Islands of Coherence: Summer Letter from Oren Slozberg
July 20, 2026
Dear Friends,
In 1976, Michael Lerner was walking along Poplar Road in Bolinas when he saw a ray of light burst through the fog and light up the old RCA building on the edge of the cliffs, just like an Italian Renaissance painting. At that moment, Michael says, he got a clear message to start a center for healing ourselves and healing the Earth. Now, in 2026, we celebrate 50 years since that moment when Commonweal was born.
A half century is a long time. When Michael, Burr Heneman, and Carolyn Brown first stepped into that building, they were living through the tail-end of the hippie movement, the Cold War, and the early days of the environmental movement. I wonder what they imagined the world would be like 50 years later? Some of what they faced is still with us—nuclear weapons, healthcare deficiencies, climate change, challenges to democracy—and some were unimaginable at that time, like the risks and opportunities of AI and social media. Colliding changes in technology, culture, climate, healthcare, the economy, and more have evolved into what we are calling the polycrisis—the convergence of multiple existential challenges facing all of us living on this planet.
Through all these changes, Commonweal has remained loyal to our original vision: healing ourselves and healing the Earth. The Cancer Help Program, since its inception 40 years ago, has been at the heart of our work. We've held more than 230 week-long retreats at the Commonweal Retreat Center, creating a setting for people facing cancer to find their way, their community, and to experience deep healing. The learnings and experiences from this work deeply reverberate throughout Commonweal today.
Over the decades, our work has expanded to new fields, often at the leading edge of what seemed possible—environmental health early on, and then, later, Rachel Naomi Remen’s work bringing the soul back to medicine; Burr Heneman's ocean policy reforms; and David Steinhardt's juvenile justice work. We have continued to build on that foundation: Today we host almost 30 programs focused on healing, youth, arts, polycrisis, hospice, leadership development, land transition, nature, and more.
Islands of Coherence
I recently gave a talk about the polycrisis. I gave people a warning at the beginning: This material is hard. If you need to leave, it's okay. The various scenarios and models of our global future are quite sobering. Whatever your news source might be, the reports are often overwhelming. It would be really easy to despair.
But we've learned something from 40 years of cancer work: You can stare into your cancer and still have an amazing life. We distinguish between curing and healing. Many cancers cannot be cured, but people can have whole lives—whether they have six months or 60 years. At Commonweal we understand this as healing, as a movement toward wholeness. Wholeness is not a return to what was—it is the knowing that meaning, connection, love, and full aliveness remains possible even within illness, loss, and the irreversible. To move toward wholeness is to turn toward life as it actually is, with nothing excluded and nothing requiring resolution.
What we've learned applies directly to the planetary moment we face. We're not going to "cure" the planet. But we can start a movement toward wholeness. We can look at these times through the lens of healing—not curing—but as wholeness. That's a framework that gives me hope.
Years ago I heard about the Nobel Prize-winning chemist Ilya Prigogine who described islands of coherence, the idea that when complex systems are in chaos, small islands of coherence have the capacity to upgrade an entire system to a higher order. Prigogine’s scientific principle can be extended metaphorically to human societies—that these islands of coherence forming around the world upgrade our entire system.
Another biological phenomenon that brings me hope is refugia. It is that lone stand of trees that survives a forest fire, the island that shelters the surviving animals and plants’ seeds for the forest that will flourish again when it comes back to life. Seeds of renewal. This is another learning from the natural world.
What Is Ours to Do?
In our Bolinas summer, the spring green turns to a California brown while the fog stretches over the land. It’s a contemplative palette of grays, sages, sand, and blue. In our place on the bluff above the water, I find myself sitting with this question more than any other: What is ours to do?
What if the answer is already unfolding? What if Commonweal, and places like it, are becoming something the world urgently needs—islands of coherence and renewal, refugia committed to healing and genuine resilience, preparing for what might emerge on the other side of these turbulent times?
Refugia can take many forms: retreat centers, permaculture farms, faith communities, schools. What they share is a commitment to tending something whole in a fragmenting world. And yet no island of coherence can survive alone. The challenge before us is not to escape our global interdependence, but to work creatively within it—strengthening local refugia while weaving them into relationship with one another.
That weaving is at the heart of what Commonweal is doing. The Cancer Help Program continues its healing work. Healing Circles now reaches communities around the world. Our Resilience Program is building capacity here while supporting other communities in discovering their own strength. The Retreat Center Collaboration is actively connecting islands of coherence across the country. Through our Omega Resilience Awards, now in its fifth year, we are in living relationship with more than 60 fellows across Africa, India, and South America, whose stories of resilience are seeds for the cultural evolution our planet needs. Altogether, almost 30 programs, both old and new, form the fabric of this community.
Imagine what becomes possible when these islands find each other—weaving a net, rooted in place, balanced with nature, reaching across the world. This is not a distant vision. It is already underway. And it is, I believe, precisely what is ours to do.
Fifty Years, and the Next Fifty
As we mark this 50th anniversary, I'm grateful for this land, this community, and the work we've been able to do together. The trees are a lot taller now. The poison oak is thicker. The cliff is a little closer to the buildings. The beauty remains, and so does the calling.
Throughout 2026, we’ve been celebrating both the people and the work. On October 3, we'll gather for a community celebration here on the land—a chance to come together, reflect on the inspiration of the past, and imagine the next 50 years. On November 8, join us for an afternoon with Francis Weller and Jaune Evans, exploring grief, healing, and the Medicine for the Long Dark. Visit the Commonweal New School website (tns.commonweal.org) for our full calendar of events.
Join Us
In our 50th year, I ask you to continue to support our work. You can support the individual projects you care most about. Or you can support Commonweal itself—the ecology supporting all of our 30 programs. We need both.
One-time donations are wonderful. Monthly contributions are even more helpful. Yearly contributions, equally so. Remembering Commonweal in your estate planning is among the greatest gifts of all. We also welcome contributions of land, houses, and other objects of value. Please contact Arlene Allsman (Cancer Help Program Director) or me if you want to explore estate planning or donate real estate or objects of value.
Remembering Commonweal each month, each year, or in your estate planning is a beautiful way to celebrate your commitment to giving back. It's a way of tending Commonweal, an island of coherence where healing happens, where resilience is cultivated, where the seeds of what comes next are being planted.
Václav Havel made an important distinction between optimism and hope:
Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out. It is Hope, above all, which gives the strength to live and continually try new things.
I do have hope. I believe in humans. And I believe in this work. Thank you for joining me in continuing to support Commonweal.
With deep gratitude,
Oren Slozberg
Executive Director, Commonweal
