Soil can change fast, but what about people? We're coming to you live from the 2026 Grounded Festival on the extraordinary Yan Yan Gurt West Farm, stewarded by the Stewart family, in the Otways of Victoria, Australia.

It’s early on day 1, the marquee Ironbark Tent is full, and we’re joined by global figurehead in agroecology, author of For The Love of Soil, and founder of the CREATE program with Integrity Soils, from Montana USA, Nicole Masters.

The session is billed ‘Soil Health Isn’t Always Sexy’. But we start by questioning the premise, and run from there, in conversation with me and those present, squarely in the moment, through a series of unplanned places and stories - bold, vulnerable and so instructive - woven together by Nicole’s unique, hard-won and globally influential wisdom. 

Nicole challenges the badge-of-honour culture of farming, and most other fields these days, at the outset: 'hard work takes no discipline'. From there we unpack the gap between what we say we want and what our days reveal, and why deep listening often creates more change than the best advice. 

We also zoom out to the bigger system. Nicole shares why collaboration beats doing it all yourself, how farmers and the rest of us can build profitable, creative business models that serve a growing desire for reconnection, and why peer pressure may be the most powerful agent of change. Along the way we talk somatics, self-regulation, succession stress, trust and intuition, AI as an unavoidable tool, and the quiet pull of ancestor work and lineage in a time that feels uncertain.

If you care about living a regenerative life, but you also want a life with joy and the space to enjoy it, this conversation is for you.

With thanks to the Grounded crew for this recording, at the biggest festival for better food, farming and ecological care ever held in this country.

Featuring listener voicemail at the end of the episode too.

Chapter markers & transcript.

Recorded 22 April 2026.

Title slide by Alan Benson.

See more photos on the episode web page.

And for paid subscribers, join us for the Solstice event with Fred Provenza (and co-host Katie Ross). 

Hear more from Nicole Masters (and Meagan Lannan) in ep164, Training the Wayfinders.

Hear Manchán Magan in ep290, How Old Stories Guide Us Through An Uncertain Future.

Hear Kristy Stewart in ep132, An Agroforestry Revolution.

Grounded was featured all over national media this year, including this article in The Monthly magazine by previous podcast guest Jo Chandler.

Music: 

Working the Fields, by Falconer (from Artlist).

Regeneration, by Amelia Barden.

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