This episode marks three years of Zen is Stupid, and that seems like as good a place as any to have our curtain call.  Everything must end!

We’ll keep the episodes up here as a bumbling testimony to the power of friendship and zen.

(And if you want to give us a little bump in funding for our project to inscribe every episode on brass plates and shoot it into space for aliens to find in the distant future, hit that donate button!)

Thanks for the good times.  Leave a parting comment below!
Links mentioned:

• Our favorite episodes from way back:

The first episode.

Anger

Koans

Zazen

Vegetarians

Music

Kids

Power

Corporate Evil

•  We’re NOT crying! 

• Our new podcast will be at The Mindfulist.  Search it out on Itunes or get it directly from the site.  Carry on!

Thinking about the end of the world will teach you a lot about yourself.

Links mentioned:

• Svalbard Seed bank.

• Idiocracy, one of our favorites.

• 2012

• The Road

(By the way, don’t mixup two movies, it’s very confusing for the person you’re talking to)

• Gwen writes more about death and dying here.

This podcast is about having affairs.  And having an affair is about craving.  We hash it out.  Plus, Patrick gets preachy!

Links mentioned:

• “Life is short, have an affair!” Commercial.  For those of you playing along at home

• An interview with the founder of the infidelty match-up site.

• The Vanity Fair article about the type of men who cheat.

Patrick’s had evolution on the brain ever since he started writing his new book about the modern humans odd position of sitting in front of screens all day.  One thing leads to another and soon enough Gwen’s teaching him how to pitch it better.  Zany!

Links mentioned:

• Ooh look bugs ate my monstera plant.  Oh wait NO THEY DIDN’T!!!

• The Knowledge Workers Survivor Guide.  On sale now.  Pick up a copy for you or anyone else who’s feeling the onset of hacker back.  Heal your body, and support Patrick.

• If you want to put the Knowledge Workers Survival Guide radio “ad” in front of your project, you can download it here.

Books mentioned:

• The Greatest Show on Earth by Richard Dawkins.  Read it if you want to get a better idea of how you got here.

We all dream of a life of leisure.  But what happens when you actually get it?

Links mentioned:

• Gwen’s post on Costa Rican life.

It’s a new year, and we think about all the ways people try to improve themselves with the latest gadgetry.  Plus, optometrist shop lady storytime!

Links mentioned:

• Find out why Chinese restaurant buddhas are all fat.

A meandering stroll through what it means to give something a name and the possibilities of changing that name.

 Links mentioned:

• A list of celebrities’ real names.

• Find out the history of your name.

• What the Buck!

• Tibetan Names.  The tag line for this site is “Tibetan names for your dog, horse, cat, pet or child!”

• Some designers react to the new Aol logo.

The end of the year brings about a torrent of “best of lists.”   We think about the yearly ritual of choosing what was best and worst in a given orbit of the sun.

Links mentioned:

• Gwen’s Best 09 Challenge.  Here’s the help page.  Start today!  If it’s not December when you’re reading this, start next time it rolls around!

• The Psychology Today article that asks are you living in the past, present, or future?

• The Atlantic article on Happiness.

• The reality of I Gotta Feeling

Getting down in the gritty details of some of the novel issues brought up by new media.  Your grandparents can’t give you any advice on this stuff, these problems have only been around for a couple of years!

Links mentioned:

• Yo yo check out Patrick Reynolds’s star turn as the freakin Mandroid in 1986’s classic, The Eliminators.

• What those profile pics might mean.

Gwen is such a terrible cook that Patrick won’t even let her step foot in his kitchen. We try to get to the bottom of this phenomenon and question what makes a person believe they are inherently good or bad at anything.

Links mentioned:

• Rick Astley Rick Rolls the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade.

• Julia Child on David Letterman from way back.  This is actually really really funny.

• Gwen Bell on the Happiness Project.

• The Happiness Project’s Post, 5 tips for kicking a bad habit.  And the little quiz on Are you a moderator or an abstainer?

• Oprah on her yo-yo-ing weight.

• A cool little site where you can explore how math underlies our perception of beauty.

•  Think you can’t cook?  Start with the easiest recipe in the world, the basic Stir Fry!

Are all these sites and lists about making your life simpler actually making anyone’s lives simpler?

Links mentioned:

• How your digestive system works.  This will take some time to read.

• The episode of South Park which destroys Family Guy

• Dave Bruno’s 100 Things Challenge

• 365 days of the same dress

• Merlin Mann brings the smackdown on the uselessness of productivity tips.

• The photography project Material World, that puts all of a family’s possessions outside their house. (Thanks to Jedi Jawa for remembering the source here)

(Music from Rob Macleod)

Living abroad can do strange things to a person, here’s what to look out for and how it applies even to people who never leave their hometown.  And some wicked travel/expat hacks.

Links mentioned:

• Learn Japanese on your DS!  (Note that this will not actually help you speak Japanese.  But it’ll make you feel better about yourself)

• Stuff White People Life : Travel

Books mentioned:

• Learning to Bow.  Not recommended!

