An Antidote to Despair:
The Impossible Will Take a Little While
Paul Loeb / Paul Loeb’s Work

(September 22, 2026) — How do we maintain hope when each day can bring new reasons for outrage or despair. In The Impossible Will Take a Little While bestselling organizer and social change analyst Paul Loeb offers a powerful antidote—stories of courage and inspiration about how people changed history despite daunting odds.

How did ordinary South Koreans stop a 2024 coup? How did Norwegian teachers’ defiance of Nazis in World War II help inspire the Minnesota ICE resistance? From the fight against South African apartheid to world-changing climate activism, these firsthand accounts show how people changed history not by knowing they’d win, but by refusing to quit.

The Impossible’s wholly updated new edition features Nelson Mandela, Bill McKibben, Heather Cox Richardson, Jesmyn Ward, Alexei Navalny, Mary Pipher, Howard Zinn, Desmond Tutu, and Alice Walker, plus Loeb’s own powerful reflections drawn from years of engagement. Together with Loeb’s classic Soul of a Citizen, The Impossible has 300,000 copies in print. The new edition gives us hope to keep fighting to save democracy and create a more just world.

• “An anthology of some of the most powerful voices of our time.”—Boston Globe
  • “A magnificent anthology celebrates hope, guts, and the power of taking action.” — O, The Oprah Magazine
  • “Stop worrying, stop feeling sorry for humanity, and read The Impossible Will Take a Little While.” — Chicago Tribune
• “A much needed salvo against despair.” — Psychology Today
• “Hopeful, inspiring and motivating… May well be required reading for us all.” — Sierra Club Magazine
• “Might possibly be the most important collection of stories and essays
  you will ever read.” — American Booksellers Association & History Channel
• “The most powerful book in my 45-year career teaching about social change”— Dan Garvey, president emeritus, Prescott College
• “When my daughter asked from college how to be an effective grassroots citizen, I gave her Paul’s books.”— Josette Sheeran, former Executive Director, United Nations World Food Program

Please pass this flier to friends, colleagues, and anyone whose spirits could use renewal.

• Order the book and learn more at theimpossible.org, including wonderful classroom responses and Loeb’s tour schedule. You can see an excerpt from The Nation here.
• Pass the word through social media or organizational newsletters with this outreach toolkit.
• Ask local libraries or bookstores to order, and colleges and conferences to bring Loeb in to speak.
• Pass the word through social media or organizational newsletters with this outreach toolkit.
• Sign up for Loeb’s Substack articles.