The Ten Crutches Podcast

David Kunin

What prevents us from being present in our lives? What ideas, concepts, tools can we use as ”crutches” to help us walk more deeply in each moment? This is my attempt to help people with being human. I try to avoid the issues people fight about, the surface conflicts, like who has the right opinion about this or that. Instead, I ask: what are the conditions that make it difficult for all of us to be human? How can we address them? Visit the podcast website at tencrutches.link to download my free ebook Ten Crutches For Walking In The Present.  What are the ten crutches? There is no such thing as “the past.” There is no such thing as “the future.” All “things” (and “events”) are the same. All “things” (and “events”) are different. You will never find “it” outside of you. You will never find “it” inside of you. You are one with everything evil. You are one with everything good. You will never really know. Your senses are the gates to the present moment. New episode drops every Monday at noon.

  1. Aug 17

    E49 Which Cults Are You In?

    Many people act as if there are actually such things as “cults” and that cults are dangerous. Many think they are not “in a cult.” Me? I see cults everywhere I look. To me, a cult is simply a group of people who believe in such-and-such and not in something else. Examples of cults? Groups anywhere on the political spectrum (left or right), groups practicing a religion, atheists, flat-earth societies, corporations requiring you dress in some particular way, football fans, stamp collectors, groups who feel money is worth pursuing no matter what harm it causes, etc etc. Q: Who is in multiple cults? A: Everyone. We are all in cults. As I said, any group believing anything can be called a cult. Some cults have been around for millennia. Some cults have wide membership across almost all of our society. But: if we all are in some cult or another, why talk about them? Because some cults can be quite dangerous. Like the cult of an oil company worshiping profits, choosing to deliberately confuse public discussion around global warming. I’ll take a small group with a charismatic leader any day. We need to be able to see our groups and our beliefs for what they are, so we can assess the ones we belong to. We need to determine if any of the cults we belong to are dangerous. Sure, of course: some small, fringe groups are dangerous. But they are not nearly as destructive as a huge cult (like a nation) that protects the wealth of billionaires, starts wars and allows pollution to continue unchecked. You may have heard of one cult I belong to. You might even be a member! I belong to a cult where  people believe each day should get one of seven names. We are totally into these seven names! But you also have to know the order. The order is very important to us. And you may not believe this, but we simply keep using those seven names in that particular order over and over and over and over and over and over. Like for our whole lives! We learned it as children and we teach it to our children. Our cult has been doing this for millennia! We never get tired of those seven names and certainly not the order. (A few years ago, one guy suggested that Wednesday could come after Friday. He didn’t get one vote.) Anyway, that’s one of the cults I personally belong to. I know we’re weird, but I try not to take us too seriously. Visit the podcast website at tencrutches.link to download the free ebook Ten Crutches For Walking In The Present. Show notes are here.

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What prevents us from being present in our lives? What ideas, concepts, tools can we use as ”crutches” to help us walk more deeply in each moment? This is my attempt to help people with being human. I try to avoid the issues people fight about, the surface conflicts, like who has the right opinion about this or that. Instead, I ask: what are the conditions that make it difficult for all of us to be human? How can we address them? Visit the podcast website at tencrutches.link to download my free ebook Ten Crutches For Walking In The Present.  What are the ten crutches? There is no such thing as “the past.” There is no such thing as “the future.” All “things” (and “events”) are the same. All “things” (and “events”) are different. You will never find “it” outside of you. You will never find “it” inside of you. You are one with everything evil. You are one with everything good. You will never really know. Your senses are the gates to the present moment. New episode drops every Monday at noon.