1. How to help victims of the Los Angeles wildfires. “As wildfires continue to devastate Los Angeles, leaving thousands displaced and causing widespread destruction, experts urge long-term support and careful giving.” In related news, Community groups provide relief as LA staggers from wildfire emergency, and Destruction of L.A. Fires Includes a Historic Black Community, and Fire survivors feel forgotten, and The Pain of Altadena Burning, “The Fight to Preserve Black History Amid California Wildfires” from Frederick Joseph, Displaced Black Families GoFund Me Directory (Google doc), and The California Fires are a Disaster. The American Cruelty is a Tragedy on The Beautiful Mess by John Pavlovitz, and The Wildfires In LA from Chuck Wendig on Terrible Minds, and How do you love your neighbors when your houses are on fire? on The White Pages, and Only Indigenous ways prevent wildfires from Rowen White on Re-Seeding Imaginations.

2. Poetry. From Julie Barton: Nose Dive, A Few of the Ways I’ve Failed, The Cormorant’s Dilemma, and After I Asked About The Stars and You Struggled to Answer. From Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer: Letter to the Others in the Dark. Also, poetry plus some: How Do We Bear It? from Jena Schwartz and Do Not Spare Yourself by Maria Popova on The Marginalian. Also, Three Poems to Live By. And this book from Ollie Schminkey, which is currently wrecking me: Dead Dad Jokes. Next up, I’m reading three of Rudy Francisco’s poetry books.

3. Good stuff from Seth Godin: Slow down to speed up and “That will never work.”

4. To resist the climate crisis, we must resist the billionaire class. “I choose to focus my energy on the climate crisis because a habitable planet is a prerequisite for everything worth fighting for, and because the prospect of losing a planet feels horrific and sad to me in a primal way that I can’t express with words. I’m also simply in love with the Earth. But planetary overheating is really just the most geophysical symptom of extractive colonial capitalism – ‘billionairism’ – a system designed to pump wealth from the poor to the rich, creating billionaires, the healthcare crisis, the housing crisis, genocide, hierarchies like racism and patriarchy, and a great deal of suffering.” Amen.

5. Good stuff on Be More With Less: How To Slow Down: 101 Ways To Adore Your Life This Year and 25 Ways To Simplify Your Life In 2025. 

6. The Seven Types of Rest Every Person Needs.

7. Five ways to bring more awe into your life.

8. ‘What have we here?’: how asking yourself a simple question can transform the way you think about your life. “Forget generic self-help advice and focus instead on the unique set of hang-ups, character traits and personal circumstances that stop you living your best life.”

9. 7 Ways To Have More Energy In 2025. “Doctors share the physical behaviors and emotional habits that can help you feel more ready for the day.”

10. Do you feel overwhelmed? Here’s why – and how to fix it. “Modern life is so demanding that it can lead us to feel chronically drained. How can we address the problem before everyday stress turns into burnout?”

11. 5 Organs Your Body Can Live Without.

12. Why Do We Say “Up the Wazoo”?

13. A university releases its 2025 list of banished words.

14. Meta SUCKS. A new era of lies: Mark Zuckerberg has just ushered in an extinction-level event for truth on social media (“The Meta boss’s decision to drastically change Facebook and Instagram’s factchecking programme has set the stage for a fact-free four years online”), and Meta is ushering in a ‘world without facts’, says Nobel peace prize winner (“Maria Ressa warns of ‘dangerous times’ for journalism and democracy after move to end factchecking in US”), and Meta has ‘heard the message’ from Trump, says whistleblower Frances Haugen (“Mark Zuckerberg’s move to end factchecking in US reflects president-elect’s views on social media, says Haugen”), and Meta terminates its DEI programs days before Trump inauguration (“Meta, fresh off announcement to end factchecking, follows McDonald’s and Walmart in rolling back diversity initiatives”).

15. Kindness of strangers, a new series on The Guardian. “Sometimes a random gesture or act of generosity can change the way you think about your day – or your life.”

16. From iced buns to brussels sprouts: nine nutritionists on what they really eat (it may surprise you). “Is it all green juice and overnight oats, or do health experts enjoy the occasional burger or chocolate eclair? They reveal their tips and treats.”

17. Artful opportunities: five ways to be creative every day.

18. What went right in 2024: the top 25 good news stories of the year.

19. Open Me: A Conversation with Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer on Embodiment Matters. (podcast) “In our conversation, Rosemerry reads several of her gorgeous poems, from All the Honey and The Unfolding, and we move through many rich themes including grief and gratitude, ways to be with someone who is grieving, the power of poetry, holding paradox and the stretch of the human heart, and being opened by life.”

20. What 15 Very Different People Hope to See in 2025 on The New York Times. (gift link)

21. I’ve Been Making Ina Garten’s Tuscan Soup for Over 10 Winters—It’s Still My Favorite. And for dessert, these oatmeal cookies.