Commercial flight has only been around for 80 years, and we’re still figuring out how to handle life thousands of feet off the ground.  Some stories and tips from the friendly skies.

Buddhism goes on and on about not clinging, but our culture goes on and on about achieving your pre-set goals.  Discuss.

Links mentioned:

• The post that got us talking about this, a piece by John Scalzi about a New York Times article by Tim Krieder.

• Forbes 100 most powerful women for 2009.

• Maureen Dowd’s piece about women’s plummeting happiness.

• By the way, that Harvard study where successful people who wrote down their goals is an urban myth.

• Elizabeth Gilbert’s TED talk.

• Take a minute and read all about Marie Curie!

Books mentioned:

• Malcom Gladwell answers some questions about his book, Outliers.

Gwen gets some bad news from the dentist and it sparks a conversation about staying healthy, in a big picture kind of way.

Links mentioned:

• Galactic cosmic rays!

• The 50,000 foot view, according to David Allen.

• Mountains and Rivers Order of Zen

Books mentioned:

• Minding the Body, Mending the Mind

• Full Catastrophe Living

What’s the Zen way out of a vicious rumor?  Plus, Patrick’s rash, sleeping with students, buddhism and the internet, and more plugs than a hair replacement clinic.

Links mentioned:

• Brad and his monkey.

• The Buddhist Precepts.  Everyone has slightly different versions but these are a good representation.

• The XX Factor video on “the truth behind yoga“  Note that we don’t know any yoga teachers that are actually like this.

• Yoga Action Squad.  Why not start with episode 1?

• Pee Wee Herman is back!

• The best 30 seconds of Brad Warner’s life.

• The trailer for We Live in Public.

• Dooce’s Monetizing the Hate.

Books mentioned:

• Hey, I heard that Brad Warner guy writes books.

When you screw up bad and are deeply embarrassed, how do you move on and not dwell on, while learning something from it all?  And maybe not be such an idiot next time?

Links mentioned:

• SNL does Jeopardy!  Sorry only US residents get to watch Hulu.  Nyah nyah.

• POTUS weighs in on Kanye.

• Don’t be like Gwen and watch Patrick’s video on how to safely fall through headstand.

Books mentioned:

• Tricycle Magazine’s Commit to Sit

There are people spending hours and hours a day trying to figure out how to make you crave and buy stuff to fill the void inside yourself.  How does a thoughtful person deal with that?

Links mentioned:

• The climax of The Endless Summer.  Watch when you need to chill.

• Mad Men.  We likey!  The opening credits alone will sell you on it.

• Some pictures of famous ladies without their make-up.

• Airbrushing is getting out of hand yo!  Click on Portfolio to see some examples of how even the most beautiful people aren’t good enough for modern media.

• Some fine looking beards and moustaches.

Want to know how hardcore we are?  A generic pop-song sends us into deep introspection of the futility of existence.  Then Gwen tries to pull the old fuddy-duddy card on Patrick but ends up playing it on herself.  Mozoltov!

Links mentioned :

• The song and video in question.

We know we should do the right thing, but the tough part is figuring out what the right thing to do is. Add to the mix that as you grow up “the right thing” takes on different shades of meaning, and you’ve got yourself a lot of sticky questions.

Links mentioned:

• You can watch the movie Valkyrie on YouTube, at least for now.

• A pretty scary video of the Bystander Effect in action.

(Cool music from Kevin Macleod)

At a recent conference, Gwen witnesses people cheat, beg, and steal swag.  What is it about free stuff that makes us lose our perspective?

Gwen is up all night waiting to be murdered, despite knowing this is a crazy thing to worry about.  The question arises, why are our minds and imaginations so damn unruly?

Links mentioned:

• Parappa the Rappa training stage.

Books mentioned:

• Peter Ralston : Zen Body Being.  This link goes to a sample text on Google Books.

• Moby Dick on Google Books.

• The Good Earth, it’s 4$ people, you should read it!

-the managment

**Update** everything’s working again after some email exchanges with the podcast gods.  Download to your heart’s content.

**Update Update** For me at least, it stalls the first time I download and then picks up the second click.  Who the hell knows?

**Update Update Update** Seems to be really fixed now.  If anyone has anymore problems let us know.

A few people have asked us to talk about what to do when your partner doesn’t practice.  Here’s our amateurish and mottled take on it. Continue the discussion below.  How have you dealt with this situation?

Links mentioned:

• The all girl AC/DC cover band Hells Belles.

Authors mentioned:

• Charlotte Joko Beck

• Pema Chodron

• Sharon Salzberg

How to balance eating well, fitness, career, and the people who want to drag you down as you try to have it all.

Links mentioned:

• **Here’s the magical secret link!  Look at me!**

• Our other podcasts on eating well.  This one, this one, and who could forget this one.

• Food Inc. could have come out anytime…

• Patrick’s favorite Kim Chi recipe.

