Our 2026 Word of the Year: Gather

Octopuses were long thought to be solitary creatures.

Then scientists found them building cities together. Nonprofits are often the same way: resilient, scrappy, self-sufficient. But this year, we’re naming something different.

GATHER

Off the coast of Australia, researchers discovered Octlantis, communities of octopuses living together, building dens from discarded shells, forming social hierarchies, communicating, and even evicting members who weren’t pulling their weight. In California, nearly 6,000 pearl octopuses gathered around thermal vents, protecting one another’s eggs in what scientists now call an “octopus garden.”

Why would animals known for going it alone choose proximity, conflict, and shared resources?

Because the conditions demanded it.

Food was available. Safety was not. Shelter was scarce. Predators were everywhere. So they adapted by becoming smarter together. One octopus’s discarded shell became another’s shelter. Over time, those shells stabilized the environment itself. Without cooperation, the habitat wouldn’t hold.

Sound familiar?

Nonprofits often operate alone, too. We compete for the same grants, the same donors, the same talent. We protect our turf. And gathering takes time, energy, trust, and space.

But the conditions right now demand it. Funding is shifting. Leadership is turning over. The policy landscape is uncertain. Pressures on the nonprofit sector are real and growing. Going it alone is risk, not resilience.

So what if we strengthened the foundation together?

Not performative collaboration, but real partnership and resource sharing, building on one another’s work and showing up for the greater good, even when it’s inconvenient.

That’s why GATHER is our word for 2026.

Gather your people.
Gather your resources.
Gather at the table.