Listen free for 30 days
-
Active Hope
- How to Face the Mess We're in Without Going Crazy
- Narrated by: C. S. E. Cooney
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged Audiobook
- Categories: Politics & Social Sciences, Sociology
Add to basket failed.
Add to wishlist failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Listen with a free trial
Buy Now for £23.79
No valid payment method on file.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Braiding Sweetgrass
- Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
- By: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Narrated by: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Length: 16 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she learned from elders, family, and history that the Potawatomi, as well as a majority of other cultures indigenous to this land, consider plants and animals to be our oldest teachers.
-
-
Spellbinding
- By Milkmoon Mama on 24-02-20
-
From What Is to What If
- Unleashing the Power of Imagination to Create the Future We Want
- By: Rob Hopkins
- Narrated by: Rob Hopkins
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The founder of the international Transition Towns movement asks why true creative, positive thinking is in decline, asserts that it's more important now than ever, and suggests ways our communities can revive and reclaim it.
-
-
What if everyone read this book...?
- By Milkmoon Mama on 02-03-20
-
The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible
- By: Charles Eisenstein
- Narrated by: Paul Geiger
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a time of social and ecological crisis, what can we as individuals do to make the world a better place? This inspirational and thought-provoking book serves as an empowering antidote to the cynicism, frustration, paralysis, and overwhelm so many of us are feeling, replacing it with a grounding reminder of what's true: we are all connected, and our small, personal choices bear unsuspected transformational power.
-
-
Watch yourself, change yourself, change the world
- By Rob on 20-01-20
-
The Turning Point
- Creating Resilience in a Time of Extremes
- By: Gregg Braden
- Narrated by: Gregg Braden
- Length: 8 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We solve our problems based upon the way we think of ourselves and the world. From peak energy and peak debt to failing economies and the realities of climate change, everyday life is showing us where we’ve outgrown the thinking of the past. Through dramatic shifts in our jobs, our relationship to money, our health, and even our homes, it’s clear that our lives are changing in ways we’ve never seen before. It’s also clear that the thinking of the past is no longer enough to meet our needs today.
-
-
Good eye opener
- By Karina on 07-02-17
-
Gathering Moss
- A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses
- By: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Narrated by: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Living at the limits of our ordinary perception, mosses are a common but largely unnoticed element of the natural world. Gathering Moss is a beautifully written mix of science and personal reflection that invites listeners to explore and learn from the elegantly simple lives of mosses.
-
-
Drowned by unbearably inane prattle
- By Amazon Customer on 13-01-21
-
Die Wise
- A Manifesto for Sanity and Soul
- By: Stephen Jenkinson
- Narrated by: Stephen Jenkinson
- Length: 18 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Die Wise does not offer seven steps for coping with death. It does not suggest ways to make dying easier. It pours no honey to make the medicine go down. Instead, with lyrical prose, deep wisdom, and stories from his two decades of working with dying people and their families, Stephen Jenkinson places death at the center of the discussion and asks us to behold it in all its painful beauty. Die Wise teaches the skills of dying, skills that have to be learned in the course of living deeply and well.
-
-
Brilliant
- By David Berg on 24-01-19
-
Braiding Sweetgrass
- Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
- By: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Narrated by: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Length: 16 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she learned from elders, family, and history that the Potawatomi, as well as a majority of other cultures indigenous to this land, consider plants and animals to be our oldest teachers.
-
-
Spellbinding
- By Milkmoon Mama on 24-02-20
-
From What Is to What If
- Unleashing the Power of Imagination to Create the Future We Want
- By: Rob Hopkins
- Narrated by: Rob Hopkins
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The founder of the international Transition Towns movement asks why true creative, positive thinking is in decline, asserts that it's more important now than ever, and suggests ways our communities can revive and reclaim it.
-
-
What if everyone read this book...?