22. World Central Kitchen (WCK)  Founder José Andrés Awarded Presidential Medal of Freedom. WCK is my current favorite place to donate money. 

23. “The paradox of staying online”: Talking screen time, digital detoxes and New Years resolutions with author and art therapist Amelia Knott.

24. These gorgeous photos of indigenous people dressed for powwow from Clark Dunbar.

25. And this collection of things I saved on my phone last week.

1. Poetry: the graveyard of my best intentions by Maya Stein, The Oldest App by Jena Schwartz, Thank You Letter to My Heart by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, Everything is Speaking by Julia Fehrenbacher, and Directional Prayer Change and Loosening the Ligatures and Retro from Julie Barton, and I take my daughter swimming at the YMCA from HannahRoWrites.. Also, here’s a Facebook reel of Andrea Gibson reading Mary Oliver’s poem The Journey.

2. The 25 Best Nonfiction Books of 2024. “Every year, the Next Big Idea Club editorial staff reviews hundreds of upcoming books to identify the best nonfiction titles. If you’re ready to boost your happiness, productivity, and general well-being in 2025, start by checking out the 25 groundbreaking books below.”

3. I Learned Not All Rare Things Are Valuable, and Not All Plentiful Things Are Worthless. “If you could save just one thing from a fire, what would it be? I wish I had been offered the choice.”

4. 366 grateful days – 2024 on A Grace Full Life. In related news, 100 things that made my year (2024) from Austin Kleon.

5. Issue #308 of The Red Hand Files from Nick Cave. “I wrote in Faith, Hope and Carnage, ‘Hope is optimism with a broken heart’. This means that hope has an earned understanding of the sorrowful or corrupted nature of things, yet it rises to attend to the world even still. We understand that our demoralisation becomes the most serious impediment to bettering the world. In its active form, hope is a supreme gesture of love, a radical and audacious duty, whereas despair is a stagnant rejection of life itself. Hope becomes the energy of change.”

6. The One Place You Can Find Hope Right Now on The Beautiful Mess by John Pavlovitz. “Now, it may sound like an exercise in semantics, but hope isn’t something anyone can give you; it doesn’t come from a post you read or a speech you stream or a seminar you attend. It’s not downloaded from social media or handed down like an inheritance from a wise, older relative. It isn’t a generous gift you receive from a stranger or even absorbed from someone close to you. Truthfully, there is literally nothing outside of you that can alter you internally. Ultimately, hope is an inside job. It can’t arrive or be given, it must be chosen. It is a decision we come to, sometimes because of and sometimes completely despite the objective data or experiential evidence around us.”

7. Good stuff from The Marginalian: The Promethean Power of Burnout and Elevating Resolutions for the New Year Inspired by Some of Humanity’s Greatest Minds and Some Blessings to Begin With.

8. The Best Trail Camera Photos of 2024.

9. please give yourself permission from Elissa Altman. “On Making a New Year’s Commitment to Tell Your Story.” I’m excited about her new book, Permission: The New Memoirist and the Courage to Create.

10. How to have a perfectly imperfect 2025. (podcast)

11. Jimmy Carter, the longest-lived US president, dies aged 100. (video obituary)

12. Starting a New Year: Revisiting The Four Agreements from Patti Digh.

13. Gentle January: 10 Ways to Rest More and Stress Less from Courtney Carver on Be More With Less. I’m excited for her new book, Gentle: Rest More, Stress Less, and Live the Life You Actually Want.

14. The Key To Making A Resolution Stick from Andrea Gibson. “True healing requires integration, not rejection.”

15. Writer’s Resolution 2025: Change Your Story from Chuck Wendig on Terrible Minds.

16. 101 ways to get healthier and happier – in just five minutes. “Open all your windows! Sing a song! Have a hot chocolate! Guardian writers and readers reveal simple ways to lift your mood in 300 seconds or fewer.”

17. Eight ways to stay happier this year, according to science.

18. 10 Questions to Ask Yourself at the Start of a New Year.

19. 25 Unexpected, Little Ways To Improve Your Mental Health In 2025.

20. All 10 Movies Based On Haruki Murakami Stories, Ranked Worst-Best.

21. Quit it! From vaping to doomscrolling, 10 bad habits and how to break them. “Procrastinating? Online shopping too much? Always cancelling? These top tips from experts will help you change bad behaviour for the better.”

22. 2 ton bull behaves like a tiny puppy. (Facebook reel)

23. Are you starting your yoga journey this year? A Facebook reel from one of my favorite yoga teachers, Scottee on @scotteeisfat. In related news, New Year Same You and Keep relighting my fire, babes. (Instagram reels)

24. And finally, a collection of random things I saved to my phone this week.