Finding Nature

Hello and welcome to a special edition of and extra episode of the Finding Nature podcast. If you’re new here, hello, if you’re a returning listener, welcome back. My name is Nathan Robertson-Ball and this is my show where each week I sit with people leading us towards a safer, healthier and more just future.

This episode is different though - it’s my Fresh Start 2026 show that is a compilation of many of the brilliant people I’ve had the pleasure of spending with and learning from. The Fresh Start Effect is something I fall for basically every Monday, every first of the month, every new season, and today being September 1, the first day of Spring here in Australia, I wanted to create something that helps give you the boost you may be looking for as we enter this new season and time of year.

The fresh start effect was coined by some behavioural scientists in 2014 and it represents how some people have a tendency to take action on new goals, make positive changes, try to get into healthy action after a date or milestone has passed. These are temporal milestones, like New Years Day, a birthday, starting a new job, every monday, every first day of the month or at a new season. I am a total sucker for these, and despite my best efforts, still find the allure of these to be compelling, even though I know right now is the moment I have to make the changes and choices I’d like to in my life.

Something that both fascinates me but I also know is essential is to live a life and to have an identity that is broader and more layered than work and career and a professional status. Having gone through a significant change in that regard this year I’m grateful for my practices of meditation and running and group therapy, for my friends and being a father and also this whole apparatus that have helped to keep me grounded and mostly healthy through it. Much of what I seek to create through Finding Nature - in many ways it’s purpose - is a portal for us all to connect with what our true nature might be, to be curious about, to nourish it and to bring it into the world in the pursuit of our goals and aspirations. I know I need to remain connected to my own deeper sense of meaning to do this well, consistently and to show up in service of this purpose over the blaring spotlights of external validation and plaudits.

This episode is about two things within that context. The first is to offer you snippets from episodes to help you feel connected and inspired by hearing the experience, strength and hope of others. The second is to either introduce you to a guest you haven’t heard from or to be reminded of the lessons the first time around. This show is about having largely timeless conversations about to live well and wisely, and I know the insights shared by these remarkable people stand the test of time. I’m very proud of the diverse and extraordinary quality of people I get to have on this show, and being able to compile something like a masterclass from such a group has been a fun and rewarding process.

So this episode covers everything from workplace influence to community politics, mental wellbeing and pursuing athletic and physical goals. I think there’s plenty for everyone here, and the diversity of guests and the snippets are a reflection of my own curiosities but also what I think are essential ingredients to live a whole, nourishing life.

It’s tough and daunting out there at the moment, and none of us do anything in our lives alone. I hope this episode offers you the message you need to get connected to your true nature, and to have the faith and courage required to get into healthy action.

Here's every episode featured today linked up (Spotify only, sorry Steve Jobs et al).

The Neuroscience of Change: The Role of Dopamine in Obstructing or Obtaining What We Want In Life With Dr Anastasia Hronis

Built To Create - Holly Rankin Is The Voice Of A Generation

Surrendering Attachment and Lessons from His Holiness The Dalai Lama - Geshe Lhakdor on What Ancient Spirituality Teaches Us About This Moment

The Voice of A Community: Nicolette Boele on Local Politics, Local Change and the Potential For A Real Shift

Steve Martin on How Influence Works and Change Really Happens

Clarity, Creativity and Connection - Dave Murphy On How Breath, Hypnosis and Visioning Are The Path To Flow State

Ask Tammi Anything - The Help We All Need In Pursuit Of What We Are Seeking

Rising Above Loss and Languishing - Hector Arisitizábal on New Beginnings

Benn Coubrough Keeps Moving - What One Of Australia's Greatest Ultra Runners Can Teach Us All About Mindset, Living and Going For It

On The Hook - Emily M Bender Isn’t Falling for the AI Hype Machine

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This week’s guest is German philosopher Hanno Sauer. Hanno was here in Sydney for the Festival of Dangerous Ideas and the opportunity to go deeper with him then he could in a panel talk or presentation was a thrill. Hanno is a moral philosopher, and his much acclaimed book ‘The Invention of Good and Evil; A World History of Morality’ is one of those rare reads that has deeply affected me and feels like it’s re-oriented my understanding of and appreciation for where we’ve come from, where we are now and where we might be going. I’ve never read anything like the content Hanno uncovers and shares in this brilliant piece of literature, but as a result I’ve come to appreciate the innate necessity for the fine balance between individual freedom and collective equality. How do we live in as much peace as possible when the diversity of cultures, ideologies, histories, stories, myths and norms vary wildly within and across communities? If there is one issue that I think sits at the heart of the present day maelstrom, it’s the ability - or inability - to be in active, healthy relationships with each other. Or as Hanno points out from the first moral epoch of humanity, the requirement to cooperate.