- By Milkmoon Mama on 02-03-20
-
The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible
- By: Charles Eisenstein
- Narrated by: Paul Geiger
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a time of social and ecological crisis, what can we as individuals do to make the world a better place? This inspirational and thought-provoking book serves as an empowering antidote to the cynicism, frustration, paralysis, and overwhelm so many of us are feeling, replacing it with a grounding reminder of what's true: we are all connected, and our small, personal choices bear unsuspected transformational power.
-
-
Watch yourself, change yourself, change the world
- By Rob on 20-01-20
-
The Turning Point
- Creating Resilience in a Time of Extremes
- By: Gregg Braden
- Narrated by: Gregg Braden
- Length: 8 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We solve our problems based upon the way we think of ourselves and the world. From peak energy and peak debt to failing economies and the realities of climate change, everyday life is showing us where we’ve outgrown the thinking of the past. Through dramatic shifts in our jobs, our relationship to money, our health, and even our homes, it’s clear that our lives are changing in ways we’ve never seen before. It’s also clear that the thinking of the past is no longer enough to meet our needs today.
-
-
Good eye opener
- By Karina on 07-02-17
-
Gathering Moss
- A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses
- By: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Narrated by: Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Living at the limits of our ordinary perception, mosses are a common but largely unnoticed element of the natural world. Gathering Moss is a beautifully written mix of science and personal reflection that invites listeners to explore and learn from the elegantly simple lives of mosses.
-
-
Drowned by unbearably inane prattle
- By Amazon Customer on 13-01-21
-
Die Wise
- A Manifesto for Sanity and Soul
- By: Stephen Jenkinson
- Narrated by: Stephen Jenkinson
- Length: 18 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Die Wise does not offer seven steps for coping with death. It does not suggest ways to make dying easier. It pours no honey to make the medicine go down. Instead, with lyrical prose, deep wisdom, and stories from his two decades of working with dying people and their families, Stephen Jenkinson places death at the center of the discussion and asks us to behold it in all its painful beauty. Die Wise teaches the skills of dying, skills that have to be learned in the course of living deeply and well.
-
-
Brilliant
- By David Berg on 24-01-19
-
Courting the Wild Twin
- By: Martin Shaw
- Narrated by: Martin Shaw
- Length: 3 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Myth is our wild way of telling the truth, of sharing stories that have our living earth speaking through them. There is an old insistence that we each have a twin we know nothing about. A wild, curious twin that was thrown out the window the night we were born, taking much of our energy with them. This story is a quest to find and court our wild twin, for they have something important to tell us. If there was something we were here to do in our few, brief years, we can be sure that the wild twin is holding the key.
-
-
Five stars for Dr. Shaw
- By Martin P on 29-04-20
-
The Nutmeg's Curse
- Parables for a Planet in Crisis
- By: Amitav Ghosh
- Narrated by: Sam Dastor
- Length: 10 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The history of the nutmeg is one of conquest and exploitation - of both human life and the natural environment - and the origin of our contemporary climate crisis. Tracing the threats to our future to the discovery of the New World and the sea route to the Indian Ocean, The Nutmeg's Curse argues that the dynamics of climate change are rooted in a centuries-old geopolitical order constructed by Western colonialism. The story of the nutmeg becomes a parable revealing the ways human history has always been entangled with earthly materials.
-
-
A strong case for intersectional environmentalism
- By Thomas S. Bevan on 24-04-22
-
To Speak for the Trees
- My Life's Journey from Ancient Celtic Wisdom to a Healing Vision of the Forest
- By: Diana Beresford-Kroeger
- Narrated by: Diana Beresford-Kroeger
- Length: 8 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Canadian botanist, biochemist, and visionary Diana Beresford-Kroeger's startling insights into the hidden life of trees have already sparked a quiet revolution in how we understand our relationship to forests. Now, in a captivating account of how her life led her to these illuminating and crucial ideas, she shows us how forests can not only heal us but save the planet.
