Tending the Roots: Composting Conversations

Karine Bell

Welcome to Tending the Roots: Composting Conversations, an exploratory podcast with the co-dreamers and friends of the Rooted Global Village, in conversation with change-makers, scholar-activists and teachers, dedicated to culture change work and seeding future(s). We evoke in these conversations the powerful metaphor of composting. Composting is a process of transformation, wherein organic materials, once alive, break down and decay, eventually becoming rich, nourishing soil. We seek to identify and grapple with aspects and elements of culture, and in our personal lives, that no longer serve us and the world(s) we wish to create, and begin the slow work of composting them. We traverse paradigm-shifting themes, exploring the transformational power of body-centered praxis, the vibrancy of creative arts, the joy of spontaneity and play, the depth of poetry, and the profound interconnections of earth-spirit and more-than-human encounters. This podcast reflects the work of personal and collective transformation that we do in Rooted.

  1. 12/20/2025

    We Are EarthSeeds: Collaborative Creation & the New World Nursery with Mist Alderkin

    In this conversation, Karine Bell is joined by Mist Saoirse Alderkin to explore the New World Nursery, a space within the Rooted Village dedicated to collective dreaming, creativity, and responsibility to the worlds we are shaping together.  They talk about heartache and the longing for alternative futures in a time of deep division and polarization, and why so many people feel disconnected from their capacity to actively participate in creating those futures. Drawing from Mist's Earthseed Web of Worlds framework, the conversation touches on grief, values, ancestral wisdom, and what it means to dream and create in relationship rather than in isolation. This episode is an invitation to remember ourselves as contributors to collective world-building, and to consider what kinds of spaces can support that remembering. Links & Resources Learn more about Mist Saoirse Alderkin: https://linktr.ee/mistalderkin Explore the Rooted Global Village: https://rootedglobalvillage.com/the-village John Trudell – Tribal Voice (playlist): https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kNjkI_4A5tqGT3VuhCvwHrAJJ8PUXFnh8&si=1sYWUCZX1HFmF7Yx

    1h 19m

  2. 05/23/2025

    What We've Sacrificed to Stay Safe and the Courage to Peer Beneath the Waterline

    Karine shares a story from childhood about visiting her grandmother's house where she encountered the heavy, unspoken tensions that would shape a lifelong commitment to shadow work. This reflection weaves personal memory with a deeper exploration of the cost of avoiding the shadow—those edges-places we've been taught to fear in ourselves, our families, and our social worlds. It explores what we sacrifice when we choose not to go to those places, and how this avoidance slowly distances us from intimacy, creativity, and our own aliveness. This mini-sode is an invitation and a gentle push toward the edges where healing and transformation await. Learn more about our upcoming program, The Alchemy in Edge-Play: Personal and Cultural Transformation in a Complex World, at www.rootedglobalvillage.com/edge-play-program. Consider a donation to HEAL Palestine, which supports communities through a holistic model grounded in Health, Education, Aid, and Leadership—not just meeting immediate needs, but empowering the next generation to thrive and lead. Their work is powered by the Palestinian diaspora, community volunteers, and people like us who believe in collective healing and liberation. To learn more and contribute, you can visit www.healpalestine.org.Every offering helps build toward a future rooted in dignity, care, and self-determination.

    10 min

  3. 05/06/2025

    In Care We Distrust (aka Experiments in Village-Making)

    In Care We Distrust is an introduction and reflection from inside the Rooted Village, where we're not just talking about care and care ecologies—we're getting into the messy, layered work of studying, designing and practicing it/them. Underneath so much of the crisis we're living through—political, ecological, economic—is a crisis of relationship (or a crisis of care, as our friend Cassie calls it) and beneath that, a deep erosion of trust: in institutions, in one another, and even in ourselves. This episode winds through some of that terrain, touches on our distrust in those things we might desire most, and what it might take to trust and care within and between us; introducing a practice we are bringing into Rooted (the Hologram) as a radical practice in care. The Rooted Village is a dynamic third-space that is open now for those ready to do this work with us—through the Care Lab, through experimentation, and through showing up not with answers but with a willingness to risk relationship to weave friendship.   Referenced: Kelly McGonigal Ted Talk, How to Make Stress Your Friend: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcGyVTAoXEU  About Cassie & the Hologram: https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745343327/the-hologram/  The Rooted Village is now open for new folks to join — discover more at: www.rootedglobalvillage.com/the-village

    15 min

  4. 11/28/2024

    On SE+AM: Relational Courage and Creative Aliveness w/Weena Pauly-Tarr

    In this episode, we dive into a powerful and thought-provoking conversation with the brilliant Weena Pauly-Tarr, creator of SE+AM—a body-centered practice that blends Somatic Experiencing + Authentic Movement. In a time of heightened polarization and disconnection, SE+AM offers a profound way to explore how we show up in relationship—with ourselves and others—and how we can begin to recognize and move beyond our patterned ways of relating into spaces of choice, and creativity. Through this conversation, Weena shares how SE+AM reveals the dynamics that shape our connections and opens up new possibilities for being together in more honest and transformative ways. Whether you're curious about somatics, relationships, or how to navigate complexity in your life or in our world, this episode is inspirational for anyone seeking relational courage and creative aliveness!

