world.IN THIS EPISODE• Farming as listening to the land, not simply producing from it• Globalisation and the loss of meaningful difference• Village-mindedness and the challenges of living together• Animism and the aliveness of the more-than-human world• Human dependence on other species• Misanthropy, conscience and historical responsibility• Grief, love and finding a meaningful role in troubled timesLINKSSupport the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonLearn about Stephen Jenkinson and the Orphan Wisdom School:https://orphanwisdom.com/Explore the films at Campfire Stories:https://www.campfire-stories.org/The Campfire Podcast is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles – and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonDougald Hine | On Regrowing a Living CultureWhat happens when the stories that have shaped our lives no longer make sense? And how do we find ways to live together when the world we took for granted is beginning to unravel?Dougald Hine is a writer, speaker and one of the founders of the Dark Mountain Project, a cultural movement exploring how we make sense of ecological and social breakdown through art, storytelling and a deeper relationship with the living world. He and his partner, Anna, are also building A School Called Home – a gathering place and learning community in rural Sweden dedicated to what Dougald calls regrowing a living culture.We meet in an old shoe shop that Dougald and Anna are turning into their home and a small school. Around the kitchen table, they are creating a space for conversations, shared meals and learning that can help people recover ways of living together that have been pushed aside by modern industrial society.Our conversation begins with the Dark Mountain Project and its challenge to the stories of endless progress that underpin modern civilisation. Dougald reflects on the limits of conventional environmental activism, the importance of acknowledging fear and despair, and the role of artists and storytellers in helping us face the times we live in. We also explore the relationship between Dark Mountain and the Transition movement, and the possibilities that emerge when we make room for uncertainty rather than rushing towards another ready-made story.From there, we turn to climate change and its deeper cultural roots. What if ecological breakdown is not simply a technical problem to solve, but a consequence of how we have learned to see and treat the world? Dougald considers the possibilities for action between individual lifestyle changes and mass political movements, pointing towards the importance of local communities, shared responsibility and small spaces where we can practise being human together.We also talk about grief, the living world and a different kind of hope – one that can emerge after we have stopped pretending to know how the story will end. In closing, Dougald invites us to think beyond our own lifetimes and consider how we might contribute to a world that will continue long after we are gone.IN THIS EPISODE• The Dark Mountain Project and its challenge to stories of progress• The Transition movement, art and cultural change• A School Called Home: building a learning community in rural Sweden• Regrowing a living culture beyond the market and the state• Climate change as a symptom of a deeper cultural crisis• Local action, community resilience and practising being human together• Grief, despair and a hope that remains open to surprise• Reconnecting with the living world• Old-growth forests, future generations and our place in a story beyond our lifetimesLINKSSupport the Campfire Podcast on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonExplore the Dark Mountain Project:https://dark-mountain.net/Read more about Dougald Hine's A School Called HomeExplore the Transition movement:https://transitionnetwork.org/The song in this episode is called Till Skogen, by the band KolonienExplore the films at Campfire Stories:https://www.campfire-stories.org/The Campfire Podcast is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles – and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support the Campfire Podcast on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonRune Hjarnø Rasmussen | Reawakening Nordic AnimismWhat changes when we stop seeing the world as a collection of lifeless resources and begin relating to it as something alive? Rune Hjarnø Rasmussen is a Danish historian of religion whose work explores Nordic animism, shamanism and the ways traditional worldviews might help us rethink our relationship with the living world.In this conversation, we explore animism as a way of relating to the world – one that recognises the possibility of respectful relationships with other-than-human persons, from lakes and mountains to animals and the wider landscape. Rune describes how his academic work, including research into Afro-Brazilian religions, led him to look at Nordic cultural traditions with fresh eyes.We talk about modernity and its separation of human meaning from a supposedly lifeless external world. Could this way of thinking be part of the deeper cultural crisis behind ecological destruction? And what might it mean to develop new stories and mythologies that help us recover a sense of kinship with the world around us?Rune takes us into the Norse myth of Ragnarök, exploring its possible connections to historical climate disruption and the breakdown of relationships between people and the world they inhabit. We also discuss raven symbolism, folklore, seasonal traditions and the animistic traces that may still be present in contemporary Nordic culture.Towards the end, we consider how people can reconnect with the traditions of the places where they live, while respecting the distinct histories and political struggles of Indigenous peoples. Rune suggests that tradition need not mean preserving something unchanged. It can be a living, evolving process through which we renew our relationships with land, culture and one another.IN THIS EPISODE• What is animism, and how might it change our relationship with the world?