I learnt an absolute tonne from Hanno, and this conversation we chat about his work charting the history of morality over the last five million years to the dysfunction and dysregulation of this moment. From moral absolutism and cancel culture, to the need for punishment to maintain cooperation, climate change as the mothership of all moral dilemmas, the role trust plays in all of this and the state of ideas - from the heinous reality of industrial animal farming to dismissing those that claim the Holocaust didn’t happen.

Strap in for this one. Hanno brings a lot of energy, views, intellect and morality. 

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

Ethics in the boardroom: A decision-making guide for directors

From values to value: The commensuration of sustainability reporting and the crowding out of morality

Planetary health check series

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That’s Sophie Bretag, I’m Nathan Robertson-Ball and this is the Finding Nature podcast. The modern professional seems to lead a life of ever-increasing juggling complexity. As the expectations mount and the speed to meet them grow, at the same time trying to manage the circumstances of our individual personal lives and all while supporting friends or colleagues or parents or kids or any combination of relationships, things can seem barely manageable on a day to day basis. Everyone’s busy, everyone wants to do and live well, including me, but what are we losing as we traverse these paths that aren’t for the faint of heart, and what’s it doing to our relationship to work, and how are workplaces and organisational cultures leaving us feeling?

Not great is the simple answer. From exhaustion and burnout to ever rising rates of serious mental health conditions, growing proportion of people working in insecure jobs, the spectre of organisations redundacy’ing their workforces in service to the broligarchy and investor demands. That’s been me and it all got to much for in the past, and that’s why Sophie's new book ‘The Kind Way; The Life-Changing Metric for Leadership, Success and the Human Spirit’ stood out and resonated so strongly.

Oh god, kindness. Really? That thing we try to instil in children but dismiss as weak or unnecessary or incompatible in modern workplaces - yes, that kindness. Sophie’s book diagnoses the sickness afflicting organisations that disconnect and dehumanise us, that favour productivity over partnership with the people who work in them, and then charts a course where kindness and success are not in tension with the other. The Kind Way spoke to me for other reasons too in how to make good and attempt to reform the places we work through a simple - but not easy to implement - four pillar framework that requires knowing yourself, intention inclusion, nurturing capacity and leading consciously.

Sophie Bretag has lived and breathed organisations - their design, their cultures, their operating protocols - and experienced the fear and despair of serious health episodes several times over. She’s on the show today to help us all remember who we are, that we don’t have to sacrifice how we behave and who we are in the pursuit of high performance, and that being kind may just be the secret ingredient required to put the human spirit back into workplaces.

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

Applying the OODA loop for leadership and company engagement

Holding the Line: A Playbook for ESG Leadership in Hostile Terrain

Women in business leadership boost ESG performance: Existing body of evidence makes compelling case

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Hello wherever you might be, welcome to or welcome back to the Finding Nature podcast and my name is Nathan Robertson-Ball. Now what a week I’ve had and having, my cup feels very full after attending conferences and events, moving forward on lots of different Finding Nature ideas and programs - including something very big for 2027 that I’m going to be very excited to share more about over time, as well as an absolutely wonderful time visiting Dungog over the weekend just gone. This episode is part of the result of that weekend, as was hitting the trails again for the first trail race I’ve done since the Takayna Ultra in March 2020.

The usual listener might be wondering - what does my interest in and pursuit of running have to do with sustainability, with Finding Nature? Well let me read something I put in my journal back in May, which hopefully answers that question:

“New dawns all over the place. Through my dismantling is the dawn of wanting to go long on foot again - to ultra. To be with one of the world's best this week, to go up to Ultra Trail Australia yesterday, to be feeling the love of running that has been coming back into my life over the last month, it feels inevitable.

To find my nature - and to stay with it - means being in connection with my body, which is running. To see and explore place and potential, with self and others, is running.

Few things in my life have I loved more than long and very long distance running. Now the urge, the desire, the yearning for, has returned. Been about six years since I last did - wow, where has time gone - the time to go again is here.”

