Reality Roundtables

A guiding light within The Great Simplification Podcast, where experts converge to shed light on global challenges—highlighting the complexities of energy, ecology, economics, human behavior, and systems synthesis.

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Reality RoundtableReality Roundtable Reality Roundtable #17 — Moving from Apathy to Action: How Facing Grief Can Help Us Navigate a World in Crisis

When facing the realities of our world, the urge to drown in grief or shut down into apathy is becoming more and more common. As we are flooded with information and global predicaments outside of our control, overwhelm can set in, affecting our energy, efficacy, and even our ability to care. But what if facing our grief is actually the pathway to increasing our capacity to stay connected to and work on the things that matter most to us? What tools, practices, or rituals could we use to help us begin to metabolize our grief?

Watch nowJul 9, 2025
The Mad Scramble for PowerReality RoundtableReality Roundtable The Mad Scramble for Power: Global Superpowers Strategies for Energy, Economics, and War

The rapidly evolving geopolitical landscape of recent years can be hard to follow.

Watch nowMar 24, 2025
Great simplification pulsing linesplastic health crisisReality RoundtableReality Roundtable The Plastic Crisis: A Health and Environmental Emergency

What do we need to know about this pervasive material and how it affects the human body

Watch nowFeb 10, 2025
Great simplification pulsing linesfuture is local nate hagensReality RoundtableReality Roundtable The Future is Local: Bioregioning 101

Nate and his guests emphasize the need for decentralized governance and institutions, as well as communities organized around resilience and regeneration.

Watch nowJan 19, 2025
Great simplification pulsing linesfuture council meetingReality RoundtableReality Roundtable Future Council: How Children are Responding to our Planetary Crises

Nate sits down with documentarian Damon Gameau and three young activists featured in his documentary film The Future Council.

Watch nowNov 24, 2024
Great simplification pulsing linesReality Roundtable global stakesReality RoundtableReality Roundtable The Global Stakes of the U.S. Election: Debt, The Dollar, and Military Power

Nate is joined by financial analysts Luke Gromen and Michael Every to explore the precarious nature of current fiscal practices.

Watch nowOct 27, 2024
Great simplification pulsing linesRR11 Murphy WhiteReality RoundtableReality Roundtable Tales from the Carbon Pulse

Summary The damaging effects of humanity’s disconnected relationship to Earth’s ecosystems are broad and deep. Yet, despite targeted efforts to address these issues and mitigate risks, our insatiable appetite for fossil hydrocarbons continues to grow at an alarming rate. What will it take to reframe our relationship with nature to move forward in a symbiotic, […]

Watch nowOct 6, 2024
Great simplification pulsing linesRR10 Andreotti Bateson Schmachtenberger WeylerReality RoundtableReality Roundtable The Ecology of Communication: Moving Beyond Polarization in Service of Life

There’s a growing understanding of the need for biodiversity across ecosystems

Watch nowJul 28, 2024
Great simplification pulsing linesRR09 Branagan Linhart TrinhReality RoundtableReality Roundtable The Next Generation’s Dilemma: Confronting the Metacrisis

As the human predicament continues to accelerate, the conversations regarding the future are still dominated by older generations

Watch nowJun 9, 2024
Great simplification pulsing linesRR08 Trivedi Thakore SavlaReality RoundtableReality Roundtable The Indic Mind: An Approach to the Metacrisis

On this Reality Roundtable, Nate is joined by Mohit Trivedi, Abhishek Thakore, and Kejal Savla,

Watch nowMay 12, 2024
Great simplification pulsing linesRR07 Hoopes Kilde Perry SulamoyoReality RoundtableReality Roundtable Stephanie Hoopes, Peter Kilde, Marc Perry, Dalitso Sulamoyo: “Poverty Blind”

On this Reality Roundtable, Nate is joined by four professionals with decades of experience working with low-income communities

Watch nowDec 10, 2023
Great simplification pulsing linesReality roundtable 6 ArtworkReality RoundtableReality Roundtable Fossil Free Food Systems: Jason Bradford, Andrew Millison, Vandana Shiva, Daniel Zetah

While a non-industrialized agriculture system is certainly possible (it was the norm for the majority of human history)

Watch nowNov 12, 2023

That’s very understandable because with left hemisphere thinking, one of the problems is that you see everything as a series of problems that must have solutions. Iain McGilchrist Neuroscientist and Philosopher

What we’re seeing is probably the largest mass movement of marine life, at least in the last 10,000 years, towards the poles. Malin Pinsky Associate Professor

The worst thing you can do to people is make them feel that whatever they do, it doesn’t matter. What we call in psychology “helplessness” — or even stronger, learned helplessness. Maren Urner Professor, Sustainable Transformation

We can’t have hundreds and hundreds of real relationships that are healthy because that requires time and effort and full attention and awareness of being in real relationship and conversation with the other human. Nate Hagens Executive Director ISEOF

30 min overview

The Great Simplification Animated Series is a 32-minute animation – in four acts – describing the backdrop for an economic and cultural transition beginning in the not-too-distant future. Energy Blind reveals how fossil fuels shaped our world, while The Human Superorganism shows their impact on economies and ecosystems. The Human Being examines the psychology behind our short-term thinking, and The Great Simplification encourages a systems-thinking approach to future challenges. With detailed notes and transcripts, this series offers a thought-provoking look at our past, present, and future. You can also enjoy all four parts together in our Animated Movie.

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The Institute for the Study of Energy and Our Future (ISEOF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation, founded in 2008, that conducts research and educates the public about energy issues and their impact on society.

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