Épisodes

  • 32: The Secret Lives of Plants and Fungi with Merlin Sheldrake and Zoë Schlanger
    Apr 7 2026
    If we understood the true complexity of the natural world, would we call it conscious? Would we begin to question the boundaries we put between ourselves and everything around us?We explore these questions with biologist Merlin Sheldrake and science journalist Zoë Schlanger. Their bestselling books, "Entangled Life" and "The Light Eaters", required monk-like study and deep immersion in the natural world. What they discovered quietly dismantles some of our most basic assumptions about intelligence, memory, and what individuality really means. Recorded during Harvard Divinity School's "Thinking with Plants and Fungi" conference, this special episode brings together Merlin, Zoë, host Elizabeth Rovere, and guest co-host Rachael Peterson, the "Thinking with Plants and Fungi" Initiative Program Lead at Harvard, to explore:✦ Whether plants have personalities and why they might be kinder to kin ✦ How a brainless slime mold can navigate its way out of an IKEA faster than a human✦ How flatworms put into question where memory actually lives✦ Whether it's possible to ferment a book and drink itWhen we stop centering the individual and truly reckon with the entangled nature of all living things, something shifts. The question stops being how do we include more-than-human perspectives… it starts being whether that separation even makes sense to begin with. Chapters:00:00: Introduction 01:10: How to Write About A Hidden World04:45: The Myth of the Individual09:53: We Are Polluting Our Own Home 15:14: The Problem Isn't Science. It's Language. 18:18: The Plant That Can Copy Anything 24:25: As Temperatures Rise, Fungi Are Evolving 28:31: Do Plants Have Personalities and Prefer Their Family?Follow Merlin Sheldrake:Website: https://www.merlinsheldrake.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/merlin.sheldrakeYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/merlinsheldrake Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/566795/entangled-life-by-merlin-sheldrake/ Follow Zoë Schlanger: Website: https://www.zoeschlanger.com/Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/zoeschlanger.bsky.socialInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/zoeschlanger/ The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-light-eaters-zoe-schlanger?variant=41096248295458 Follow Wonderstruck:Website: https://wonderstruck.orgSubstack: https://newsletter.wonderstruck.org YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@wonderstruckpodInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/wonderstruckpod/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@wonderstruckpodFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/wonderstruckpodApple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6fS5boWGwYTShddG7SKlVw Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    42 min
  • 31: Mystic Poet Chelan Harkin on Poetry, Prayer and Unlocking Creative Flow
    Mar 3 2026

    Mystic poet Chelan Harkin doesn't write poems, she transmits them. At 21, after giving herself permission to write a "bad poem" every day, a creative channel cracked open and poems have flowed through her ever since.


    Her work has drawn comparisons to Rumi, Hafiz and Khalil Gibran. Poets whose words slip beneath the thinking mind to reach something deeper, older and more alive within us.


    Celebrating World Poetry Day this month, this episode features Chelan speaking with Wonderstruck's Elizabeth Rovere about:

    ✦ How a Hafiz poem she heard at 17 unlocked her heart and set her entire path in motion

    ✦ The "bad poem experiment" and how permission to fail became the key to creative flow

    ✦ How praying to her favourite dead poets led to a synchronicity that changed everything

    ✦ How our deepest fears, when met with consciousness, can transform into our strongest allies

    ✦ The extraordinary story behind her book The Prophetess which stands in conversation with Gibran’s The Prophet


    This is a conversation for anyone who has suspected that the sacred isn’t elsewhere, but closer, more available and more alive than we ever dared to believe.


    00:00:00 Introduction

    00:07:06 The Poem That Changed Everything

    00:13:47 The "Bad Poem Experiment"

    00:19:22 Say Wow: The Poem That Went Viral

    00:23:44 Praying To Her Favourite Dead Poets

    00:30:50 The Meaning Of Authentic Service

    00:35:55 Suffering and Our Great Cocoon

    00:39:21 Writing The Prophetess

    00:43:33 Meeting Hajjar Gibran

    00:51:53 Fear as a Life Force

    00:58:32 Closing Reflections


    Follow Chelan Harkin:

    Website: https://chelanharkinpoetry.com/

    Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chelanharkin/

    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chani.harkin

    Find all Chelan's books on Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/stores/author/B08PL55XMD


    Follow Wonderstruck:

