Each week we share the essays, films and conversations that have shaped our thinking and stayed with us. Here, we’ve gathered our favourites from across the year.
 
This is The Best of The Edit: a thoughtful selection of ideas on connection, creativity, leadership and meaning, drawn from The Beautiful Truth and voices we admire beyond it. We hope it offers good company over Christmas, and something to carry into the year ahead. 

To read

The art of making meaningful connections  
Adam Penny and Elizabeth Smith | January 2025 | The Beautiful Truth  
Are genuine connections becoming fleeting in our hyper-connected world? The Beautiful Truth’s Co-founders explore.  

Don’t make small talk. Think big talk 
Arthur C. Brooks | February 2025 |  The Atlantic  
Discover the rewards of discussing deeper things. 

Masters of love 
Emily Esfahani Smith | February 2025 | The Beautiful Truth  
Science says lasting relationships come down to two things: kindness and generosity. 

The role of art in difficult times 
Margaret Heffernan | April 2025 | Financial Times  
Where propaganda simplifies, artists invite us into the liminal space between what is and what ought to be. 

The best advice I’ve ever heard for how to be happy  
Jancee Dunn | April 2025 | The New York Times  
Some involve finding small opportunities for delight; some are about interacting with people; some are little exercises in gratitude. These are the tips that have stuck. 

A masterclass in creativity and imagination 
Michael Kiwanuka and Hannah Finch | June 2025 | The Beautiful Truth  
TBT’s Editor in Chief Hannah Finch talks to Mercury-prize-winning musician Michael Kiwanuka. 

Ancient myths and legends 
Sam Bowen and Rupert Read | July 2025 | The Beautiful Truth  
Our need to be inspired by storytelling in our modern permacrisis. 

How the busiest people find joy 
Leslie A. Perlow, Sari Mentser and Salvatore J. Affinito | July 2025 | Harvard Business Review  
While achievement and meaning often flow naturally from work and family, joyful experiences tend to be rare and fleeting.  

Finding beauty in a bowl of soup 
Major Jackson and Hélène Blanc | August 2025 | The New York Times 
A visual essay by an artist and poet discovering joy in the unexpected moments over a bowl of soup – deepening awareness of each other and of traditions. 

The lost art of admitting what you don’t know 
Sarah O’Connor | August 2025 | Financial Times  
Even LLMs are starting to show this worrying human tendency. 

Between stars and sand 
Katie Paterson and Hannah Finch | September 2025 | The Beautiful Truth 
Widely regarded as one of the leading artists of her generation, these are Katie Paterson’s visions of infinite landscapes. 

The hunt for the world’s oldest story 
Manvir Singh | October 2025 | New Yorker  
From thunder gods to serpent slayers, scholars are reconstructing myths that vanished millennia ago. How much further can we go – and what might we find?  

When I’m sick of doomscrolling, I turn to this poem 
A.O. Scott | November 2025 | The New York Times 
 “Monet’s ‘Waterlilies,’” by Robert Hayden, reflects on what art can (and can’t) do in tumultuous times. 

The lost art of leading 
Edward Brooks and Michael Lamb | November 2025 | The Beautiful Truth  
Professors Edward Brooks and Michael Lamb explore what the humanities can teach leaders, that an MBA can’t. 

To watch

Blessings by David Whyte  
Andrew Hinton, Owen Ó Súilleabháin and David Whyte | January 2025 | The Beautiful Truth 
David Whyte’s “Blessing” poems are interpreted through a visual journey across the Irish landscape in this short film by Emmy-winning filmmaker Andrew Hinton and musician and composer Owen Ó Súilleabháin.

The Deal for Connection 
Will Storr | March 2025 | The Beautiful Truth  
Author Will Storr uncovers how we can harness the power of our storytelling brains. 

Thoughts on the common toad 
G Anthony Svatek | April 2025 | Aeon 
Why Orwell urged his readers to celebrate the spring, cynics be damned.

How to care deeply 
Meghan Sullivan | June 2025 | Big Think  
Effective altruism may overlook the moral importance of seeing others as individuals. A philosopher explains how love should guide how we care for both present and future humans.

You need to be bored. Here’s why 
Arthur C. Brooks | August 2025 | Harvard Business Review  
Are you afraid of boredom? Make room for being bored, Arthur C. Brooks argues, and you create the mental space to wrestle with life’s deeper questions of meaning and purpose.  

Recall Me Maybe  
David Baddiel | September 2025 | Financial Times Drama   
Stephen Fry and Gemma Whelan star in a new FT drama. Fry plays a grandfather with dementia who uses AI to fill in gaps in his memory; but which memories are really true? How is AI defining who we are? 

Five studies on light 
Boris Acket, Studio Airport | November 2025 | Emergence  
These immersive, interactive studies on light explore the very nature of light itself, through film, 360 degrees and prose. They are invitations to meet each of light’s faces; to move with it as it evolves.

To listen

The science of better workplace conversations 
Alison Wood Brooks and Isabel Berwick | January 2025 | Financial Times  
Changing someone’s view rarely happens all at once. 

Justin Vernon – Being Bon Iver 
Krista Tippett and Justin Vernon | April 2025 | On Being  
A sweet and searching conversation between Krista Tippett and the man behind Bon Iver, full of wisdom and revelation. He experiences deeply, metabolises creatively and keeps growing. 

What is hopeful pessimism?  
Sean Illing and Mara van der Lugt | July 2025 | Vox’s The Gray Area  
Philosophy professor, Mara van der Lugt, challenges the virtue of optimism, the downfalls of blind hope and tells us pessimism, not to be confused with fatalism, might prepare us best for this world. 

This is what it sounds like to be alive 
Sam Gilberg | August 2025 | Big Think  
Neuroscientists put together this playlist for you to experience frisson, the feeling when a song pierces your body and soul, on repeat.
 
Brené Brown doesn’t want to be your self-help guru anymore 
Lulu Garcia-Navarro and Brené Brown | September 2025 | NY Times 
The author and podcaster wants to apply her old ideas about vulnerability and empathy to the workplace.