A Song For All of Us

What is ours to do in a world that feels more overwhelming by the day? In this intimate episode, host Lisa Littlebird turns the microphone toward the person who knows her best — her partner, baritone, behind-the-scenes producer, and unsung hero of Wholehearted Chorus: John Halcyon Styn.In a tender, personal, funny, and genuinely honest conversation, John and Lisa talk about the places where both of them are still figuring it out. Together they explore why our evolutionary brains were never built for the rate of change we're living through, the difference between a circle of concern and a circle of impact, and why direction, not distance might be the most liberating framework for showing up in a broken world.John shares how he lives these ideas daily — through morning gratitude broadcasts, a 1st Saturdays houseless outreach program, stopping to greet every person on a morning walk — and introduces the concept of the "Optimism Tax": the price we sometimes pay for staying open-hearted, and why it's almost always worth it. Lisa, in turn, reflects on her edge as a visionary leader: the tension between structure and spontaneity, between serving a group and tending herself, and what it looks like to let vulnerability participate in leadership without becoming a performance of it.The season's two closing songs anchor the conversation: Through Your Hands by John Hiatt — a reminder that it's our actions, not our thoughts, that move mountains — and Alicia Keys' Underdog, reframed as a love song to the small, singular moments of human connection that quietly change everything.Come in. This one's personal.John Halcyon Styn: https://lifestudent.com 

Forgiveness frees me. Forgiveness frees you. Forgiveness clears the path. Forgiveness sees through.In one of the most profound conversations of the season, host Lisa Littlebird sits down with the Reverend Canon Mpho Tutu van Furth — Episcopal priest, artist, author, and daughter of Archbishop Desmond Tutu — beaming in from the Netherlands for a conversation about the most demanding and perhaps most necessary human practice: forgiveness.Mpho is the co-author (with her father, Desmond Tutu) of The Book of Forgiving, which many members of Wholehearted Chorus have been reading together in a season-long book club. This conversation is the living extension of that work — rich, personal, and beautifully honest.Together Lisa and Mpho walk the fourfold path of forgiveness: why "I'm sorry, let's move on" is not the same as repair; how skipping the step of naming the hurt leaves stones in the shoe of every relationship; the way righteous indignation becomes a fortress we hide inside; and why guilt and shame, if left unexamined, become the very thing that keeps us from facing the harm we've caused. They explore the African concept of ubuntu, an ancient African philosophy meaning "humanity" or "I am because we are”, as a fundamentally different frame for forgiveness, one where healing can only be collective. And they hold a timely tension: the difference between a healthy boundary and a closed heart, and what the epidemic of family estrangement may cost us in loneliness and regret.Woven in: the remarkable story of Lyndsey Scott, Wholehearted Chorus's primary song collaborator this season, whose own profound forgiveness story led to a songwriting partnership across prison walls — and the inmates at Fort Dodge Prison currently working The Book of Forgiving together.The episode closes with the words of Lyndsey's forgiveness song — first spoken, then sung. Learn more at asongforallofus.com Wholehearted Chorus concerts are coming soon in San Diego and Monterey, CA this October! wholeheartedchorus.org  The Book of Forgiving is available from book sellers everywhere.Forgiveness and Reparation, the Healing Journey is the other book by Mpho referenced in the podcast. https://bookshop.org/p/books/forgiveness-and-reparation-the-healing-journey-mpho-tutu-van-furth/ac80b5bf984f40cc Lyndsey and Tony’s story was shared here with permission. Learn more in the 3rd and final conversation with Lyndsey coming soon here in this podcast season.Get “All the Colors” on Bandcamp, as part of her new Work Of Love EP: https://lyndseyscott.bandcamp.com/track/all-the-colorsLive well. Sing more.