• To hear Patrick’s rebuttal to “clean your plate,” read his PCP Blog about it.

Patrick borrows Gwen’s social skills to deal with some chromosone challenged wallflowers.  A good time is had by all.

Links mentioned:

• An article about how being able to read faces is key for social interaction.

• The Diving Bell and the Butterfly trailer.  Skip the movie read the book!

Books mentioned:

• If you don’t want to read the whole book, here is a low-fi summary of Dale Carnegies principles from How to Win Friends and Influence People.

• The ubiquitous Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui.

Hey did you hear about that terrible thing happening in that far-away place that you know nothing about and can have no impact on!?  You gotta get INVOLVED man!

Links mentioned: 

• Jim Davis, creator of Garfield, has no kokoro.

• But we like this song Cucurrucucu a lot.

• Gwen’s scathing post on the concept of Earth Hour.

• An article on how the internet is reducing our empathy.

Books mentioned:

• Anything by Pema Chodron.

(music used with permission by Peter John Ross)

To make up for the long absence due to Gwen’s technical difficulties, we went storytime bananas this episode.  Still working out the audio so the Elton John in Patrick is NOT satisfied with this quality.  But hey, it’s not like you paid for it… yet.  Also Patrick never gets around to divulging the secret of Zen in this episode.  Maybe over a beer sometime?

 Links mentioned:

• The Knoll Bertoia chairs Gwen almost scored for $40.

• The worst Price Is Right contestant ever. 

Books mentioned:

• Herb Cohen’s  You Can Negotiate Anything.

Patrick tries to get that happy-go-lucky feeling back that he never really had in the first place.  Plus,  funbrows, factoids, flow, and fabulous dancing.

Links mentioned:

•  Gwen’s adventure in ThemePark Land World.

• The original classic, Jizz In My Pants

• The inferior knock-off that tries to sell you crap, Puke In My Mouth.

Books mentioned:

• An excerpt of one of our favorite books, Japanese Death Poems.

Making friends with death so that you’ll be better at life.

Links mentioned:

•  The Guardian’s moving photo series of people before and just after they’ve died.

Who are all these people trolling the internet searching for things to label as “fail?” Why are we so afraid of screwing up? Plus, cool beans.

Links mentioned:

• The NY Times article, Earplugs to Lasers article on concentration.

• A post from Merlin Mann about embracing “Courageous Sucking“.

• Gwen’s post on burning grilled cheese and other failures.

• Patrick’s post on his not “9 to 5″ lifestyle.

Books mentioned:

• Benjamin Franklin’s The Art of Virtue.

Links mentioned:

• Autotune!

• In our detailed research for this podcast, we came across this excellent resource for more information on rad dudes, http://www.rad-dudes.com.  That’s where we pulled the above picture from.

(Music from  Mr. Macleod at Incompetech)

How did Gwen naturally come out with a healthy relationship with food?  Why does Patrick inhale brownies like there’s no tomorrow?

Links mentioned:

• You heard that right, Gwen went and signed herself up for Patrick’s Peak Condition Project!  Follow her progress here.

• Get up close and personal with freaky Abraham Lincoln with this giant sized photo!

Books mentioned:

• The Skinny Bitch book universe.

If you spend hours a day in front of a screen, a swift punch to the gut might be more grounding than an hour of meditation. Move people!

Links mentioned:

• George Packer’s blog about the NYC roofer and yuppie buffers.

• Parody video of Microsoft’s “PCs for Poor People” campaign.

• The future of Nanoblogging, Flutter.

Books mentioned:

• The World is Flat, by The Lexus and the Olive Tree author Thomas Friedman.

• Here Comes Everybody, by the brilliant Clay Shirky.

(Music from Black Box.  Old Skool baby)

Behold the decaf Patrick!  A meandering conversation that touches on transferring your practice to real life, skillful teaching, and dealing with people who want your attention.  Plus Gwen reveals her new company’s name and asks for feedback, so people, feed us back yo!

Links mentioned:

• The new Sacha Baron Cohen movie trailer, Bruno!

• William Blake’s acid and metal etching of The Sick Rose.

Books mentioned:

• Nicholas Nassim Taleb’s perspective changing book,  The Black Swan.

Do we really manifest our thoughts, or is that a vanity of Westerners at the top of the economic food chain?  Plus, Patrick reveals his next big idea.

Links mentioned:

• Wikipedia has a nice critique of The Law of Attraction.

• The NYT piece about how we are all reading “The Daily Me.”

Books mentioned:

• The World Without Us by Alan Weisman.

• Eric Weiner’s website, author of The Geography of Bliss.

• Refuse to Choose by Barbara Sher.

We get back to basics in this episode.  Enjoy and thanks for listening.

-Patrick

If you’re trying to live well and be mindful, why must you wear loose flowing linens?  Why can’t you look cool like us?  Storytime break halfway through.

This is a very special storytime that we caught on tape but weren’t sure what to do with.  Our ode to the wintry north.  Plus some other stuff.  Thanks to everyone who made this possible.

