The Overexamined Life

What if getting lost, wandering aimlessly and being completely bloody confused by life should actually be our goal? Thoughts from one of the most seminal travel authors of all time, Tom Lutz.Sick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclubWant to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primoWATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com

Doing nothing used to be normal. Now it's an extremely weird radical act. A solo episode on the lost art of staring into space.Sick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclubWant to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primoWATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com

Can you fall in love with another person, or only with the picture of them you carry around in your head? This week, a Buddhist nun who walked away from a PhD, a career, and most of the things you and I would call fun tells me you can't. Jayasara lives celibate in a forest hermitage, wakes at 3am, and chops a lot of wood. We talk about booze, lust, gossip, whether a monk's life costs you the best nights of your life, and why the fireworks you set off on a mountain in Japan are now, according to her, just a blip on the screen of consciousness.Sick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclubWant to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primoWATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com

My guest today thinks nature might be one of our greatest teachers. Forty years ago, Mark Coleman was a punk rocker and self-described anarchist in London, until he found Buddhism and began looking inward.Today, he’s a renowned meditation teacher who takes mindfulness out of the temple and into the woods, believing nature can transform how we experience ourselves and the world.We get into nature, self-care, ADHD, and the ethical dilemmas of taking the natural world seriously.Sick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclub Want to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primo WATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com

Joan Tolifson spent the sixties drinking herself into blackouts before becoming one of the most unflinching voices on addiction, shame, and what actually gets you free of them — a path built not on willpower, but on attention. Sick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclub Want to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primo WATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com

We’re gonna get to the bottom of whether or not “you” exist. Here’s why it matters practically. If you don’t exist, you might navigate life with so much more joy. Because what exactly are you protecting, every time you get defensive, jealous, insecure, anxious? Nothing. Sick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclub Want to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primo WATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com

Todd Fink has the ability to casually articulate some of the most complex spiritual paradoxes all while exuding an aura of warmth and love. We explore the ego, the healing effect of nature, and the way society and commerce can commodify art and turn spirituality into an industry - in an effort to figure out what’s real and what’s performance, what’s authentic - who are we really when nobody’s watching? More from Todd: michaeltoddfink.comSick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclub Want to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primo WATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com

A tech founder tried the same dark retreat as Nate and tapped out after three hours. One of favourite friends of the show - Nate Green, did over a hundred, straight, alone, and with a real risk of losing his grip on reality. He walks us through what a hundred hours in blackout darkness does to your sense of time, your sense of self, and your ability to tell whether you're living or dying. Then faces the Reckoning of Self, my closing gauntlet of questions on fear, death, and regret. Sick of being ruled by your emotions?Join our Patreon for AD-FREE listening, Free Gratitude Club, bonus episodes, and mindfulness exercises that are actually fun: patreon.com/TOLclub Want to learn how to meditate? Get 30 days of the Waking Up App FREE: wakingup.com/primo WATCH THE PODCAST on YoutubeFollow Jonah Primo on Instagram or Letterboxd visit his WebsiteJonah writes on SubstackYou can contact The Overexamined Life at team@jonahprimo.com