Even Heretics Deserve Rituals! With Jeremy Steele

For as long as there have been humans, there have been rituals. Every religion and spiritual practice has developed its own set of practices and rites, and attached sacred meaning to them. But behind the theology and mysticism, is there something happening that even the non-religious could benefit from? This week, we welcome back Jeremy Steele to talk about his new book Rituals for Heretics, a guide to reclaiming ritual, meditation, and meaningful practices without needing to believe in magic, dogma, or blood sacrifice. We explore questions like: What happens when you take religion out of ritual? Can people who don't practice a religion use a modified version of their rituals anyway, or is that appropriation? Why is Dan B's brain so weird? And does sandwich hurling count as ritual? Get your copy of Rituals for Heretics here: https://jeremy-steele.com/store/p/all-the-best-questions-signed-and-personalized-hr8jh-99b8c-47lem ---- For early access to an ad-free version of every episode of Data Over Dogma, exclusive content, and the opportunity to support our work, please consider becoming a monthly patron at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/DataOverDogma⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow us on the various social media places: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.facebook.com/DataOverDogmaPod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.twitter.com/data_over_dogma⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Have you ordered Dan McClellan's New York Times bestselling book ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Bible Says So⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ yet??? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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  There's no reason that all of these things have to be controlled by a system that is trying to bilk you out of money, or tell you you're going to hell, or whatever. Like, we own this. Humanity owns this.

• 2:04Speaker 00

  Hey everybody, I'm Dan McClellan.

• 2:06Speaker 01

  And I'm Dan Beecher.

• 2:07Speaker 00

  And this is Data Over Dogma, where we increase public access to the academic study of the Bible and religion, and we combat the spread of misinformation about the same. How are things today, Dan?

• 2:19Speaker 01

  Things are good here in Salt Lake City, but more importantly, things are going to be good in the DC metro area because we get to talk to a guest. This is one of the rare instances of a returning champion.

• 2:33Speaker 00

  Yes. We mostly get turned down when we say, would you like to come back on the show?

• 2:37Speaker 01

  Absolutely not. I will never come back on the show. No. Today, we have Jeremy Steele joining us to talk about his new book, which just, it's hot off the presses.

• 2:51Speaker 03

  Hot off the presses.

• 2:52Speaker 01

  Coming in hot and steamy. Jeremy, welcome back to the show.

• 2:58Speaker 03

  Thanks so much. Hot and steamy, like a pile of...

• 3:03Speaker 01

  Like a pile of book.

• 3:05Speaker 03

  Like a pile of book.

• 3:10Speaker 01

  So, why don't we talk a little bit about that book? The book itself is called Rituals for Heretics.

• 3:18Speaker 03

  Yeah, Rituals for Heretics. That's the thing. I'm actually a certified heretic. I've been certified by commenters on social media.

• 3:28Speaker 00

  No, I thought you were gonna say, Universal Life Church does that now, too.

• 3:34Speaker 03

  I gotta, when I was an undergrad, like back in the 90s, that's when it first started. And I was in a Bible class, and so I went online and signed up so that I could be Reverend.

• 3:48Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 3:49Speaker 03

  And then I started putting on my papers Reverend Jeremy Steele. And the professor was like, this isn't appropriate. And I was like, no, I actually am. And I gave them the certificate. And he's like, I guess it means nothing now.

• 4:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:04Speaker 00

  I was in undergrad, too, when I was ordained in the Universal Life Church. So, I wanted to be able to marry. People if for whatever reason, someone was like that guy, that's the guy.

• 4:16Speaker 03

  He just wanted to be prepared.

• 4:18Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 4:18Speaker 01

  I, I literally, I missed my opportunity because for a while, Universal Life Church, and this is just the sort of fake church that everybody can go, it's real, like it's, it's, it's registered as a church.

• 4:30Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 4:30Speaker 01

  But it, but like, uh, they, you know, they, if you want to be able to marry someone, they will ordain you for, uh, just for, for money.

• 4:39Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 4:40Speaker 01

  And for a while.

• 4:41Speaker 00

  Something like that.

• 4:42Speaker 01

  For a while, they were offering doctor, doctorate in divinity.

• 4:47Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 4:47Speaker 01

  Uh, degrees. And I should have just gotten it while I, you know, it cost a little extra and I really, I should have just nailed that down while I could. So that I could just be a, uh, so I could be Dr. Dan and.

• 5:00Speaker 00

  Then, then you would be, it would be basically like Dr. James White and Dr. Kent Hoven where you.

• 5:05Speaker 01

  This is what I'm saying.

