The Tao of Lloyd

Lloyd Dobler
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Zen-punk mixtape meditations from iconic Gen X Everyman Lloyd Dobler. Think Ram Dass by way of Rage Against the Machine, filtered through a VHS tape of Say Anything left to melt on the dashboard of American decline.  Imagine Lloyd Dobler from Say Anything as a middle-aged dissident: still romantic, still defiant, and thumbing through the Tao Te Ching to turn ancient philosophy into an anti-fascist dharma mixtape for the Trump 2.0 era; on a mission to craft a field guide for late-stage everything.

  1. 3D AGO

    S2. Chapter 24: Pam Bondi and The Dow of MAGA vs. The Tao of Lloyd

    Pam Bondi screams, “The Dow is over 50,000!” when asked about Jeffrey Epstein’s co-conspirators. And suddenly the mask slips. Is it deflection? Gaslighting? Or is it translation? In Chapter 24 of the Tao of Lloyd,  Lloyd Dobler explores what happens when performance replaces truth, when the market matters more than the missing, when green arrows outweigh human beings, and when even resistance starts to feel like auditioning. Because here’s the uncomfortable twist: It’s not just Pam Bondi performing. It’s all of us. Using Chapter 24 of the Tao Te Ching: “Just do your job, then let go”, Lloyd wrestles with spectacle, credibility, outrage, and the empire’s operating system that demands we shine, define, and prove ourselves constantly. The Dow of MAGA vs. the Tao of Lloyd. Performance vs. presence. 🎧 Season 2 of The Tao of Lloyd continues—two episodes a week. Listen wherever you get podcasts or at patreon.com/taooflloyd. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    12 min

  2. 6D AGO

    S2. Chapter 23: The Lloyd Dobler Sit-Down Uprising

    What if the most anti-fascist thing you can do today is… sit down and get quiet? In S2 · Chapter 23: The Lloyd Dobler Sit-Down Uprising, Lloyd Dobler takes Chapter 23 of the Tao Te Ching: “express yourself completely, then keep quiet”—and turns it into a spiritual practice with political teeth. Because the system doesn’t just want your labor—it wants your attention. It wants you jittery, reactive, scrolling… so you never do the one thing that scares it: get clear. This episode includes a Tao Te Ching reading, a guided “sort-of meditation,” and Lloyd’s most embarrassingly practical proposal yet: what if refusal isn’t cinematic? What if it’s small, repeatable, contagious… and it starts with you sitting down, breaking the trance, and choosing a different move? Stop cooperating. Start refusing. From the edge of empire and the center of self—this is The Tao of Lloyd. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    11 min

  3. JAN 29

    S2. Chapter 22: Harness Your No

    Minneapolis. January 2026. Lloyd Dobler drops a chapter that refuses to “perform coherence” while the empire insists your eyes are lying. This is The Tao of Lloyd: a zen-punk mixtape meditation where Lloyd duct-tapes each of the 81 chapters of the Tao Te Ching to the collapse of American empire like a sticky note that says: Be kind. Rewind. Revolt. Meaning: refuse to cooperate with the lie. In Chapter 22, Lloyd reads the Tao Te Ching’s paradox like a message in a bottle that just washed up on the shore of Minneapolis: If you want to become whole, let yourself be partial.If you want to become straight, let yourself be crooked.If you want to be reborn, let yourself die.Then he tries to live that teaching in real time: grief that won’t clean itself up, rage that wants certainty, and the question underneath everything—what does wu-wei (not forcing) mean when the machine keeps calling murder “just doing its job”? This isn’t “five steps to inner peace.” It’s practice that doesn’t gaslight you: breathe, stay present, and choose what you do next—without branding your grief. Topics: Tao Te Ching Chapter 22, wu-wei, nervous system, propaganda, legitimacy crisis, noncooperation, refusal, late-stage everything. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    17 min

  4. JAN 15 · BONUS

    How to Be Water When the House Is on Fire (Mixtape Rewind, S1)