We sit around the fireside and swap stories about how we got into Zen and how it got into us.  Plus some tips for beginners based on our vast armory of past mistakes.

Links mentioned:

• Patrick’s Video Guide for Zazen Beginners.

 Books mentioned:

•  Dinty W. Moore’s The Accidental Buddhist.

One of the ZIS duo is tying the knot, and it’s not the girly one.  Congratulations Gwen!  But how do you stay cool when everyone around you is cheezing out?

Links mentioned:

• Gwen and Joel dot com.

Books mentioned:

• Ariel Stallings’ The Offbeat Bride.
• 7 Principles for Making Marriage Work by John Gottman.

Links mentioned:

• The Slate article that broke Patrick’s back.

• Grethin Rubin’s Happiness Project.  Like Zen is Stupid but without the Zen and the… uh… Stupid.

• Zen is Stupid’s Facebook page.

Every week hundreds of these things come out, promising to bring health and happiness to the masses.  They’re so much a part of our modern wallpaper that we don’t think about them much, but they do have an impact on our psyches.  Discuss!

Links mentioned:

• Kroger supermarkets, old skool baby!

• Tricyle Magazine

• Shambala Sun

• What is Enlightenment?

• Yoga Journal

• Body + Soul Magazine

Patrick is appalled at Gwen’s living conditions and tries to do something about it.

Links mentioned:

• One of our favorites, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

• Gwen got herself organized using the Itso interlocking system.

Books mentioned:

• Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui, by Karen Kingston.  Lots of new age mumbo jumbo but some pearls of organizational wisdom scattered throughout.

Working with stress constructively and without a bunch of new agey nonsense.

Links mentioned:

•  Tetris for the next generation: Lumines!

• A cool little tutorial on how to draw anime eyes.

• A very thourough site on stress management.

25 minutes chock-full of tips, tricks, and life-hacks to get your New Year started right.  Plus, one of our favorite sports, life-coach bashing!

Links mentioned:

• Want to quit smoking? Pull out your DS and pop in My Stop Smoking Coach with Allen Carr

• A much finer podcast, WNYC’s Radiolab

• Zen Habits

• 43 Things

• Omnifocus for Mac.

Books mentioned:

• David Allen, author of Getting Things Done and 52 Productivity Principles for Work and Life.

• The Art of Power by Thich Nhat Hanh.

A yoga class prompts some introspection about how to keep your beginner’s mind when  you’re the mack-daddy.  Plus, cross-stitching monkeys!

More funny action figure yoga can be found at Yogabeans.

Links mentioned:

• The next generation of wholistic healthcare happening now at Duke University.

• A no-frills web-bio of Dr. Dean Ornish.  He’s an interesting guy!

 Books mentioned:

• An excerpt from Shunryu Suzuki’s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind.

Our random thoughts on the mixed up feelings this time of year brings on.

Links mentioned:

• If you want more of Gwen’s advice for dealing with the holiday season, check out her article on Real Simple.

A trip to the gamestore prompts a conversation about the individual’s responsibility within a corporate structure.  Plus, Christmas storytime!

Links mentioned:

• The Flight of the Conchords video in which the eternal question is asked, “Are hermaphrodites into themselves?”

And if anyone wants to game with Patrick his gamertag is “deadwoodsweep”.  Send a message!

Is it possible to truly give something without expecting anything in return?  And do all relationships have a self-interested angle to them?  We have no idea.

Links mentioned:

• The article about Sugardaddies.

• Want your own Sugar Daddy?  Here’s the site that will hook you up.

A burger chain we don’t even want to name lest they get better search results launches an ad campaign that seems to sum up everything that’s wrong with the world in one fell, well produced sweep.  We consider giving up.

Links mentioned:

• The abominable ad campaign in question.

• Worldmapper.org, where the maps are distorted to reflect the true state of the world.

• The NY Times article about the mom who had to sacrifice her designer jeans in these dark economic times.

• The website that let’s you “order” crabs to get revenge on your ex.

• Michael Pollan’s piece about the nonsensical farming practices that result in a hamburger being cheaper than a head of broccoli.

• The YouTube video depicting how the Earth will end.

Books mentioned:

• The Art of Power by Thich Nhat Hanh.

(Music from Kevin Macleod)

One of our biggest problems is getting in over our heads with projects because we can’t seem to say no when people ask us to do stuff.  Are we being good helpful buddhists or weak willed losers?

Links mentioned:

• This page will help you not sound like a moron when you try to say Sigur Ros.

• The CreativeBits blog post on not giving away your work.

• Our man Tim Ferriss’s blog.

Books mentioned:

• What Would (The) Buddha Do? by Franz Metcalf.  The (The) provided by Patrick.

• A book review of The Book of No: 250 Ways to Say It - and Mean It and Stop People-Pleasing Forever.

The spaces we inhabit and how they change our human experience.  Zen is Stupid now comes with twice the random tangents, all at the same low low price.