• 5:07Speaker 00

  It's just as valid as. PhD, yeah.

• 5:10Speaker 03

  I, I got it on the ground floor. It was free when I, when I signed up. You only had to pay if you wanted them to mail you a certificate.

• 5:18Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 5:19Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah. The, uh, so I, I, I thought that was so much fun to get that certificate. I wish I still had it. I don't know where it is. But I've got, I should need to make a, uh, like a, I need to do a video on Universal Life Church.

• 5:32Speaker 03

  Yeah. And, and like, you should, you could put it like next to your Oxford diploma, right?

• 5:38Speaker 00

  Well, you know, I, I tell people, look, I've got five degrees. I have four degrees related to biblical studies and then I've got a vocational degree. I have a massage therapy vocational degree, which I did before any of my other degrees. And like, I'm just as proud of that degree as I am as of, uh, the other four.

• 5:57Speaker 01

  And yet you've never given me a massage and for that.

• 6:01Speaker 03

  Yeah. I, like, I missed out when I was there last time. Geez. I could have been like, I had a massage from Dan McClellan.

• 6:10Speaker 00

  That's right. There are, there are, there are a list of people who can say this and I'm, I'm on a very small list of people who has done yoga with Emmanuel Tove. So, uh, like I know how fun it is to be on these lists, but we're not here to talk about.

• 6:26Speaker 00

  We're not here to talk about our lists, though.

• 6:28Speaker 01

  I'm really, no, no. Look, we, here's the problem. You, we all had an amazing, fun, uh, very personable discussion that got into places like drag queens and, you know, all, all sorts, you know, karaoke and everything.

• 6:44Speaker 03

  And, and, uh, my Taylor Swift song, original.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  And your Taylor Swift song.

• 6:49Speaker 00

  And singing in a salt with a deadly sandwich.

• 6:52Speaker 01

  Yes, that's right. You were there. You were present for that. And all of our patrons who are above the, uh, the $10 a month level can go and hear that right now.

• 7:02Speaker 00

  I thought you were gonna say age of 21, but yeah.

• 7:04Speaker 01

  And, and probably, uh, you might want, you know, parental guidance is advised.

• 7:09Speaker 03

  Right. And I mean, it's worth it just for drag queen reviews of the drag queen in Salt, Salt Lake City.

• 7:16Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 7:17Speaker 03

  It's worth it just for that.

• 7:18Speaker 00

  Do you remember the name of the drag queen that you were talking about?

• 7:21Speaker 01

  No, no, no. Look, I'm, I'm trying to steer us away from that conversation.

• 7:25Speaker 03

  Sorry, sorry. We, we, we don't wanna, we don't wanna blow the look.

• 7:28Speaker 00

  Leave them wanting more. That's right.

• 7:30Speaker 01

  So, so if you want any of that, become one of our patrons, or if you're already a patron, get, head on over there, uh, after this. But we're here to talk about your book, uh, which I'm actually, one of the things that we did talk about in the patrons only thing was the fact that you have this community online of sort of, uh, it can be anybody. You call it not church. Uh, it's something that people can go and check out. It's a Discord thing. Uh, and that's cool. And I realized that between that, which is a community, which is one of the things that religion really offers and does an excellent job of is creating community. And the other thing that rich, that, that, uh, religion also offers and, and that is really important

• 8:14Speaker 01

  to a lot of people is ritual. And that's where your new book comes in. So let's talk about ritual. Tell me about why this book seemed important to you, why you wanted to do this book.

• 8:28Speaker 03

  Yeah, so.

• 8:31Speaker 03

  For millennia, humans have been meeting psychological needs through religious ritual. For millennia, right? So that means it's been being refined for millennia. And when things didn't work or didn't connect, they would not last, right? And so religious rituals and meditation practices represent a huge mass of human knowledge. And, and you know, they have been studied by legitimate scientists. And it turns out, it actually is true, which

• 9:09Speaker 03

  is not surprising because of the, the long development, but that these rituals do have very positive and real psychological effects and benefits. The problem is that when you are traumatized by the church, when you leave your faith, you don't have faith, you don't have a religious identity at all, or you're not sure what you believe, generally you don't engage in religious ritual. And what that means is that you lose out on this huge mass of human knowledge. And, and so I, you know, in my work online, I am the skeptic

• 9:52Speaker 03

  pastor, but when I say pastor, I really mean that, like, people can go on and schedule one-on-one pastoral Zoom calls with me. I think between like September and December, I did like 50 of them.

• 10:05Speaker 01

  To be clear, you're more than, it's, this is more than just the universal life thing. You're an actual like.