    Website: https://wonderstruck.org

    Substack: https://newsletter.wonderstruck.org

    YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@wonderstruckpod

    Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wonderstruckpod/

    TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@wonderstruckpod

    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wonderstruckpod

    Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661

    Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6fS5boWGwYTShddG7SKlVw

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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    59 min
  • 30: Daoist Teacher George Thompson on What Tai Chi Taught Him About Anxiety
    Feb 3 2026
    Can a mountain teach us how to live in peace? In his early twenties, George Thompson was living with intense anxiety and a deep sense of meaninglessness. His body carried constant tension, and the voice in his head told him that he was not good enough. That crisis became the catalyst for a decision that would change the direction of his life.George travelled alone to China’s sacred Wudang Mountains, the birthplace of Tai Chi and a centre of Daoist (Taoist) practice for centuries. There, immersed in mountains, monasteries, and daily practice, he encountered Tai Chi. In this conversation, George and Wonderstruck’s Elizabeth Rovere explore:✦ Tai Chi as a martial art and moving meditation: powerful, peaceful, and beautiful✦ Balance as something dynamic that allows you to hold your centre in the midst of change✦ The inner critic (“the Underminer”) and learning not to identify with the story it tells✦ Why peace can’t be learned, but arises through presence and awareness✦ The universal language of wonder and aweThis episode reminds us to look at what lies beneath the thinking mind, and to discover, as George puts it, that balance is possible.Chapters 00:00:00 Introduction00:05:49 Journey to the Wudang Mountains00:10:22 Finding Balance Through Tai Chi00:18:14 Spirituality as a Form of Activism00:24:45 Hope & The Vinegar Metaphor00:29:58 Love, Connection & Fierce Compassion00:35:29 Is Eminem Daoist?00:42:04 Awe and Wonder Predates Language00:46:27 Nature, AI, and the Technology Continuum00:49:42 Why Are We Here? Follow George:YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@George-Thompson The Subtle Art of Losing Yourself: https://youtu.be/9KArWcMldPM?si=fHt4OPWFb8-zSuAx Balance is Possible: https://www.balanceispossible.com/ Taoist Wellness Community: https://www.taoistwellness.online/community Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/george.thompson._/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@george.thompson_Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/georgethompson.uk Follow Wonderstruck:Website: https://wonderstruck.orgSubstack: https://newsletter.wonderstruck.orgYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@wonderstruckpodInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/wonderstruckpod/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@wonderstruckpod Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wonderstruckpod Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6fS5boWGwYTShddG7SKlVw Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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    54 min
  • 29: Psychoanalyst Macario Giraldo on How the Unconscious Shapes Our Lives
    Jan 6 2026

    From a coffee farm in rural Colombia to the psychoanalytic couch, Macario Giraldo has spent his life listening for the quiet forces that shape a human life: language, loss, desire, and love.


    At the age of ten, Macario left his family to join the La Salle Christian Brothers, a Catholic religious order that would become his home for the next twenty-five years. Beneath the structure of faith and vocation, an early sense of separation endured. Over time, it found expression as a desire for something he had long deferred: a family of his own.


    A Fulbright scholarship brought Macario to Washington, D.C. It was here that he received a rare dispensation from the Church to leave the brotherhood and encountered psychology and the work of Jacques Lacan, which would shape the rest of his analytic life.


    In dialogue with Colette Soler, an analysand of Lacan, as well as clinicians Marianne Goldberger and Hugh Mullan, Macario developed a distinctive approach to group therapy informed by Lacanian psychoanalysis. In his work, he listens not only to what is said, but to what stirs between people: the unconscious processes that emerge in groups, including conflict, desire, identification, and shared symbolic history.


    In this episode, we explore:

    ✦ Cause and triggers

    ✦ Group therapy as a modern ritual

    ✦ Lacanian thinking beyond the individual

    ✦ The fantasy of complete satisfaction

    ✦ Listening as a psychological practice

    ✦ The journey to become your own friend


    Macario invites us to wonder about the desires that take shape in relation to others, the limits of certainty, and how, over a lifetime, we might learn to live more truthfully with ourselves and with one another