Links mentioned:

• Shiba Inu Puppy Cam : Beware, the cuteness might make your heart might explode in your chest cavity.

• Cuddle up with an Ugly Doll.

• Paro, the robotic seal who comforts the elderly.

• A nasty-ass deodorant rock.

• Here’s the exact quote from Thich Nhat Hanh about how hitting pillows isn’t a good anger resolution strategy:

When you close the door and hit a pillow, you think you are getting in touch with your anger. But you are only transforming the energy of your anger into the energy of pounding and hitting. You feel better because you have spent much energy hitting the pillow. But the seeds and roots of your anger are still there. I don’t think you are in touch with your anger as you hit the pillow. You are dominated by your anger and are practicing it. You are planting more seeds of anger within.

• If you’re interested in financially helping us set up our Mindful Restaurant, send us an email to zenisstupid (at) gmail.com

Books mentioned:

• The Nice Factor : The Art of Saying No.

• Here you can read the first chapter of Nice Girls Don’t Get Rich, 75 Avoidable Mistakes Women Make with Money

(Storytime music from Kevin Macleod)

A sprawling talk on the various ways technology is changing how we live and interact, and how to handle all this change with a dash of zen wisdom.  Or not.  Plus, storytime!

Links mentioned:

• School of Rock, we like!

• Kung Fu Panda, we like!

Books mentioned:

• Check it out, you can read the first chapter of Bit Literacy, by  Mark Hurst.

• Loving What Is, by Byron Katie, who’s expansive website can be found here.

• And her husband Stephen Mitchell, whose translation of the Tao Te Ching is the bees knees.

Patrick fretitates on his inability to attain elected office, while Gwen is the cool-headed one for once.  Our mics were on the fritz so the audio is back to the bad old days.  Working on it.

 Links mentioned :

• Gwen’s ranking among the top 50 most influential women in social media.

• And Gwen as one of the top 50 people to follow on Twitter.

• One of our favorite beverages, Brawndo.  Win at Politics!!!

• A 50 minute video about Thich Nhat Hanh’s struggle to exert influence while remaining true to his Buddhist vows.  Great stuff.

The first half of this podcast is a talk about gender issues, the second about dealing with the disappointments of life.  They connect in there somewhere, but we can’t tell you how.

Links mentioned:

• For more on Seasonal Affective Disorder click here.

• A video of The Loreleis that gives you a pretty good idea of what kind of outfit Gwen was involved in.

Books mentioned:

• Seducing the Boy’s Club, by Nina DiSesa

This show is all over the map but we’re really just talking about one thing.  How your life and the choices within it are all the result of thought patterns  that you’ve built up over the years.  The challenge of Zen is to confront and break up these habitual patterns and live spontaneously.  We’ll get back to you on our progress in 30 or 40 years…

Links mentioned:

• Here’s the Snoop Dog video with the round bed that Patrick is currently installing under his mirror ball.

• If you’d like to make Brad Warner’s weekly zazen sessions less (or more) of a sausage fest here’s the info for when and where they meet.

• Look… 4 Doubloons!  Good thing I have all these pockets!

All about the internet and how we use it to run our lives, and how it runs ours.  This ends up just being a fretful meditation, hereon know as a “fretitation” on pop culture in general.

Links mentioned:

• Here’s a link to Gwen’s Productivity Guru, David Allen.  For the record, he studied Zen in college but is now into something else.

• An article on the blogger who totally messed with not Northwest, not Delta, but United’s stock by reading a six year old article on the company’s bankrupty.

• The No Depression Online Magazine, or at least the beginnings of it.

• The Peak Condition Project, the coolest project ever.

Books mentioned:

• Kathy Black’s Book, Basic Black.

A talk about how the world seems to break down into dualities, male/female, liberal/conservative, thinking/feeling, intuitive/scientific and on and on.  Plus, the first ever appearance of a guest on our show!  Very strange!

• Here’s the front door for the racism test.  It’s awesome, they make you click a disclaimer that says you may find out some unpleasant things about yourself!  Stare the harsh reality in the face listeners!  You are prejudiced!

• Some more interesting facts about Jellyfish.  Below is a photo Patrick took of a jellyfish in Enoshima.  He’s very proud of it and thinks jellyfish are neat-o.

In this podcast we play a few riffs off of a central theme, that what we perceive is almost entirely manufactured within our own minds and then projected onto the world.   Forgetting this fundamental fact is the root off stress and conflict.

 Links mentioned:

• Ito-en… sponsor us…  We drink a lot of your tea…  just give us some money!

• Kinokuniya Book Store

• An interesting article on how what language we speak determines what we see, as with the blue trees of Turkmenistan.

• If you want to get your Japanese kitchy snack fix, try jlist/jbox.

• Want to check to see if you’re colorblind?  Go here.

• A Washington Times piece about how men and women use their brains differently.