• Modernity, the story of separation and the idea of a lifeless Earth• Nordic shamanism, traditional knowledge and cultural renewal• Norse mythology, Ragnarök and the climate crisis• The raven as a symbol of kinship between humans and nature• The animistic roots of Yule and Scandinavian seasonal traditions• Indigenous knowledge, cultural appropriation and reconnecting with place• How we might re-traditionalise ourselves in a changing worldLINKSSupport the Campfire Podcast on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonRune Hjarnø Rasmussen’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@NordicAnimismThe music in this episode comes from Daniel Reid.Explore the films at Campfire Stories: https://www.campfire-stories.org/The Campfire Podcast is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles – and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Consider supporting the Campfire Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonStephen Jenkinson | Origins of an Orphaned Culture – Part 2How do we live with grief in a culture that has so few ways of meeting it? And what might our mortality have to teach us about belonging to the living world?In the second part of this conversation with Stephen Jenkinson, we turn towards grief, human limitations and the challenges of remaining awake to the times we live in. Stephen draws on his years of working with dying people and their families to question our modern discomfort with mortality, and to suggest that grief is not something to overcome, but a way of recognising our place within the larger web of life.We talk about the difference between being human and being humane, the dangers of mistaking hope for a way around grief, and the importance of facing the consequences of our actions. Stephen also offers a striking reflection on time, suggesting that rather than moving towards the future, we are continually travelling towards the past – towards all those who have lived before us.IN THIS EPISODEGrief as a way of belonging to lifeHuman limits, mortality and the pursuit of eternal lifeHope, wholeness and the need to face difficult realitiesWhat it means to be awake to the consequences of our actionsCourage, obedience and living in troubled timesLearning how to be with those who are dyingTime, memory and our relationship with the pastLINKSTo support the Campfire Podcast, please consider becoming a Patreon supporter.Discover Stephen’s work and the Orphan Wisdom School.Explore the films and conversations at Campfire Stories.The Campfire Podcast is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles – and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support the Campfire Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/c/mattiasolssonStephen Jenkinson | Origins of an Orphaned Culture – Part 1Where did our sense of separation from the living world begin? And what have we lost along the way?In the first part of this conversation, author, poet, farmer and former grief counsellor Stephen Jenkinson joins me to explore some of the deeper origins of our modern predicament. Drawing on Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael, we look at the Agricultural Revolution, the emergence of surplus and the gradual erosion of an older, animistic understanding of the world.Stephen offers a fascinating reading of familiar stories from the Bible, including the Fall and Cain and Abel, and considers what they might reveal about the changing relationship between humans, animals, land and the sacred. We also explore the idea of Gods of place, the difference between living in a world where everything is alive and treating the world as a collection of resources, and what it might mean to recover a sense of kinship with life.IN THIS EPISODEDaniel Quinn’s Ishmael and the story of the TakersThe rupture between humans and the living worldAnimism, surplus and the origins of commerceRethinking the biblical stories of the Fall and Cain and AbelNomadic life, shepherds and our relationship with animalsThe loss of Gods of place and a living relationship with the landLINKSTo support the Campfire Podcast, please consider becoming a Patreon supporter.Discover Stephen’s work and the Orphan Wisdom School.Explore the films and conversations at Campfire Stories.The Campfire Podcast is part of Campfire Stories, an independent film platform exploring the roots of our ecological and social troubles – and the beginnings of a different direction.Films and conversations are freely available. Campfire Stories is sustained by people who believe this work matters. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Brigid LeFevre runs the community supported agriculture operation ”Förädlad” (roughly ”Enhanced”) in Järna, Sweden. It’s a biodynamic vegetable garden that focuses on fermenting the harvest in order to enrich it with lactic acid bacteria and to make it keep for a long time.Brigid grew up in an anthroposophically inspired Camphill community in Northern Ireland where volunteers lived and worked together with people with special needs.Growing up in a place where food production was separated from the economic market has had a big impact on Brigid’s philosophy as a farmer. And really, come to think about it, why should the global ups and downs of the economy determine the operating practices of local farms?In Brigid’s garden it doesn’t. She grows and ferments vegetables for the members, who subscribe to her jars of delicious sauerkraut, kimchi and all sorts of lacto fermented pickles all year round.  It’s a local, circular economy, which underpins an alive garden, buzzing and chirping, where the goal isn’t to turn a profit, but rather to make the soil more alive with the passing of each season.This podcast brought to you by the film platform Campfire Stories – Inspiring Change through Film. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.