    36 min

  5. 08/29/2024

    Where Do I Belong: An Exploring Identity and Belonging for Bi/cultural bodies [THIS TIME FOR EUROPE]

    Welcome to a fresh session of Tending The Roots. In this episode Karine Bell speaks with Dr Leticia Neito about an upcoming program hosted by The Rooted Global Village called Where Do I Belong: An Exploration of Identity and Belonging for Bi/multicultural bodies - this time, for Europe. It's a fascinating one. The two of them talk about how this program for bicultural bodies came to be, some of the most interesting learnings that have come out of the last two iterations, and the intriguing role psychodrama has played in participant's process of self-discovery. If you're interested in learning more about this program, the next Where Do I Belong Cohort for EUROPE begins on September 12th. You can register by visiting us at www.rootedglobalvillage.com/belonging-reg-europe Hope to see you there! And if you're interested in Future Where Do I Belong programs in other global contexts, get on the waitlist for them at https://www.rootedglobalvillage.com/belonging-ambiguity-project-waitlist

    43 min

  6. 03/21/2024

    Wanna Play? Play as Liberatory Practice with Heidi and Karine

    About Heidi J Cardoza:   From a young age Heidi has been empathic and expressive, with a love of nature and a desire to understand reality by honoring multiple perspectives. She studied physics, dance and performance art in college and produced several multimedia shows asking questions and inspiring integration and celebration.    She joined La Caravana Arcoiris por la Paz (the Rainbow Caravan for Peace) for many years in South America. This was an international group of rebels who traveled, worked and made art together. They learned to live simple, everyday lives together in connection with the mythic and the sacred land. Upon returning from Latin America, she started a multimedia performance art collective in Missoula, MT called the Open Field Artists, who played with cultural and spiritual change. She was also a certified yoga facilitator, massage therapist and arts mentor.    In time, Heidi's body began to release personal unconscious material (trauma) into the conscious mind and body to be integrated (which was scary). She then produced another multimedia art show called First Breath, which used theater to examine patterns we inherit from our parents. After this show her body-psyche initiated a deeper transformational process integrating ancestral trauma, and she moved into a land-based farm and garden community for a few years. Although this was a difficult time due to isolation and lack of support, it was also precious and brought her very close to herself, the land and the benevolent ancestors.   Since then, Heidi has been using her experience in sound, movement, theater, improvisation, performance art, comedy, clowning, drag and music - to continue collaborating, playing and experimenting! She initiated a collaborative multimedia art project called Free System-Sistema Libre. She also joined the Rooted Global Village and feels immensely grateful for all the ways she has grown within Rooted over the past few years. And she has been active in the disability community for years as an artist, educator and organizer, which has been empowering and enriching. She also works as a hospice caregiver, and is currently focusing on loving connections and mutual empowerment as humanity and nature continue to go through what she (and many others) experience as a mysterious cultural paradigm shift.   Heidi has failed a lot. SHE is sometimes a HE, and HE is quite sexy. They love a swim, especially under moonlight, with friends. She/he/they are howling and dreaming with all you friends out there…   Facebook: heidi junkersfeld Instagram: @heidij.free Website: www.freesystemsisteamlibre.com For more information about Rooted Global Village visit our website: www.rootedglobalvillage.com

    1h 10m

  7. 01/27/2024

    Part 4: Cycles of Fire: Imagination and our Maps

    On our own, the desire born from the challenges we've faced can be a powerfully transformative force in our lives.   Our personal embrace of the Soulful Chainbreaker becomes a cultural force when we gather together, commune, share stories, and support each other to commit to and sustain the journey.  We do not disrupt and re/orient within a vacuum, other beings dedicated to this process become our co-conspirators and co-creators of new experiences and new future(s).   Rooted in the experience of our non-separation we might find greater access to our creative life energy and imagination to become newly oriented in the world, to create new maps and pathways of belonging.

    17 min

  8. 01/20/2024

    Part 3: The Spirit and Science of Change Work

    Many experiences of trauma/oppression reveal where we've failed to belong authentically. The ways in which, as we navigate our social worlds, we come up against blocks and barriers to birthright dignity, authenticity, acceptance and belonging. That is, where we disappoint and fail to conform to the expectations of dominant cultural narratives. This rejection dampens our inner spark, disorients our desire, and erects borders and checkpoints in our interior world that prevents the wild rambling and roving that is our birthright and is necessary for wellbeing. This non-belonging is also a portal to a re/imagination of how else we might live.  Often unconscious to us, our experiences within culture shape the ways we're oriented in the world; influencing the neurophysiology of our bodies, our emotions, perceptions, and beliefs about ourselves, others, and the world.  On this shared journey the Chainbreaker illuminates the borders and checkpoints - the chains - that limit the free expression of our own unique hearts. The Chainbreaker archetype offers a way to embody fire-based courage so that we may see clearly the impacts of dominant familial and cultural narratives and a path to liberate ourselves and the generations that will come after us. What appears to us as evident in a field of infinite possibility is influenced by our early experiences embedded within family systems and culture.   This explores the spirit and science behind change-making and chain-breaking. And it asks the question: What can we learn from our bodies that the broader culture tries to bury?  We'll also offer guided reflection practice on what trauma has made way for in your life.

    27 min
See All (20)

Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
5 Ratings

About

Welcome to Tending the Roots: Composting Conversations, an exploratory podcast with the co-dreamers and friends of the Rooted Global Village, in conversation with change-makers, scholar-activists and teachers, dedicated to culture change work and seeding future(s). We evoke in these conversations the powerful metaphor of composting. Composting is a process of transformation, wherein organic materials, once alive, break down and decay, eventually becoming rich, nourishing soil. We seek to identify and grapple with aspects and elements of culture, and in our personal lives, that no longer serve us and the world(s) we wish to create, and begin the slow work of composting them. We traverse paradigm-shifting themes, exploring the transformational power of body-centered praxis, the vibrancy of creative arts, the joy of spontaneity and play, the depth of poetry, and the profound interconnections of earth-spirit and more-than-human encounters. This podcast reflects the work of personal and collective transformation that we do in Rooted.

Information

You Might Also Like