Hey everyone.  Went to edit our most recent podcast and found Gwen’s audio track was stuttery and all over the place, kind of a Max Headroom effect.  It couldn’t be salvaged, even considering the very low standards of Zen is Stupid.

So we’ll do another one some time this week if all goes well.

But the cool thing is that this glitch gives us a “lost episode” that only the hardcore fans will be into.  If you really want to hear it you’ll have to leave an inspired and awesome comment below.  Good luck!  Judging will be totally subjective and left up to our capricious whims, but if we like what you have to say, you’ll get the lost episode delivered to your inbox, along with a bonus Story Time featuring Patrick’s trip to a japanese bath-house.

**Update** I’ve received so many emails about this that I’m just going to post the thing here, warts and all.  The first five minutes are messed up but after that it smoothes out.  The content is sub-par as usual.

-Patrick

A rambling off-topic discussion (us? rambling? off-topic?) about travel, vacations, and what we can learn about our own and other cultures by hopping on a plane every once in a while.

(Music from Team America World Police)

Does having a constant inner PR agent undermine our effort to reduce the ego? Plus, Patrick takes it like a little girl.

Links mentioned:

• The one and only Dooce.

• The video game podcast Patrick mentions was the July 3, 2007 episode of 1up Yours.

• You best not mess with Pema Chodron’s tea, sucka!

Links mentioned:

• Mmm… shmeat.

• And a page of placenta recipes! Mouth-watering!

• And last but not least… Human Flavored Tofu! Hufu… simply delectable! All the great flavor of eating humans without the guilt!

(Music from Kevin MacLeod )

Links mentioned:

• The site that we talk about all episode, Stuff White People Like.

• A Pali resource if you’re crazy enough to study that crusty old language.

• The Wired piece on the girl who is famous for being famous.

Links mentioned:

• Here’s the piece that prompted the podcast.

• And the epic, unforgettable, The Website is Down.

(Becasue she’s so fine, Gwen’s mic was crackling hot out this episode, sorry)

Links mentioned:

The 5 Mindfulness Trainings of Thich Nhat Hanh

Links mentioned:

• The YouTube girl who does Japanese videos.

• Guitar Hero On Tour for the DS.

• One of our favorite videos of all time, Strongbad as a Japanese Cartoon.

(Music from OverClocked Remix)

A viewing of Wall-E prompts Gwen and Patrick to think about consumption and the consequences of it.
Links mentioned:

• The Onion article Patrick reads from.

• ClimateCrisis.net

• Stuff White People like : Recycling

Books mentioned:

• A decent review of Voluntary Simplicity, by Duane Elgin.

This week we’re takin’ time off to…erm…meditate or something.

Zen is Stupid takes a break once a year. Today’s the day. So, no podcast. But if you’re bored, try:

The Sound of Young America…Colin Marshall reviewed us & I think the best part about the review is the comment where someone says Gwen is full of CRAP!!!! I mean, I couldn’t have said it better if I’d said it myself.

Patrick’s Peak Condition Project is taking off. Check out his hot bod. A hot Buddhisty dude? Yeah, right, you think. Well, think again.

Gwen’s a Brand Enthusiast for Nintendo now & just had a kick-ass, all-girl party in Denver, CO. Go ahead, cruise on over & leave mean comments if you want. She can still demolish you in Mario Kart any day of the week. So bring it.

Well, that’s all for this week! Check us out next week when we talk about something deep and meaningful that will shift the axis of your world, making you a better friend, spouse, and overall human being. Or maybe we’ll just talk about mullets.

Thanks for reading, listening, commenting, as always…

Books mentioned:

• Cave in the Snow, the story of Tenzin Palmo’s years in solitary meditation in a Tibetan cave. Soon to be rewritten properly by Patrick.

• Pema Chodron’s The Places That Scare You.

Links mentioned:

• The episode of Penn & Teller’s Bullshit that dishes on the truth behind “Dr.” John Gray.

We sit down and have a frank discussion about Christianity, the Bible, and Church culture. If we (i.e. Patrick) offended you, we’re sorry and really think you’re a nice person.Links mentioned:

• Richard Dawkins and his adventures with the God Machine.

Books mentioned:

• Who Cooked the Last Supper?, by Rosalind Miles

• The first part of Thich Nhat Hanh’s, Living Buddha Living Christ

• Sharon Salzburg’s book, which Gwen refers to as “Faith Something Something” is actually just called Faith.

Music: Kevin MacLeod

A rambling discussion about how diversity can help us grow, and why it’s so hard to find it in our daily lives. Plus, storytime!

Links mentioned:

• Here is some of the fallout from our podcast entitled “Privilege.”

• The NPR critique of the Peace Corps’s current situation.

• A classic Mr. Rogers clip where he learns about the newest sensation, video games. Very cool except Mr. Rogers doesn’t let the kid finish out his game! What a jerk.

Books mentioned:

• A good review of Bill Bishop’s book, The Big Sort.

Like it or not, we live in a world of high and low, have and have-nots, powerful and weak. How does a Buddhist navigate this swamp and not get screwed?

