Writing and conversations about culture, movements, participation, impact, and how change happens.
I have spent my life seeing how culture can open up possibilities for change. Today, I write, facilitate conversations, and work with artists, organizers, and cultural leaders trying to understand how change happens, where they fit into it, and what might actually be useful to do next. Take a look at some of my work below, and reach out if you want to explore any of this together.
ABOUT ME
At 21, I co-founded the Milarepa Fund and Tibetan Freedom Concerts with Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys. Later, I co-founded Revolutions Per Minute with some folks from Pearl Jam and R.E.M., providing strategy and support to more than 1,300 musicians seeking to make a difference on the causes they cared about, including ways to engage their fans in that work.
Since then, my work has expanded well beyond music. I have worked with internationally known artists as well as emerging and independent creators across film, television, literature, visual art, food, comedy, and other forms of cultural expression, alongside organizers, organizations, and funders. I have also helped shape the practice and language of cultural strategy, narrative change, and impact storytelling through writing, research, and field-building work. Those ideas have been used by practitioners, funders, and educators, but I am most excited when they help artists, activists, and audiences create change in the world.
In 2026, I created Freedom Needs a Soundtrack, a six-part documentary podcast about the music, friendships, organizing, Tibetan resistance, and improbable series of events behind the Tibetan Freedom Concerts. Revisiting the Tibetan Freedom Concerts thirty years later raised some questions I have been carrying for a long time: How does collective action begin? How do culture and movements shape one another? How do we know what impact we have had? How do we understand what this moment calls for? And what can we learn from something that worked thirty years ago without simply trying to do it again?
My Work
Writing: I write about culture, movements, storytelling, participation, impact, and the strange ways change actually happens. I am less interested in having the last word than in putting useful ideas into circulation and starting conversations.
Conversations: I join university classes, conferences, retreats, and other gatherings to explore collective action, culture, artists and activism, impact, and how people find a place in making change. I am happiest when these are real conversations rather than one-way talks, since the most useful thinking rarely comes from only one person in the room. See here for more on university conversations.
Facilitation: I design and facilitate retreats, workshops, and meetings to help people think better together. I bring enough structure to keep things moving but leave room for the conversation to go somewhere useful or unexpected. Often, that is where new ideas, stronger relationships, or collaborations begin.
Strategic reflection: Sometimes people just need another strategic thinker in the room who is not as close to the problem as they are. I work one-to-one with people doing cultural, narrative, and creative work to help them sort through ideas and strategies, see what they may be missing, and decide what is worth doing and, maybe more importantly, what isn’t.
Freedom Needs a Soundtrack
A six-part documentary podcast tracing my journey through the music, activism, friendships, organizing, and Tibetan resistance behind the Tibetan Freedom Concerts.
Selected Writing
Essays and reflections on music, movements, culture, power, impact, and change.
Spotlight on Impact Storytelling
A report mapping the narrative and cultural strategy field and what it needs to grow stronger.
A Conversation About Cultural Strategy
An essay defining cultural strategy and clarifying how story, narrative, and culture work together.
Gen X Questioned Power. Now We Hold It. What We Do With It Matters.
On what it means for Generation X to move from questioning power to holding it, and how the values that shaped us might guide how we use influence now.
The Power of Music: Why Freedom Needs a Soundtrack
Why music matters in struggles for freedom, and how culture can help people move from awareness to solidarity and action.
Adam Yauch, Activism & Fake Mustaches
A reflection on friendship, loss and what Adam Yauch taught me about working hard, taking risks, and making change without losing humor or joy.
The Storytellers’ Guide to Changing the World
A practical guide for storytellers, organizers, and cultural strategists working to create more compelling stories about the future and the world they want to build.