    Chapters

    0:00:00 Introduction

    0:03:21 Picasso and the Desire of Others

    0:08:27 Presence, Absence, and the Fort-Da Game

    0:15:18 From Coffee Farm to the Christian Brothers

    0:18:53 Discovering Jacques Lacan

    0:24:49 Jouissance: The Pursuit and Crisis of Desire

    0:30:34 The Unexplored Gold Mine of Group Therapy

    0:38:34 The Power of Listening

    0:41:35 Anxiety is an Index of the Real

    0:48:27 Faith after Dogma

    0:55:35 The Journey to Become Your Own Friend

    0:58:13 Gardens, Love, and Wonder: The Closing Note


    Follow Wonderstruck:

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    Substack: https://newsletter.wonderstruck.org

    YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@wonderstruckpod

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    Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661

    Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6fS5boWGwYTShddG7SKlVw

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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    1 h et 1 min
  • 28: Dr. Monica Gagliano on How Plants Know Things We Don’t
    Dec 2 2025

    Plants are our ancient teachers, whispering and nudging… if only we’d listen. Dr. Monica Gagliano is an evolutionary ecologist who has turned the green world into something wonderfully surprising. Her research reveals plants that listen, remember, make choices and even teach one another. Some can sense eclipses before they happen. Others communicate in ways we’re only just beginning to catch up with.


    In 2008, Monica did something bold: she stepped out of academia and followed her curiosity into the forest, literally. Blending scientific experimentation with Amazonian plant ceremonies and the guidance of shamans, she helped spark the field now known as plant intelligence. Since then, her work has captured imaginations around the world, appearing in The New York Times and the National Geographic.


    In this episode, we explore:

    ✦ Pushing back against the scientific status quo

    ✦ Letting nature show you what it knows

    ✦ Welcoming indigenous plant teachings into scientific practice

    ✦ Paying attention as a joyful act of devotion


    Monica invites us into a playful and daring question: what do plants actually know… and what might they be trying to tell us?


    Chapters

    0:00 Intro: Science, wonder, and pushing boundaries

    03:03 Initiation on the Great Barrier Reef

    12:53 “Plants rescued the scientist in me”

    20:57 Monica’s first experiments with plants

    27:10 Bringing empathy into science

    32:37 "More-than-human" is a place

    37:33 It's the human that needs saving

    42:44 Indigenous science and plant communication

    50:54 The ancient tree that spoke to her

    56:14 Trees synchronize during solar eclipse

    01:03:51 Attention is the beginning of devotion


    Follow Monica:

    Website: https://www.monicagagliano.com/

    Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/_monicagagliano_


    Follow Wonderstruck:

    Website: https://wonderstruck.org

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    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wonderstruckpod

    Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661

    Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6fS5boWGwYTShddG7SKlVw

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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    1 h et 8 min
  • 27: Psychotherapist Mark Vernon on the Meaning Crisis and Rediscovering the Sacred
    Nov 4 2025

    Mark Vernon is a former priest turned psychotherapist who has spent the last 30 years exploring one central question: how do we find meaning in a secular age?


    After a crisis of faith pulled him away from the Church’s inner sanctum in his youth, Mark turned to Plato and Jung in pursuit of a deeper understanding of purpose, connection, and the soul. Today, his writing bridges ancient philosophy, religion, and modern psychology, a powerful triad he also applies to his work as a therapist.


    In this episode, we discuss:

    ✦ The overwhelm of conflicting meanings and remembering the sacred

    ✦ The spiritual thread connecting Dante, William Blake, and Jesus

    ✦ How wonder helps us access the divine

    ✦ Why psychotherapy is a path for ‘spiritual intelligence’


    Mark's work invites us into the depths of wonder and spirituality as a necessity for the soul.


    Chapters

    0:00 Intro: The modern crisis of meaning

    5:08 Psychotherapy and the vertical dimension of life

    11:25 The cloud of unknowing and mystical experiences

    18:19 Kairos time: Moments of spiritual significance

    23:01 William Blake on joy and eternity

    27:04 Death as a transcendent and transformative experience

    33:08 Early Christianity's deeper mysteries and meanings

    40:44 Humility as an expansive spiritual virtue

    50:56 Owen Barfield and the evolution of consciousness

    57:35 Ontological shocks and transformative experiences

    1:02:41 Outro: The importance of sacred experiences


    Follow Mark:

    Website: https://www.markvernon.com/

    Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/platospodcasts/?hl=en-gb

    X: https://x.com/platospodcasts

    YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@PlatosPodcasts

    Awake! William Blake and the Power of the Imagination: https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/awake/


    Follow Wonderstruck:

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    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wonderstruckpod

    Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661

    Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6fS5boWGwYTShddG7SKlVw

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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    1 h et 4 min
  • 26: Philosopher Bayo Akomolafe - Beyond Fixing the World: Embracing the Cracks and Creating Sanctuary
    Oct 7 2025

    What if the cracks in our world aren't flaws, but thresholds into the unknown? In this episode of Wonderstruck, we sit with philosopher, poet, and playful trickster Bayo Akomolafe. Bayo's vision invites us to linger in mystery rather than rush to solutions. He takes us into the unfolding terrain of post-activism, where possibility, not certainty, becomes our guide.


