What podcasts are you listening to?
I listen to podcasts the way some people tend a garden — slowly, regularly, and with gratitude for the voices that keep me company as I walk. These aren’t simply sources of information; they are companions. Each, in its own way, helps me see, lead, and listen differently.
Kate Bowler — The Grace of Limits
Kate Bowler’s Everything Happens is part theology, part therapy, part laughter in the dark. Diagnosed with stage IV cancer while studying the prosperity gospel, she found herself living her research — face to face with the limits that success narratives can’t explain.
She speaks to my pastoral heart. I admire her humour, her lack of pretence, and her ability to draw out stories of courage without polishing them. She reminds me that grace lives best in the ordinary and the imperfect. That everything happens — not for a reason, but within a world still loved by God.
Phil Cummins — The Courage of Leadership
Phil Cummins’ Game Changers speaks to my heart as an educator. He believes leadership begins not with policy but with purpose. In an age of rapid change, his podcast keeps returning to character, calling, and formation.
He reminds me that leading is not about controlling outcomes but about orienting people — strengthening, aligning, and enriching communities so that others can flourish. It’s the kind of leadership that builds ecosystems rather than empires, and I find that deeply refreshing.
Krista Tippett — The Art of Listening
Krista Tippett’s On Being has long been a touchstone. She speaks to my civic heart, the kind of people we are becoming. Even though new episodes are rare, her archive feels timeless. Tippett treats conversation as a moral art — a way of practising hospitality, curiosity, and love.
She speaks of “ecosystem-building over institution-building,” of tending human wholeness, of listening with generosity and patience. Her conversations weave poetry and philosophy, faith and doubt, into something both spacious and grounded. She makes goodness riveting.
Formation Rather Than Performance
Across all three, there’s a shared orientation toward formation rather than performance.
– Bowler tends the inner life in the face of suffering.
– Cummins tends the leader’s character in the face of change.
– Tippett tends the collective soul in the face of fragmentation.
Each one reflects my own preoccupations:
– The need to see potential in others.
– The belief that deep truth emerges in dialogue.
– The conviction that leadership is an act of care for the human condition.
What binds these voices together is more than theme — it’s posture. A way of holding space for what is fragile, hopeful, and unfinished.
These podcasts don’t just fill time. They form me — shaping the way I think and live, one conversation at a time.
The Afterword 
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