-
-
wonderful book
- By M. Turner on 29-12-20
-
The Late Bloomer
- Myths and Stories of the Wise Woman Archetype
- By: Clarissa Pinkola Estés
- Narrated by: Clarissa Pinkola Estés
- Length: 7 hrs and 50 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Are you waiting for New Life, for your talents to bloom? With The Late Bloomer, Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes presents volume four of her masterwork on the Wise Woman archetype, bringing you six sessions of origial tales, stories from her ethnic families, poems, blessings, and psychological commentary exploring the cycles of "burgeoning, blooming New Life."
-
-
wonder full - full of wonder
- By Ms. Lm Cattrall on 10-10-20
-
The Highest Goal
- By: Michael Ray
- Narrated by: Jonathan Marosz
- Length: 5 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Through 25 years of teaching Stanford University's famed Personal Creativity in Business course, Michael Ray discovered that people who move beyond ordinary success and achievement have a secret. They live for a highest goal that drives them to accomplish their dreams, find fulfillment, and become generative leaders. Here, Ray tells you how you, too, can thrive by incorporating this powerful secret into your daily life.
-
Beauty: The Invisible Embrace
- Rediscovering the True Sources of Compassion, Serenity, and Hope
- By: John O'Donohue
- Narrated by: John O'Donohue
- Length: 5 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The human soul is hungry for beauty; we seek it everywhere in landscape, music, art, clothes, furniture, gardening, companionship, love, religion, and in ourselves. When we experience the Beautiful, there is a wonderful sense of homecoming; we feel fully alive. Our lives become illuminated, and behind the shudder of appearances we come to glimpse the sure form of things. On Beauty: The Invisible Embrace, Irish poet and philosopher John O'Donohue invites us to remember and to awaken the Beautiful.
-
-
Captivated.
- By Jennie on 23-01-17
-
Nature and the Human Soul
- Cultivating Wholeness and Community in a Fragmented World
- By: Bill Plotkin PhD
- Narrated by: Matthew Josdal
- Length: 25 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Addressing the pervasive longing for meaning and fulfillment in this time of crisis, Nature and the Human Soul introduces a visionary ecopsychology of human development that reveals how fully and creatively we can mature when soul and wild nature guide us. Depth psychologist and wilderness guide Bill Plotkin presents a model for a human life span rooted in the cycles and qualities of the natural world, a blueprint for individual development that ultimately yields a strategy for cultural transformation.
-
-
My new bible!
- By alistair j j leaver on 28-05-21
-
Pathways to Possibility
- Transforming Our Relationship with Ourselves, Each Other, and the World
- By: Rosamund Zander
- Narrated by: Rosamund Zander
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The best-selling author of The Art of Possibility returns with a new vision for achieving true human fulfillment. In this powerful and inspiring book, family systems therapist and executive coach Rosamund Stone Zander invites listeners to shed the childhood stories that hold us back, and enter a realm of true maturity and fulfillment, where limitless growth becomes possible. As children, we develop stories about how the world works, most of which get improved upon and amended over time.
-
-
Enlightening and Practical
- By Katharine Woods on 19-02-20
-
The Book of Hope
- A Survival Guide for an Endangered Planet
- By: Jane Goodall, Douglas Abrams
- Narrated by: Jane Goodall, Douglas Abrams
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The world-renowned naturalist and conservationist Jane Goodall has spent more than a half-century warning of our impact on our planet. From her famous encounters with chimpanzees in the forests of Gombe as a young woman to her tireless campaigning for the environment in her late '80s, Jane has become the godmother to a new generation of climate activists. In The Book of Hope, Jane draws on the wisdom of a lifetime dedicated to nature to teach us how to find strength in the face of the climate crisis and explains why she still has hope for the natural world and for humanity.
