Friday Fixations

What I'm into right now

Happy Friday, my fellow suffering beings. Each week, I share two things I’m digging right now (books, TV shows, movies, music, and the like) plus one online video of nearly zero cultural merit.

• I’m Not You by Ways Away: I recently interviewed Ethan Kross, who talked about how you can use music to deliberately shift your mood. I’ve been using this record to help me work out. Primo, catchy punk rock. Some of the songs go a little hard for my taste, but this one hits the sweet spot.

• Untold: The Liver King (on Netflix): A cautionary tale about the wellness industry (produced by some former ABC News colleagues of mine). It’s about a conman who rides a tidal wave of bullshit to fame—and then infamy. It’s a case study in how the algorithms incentivize all the wrong things. Warning: many scenes of people eating bull testicles.

• Makes me want a dog. (I've actually been considering getting a dog to accompany me on flights, to help with claustrophobia. Videos like this definitely push the needle in a canine direction.)

• One last thing: my friend and mentor, Joseph Goldstein, is offering a live, online course called "Ask Joseph," where you get to interact with the man himself about how to go deeper into your meditation practice. Highly, highly recommend.

Paid subscribers can comment on this and other posts, and can also: join twice-monthly live video sessions where I guide meditations and take questions; get the ad-free version of the 10% Happier podcast; and—every Monday and Wednesday for month of June—get bespoke meditations from one of my favorite dharma teachers, the deeply wise and ridiculously funny Cara Lai.