Links mentioned:

• The 48 Laws of Power, as compiled by Robert Greene and Joost Elfers.

We consume it everyday, we excrete it everyday, and we hardly pay attention to it. Mindfulness in the kitchen, and later, on the toilet.

Links mentioned:

• Patrick’s Peak Condition Project, now with 3 new members!

• The Questions of King Milinda (sometimes called Menander), an old and surprisingly readable Buddhist text. Here is the excerpt that discusses taking care of the mortal body as if it were a wound

Excerpted from the Chapter, The Arhats and Their Bodies

The king asked: “Is the body dear to you recluses?”

“No, it is not.”

“But why then do you look after it, and cherish it so?”

“Has your majesty somewhere and at some time in the course of a battle been wounded by an arrow?”

“Yes, that has happened.”

“In such cases, is not the wound anointed with salve, smeared with oil, and bandaged with fine linen?”

“Yes, so it is.”

“Is then this treatment a sign that the wound is dear to your majesty?”

“No, it is not dear to me, but all this is done to it so that the flesh may grow again.”

“Just so the body is not dear to the recluses. Without being attached to the body they take care of it for the purpose of making a holy life possible. The Lord has compared the body to a wound, and so the recluses take care for the body as for a wound, without being attached to it. For the Lord has said:

A damp skin hides it, but it as a wound, large, with nine openings,
All around it oozes impure and evil-smelling matter.”

“Well answered, Nagasena!”

Books mentioned:

• Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food

• Skinny Bitch

We debate whether Gwen should be committed. Wait… that didn’t come out right.

Links mentioned:

• Nonviolent Communication (NVC).

• The NPR story about 22 being the peak reproductive age.

• The video about getting older.

We scoff at the jerks who blow hundreds of thousands on sports cars and jewelry, but aren’t we just as guilty of living large? And perhaps the real problem is the scoffing itself?

Links mentioned:

Gwen talks a little bit about the classic spectra of personality. Find more out here.

Books mentioned:

Awake at Work, by Michael Carroll

An online stress-test prompts us to think about how Zen helps us with life transitions, especially the biggest transition of all, dum dum dum dum, death!Links Mentioned:

• The Wiki entry for the Japanese phenomenon of karoshi, “working yourself to death.”

• The photo exhibition of people before and after they have died.

Books Mentioned

• Pema Chodron’s When Things Fall Apart .

• The book filled with Japanese Death Poems from Zen Monks.

We all think we’re pretty cool, and then that one thing from our youth turns us into a saggy nostalgic bag of sighs. Is this healthy, and even less important, is this Zen?

Links mentioned:

• All of your wishes have come true Gwen, NKOTB is back.

• An interesting article from the AMA on false memories.

• An in-depth talk on the 5 skandhas. It’s from a Dzogchen teacher but hey, gotta throw them a bone sometimes…

• And our man Thanissaro Bhikkhu and his blessed translations with a thankfully short sutra on samskara.

• Gwen talks some smack on Hot Yoga (Bikram Yoga) If you want some more info on why we’re not down with it read this engrossing Mother Jones piece.

• Patrick mentions the Uncle Rico character from Napoleon Dynamite. Now you can get the action figure! Sweet!

Sometimes you just don’t want to talk about, think about, or do zen. And that may be part of the practice. Also hear Patrick squirm about his coffee addiction.

Links mentioned:

• Scientific American on Orgasms

• Ethan Nichtern and the ID Project

• Our buddy Brad Warner

• And Brad’s most favoritest teacher, Genpo Roshi, talking to Gwen

• ibiblio’s Koan Site

• Jamba Juice

Books mentioned:

• Vanda Scaravelli, Awakening the Spine

• Three Zen Masters, by John Stevens

It’s spring and we both (without consulting the other) started big bodywork projects. A lot of people ask how you can do this kind of goal-oriented stuff and still live in the moment Zen style, so we take a crack at that question and give some tips for people interested in becoming healthier.Links mentioned

• Stickk.com, the website Gwen is using to keep her detox project in line.

• Mr. Pibb. Patrick used to like this stuff a lot. But not as much as this kid! (hilarious late 90’s homepage styling ahead!)

• Patrick’s Peak Condition Project, updated daily.

• Gwen’s homepage, Gwenbell.com

Clearing out the inbox, Zen is Stupid style.

Links mentioned

• Elephant Magazine.

• Carolina Morning zafu company. We really like these guys and think you’ll like them too. The Smile Cushion rocks.

Matching Headphones = Dorky

Last week a big scandal broke in New York, and we try to puzzle out why these things keep happening to people in positions of power, and how to deal with our judgmental natures.

Links mentioned:

• Here’s an interesting Q & A on the Spitzer scandal from the NY Times.

• The “Toe Tapping Senator” Larry Craig’s sexuality is talked about in this Washington Post blog.

• Ted Haggard, former Evangelical leader, on YouTube admitting to buying Crystal Meth from a Gay Prostitute.

