What if the rupture of these tumultuous times is not an ending, but an opening? In this episode, Willow speaks with Bayo Akomolafe, philosopher, poet, and thinker whose work challenges us to step beyond binaries and into the fertile, unpredictable space of emergence. They dig into how transformation doesn’t come from rigid certainty or oppositional thinking, but from the cracks—where new possibilities take root. Nature does not resolve tension; it composts it, making way for something unexpected to arise. Bayo invites us to see the turbulence of our moment not as a problem to be solved, but as an invitation to step out of fixed ways of being and embrace the "third way"—the space between and beyond, where new ways of relating, knowing, and becoming can unfold.

Podcast production by Magnificent Noise

Series photography by Camila Falquez

Episode photography by Arianna Lago

Executive Producers: Willow Defebaugh, Theresa Perez, Jake Sargent

Special thanks to Karen Gray, Jasmine Hardy, Tessa Forrest, Ásta Þrastardóttir, Jonas Woost, Kattie Laur