Heading up to Run Dungog was what I signed up for, but after I’d completed my registration they announced that Benn Coubrough was also going to be there - and Benn is today’s guest. I couldn’t believe it - the race I’d selected to go in after six and a half years was going to host one of Australia’s greatest ever ultra distance runners, and most likely one of the best athletes in Australia in any sport at the moment. So I reached out to Ben about whether he’d like to be on the show, and he said yes. Then I thought maybe this was the opportunity I’d been looking for to do a live podcast recording. So I asked Benn, and he said yes. So I reached out to Dan at Run Dungog about being included in their weekend of activities, and he said yes. Then we spoke to the team at the Tinshed Brewery on the Main Street of Dungog, and they said yes, and like that, the format I’ve been wanting to do for a long time was going to happen.

On Saturday we were joined by locals and travellers to listen in to what you’re about to hear. And what a story this is. Ultra distance runners and sustainability professionals have a lot of common characteristics in my mind - determined, seekers, mutants, caring, community oriented, mission focussed, and I think you’ll love this conversation even if the idea of running around the block is something you detest.

Benn’s epic adventures in races like Badwater 135, Moab 240 and Coast to Kosci are remarkable, and the insights and lessons he shares on mindset, discipline, joy and going for it are applicable to everyone out there.

Check out (and sign up to) Benn's coaching business, Stroke No Limits and follow him on Instagram. 

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

The board playbook: Winning strategies for long-term value creation

Policy portfolios: Empowering long-term thinking and tactical flexibility

Target-setting protocol fourth edition

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At the end of 2023 when I was starting to get this Finding Nature show on the road I was fixated on two questions after 20 years in and around large organisations where I felt both lost in my career but also demoralised by another leadership decision to avoid the harrowing reality of what climate change means for everyday people, their finances, home security, access to insurance and their right to safety. How could they abdicate their agency to help avoid harm to others and their own business? So I wanted to know two things primarily, firstly, how does change happen, and secondly, what do I do with my anger, grief, disillusionment and fear for what a climate changed planet and existence looks like? My name is Nathan Robertson-Ball, and welcome to or welcome back to the Finding Nature podcast where each week I sit with leaders who’ve pursued change and are actively working to make this planet a healthier, safer and more just place.

So to those questions I’ve been privileged to now host 128 of these episodes where I explore and seek to understand the insights and let the wisdom of my guests wash over me, and I know it’s had a significant and positive effect. Today’s guest, Glenn Albrecht, is one of the most meaningful conversations I’ve had, not just on this show, but ever.

Glenn is someone I frankly cannot believe I hadn’t come across until about six weeks ago when my John Elkington newsletter made reference to this man in New South Wales who has developed an entire lexicon for how we can better understand our emotions in a changing world - including the word solastalgia that I’ve seen pop up all over the place. Glenn is an environmental philosopher who for decades has worked to understand deeply and put precise language to the emotions people are having when they experience the loss, destruction, degradation, removal or alienation from a place they love. It’s me! These are the words I’ve been looking for for years, and he’s been up the Blue Mountains this whole time!

I absolutely loved this conversation, and Glenn’s work, especially his book Earth Emotions, is something anyone listening to this episode and working in sustainability would be well advised to seek out and immerse yourself in. The most common conversation I’ve had this whole time in Finding Nature Land centres on the despair and despondency people are having watching the world literally burn, where genocide and killing and corruption and nepotism and white collar crime are moved on from with the swipe of a finger. How to reconcile the desire and immense effort that goes into being a force for positive change, while so much else is making the underlying conditions worse?

In this episode we talk about Glenn’s work in environmental philosophy, the words he has devised and their meaning, the emptiness of language and words like sustainability and ESG that are devoid of a connection to life and relationship, the parasitic nature of the Anthropocene and his hopes, ambitions and motivation to see an era of symbiosis come to life.

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

Life, Climate Volatility, and What Comes After

Our predicament: The fundamental flaws of predominant economic systems - and the cultures scaffolding them

Framing and language for effective climate conversations

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Joy McCann is an environmental and public historian who has worked to understand and share the stories of how the histories of people, places, ideas and the non human world have and do interact to create the cultures, practices and rhythms of life on this planet. Her work and research has taken her across Australia and over the last decade she has explored the oceans, ice, islands and coastlands of the Southern Hemisphere, resulting in her latest book, ‘Heart of Ice; A Journey Into Antarctica’s Frozen Realm’.