-
-
Sensational
- By Lisa Sacks on 24-10-21
-
Moral Ground
- Ethical Action for a Planet in Peril
- By: Desmond Tutu - foreword, Kathleen Dean Moore - editor, Michael P. Nelson - editor
- Narrated by: Kevin Stillwell
- Length: 18 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Moral Ground brings together the testimony of over eighty visionaries, theologians and religious leaders, scientists, elected officials, business leaders, naturalists, activists, and writers to present a diverse and compelling call to honor our individual and collective moral responsibility to our planet. In the face of environmental degradation and global climate change, scientific knowledge alone does not tell us what we ought to do.
-
Entangled Life
- How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds and Shape Our Futures
- By: Merlin Sheldrake
- Narrated by: Merlin Sheldrake
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Neither plant nor animal, it is found throughout the earth, the air and our bodies. It can be microscopic, yet also accounts for the largest organisms ever recorded, living for millennia and weighing tens of thousands of tonnes. Its ability to digest rock enabled the first life on land, it can survive unprotected in space and it thrives amidst nuclear radiation. In this captivating adventure, Merlin Sheldrake explores the spectacular and neglected world of fungi: endlessly surprising organisms that sustain nearly all living systems.
-
-
Willingly entangled
- By Paul on 17-11-20
-
Spirit Paths
- The Quest for Authenticity
- By: Gerry Starnes
- Narrated by: Charles Henderson Norman
- Length: 8 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Spirit Paths program is based on a fundamental understanding of the way in which personal work affects change. While the focus and content of the series has evolved since its inception, the intention for individual discovery remains clear: The only thing that you bring to the table in your life is your authentic self.
Summary
The challenges we face can be difficult even to think about. Climate change, the depletion of oil, economic upheaval, and mass extinction together create a planetary emergency of overwhelming proportions. Active Hope shows us how to strengthen our capacity to face this crisis so that we can respond with unexpected resilience and creative power. Drawing on decades of teaching an empowerment approach known as the Work That Reconnects, the authors guide us through a transformational process informed by mythic journeys, modern psychology, spirituality, and holistic science. This process equips us with tools to face the mess we're in and play our role in the collective transition, or Great Turning, to a life-sustaining society.
Critic reviews
More from the same
What listeners say about Active Hope
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Xanthe G.
- 17-11-18
Life changing book for times of change
This book has profoundly moved and awakened me. I feel refreshed and with a courageous new motivation to fully commit to making positive changes in this important time. Just what we need to help strengthen us. Highly recommended. I’ll be buying copies as gifts.
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
- Vida M
- 18-07-20
This book is a survival guide for our time
Active Hope is a powerful book deploying valuable information and wisdom to help us face the environmental crisis with energy and enjoyment. It's hard hitting in all the right ways and balance with wisdom that is vital in an age where our sense of how to find meaning in our lives is largely crippled by consumerist culture values that most of us are conditioned into believing are the only way to fulfilment. This book is essential, with nothing said that didn't need to be, and right on point with its title: how to find Active Hope, and face the mess we are in without going crazy. It is truly transformational and I think would be useful to support all people at this time of global crisis.
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- aliceruz
- 22-11-17
Life-giving
Life-changing, path-redirecting. Listening to this every day helped me get through a rough patch of life renavigating. Truly a one of a kind book, it lifts you up, gives you hope and most importantly gives you strategic exercises that bring your to be an active participant in the change of the world for the better. Infinite gratitude for this precious guide.
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- upperflisk
- 20-12-21
Narrator mismatch
So sad when such a distinguished author gets paired with a voice that sounds like a nanny reading a children’a book. I will struggle through this because I rate Joanna Macy’s work highly but will take a note not to buy another with Ms Cooney as the reader.
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amazon Customer
- 19-06-21
Helped me regain hope
I started reading this feeling quite hopeless about the world and it’s been really transformational for me.
Lots of interesting exercises and advice to give you all the hope and resilience you need
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- ThatPersonOverThere
- 21-09-20
Hope conquers despair
It's so easy to despair about the future right now. This was true when the book was written but doubly so during the pandemic. Learning about how to build and foster hope and how to find practical ways to move ourselves in the right direction is invaluable.