• 10:10Speaker 03

  I'm ordained in the United Methodist Church. But I, my goal is to help people find spiritual beliefs and practices that work for them, wherever they find them.

• 10:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:22Speaker 03

  Right? I don't, you don't have to be a Christian or like, whatever. But I have these Zoom calls, mostly with people who have, have been hurt by church, you know, left religious organizations, are, I hate the term, but deconstructing, or are, are spiritual curious atheists, or agnostics. And, and the more that I, that I.

• 10:55Speaker 03

  Engaged with those people, the more it felt like I was offering them rituals that were not, that I removed the God part from. And that's what I do in the work, in the book. I take rituals and meditation practices from all kinds of different religions. I remove the God part and I keep the methodology and the psychological work that's being done. So that people can put whatever they believe or don't believe about God into the book, into the ritual.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. Talk to me a bit about the, because I can hear the idea that like some people might say, if you take God out of the ritual, then is the ritual even, does it even have any meaning anymore? Because this ritual was meant to be in church, you know, we're talking about something like the Eucharist or something like, you know, lighting candles for saints or any of these sort of ritual things that happen in a church, in a synagogue, in a, in a, you know, mosque or whatever. Does removing God or the religious context, how does it change it? And, and, and what is it, what is it still doing?

• 12:19Speaker 03

  Yeah, I think that's a really great, and people ask that all the time about this, about this book. And, you know, the thing is, is that whether or not you believe in God, right? The, the actions, the, the physical actions that are taking place in these rituals or the, the method behind the meditation practice, those all still function psychologically. Right? And, and so each chapter, actually, there's a little bit of an intro of like, this is the religious background. Often there's, there's multiple religions that have similar practices.

• 13:04Speaker 03

  Right? And then there's a like psychological explanation of like, what's going on in the brain? And, and so if you like to read.

• 13:16Speaker 03

  Words like parasympathetic nervous system, you will really love that part.

• 13:22Speaker 03

  And so what I say is like, the God part, whatever you believe about spirituality, that can add a dimension, it can add labels to what's happening.

• 13:38Speaker 03

  But it doesn't change what's happening. Because what's happening is happening in your brain. At least, I mean, I'm a skeptic, so like, I like science, like, if, fine, if you want to say it changes what's happening, great, but yeah.

• 13:54Speaker 00

  Well, there's a sense in which what religion is doing, this thing that we've labeled religion, is kind of appropriating features of our evolutionarily installed cognitive architecture. And what that does is that for a long time, that has drawn a line around it, saying, this is the purview of religion. And that has drove, driven, droveen?

• 14:17Speaker 03

  Droveen, I think is the right word.

• 14:19Speaker 00

  Drove is right, yes.

• 14:20Speaker 03

  Drive-ical.

• 14:21Speaker 00

  Drive-ivinin, droves of people away. And so now there's, there's kind of a stigma on these, not to appeal to a religious word, but, but there's, there's a sense in which this is not what you do unless you are religious. But I got the sense that what you're trying to do here is reclaim for a more intentional, more informed audience who might find value in these practices that can be kind of a, can function as kind of a, you know, psychological self-care. And, but there is one thing I did want to, sorry, I interrupted, go ahead.

• 15:04Speaker 03

  No, you're fine, no.

• 15:05Speaker 00

  Well, I was, the one thing that I did notice that also seemed to have been. From which these rituals have been divested that I wanted to ask you about, and particularly in relation to some of these rituals, which are, which come from very communal contexts, and which are, which function primarily communally, particularly the meal.

• 15:27Speaker 03

  Right, yes.

• 15:28Speaker 00

  Ritual and things like that. You, you're talking, the book is instructions for an individual to do this all by themselves, for the most part. I, at least I don't recall having read anything where they were like, get in a group of like-minded individuals. What, what can you say about the role of community or communalism to the functionality of some of these rituals? Like the sharing the meal thing and things like that?

• 15:50Speaker 03

  No, for sure. And, and actually, there are, there is, I, there's a couple of them. One of them that is coming up for me is the, the ofrenda and the Dia de las Muertas ritual, where you bring people to create the ofrenda, and you share stories. So, yeah, I think part of what, what is, any of these things can be done with other people. But my, what I was hoping is that, I didn't want to put any barrier between somebody.

• 16:35Speaker 03

  I, I really hope this is, there's like a sense of play to this. Like trying things out, enjoying things. If you want to do it with somebody, great. But I didn't want you to say like, oh, well, I can't do this because I don't have somebody. I'm, I live alone. Because the other thing that like, if you're saying like, grab a group of friends and they're like, I am alone in my life is horrible. Thank you for reminding me of that and making this contingent on me not feeling lonely.

