The Ten Thousand Things

Sam and Joe discuss co-parenting and being a single Dad. 

Sam and Joe discuss 3 quotes about Christianity from Bishop John Spong. 

Sam and Joe discuss this quote: Natural Great Peace by Nyoshul Khenpo Jamyang Dorje Rest in natural great peace  This exhausted mind  Beaten helpless by karma and neurotic thought  Like the relentless fury of pounding waves  In the infinite ocean of saṃsāra.

Sam and Joe discuss this David Hume quote: For my part, when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat or cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never catch myself at any time without perception, and never can observe anything but the perception. Contact us: thetenthousandthings@outlook.com Photo by Solstice...

Sam and Joe kick off the new year by discussing a quote from Joseph Campbell: People say they believe in God. God is a metaphor for a mystery that absolutely transcends all human categories of thought. Even the categories of being and nonbeing. Those are categories of thought. I mean it's as simple as that. It depends on how much you want to think about it. Whether it's putting you in touch with t...

Sam and Joe discuss Verse 4 of the Tao Te Ching: The Way is empty, yet inexhaustible, Like an abyss! It seems to be the origin of all things. It dulls the sharpness, Unties the knots, Dims the light, Becomes one with the dust. Deeply hidden, as if it only might exist. I do not know whose child it is. It seems to precede the ancestor of all.

Sam and Joe discuss a School of Life Quote:  "But two truths would help: 1. There aren't that many people we genuinely like. 2. There aren't that many people who deeply like us back. The sooner we accept this, the gentler the experience becomes."

Sam and Joe discuss an Eckhart Tolle quote which launches them into a broader discussion of loneliness vs solitude. Also discussed is the latest post from Alain de Botton, you can find a link here: https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxIxHSMpzz1Lc45g-e3W8bt_PMO3oFVYU4

Is this episode Joe and Sam get into attraction. Capricious, fleeting, hard to pin down. More than just boobs and bums and 90's pin ups? We seem to think so. 

Sam and Joe discuss listener Kate's question about "radical honesty". They also get into rigorous honesty, brutal honesty and kind honesty.  Links: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_honesty https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a26792/honesty0707/ Image: Giorgio Trovato

Sam and Joe discuss this quote: Behind the sometimes seemingly random or even chaotic succession of events in our lives as well as in the world lies concealed the unfolding of a higher order and purpose. This is beautifully expressed in the Zen saying "The snow falls, each flake in its appropriate place." We can never understand this higher order through thinking about it because whatever we think...

Sam and Joe answer listener Lou's question which is: "How do you talk about mental health or neurodiversity with people who don’t get it?" Image: Noah Buscher

Sam and Joe take on listener Liv’s topic about reaction, reactivity and being “triggered”. This leads to personal reflections on responses to geopolitical events and other things in life that lead them to react strongly. Some big world problems get a thorough going over and some interpersonal beefs get ironed out.  Image: Johannes Plenio

Sam and Joe reunite to tackle Verse Two of the Tao Te Ching: Everybody on earth knowing that beauty is beautiful makes ugliness. Everybody knowing that goodness is good makes wickedness.   For being and nonbeing arise together; hard and easy complete each other; long and short shape each other; note and voice make the music together; before and after follow each other.   That’s why the wise soul d...

Sam and Joe discuss Verse One of the Tao Te Ching and how it relates to their own experience of reality.  TAO called TAO is not TAO. Names can name no lasting name. Nameless: the origin of heaven and earth. Naming: the mother of ten thousand things. Empty of desire, perceive mystery. Filled with desire, perceive manifestations. These have the same source, but different names. Call them both deep-...

Sam and Joe discuss the poem Desiderata and how it relates to their experience of life on earth. Desiderata Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story. Avoid...

Sam and Joe are back after a long break with a juicy quote from their old friend Carl Jung. Myths, archetypes, figures of light, dark caves with dragons and treasure, it's a wild ride. Enjoy! 

What we take to be a self is tentative, fictitious, constructed by clinging, a temporary identification with some parts of experience. Self arises, solidifying itself, like ice floating in water. Ice is actually made of the same substance as water. Identification and clinging harden the water into ice. In a similar way, we sense ourself as separate. Jack Kornfield - The Wise Heart This realization...

The root of this physical urge is a spiritual one. The longing for an end to duality, a return to the state of wholeness. Sexual union is the closest you can get to this state on the physical level. This is why it is the most deeply satisfying experience the physical realm can offer. But sexual union is no more than a fleeting glimpse of wholeness, an instant of bliss. As long as it is unconscious...

“I have really found when I look around that the romantic love I see is this ideal, the anima . The anima is the ideal that you carry within yourself that you put onto the different entities out there and you unite with that. Pretty soon you see through the projection. And then what happens?” Transcript: That's Joseph Campbell from an interview he did. I won’t pretend to be an expert on what the a...

To be a loving person is to wrestle with a profoundly improbable idea: that however modest our position in society might be, however much we may have been maltreated in the past, however mesmerised we are by the deplorable behaviour of powerful individuals, however shy and frail we are, we are constantly capable of causing other people significant hurt. Alain de Botton in A More Loving World: How...

All that is necessary then is to rest undistractedly in the immediate present, in this very instant in time. And if we become drawn away by thoughts, by longings, by hopes and fears, again and again we can return to this present moment. We are here. We are carried off as if by the wind, and as if by the wind, we are brought back. When one thought has ended and another has not begun, we can rest in...

Romantic Realities: Deconstructing the Romantic Love Myth We dive into the misconceptions of romantic love prevalent in Western culture, drawing on a quote from You Are the One You've Been Waiting For: Applying Internal Family Systems to Intimate Relationships, by Richard Swartz. Get the book from Internal Family Systems Institute at https://ifs-institute.com/you-are-one-youve-been-waiting Sam men...

Listeners are producers. Thank you for getting the show out. I reflect on my own podcast listening: helpful with insomnia, and a lifeline during tough times. Write me here Reading a wide range of listener notes, I respond and explore  personal themes: vulnerability thoughts on how to engage usefully with attachment theory, to go looking for the things we don't want to say the two breakdown eps fro...

Thinking back on favourite films, it becomes clear what they say about us. Cinema, the Psyche, unveiling Inner Heroes It's always therapy and psychoanalysis around here, movies are the vehicle. Favourite films reflect deep psychological themes and evolving personal identities. What we once found aspirational in a character, we might later rethink, or realise it was not the healthiest hero to have....