Our second anniversary is a celebration of our collective accomplishments and an invitation to the future. Whether you've been with us since day one or are just discovering Bahala, there’s a place for you here.

Feeling disenchanted with the U.S., financial markets, and capitalism, she wanted to live in nature. “I realized the world was my oyster,” she says.

Through metamorphosis coaching, cacao ceremonies, sound medicine, and art medicine, Quinne creates spaces where people can reconnect with that wisdom. “These are simply tools," she says. “They're toys, really. Beautiful invitations to meet yourself again.”

Sparked this past January in Minneapolis after federal agents killed Renée Good, people spontaneously began singing in the streets and in churches to funnel their heartbreak, fear, and feelings of helplessness into community solidarity and as a key part of the network formed to protect each other. 

“Book clubs are like any communal group, including democracy,” Carlo quips. “How to create the right amount of choice, how decisions are made, how to create equity and a semblance of order, book clubs are fascinating microcosms of all that. They’re good practice for being citizens and community members.” 

At its core, Civic Bites is designed as an evening counterpart to traditional book clubs or community talks. The idea is to spark a fun atmosphere where we can be together and learn together. Not a stuffy lecture hall with a bombastic professor, nor the heady chaos of a partisan rally. 

Communitas in Pictures, featuring community leader and Bahalan, Maria Rodriguez.

The Ladies’ Literary Club of Ypsilanti, Michigan, still running 148 years later with over 100 members, owns a beautiful building where they hold twice-monthly meetings.

People want to do right by the workers who support their families, but they don’t always know how.

Santa Monica celebrated the Main Street Community Garden’s 50th anniversary by honoring the community garden that began in 1976 after residents advocated for dedicated urban gardening space. The event highlighted five decades of local stewardship with a morning of garden tours, music, and hands-on activities. Civic infrastructure rooted in shared green space!

The Early Childhood Task Force joined with SMPL and community partners to transform Virginia park into a farm!

LA Yarn Crawl

Festival of Books at USC

The act of making the cards is just as meaningful as receiving them. Rooted in principles similar to art therapy, the process invites participants to slow down, breathe, and create with intention.

See a sample of the beautiful plants, flowers, and trees we saw on the Native Garden Plant Tour organized by the Theodore Payne Foundation.

In Santa Monica, support for young children doesn’t begin and end with preschool enrollment. It’s part of a large community-wide effort that stretches from the earliest years of life into adulthood—a philosophy that recognizes when children thrive, the whole community benefits.

At the center of this work is the Santa Monica Early Childhood Task Force (ECTF), a coalition that brings together childcare providers, educators, parents, advocates, and civic leaders to strengthen the city’s early childhood landscape.

Residents consistently described the Library as a valued public institution that supports learning, connection, and belonging.

What happens when math becomes a measuring stick for intelligence rather than a tool for understanding the world?

We are all born with an intuitive sense of patterns, quantities, and relationships. The best version of math education builds on that inheritance, doesn’t suppress it.

Through every stage of her career—from stand-up to novels—the throughline has been humor.