    In this conversation, we explore:

    ✦ How physics becomes philosophy… and poetry offers a new way of seeing

    ✦ How AI unsettles our ideas of consciousness and what it means to be human

    ✦ His vision of an “autistic politics,” shaped by those who move differently through the world

    ✦ The role of sanctuary and sacred spaces in times of upheaval


    This is less a conversation of answers than of reimagining; an invitation to pause, to listen otherwise, and to encounter the mystery shimmering inside the fractures of our time. In these transformational times, Bayo is a rare and radical voice, urging us to reimagine how we see the world.


    This episode of Wonderstruck invites you into that space.


    Chapters

    0:00 Introduction

    5:31 Autistic perception and expanded awareness

    12:30 AI is redefining intelligence

    18:58 The Ship of Theseus and posthumanism

    25:50 A moment of wonder at the moon

    40:00 Second sound and postactivism

    55:38 Liminality and the Cracks

    1:06:50 Death, Eshu and Jesus as trickster

    1:14:51 Making sanctuary and examining life's glitches


    Follow Bayo:

    Website: https://www.bayoakomolafe.net/

    LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bayoakomolafe/

    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bayoakomolafeampersand

    Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bayo.akomolafe/

    Emergence Network: https://www.emergencenetwork.org/


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    Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661

    Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6fS5boWGwYTShddG7SKlVw

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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    1 h et 20 min
  • 25: Mycologist Giuliana Furci - Fungi Will Change How You See the World
    Sep 9 2025

    Fungi are everywhere. Under our feet, in our food, in our medicines. Yet they remain one of the most overlooked kingdoms of life.


    In this episode of Wonderstruck, we speak to mycologist Giuliana Furci, a self-taught champion for fungi and founder of the first NGO in the world dedicated to fungal conservation, the Fungi Foundation. She reveals how mushrooms shape ecosystems, inspire culture, and hold ancient knowledge. They are alchemists of decay, transforming death and toxins into the fertile ground of new life. From sacred candlelit ceremonies to songs created with a cloud forest that has rights, Giuliana’s stories may change how you see the world forever.


    We explore:

    • How fungi sustain life on Earth and make our survival possible
    • Documenting indigenous relationships with fungi, from birth control to healing
    • The Song of the Cedars with Robert Macfarlane, Cosmo Sheldrake, César Rodríguez-Garavito
    • Sacred mushrooms, Mazatec culture and Maria Sabina
    • Why protecting fungi may shape the future of our planet


    Giuliana’s story is a testament to what can happen when we follow our calling and, in the words of Giuliana's mother, that something doesn't have to be done in order for us to do it!


    Chapters:

    0:00 Intro: A fateful encounter with fungi

    5:56 Mycology 101: Fungi's role in life on Earth

    9:37 Studying fungi with experience and intuition

    15:07 Don Pfister’s invitation to Harvard

    23:13 The Song of the Cedars and forest rights

    30:13 Documenting indigenous relationships with fungi

    37:38 Surprising fungal uses across cultures

    41:27 Fungi communication and sacred ceremonies

    47:49 National Geographic award and impact


    Follow Giuliana:

    Website: https://giulianafurci.com/

    Instagram: @giulifungi

    Fungi Foundation https://www.ffungi.org/

    LET THINGS ROT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpjWh1TXthM

    Flora, Fauna, Funga Documentary National Geographic Society: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DsnWcWeyoI

    The Song of the Cedar by Cosmo Sheldrake and Robert Macfarlane: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HH_timp2S3E&list=RDHH_timp2S3E&start_radio=1

    Is a River Alive? by Robert Macfarlane: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/455147/is-a-river-alive-by-macfarlane-robert/9780241624814


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    Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wonderstruck/id1671879661

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    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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    51 min