• 17:04Speaker 00

  Well, that was, that was something I kept thinking about. The last time we were together, we talked quite a bit about the fact that we have a lot of folks in our audience where they are within a community that does not want them, or within a community where they cannot be their authentic selves, or they cannot express these kinds of thoughts. So, so that was coming to mind. I realize your target audience might have a higher percentage of, of folks without access to that kind of thing. So, so I, that was what I was wondering you, if you were going to say. But you, it sounded like you had more to say.

• 17:35Speaker 03

  Yeah, and I, well, I think to the, it's, there's a sense of when people, a lot of places where people are, their whole social system is built around, is built around this church or religious piece. And so many of the people that I talk to, they, they don't feel like it is safe to ask the questions or say they don't believe things and definitely wouldn't feel safe, like, you know, trying to reenact a hoodoo ritual, right? And so, like, I was trying, I'm trying to be sensitive to that.

• 18:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 18:18Speaker 00

  So Dan, you've heard me talk ad nauseam about the fact that we've got construction going on at the house. We are-

• 18:24Speaker 03

  I've heard the construction.

• 18:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, you've heard the construction too. We're finishing our basement. We're actually adding on to the house. We're doing some stuff in the backyard. And I was thinking the other day about how nice it was to be able to do this because we, I wanted to get a new car and I wanted to do these, these improvements to the house, but we had to pay off our old car and that took actual planning, which you know I hate. And so I really had to shift my thinking quite a bit when it came to my finances. And we had to set dates and we had to create a budget and it was so satisfying to actually make a plan. And

• 19:07Speaker 00

  then even though it took some discipline and there were some bumps in the road, we actually succeeded and were able to pay off a car, got a brand new car. And it feels so relieving to know that if we actually set these goals and plan for them and stick to them, it goes from, oh, this will never end, actually feeling like you have control over stuff. And that has made a huge difference to me and to my family.

• 19:34Speaker 01

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• 20:19Speaker 01

  Monarch has other things like, uh, you can watch your timeline move. You can play out the options. You can choose the fastest way to alleviate your debt. Most apps just tell you what you've spent and how much debt you're in, not Monarch. Monarch even has an AI assistant that will tell you, help you with anything to do with your finances. You can ask, how much did I spend on travel last summer? Or can I afford the vacation that I want to do? And it'll walk you through it all. It's super easy. It's super useful. I love it.

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• 21:36Speaker 03

  But the other thing that's really, I found really interesting that I didn't anticipate.

• 21:45Speaker 03

  Well, the, probably the most heretical thing that I do is I adapt the Eucharist, the communion ritual. And, and so there's this, there's this form that it follows, the words change from tradition to tradition, but there's like a welcome, there's a confession of your sins, and there's this sacred meal. And in most Christian traditions, the theology around communion is a theology of connection, that through consuming this bread and wine

• 22:23Speaker 03

  or juice or whatever, you are connected through the Jesus, not just to Jesus, but to every Christian who ever was or ever will be, right? That Jesus is this sort of unifying force. But, but the modality is through food, right? And it's a sense of connection. So as I was like, reading, thinking, researching the sort of psychological pieces, I came to this

• 23:03Speaker 03

  epiphany, really, where if food is the, is the method, the food actually is inherently connecting, right? Because we will die, our atoms will become dirt, and then grass, you know, plants will grow, and some of those plants we will eat, and some of the animals we may choose to eat will eat the plants, then we will eat those things, they, those molecules become part of our bodies, then we will do all over again. And, and when you really sort of think deeply about that connection,

• 23:46Speaker 03

  That connection actually demands accountability, right? That we need to use our molecules to try to make things better for the people that will come after us. And so, so the ritual does that. It has this sort of welcome. It has this, where have I gotten off track? Like, where am I not using my life to make the world a better place? Then there's the, the food ritual. And so I did this in a live stream several times over. And, and one of my friends, who actually happens to be a pagan high priest, was, he grew up as a, as a Christian.

• 24:30Speaker 03

  I feel like the, the Christian to pagan high priest pathways probably really well traveled. But anyway, he was on the, he was on a live stream. And like I said, he grew up Christian and he texted me afterwards. And we had this long conversation about how healing that was for him. Right? That was such an important part of his life and his experience of the divine for so many years. But the Jesus stuff, the blood stuff, the violence stuff, all of that, you know, was triggering and made it completely inaccessible to him.