I loved reading the book and speaking with Joy as both helped me realise how little I know about the ice continent, as well as its fascinating history. From the commencement of planetary glaciation around 34 million years ago to the fables and myths humans projected onto the great unknown southern land, to her own trip to the ice as well as the human history of exploration and discovery there. Considering its crucial role in creating and maintaining our planet’s homeostasis the threats and perils it faces, and the rapid changes it has already undergone, are alarming to say the least. What happens in Antarctica doesn’t stay in Antarctica, and its role in regulating climate and oceanic systems is fundamental for a stable globe.

More than the threats and perils though, Joy’s work is about understanding how we got to here, and by revealing the secrets of the past - the stories human’s have and still do tell ourselves about ecosystems, place, other species and the planet in general - uncover deeply held values, bias, misalignments and emotions. In the Heart of Ice Joy shares myths about hidden monsters and something known as hollow earth theory about how humans accounted for what they didn’t know hundreds of years ago, as well as how the economic invectives of the 18th, 19th and 20th century to plunder and massacre millions of whales, seals and penguins are still entirely present today. A history of separating humanity from the natural world holds strong today, and this book tells the stories of how our species perpetuated that on a continent thousands of kilometres away, across the most gruelling and dangerous ocean crossings on the planet, only to end up carving it up for resources and what could be taken from it for profit.

Joy’s work reveals the depths of our cultures and the strength of story passed on over generations. I hope she inspires you to consider the stories you tell yourself and others. 

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

Is the Atlantic Overturning Circulation Approaching a Tipping Point?

What We Know About Deep-Sea Mining — and What We Don’t

Turning the tide: How to finance a sustainable ocean recovery

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Today’s guest is Simon O’Connor, who for more than two decades has worked at the forefront of responsible investment and sustainable finance. From his training and time as an economist and working with the Australian Conservation Foundation, running the Responsible Investment Association of Australasia for over a decade and helping to established the Australian Sustainable Finance Initiative, Simon has been neck deep in everything to do with hardwiring a different financial system. His knack for building alliances has been central to his efforts and successes in trying to pull every available lever to shift the leadership, systems and culture of a system that is both necessary to undertake society-level transitions but also incentivised to reinforce itself to maintain as much of the status quo for as long as possible.

I wanted to speak with Simon because he is the archetype of the person I started this show to speak with - he’s been in the game for years, he’s been in thousands of rooms where the change I hope is possible is either unlocked or vanquished, he cares and he’s lit a path for all of us over the years for everything that I hope is still to come. Being a sustainability professional in the 2000s was different to the 2010s, and is different again in the 2020s, from a nascent outsider in those early days to a capability and mindset that is now inevitably positioned to transform every aspect of our society and economy, Simon has been and remains a leader I wanted to learn from to understand what his insights are and wisdom he has to share.

We chat about plenty in this episode, but it centres on three central questions - how was it, what happened to create change along the way, and how is it now? We get into the pendulum of despondency and optimism, personal resilience, culture and team building, longevity, the trade offs between incremental and transformative change, language and jargon, as well as a final conversation about how pursuing hard things in our non-work lives help to set us up for success in our work lives.

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

What can investors do about climate change?

Driving positive social change through co-operatives and mutual enterprises (CMEs)

Navigating the winds of change Strategic foresight and the power of weak signals

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Hello out there and welcome to or welcome back to the finding nature podcast. My name is Nathan Robertson-Ball and today’s episode is a slightly different format to what is usual here. Today I’m chatting with the show’s most popular guest, and someone I consider a teacher, friend and colleague Cameron Tonkinwise about the eight years I spent in the organisation that will not be named. Sounds a bit like Voldemort from Harry Potter, and perhaps even mentioning their name also risks summoning their followers or drawing dark magic.

This show has been in the works for a little while after Cameron and I chatted about ways to capture and share the misadventures of attempting to do corporate sustainability in one of Australia’s largest organisations for the best part of the last decade. Ever the teacher, Cameron was keen to remind me that the roles I had and unusual spaces I was privileged to exist in is likely valuable for others to appreciate as part of our shared ambition to shift institutional structures and barriers. So this episode is somewhere between Cameron interviewing me, me interviewing him and also two people that spoke on a near daily basis for those eight years surfacing memories and insights and questions for all of us to consider, and hopefully learn from.

