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THE SPACESHIP EARTH PODCASTThe story of Spaceship Earth is simple... We liv Author: Dan Burgess
We live on a life giving rock called Earth hurtling through space. Like a spaceship, we have a finite amount of supplies with an intelligent operating system, called nature, which keeps everything replenished as long as we all respect and participate wisely. In this podcast Im in conversations with humans involved in regenerating life, Shifting consciousness and re-imagining how we can live more beautifully and peacefully. I talk with artists, writers, activists, designers, adventurers, healers, farmers, creative mavericks and more. Their stories invite us to participate in the co-creation of life sustaining cultures. In service to life. Becoming crew on Spaceship Earth. becomingcrew.substack.com Language: en Genres: Nature, Science, Society & Culture Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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Episode 113: Sam Crosby | Returning to Myth, Wisdom and Eldership
Friday, 19 December, 2025
Right then, this is our final episode of this year.But first up to say a big hearty thank you to all who have listened, shared and supported the podcast this year.To all the guests who’ve joined the rambling - respect for your time, wisdom and open-ness.And to my podcast crew who help make this a reality - Charlie Shread, Seemah Nahome-Burgess and Fin Burgess.And a massive shout out to those who subscribe with a monthly payment to this project.So to Episode 113…My guest, Sam Crosby, is an oral storyteller and myth-informed guide whose work braids together story, psyche, ancestry, eldership and the living Earth.This episode was recorded around the fire at Ghost Wood Down - two men sitting in the half-light, speaking honestly about what it is to search for meaning in a world that feels increasingly senseless.Across two hours we wandered, wondered, and returned again and again to the mythic ground beneath our feet - the place modernity keeps trying to concrete over.But there were core themes and patterns we were carrying throughout:1. Myth as orientation, not entertainmentMyth isn’t a story about long ago - it’s a technology for staying human in ambiguous, unraveling times. We kept returning to myth as a compass when the rational mind fails.2. Eldership vs.“Oldership”A core wound: we’ve lost the adults who know how to hold the whole. Modernity extends lifespans but not wisdom.Sam goes deep into the distinction between age and elderhood - and the hunger for guidance that can hold complexity without collapsing into certainty.3. The mythic roots of the AI momentWhat if the crisis with AI is not technological — it is mythic.Humanity is generating intelligence way faster than it is generating wisdom. Our conversation suggests AI as a kind of mirror, revealing our disconnection from story, meaning and long arcs of time.4. The crisis beneath the crisis: meaninglessnessWhat makes these times unbearable is not the data - it’s the absence of orientation. Sam repeatedly speaks to the human need for story, ritual and shared containers of meaning.5. Rites of Passage & thresholdsOne of our deepest shared passions: Cultures that lack thresholds create perpetual adolescence.This is why the absence of elders is so severe — there is no one to midwife beginnings or endings.6. Stories as living beingsSam treats stories as alive, with their own agency. This shifts storytelling from performance to participation - a relational act where story chooses the teller and carrier.7. The danger of speed & the loss of the underworldModernity has flattened the vertical dimensions of being -no descent, no soul work, no underworld, no mysteries. We point toward slowness, ambiguity, and unknowing as necessary conditions for true wisdom to spread.Sam is a wonderful human who speaks beautifully with great humility, courage, and imagination, and is doing really extraordinary work, especially the project on rekindling cultures of eldership, which we speak to at length here and I link to in the show notes below.LINKSam’s workEldership ManifestoInto the Dark from Becomin Crew- Register by 9th January Get full access to Becoming Crew at becomingcrew.substack.com/subscribe