The book's content is great. I wasn't a big fan of the narration style, which I think befits a guided meditation session better than an audiobook.
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Douglas Mackay
- 13-12-18
A book for our time
Pertinent & fresh in these turbulent times. the shambala prophecy particularly stood out for me but value throughout.
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Amazon Kunde
- 19-07-17
One of the most inspiring and powerful books
When I started reading this book in a depressive phase, it helped me get out of it by applying "Active hope" to my personal life.
Now, whenever I feel a lack of motivation for my participation in the "Great Turning", or even lost touch with the purpose of my life, I listened to a part. Mostly after just 5 min, I was totally inspired and wired again, energized to do the exercises, and to work on creating an organisation...
5 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Molly C. Bennett
- 19-06-18
Fairly basic and not intersectional
This book may have been helpful to me 8 years ago when I was just entering activism and awareness of problems. But for someone who has been working in intersectional activism spaces for many years, this book is far too basic to be useful. It focuses in on climate change almost exclusively and from a very white, middle class perspective. It doesn't go into how to deal with more immediate and life threatening problems like violence based on race or sexuality/gender. Save your money and read a book by a person of color instead.
10 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Makenzie
- 09-09-20
Somewhat Helpful
I found it difficult to get through this book, mainly due to the narrator's voice. Nearly every word was over-annunciated, which distracted from the actual content. There were some helpful writing prompts and motivational moments in the book, but overall I felt like it didn't tell me anything that I didn't already know. It would have been nice if there was some mention of the fact that every individual has the power to help reverse the climate crisis by cutting meat and dairy out of their diets. Making a significant impact is actually that simple. Animal agriculture is the leading cause of climate change and yet so many "environmentalists" are unwilling to change their personal habits to align with the cause they claim to be fighting for.
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Eve Botelho
- 25-04-19
Much food for thought.
I found the orators voice so distracting it was hard to take in a great deal of the book and it’s message I’m sorry to say.
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- PippaMaus
- 01-11-21
The narration is insipid
The narrator recites the words with so little apparent understanding of their meaning, that the meaning becomes obscured. Too slow at times, too emotive at others, with awkward pauses and incorrect emphasis. Joanna Macy’s message is too important for such an artless reading. Skip the audible edition of this title and just read the book.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Kellum Lewis
- 22-10-21
Amazing content, slightly irritating performance, and a homophobic gaff
I found the content to be inspiring and transformative. Macy’s spiral-shaped Work That Reconnects is a precious, life-affirming and much-needed resource. Macy and Johnstone’s examples and exercises bring insight and cultivate self-knowledge, leading to action and “active hope.”
I found the narration to be a bit tedious, with the voice performer over-enunciating to the point of distraction and which often interrupted the logical and emotional impact of phrases and sentences.
One startling, homophobic gaff occurs near the very end of the book. The authors use the term “sexual preference” where they, I believe, mean “sexual orientation.” I hope their understanding of sexual orientation has advanced since 2012.
All in all, though, an inspiring and very important book for our time. Highly recommend.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Rebecca Studer
- 07-10-21
bury the doubts and bring to life true solutions
an interesting approach to remaining hopeful and moving forward in spite of seemingly insurmountable odds to our ever turning to a sustainable existence.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Leah D. Schade
- 17-11-19
Equipping us for "active hope"
Helpful practices in every chapter to equip us for practicing the skills of "active hope" needed for the days ahead. The Great Turning will need all of us.
Narration was a bit annoying. Overreach on earnestness led to a stilted and unnatural diction and cadence.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- happy customer
- 19-09-17
Essential reading for our time
Clarity wisdom and compassion abound in this beautiful book about the great turnout. If you are concerned about the state of the natural world at this point in human history then you may resonate to much of what she has to say. Joanna has been at this work for decades end it shows in the wisdom and depth of what she has to say. Please read this book and join the movement for a more just sane and sustainable civilization.