To be clear, the eight years of doing social innovation, home electrification and climate risk management were full of valuable insights, progressed me as a professional and allowed me to meet and work with hundreds of terrific and intelligent people. This isn’t my version of a takedown, but a legitimate effort to reflect on my experience, look into a mirror to conduct honest self appraisal and openly question what needs to be different and what I can do differently over the next phase of my career and life. I’m hoping there are stories that resonate and insights that inspire for each of you out there listening. I’m always keen to get feedback and the thoughts of everyone else, so please get in contact through the website or send me something via email ([email protected]).

So the question I haven’t been able to stop asking myself the last few months is whether organisations by and large are just pretending to try with their sustainability ambitions. Cameron helped me explore this further. 

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

Can you be the change you’d like to see? Three US philosophers aim to offer hope

We need to talk about net zero bullsh*t.

The business case for “speaking up”: How internal reporting mechanisms strengthen private-sector organisations

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A category of guest I really enjoy speaking with though are those who are on the way up. People like Holly Ransom or Kal Klanznig or Vanessa Pirotta who are clearly going places - it’s a thrill to spend a little bit of time with them before they accomplish even more. Today’s guest doesn’t have the public or social media profile of those three, but I hope that is to change in next little while. Timothy Neal is a senior scientia fellow in the Department of Economics at the University of New South Wales and also the Institute of Climate Risk and Response. Earlier this year he was named Australia’s leading researcher in probability and statistics with applications and in 2021 was the recipient of the prestigious Paul Bourke Award for Early Career Research by the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia.

What does that mean he’s an expert in then for those less initiated with economics, statistics and social science - it means his work at the intersection of climate change, casual inference and econometrics is resulting in entirely new ways by which to understand how much we already have and will continue to lose as a result of a changing climate and our civilisation’s collective commitment in dismissing and avoiding the reality of the losses, impacts, damages and harms that have arrived and are now locked in for decades to come.

Tim’s work has re-shaped how I think, talk about and worked on physical climate risk - and his work with UNSW colleagues Ben Newell - a former guest on episode 87 - and Andy Pitman - in 2025 dropped a grenade into conventional economic thinking and modelling regarding climate change. How can we know that human activity has fundamentally altered the chemical, biological and physical reality of our atmosphere and still see company after company, regulator after regulator, reserve bank after reserve bank tell us that their numbers are telling us there is nothing to see here? How can a company write that climate change represents a material financial risk to their business then claim their scenario analysis process presents a near-zero loss future due to climate change? It makes no sense. Tim’s work has helped me understand why that is, what needs to change in economics to redress this and how all of us as lay people can better engage with the real but complex reality of attempting to understand what disaster after disaster means for economic performance nationally and across the globe.

In this chat we get into Tim’s recent work on economic losses already able to be quantified and mounting up just in NSW, his seminal work on global macroeconomic loss results as well as what his research into panic buying and hoarding at the onset of Covid may have in stall for us as we face a future certain to be more volatile, dangerous and disaster-prone.

Some extra reading relevant to this episode from our friends at Altiorem. 

Making the case: Macroeconomic risk & portfolio impact: A tool for system-level investors

The macroeconomic impact of climate change: Global vs. local temperature

Discourses of climate delay

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One person who for a decade now has fought against the construction of what would be the largest mine in the South Pacific in Papua New Guinea by an Australian headquartered but Chinese backed mining operation in a pristine landscape in one of the world’s most seismically active locations. Manu Peni is that man and today’s guest, and I was fortunate to meet and spend time with Manu during his recent trip to Sydney for the premier of the documentary Sukundimi Walks Before Me at the Sydney Film Festival, which won the Sustainable Future Award there too.

Captured by the film is the remarkable story of the work Manu has led for ten years in the creation of the Supreme Sukundimi Declaration - a signing by 28 different clans along the Speik River to protect it from the mine and its approval. The Sepik River is over 1,100 kilometres in length and is one of the last unspoiled river systems anywhere in the world, and the plans of the mine would seriously risk its health and that of every person and species living along and relying upon the surrounding ecosystems.

Manu’s story is bigger than words allow to describe. He is diligent, charismatic, intelligent, grounded and ambitious, all things he’s needed to be over the course of this battle which has included threats to him and his family. Beyond just the Save the Sepik campaign though, we talk about the concept of imposed development, how climate change has already affected the lives and livelihoods and Papua New Guineans and the deleterious impacts mining projects like Porgera, Ok Tedi and Bougainville have had when western interests have steamrolled the interests and safety of local people.

Manu represents a vision of living and the future we desperately need. I hope you’re inspired by listening.

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