• And, after wading through all that hypocrisy, shame, and smut, Thich Nhat Hahn’s Call Me By My True Names, in it’s entirety.

Call Me by My True Names

Do not say that I’ll depart tomorrow
because even today I still arrive.

Look deeply: I arrive in every second
to be a bud on a spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with wings still fragile,
learning to sing in my new nest,
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry,
in order to fear and to hope.
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and
death of all that are alive.

I am the mayfly metamorphosing on the surface of the river,
and I am the bird which, when spring comes, arrives in time
to eat the mayfly.

I am the frog swimming happily in the clear pond,
and I am also the grass-snake who, approaching in silence,
feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,
my legs as thin as bamboo sticks,
and I am the arms merchant, selling deadly weapons to
Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat,
who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea
pirate,
and I am the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and
loving.

I am a member of the politburo, with plenty of power in my
hands,
and I am the man who has to pay his “debt of blood” to, my
people,
dying slowly in a forced labor camp.

My joy is like spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom in all
walks of life.
My pain if like a river of tears, so full it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can hear all my cries and laughs at once,
so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can wake up,
and so the door of my heart can be left open,
the door of compassion.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Now that’s hardcore.

Gwen and Patrick both produce a lot of content online. Yet Gwen receives the lion’s share of negative comments, despite Patrick’s much higher rate of incompetence. What’s going on here? Our discussion takes us through realms of technology, identity, gender, sexuality, and maybe a little Zen, but probably not. Plus, dudes going “uwa uwah uwahhhh.”

Links mentioned:

• Gwen talks several times about something called “Charnel Grounds Practice.” You can read an interview between Gwen and the teacher that introduced her to this idea, Fleet Maull, here.

• Ken Wilber doing some h8ting of his own on his blog.

• If you’re lucky enough to have a Mac, you can check out this Tao Te Ching widget for your dashboard.

Books mentioned:

• David Deida, The Way of the Superior Man

Here are your choices:

a) Yes! Now I can finally be one of the beautiful people.

b) Uh, I guess, if it was like 5 dollars.

c) That shirt sucks.

Just leave a comment and let us know if this is a good idea or not!

We talk about our favorite subculture species, the Hipster! And, more seriously, how people take on different guises in an attempt to deal with the stuff life throws at us.Links mentioned:

• Here’s the Bowling for Soup song (not Blink 182) that Gwen mentions, 1985.

Books mentioned:

• Full Catastrophe Living, by Jon Kabat Zinn. Which Gwen “hasn’t read and doesn’t plan on reading.”

Gwen knows a dude that steals often and with a purpose… to stick it to the man. We also enjoy sticking it to the man, but how does this fit into a Buddhist lifestyle? Hell if we know…

We take a moment to ask what exactly Buddhism is and how Zen fits within that framework. And get hopelessly tangled up trying to make sure we cover all the bases. A good lesson that we should just stick to talking about celebrities and hedgehogs.

Links mentioned:

• Here’s the interview Gwen did with someone studying Women in Buddhism.

Books mentioned:

• Lama Surya Das : Awakening to the Sacred: Creating a Personal Spiritual Life

We wonder what life would be like if we got paid for any of the stuff we do.

Links mentioned:

• Here’s the video of the guy who took a picture of himself everyday for 6 years (and who everyone except Gwen saw 2 years ago) .

• Here’s Tay Zonday’s original video.
• And the sell out cola video.

• And here’s Patrick’s video channel on YouTube. Check it out and leave some comments!

• If you’re interested in advertising and want to know how to do it right, Seth Godin’s Blog is something you should be reading.

• And the Wiki on Buddhist Dana.

We have nothing in particular against drugs but they never seemed to be a good answer for us. We lay out our reasoning in this episode, plus an email/comment challenge!

Links mentioned:

• Here’s the South Park Episode, Guitar Queero.

In this episode we take on the question of what drives people like Tom Cruise who are so sure that their particular belief trumps all others.Links mentioned:

• Here’s the Tom Cruise video for the three of you who haven’t seen it.

• And Planet Unicorn (Heyyyyy~)

• More on Nichiren Buddhism from Wikipedia.

• And probably the most Un-Zen movie/book in the world, The Secret . And the Zencast Patrick talks about is Zencast 115 - What Can You Let Go Of?

• Plus, a listener sent me this link to a blog post that fits right in to this episode’s theme. Thanks Scott!

What’s the line between feeling down and being depressed? Should Patrick get on Prozac?

Links Mentioned:

• Here’s the Wiki entry on Blue Monday.

• And here is the Dooce article we talk about.

Links mentioned:

• Here’s the NYT review of the book that proposed that parents don’t have much influence on how their kids turn out.

• And an interesting breakdown of the data that show childless couples are happier.

• Gwen talks a bit about synthetic happiness, which is an idea championed by Dan Gilbert, and which you can watch a fantastic 20 minute presentation about at the TED talks site. Very Buddhist!