    New episodes return Thursday, January 22. Until then, here’s an essential Season 1 rewind: the manifesto episode. Gen X grief, late-stage everything, and wu wei resistance—be water, find the cracks, and help each other build what comes next. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    16 min

  5. JAN 12 · BONUS

    Guided Meditation for When the News Won’t Let You Breathe (Mixtape Rewind, S1)

    New episodes return Thursday, January 22. Until then, here’s a curated Season 1 rewind for your nervous system. This one’s a sort-of guided morning meditation for when the doomscroll hits before you’ve even brushed your teeth. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    12 min

  6. JAN 5

    S2. Chapter 21: Late Stage Everything

    If Late Stage Everything is when the system still runs—just not for humans, have we arrived there yet? In Chapter 21 of the Tao of Lloyd, Lloyd Dobler (yes, that Lloyd Dobler) drops a zen-punk mixtape meditation for doomscroll times. When your phone buzzes like a casino slot machine designed by a sociopath, your nervous system is getting hit with endless war + climate catastrophe + AI apocalypse before coffee, and “normal life” feels like a group project run by billionaires. Chapter 21 is not “five steps to inner peace.” It’s a chapter about learning to stop clinging—to takes, to outrage, to certainty, to the fantasy that one more refresh will make everything make sense. It's about learning to trust what you can’t get your hands around. Lloyd makes the case that radiance doesn’t come from knowing more or refreshing harder; it comes from letting go of the demand for certainty. Not checking out—just stopping the constant clench long enough for the mud to settle, so you can see your right action. That's wu-wei.  from the edge of the empire and the center of self this is the Tao of Lloyd. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    10 min
  7. Morning Meditation: Try Again. Fail Again. Fail Better

    JAN 1

    Morning Meditation: Try Again. Fail Again. Fail Better

    A morning meditation with Lloyd Dobler—yes, from Say Anything—all grown up and trying (imperfectly) to become a dissident sorta-guru. This is a repeatable ~10-minute practice for mornings when you woke up tired, hit snooze too many times, or you’re already commuting to the capitalist timeclock circus. Built around four “sacred questions” (popularized by Deepak Chopra): Who am I? What do I want? What is my purpose? What am I grateful for? Expect breath cues, monkey mind interruptions, cultural critique, and permission to meditate badly—because not all of us can disappear to a silent retreat with catered vegan breakfast and hot rock massage lunch. Try again. Fail again. Fail better. From the edge of empire and the center of self—this is The Tao of Lloyd. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    8 min

  8. 12/29/2025

    S2. Chapter 20: Late-Stage Compliance (Why Do We Obey in Advance?)

    What rules are you still following that no one is enforcing anymore? Chapter 20 of the Tao of Lloyd takes on burnout culture: late-stage compliance, people-pleasing, and self-policing disguised as “professionalism.” Then a calm, deadpan guided meditation on opting out quietly, imperfectly, and without needing to prove anything today.  With Lloyd Dobler. Send a text. Ask a question & I will answer, maybe in a episode Support the show ABOUT / The Tao of Lloyd is a Zen-punk mixtape for late-stage everything—blending Tao Te Ching meditations, Gen-X philosophy, and anti-fascist satire from Lloyd Dobler, your reluctant middle-aged dissident. No ads. No paywalls. Just clarity, chaos, and sacred refusal. Support the show & get bonus episodes: patreon.com/taooflloyd. link tree: https://linktr.ee/TaoofLloyd

    9 min
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Zen-punk mixtape meditations from iconic Gen X Everyman Lloyd Dobler. Think Ram Dass by way of Rage Against the Machine, filtered through a VHS tape of Say Anything left to melt on the dashboard of American decline.  Imagine Lloyd Dobler from Say Anything as a middle-aged dissident: still romantic, still defiant, and thumbing through the Tao Te Ching to turn ancient philosophy into an anti-fascist dharma mixtape for the Trump 2.0 era; on a mission to craft a field guide for late-stage everything.

Information

  • Creator
    Lloyd Dobler
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    40
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 The Tao of Lloyd
  • Show Website
    The Tao of Lloyd