Before you can answer what is mine to do — you have to get still enough to hear the question clearly.In this conversation, host Lisa Littlebird sits down with her trusted friend, teacher, and sometimes-chorus-member Alexis Davis, a Theta Healer whose work lives at the intersection of the energetic and the deeply practical. Together they explore the inner architecture of discernment: how to know which voice inside you is trustworthy, how to tell a need from a preference, and why our culture's worship of intellect, individual achievement, and constant motion makes it so hard to hear anything deeper at all.Alexis introduces the ThetaHealing framework — accessing a deep brainwave state to work with the belief systems, patterns, and "coding" that quietly run our lives — and makes a compelling case that psychic intuition isn't spooky or flaky: it's a birthright, a compass, and listening is the muscle. Lisa maps this beautifully onto the arc of Wholehearted Chorus's 2026 concert season: how the 15-song lineup is designed to move audiences from resourcing (getting regulated and rooted) to listening (getting quiet enough to hear) to acting (answering the question from a place of clarity rather than fear or reactivity).Along the way they explore: why calm must precede clarity before clarity can precede action; the difference between being a peaceful, soft presence and being a rooted one that can also hold fierce fire; the sustainability of service and how burnout often signals a refusal to get still; and why forgiveness — practiced daily, in the small moments — is the antidote to the cycles of harm we keep passing around.This one is for the sincere seekers, the service-hearted, and anyone who suspects that getting quiet might be the most radical thing they can do right now. Find Alexis at: https://www.corevisions.net/services-1 Wholehearted Chorus October 2026 concerts in San Diego and the Monterey area, CA: wholeheartedchorus.org  

What does it mean to discover what is truly ours to do?In this episode of A Song for All of Us, Lisa Littlebird sits down for part 2 of 3 conversations this season with collaborating song weaver and composer Lyndsey Scott, to explore the lived experience behind Wholehearted Chorus’s 2026 season theme: “In an overwhelming world, what is mine to do?”Lyndsey and Lisa reveal some of the hidden layers inside their curriculum this season… the resistance, vulnerability, and learning to hold the parts of ourselves that simply don’t want to do the work. Together, they acknowledge the value of being witnessed as whole human beings on a spiritual journey—not as polished or perfected versions of ourselves.They also explore the mysterious way songs come into being, including the birth of Lyndsey and Lisa'’s new song “Love Is My Name,” created with Alexis Davis through a practice of intention, silence, attunement, and listening. The conversation includes love as a way of being, the power of compassion to interrupt cycles of trauma, and song as a kind of original currency connecting us across different stories and beliefs.Lyndsey also shares the story behind “The Way Knows,” a wildly popular song in community singing circles that emerged in 2019 while she was biking across the Midwest and wrestling with questions of motherhood, purpose, trust, and surrender.This is a conversation about listening deeply—to our bodies, our lives, one another, and whatever wisdom may be moving through us. About becoming more comfortable with silence and not knowing. And about discovering that sometimes the way forward isn't something we figure out. It's something we learn to feel.Come listen, sing, and remember: you don't have to know the way. The way knows the way.A Song For All Of Us:  asongforallofus.org Wholehearted Chorus: wholeheartedchorus.orgWholehearted Chorus October Concert Tickets: wholeheartedchorus.org/ticketsLyndsey Scott: https://www.lyndseyscott.earth/Lyndsey’s New EP, including “Love is My Name”: https://lyndseyscott.bandcamp.com/ The Way Knows: https://lyndseyscott.bandcamp.com/track/the-way-knows  or the Wholehearted Chorus arrangement: https://thebirdsings.com/thewayknows/ 

What does it mean to fashion yourself into an instrument — to be played by music rather than simply playing it? In this episode, Lisa Littlebird sits down with songwriter and community songleader Brian "Yam" M. Dwyer, a devoted song man living in Bellingham, Washington, whose songs are woven into the heart of Wholehearted Chorus's 2026 concert season.Yam arrives fresh from a car accident that left him savoring every ordinary moment, and that spirit of preciousness and presence threads through the entire conversation. Lisa and Yam are becoming friends in real time — and you get to listen in as they discover just how much they share: a belief that song is a birthright, a direct route to the divine, and sometimes a lifeline.They explore the etymology of the word music (the art of remembering), the wisdom of full-body intuition versus the endless loop of the mind, and what it truly means to be a servant of love.The episode closes with Yam singing "Servant of Love" — the song opening and closing all Wholehearted Chorus concerts this season — a love song not to a person, but to love itself.Come in. Take a breath. The sails are up.🎙️ Learn more and find all episodes at asongforallofus.orgLive well. Sing more.Yam’s Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/BrianDwyersUniverseWholehearted Chorus: https:wholeheartedchorus.org