Standing Nowhere

I've quit alcohol and cannabis. Kicked my energy drink habit that was costing me $150-200 a month. But I still can't stop buying ice cream at the end of brutal work days. And I'm obsessed with making this podcast perfect, going back to edit old episodes when I should just let them be. This episode is about attachment, desire, and why we can't stop wanting things even when we kn...

Spirituality can be the biggest ego trip of all. In this episode, Jacob works through Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche's concept of spiritual materialism — the subtle (and not so subtle) ways the ego hijacks spiritual practice and turns it into another identity, another badge, another club to belong to. From growing up in church to virtue signaling on Instagram, from religious one-upmanship to the me...

"Why didn't you just leave?" It's the question everyone asks about domestic violence - until they hear Kate Mageau's story and realize how trauma bonds, gaslighting, and the cycle of violence make leaving the most dangerous moment of all. Kate is a licensed therapist (LMHC, ADHD-CCSP), author, and toxic relationship survivor. In this conversation, we explore her memoir Ros...

You've done the research. You've made the outline. You've prepared and prepared and prepared. So why won't you just move? In this episode, Jacob explores the Zen concept of wobbling — that state of hesitation where you're split between faith and fear, never fully here, never fully acting. Drawing from the Bhagavad Gita, Einstein, Alan Watts, the book of James, and a drill...

My first podcast guest is my mom, Diane Buehler—and this conversation goes places I never expected. She shares stories I'd never heard in detail: growing up on five acres in Indiana eating the pigs she raised for 4-H, hitchhiking as a teenager in California, joining a traveling Christian theater group that performed in San Quentin, and meeting my dad at Bible college over joints and parties t...

Forty-five minutes after meditating, feeling centered and peaceful, I flipped off a driver who cut me off on the freeway—with my kids in the car. He slammed on his brakes. I almost rear-ended him. I flipped him off again. He braked harder. The guy who was floating on a meditation cushion that morning was now blind with rage, endangering his own children over getting cut off in traffic. This episod...

In this milestone 10th episode, Jacob explores the paradox of trying too hard—how the more we strive for outcomes, the more we get in our own way. Drawing from his experiences as a burned-out gig worker, anxious gamer, and devoted parent, he examines the difference between healthy effort and destructive striving. Through stories from Buddhist, Taoist, Christian, and Hindu traditions—including Mila...

I was outlining this episode on a Friday night during a pickup at a noisy sushi bar, surrounded by laughter and music, quietly drafting notes about stillness. The irony wasn't lost on me—but that's exactly when the teaching comes, in the chaos before you learn to find the silence within. This episode is about why daily spiritual practice isn't optional anymore. Not because it's...

I was carrying a 40-pack of water up three flights of stairs in 115-degree Arizona heat, sweating through my shirt, for a customer who barely tipped—and I felt grateful. Not sarcastically. Actually grateful. Because this is my life right now: a gig worker in my 40s, forced to accept 70% of all orders or get no work at all, making $20,000 less than last year while working more hours, taking orders...

This isn't a music review—it's a spiritual reflection on a piece of art that changed how I see life and death. Avenged Sevenfold's Life Is But a Dream is a meditation on losing yourself, dissolving the ego, and discovering you were never separate from the cosmic dance. If you've never heard the band or this album, you'll still get everything from this episode. But if you l...

I threw my sunglasses on the ground and watched them shatter. My brother had just spent all day helping me fix my car in brutal heat—again—and when we took it for a test drive, there was a loud squealing sound. My brain panicked. I hadn't slept well in days. I'd just quit smoking weed to stop numbing myself. I was behind on rent and bills. And I lost it. Threw my favorite sunglasses—the...

My clutch pedal sank to the floor halfway through a Chipotle delivery. I heard a pop, the pedal hit the ground, and my income vanished instantly. I'm a gig worker—no car means no money. It's Sunday as I record this, the Kia dealership doesn't open until Monday, and I have no idea how I'm paying my bills next week. I lost $250 in earnings today. But I remembered the Dalai Lama:...

What if the thing standing between you and reality isn't ignorance — it's knowledge? In this episode, Jacob unpacks what mysticism actually is and where it came from — not as magic or esoteric religion, but as the natural counter-current that arose in every major spiritual tradition when people got too lost in words and concepts to experience the thing the words were pointing to. Through...

What if you've never actually met yourself? In this episode, Jacob invites you into a simple experiment — sit down, watch your breath, and notice what happens. What you'll find is that thoughts arise on their own. You don't do them. They do themselves. And the one watching them isn't a thought at all. Drawing from Buddhism, Christian mysticism, and a brutally honest story about...

I reached a point where not existing seemed more appealing than existing. That's a sad state of mind. But something shifted—a paradigm inside me changed everything. Now I'm under just as much stress (maybe more), but I have space inside. Joy. Elation. Enough energy to carve out time for this podcast. How does someone go from daydreaming about a car taking them out to feeling this alive?...

On my 42nd birthday, I finally hit record. As the title suggests, I don't know what I'm doing—but three years ago, I hit a point where I had this dark thought: "I would love it if a car would just take me out." Not suicidal—just exhausted. Working 60-hour weeks doing DoorDash, waking up at 3am sweating about rent, racing every day to get out of the red. I was crying on deliveri...