• 25:15Speaker 03

  But when it was redone in this way, he was like, I needed that. That brought me so much healing from all of that to realize like, oh, no, no, no. There is something really important in here that I can still access. So, yeah, that was something I wasn't anticipating.

• 25:34Speaker 01

  There's a very baby and bathwater question here where it's like, where, where, you know, when, when someone leaves a religion or when they consider a religion from an outsider, or from a, from a more outside perspective.

• 25:49Speaker 01

  It's hard to know which parts, because it's such a big thing, because you know, I was raised in the LDS tradition and Mormonism has, it's, it's part of so many parts of your life. It is, it, you know, you're, you're expected to go not just on Sundays. And in my day, it was three hours on Sundays. Now they've cut it, now they're, now it's a bunch of pansies. They're all just doing two hours.

• 26:17Speaker 00

  Well, you hear about the new change? No, the second hour is split in half.

• 26:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, it's, it's, it's a walk in the park these days. But it was, it was three hours then, and then you had midweek stuff that you were doing. And you had other things, you had, you know, callings that you were supposed to do. And it ended up, and it was, so when you leave, you don't know which parts of it necessarily made you feel good and which parts of it made you feel bad, because it's just a sort of monolith. So I think that it's very interesting, this, this idea of like, let's, let's see if some of this was actually, you know, of value, even though it's associated with some things that I, I no longer can connect with. And I thought, one of the things that I liked about your book, I wanted, and I wanted to

• 27:05Speaker 01

  get to was this idea of, this is not a book that you read so much as it is a book that you do. Yeah. And, and you know, I read through a whole bunch, I didn't read through, I will be honest, I didn't read through all of the rituals.

• 27:21Speaker 00

  Please don't.

• 27:22Speaker 01

  That, that's exhausting. I'm allowed to do that, but yeah, don't do it in one sitting, because it's not the kind of thing, because, because that's not how.

• 27:30Speaker 00

  More of a reference work than it is a novel.

• 27:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. And, and so like, literally you go through and there are things, you know, I really appreciated, for instance, one of your rituals is about, you know, you live in a place that holds pain for you. Whether you experienced a loss there, or you experienced abuse there, or you experienced something, you know, there's, if you have a space, you know, that holds that kind of pain, you have a ritual for that. And, and yeah, if you feel disconnected from the world, you have a ritual for that. Talk about the doing and, and, and how it feels to do, because the other thing is,

• 28:11Speaker 01

  It will feel weird to do a lot of these things. So talk about the doing of ritual.

• 28:19Speaker 03

  Yeah, and I, so one of the things that I think is a barrier for some people is there's a sense that religious ritual has to be done in this very serious way. Right? That you're gonna wear robes and there's, there's gonna be high ceilings and, you know, stained glass or whatever. And I think that if you are engaging ritual in that like, super serious way, what can be kind of weird can get even weirder.

• 28:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:00Speaker 03

  Right? But if you're engaging it, like you might engage listening to a piece of music or trying out drawing, right? You know, you try out drawing and it really kind of sucks, but you kind of enjoyed the experience, but you weren't good at it.

• 29:22Speaker 03

  Approach it with this sense of like, this is gonna be fun. This is kind of, this is different. I don't do this normally. I think that's a huge part of it. So like, one of the things that you talked about, and this is a ritual that I, the people that have tried it and responded to me have had a really positive experience with it, is the, the place that holds pain. And it's based in a practice called smudging, where, and this is in a lot of different religions, but basically you're burning dried sage or something and the, and you're, the smoke is part of it. But, but the whole, the

• 30:03Speaker 03

  whole ritual psychologically is incredibly powerful because the, the smell is important, the moving is important, the saying of these things out loud is important. And, and all of that, so, so basically what you do is you stand at the threshold and you light the smoky thing and, and you say like,

• 30:29Speaker 03

  You say something, let me just see. I've got it right here. Why do I need to? Why do I need to make it up?

• 30:35Speaker 01

  Page 27. Go to page 27.

• 30:37Speaker 03

  This, uh, this smoke carries away what no longer belongs here. And you don't have to think like, oh, it's literally carrying it away, but like, it's a symbol.

• 30:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:50Speaker 03

  Right? I, I, this is what I want. I want these bad things to get out of here like the smoke that's gonna go out of the window. And then you go to the different places that hold pain and you name the pain.

• 31:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:05Speaker 03

  In the place. That is incredibly powerful. That, that activates this in a potent way with the smell and the whole experience. Because a lot of times when there's pain, it gets stuck. It gets sort of stored in the emotional side of the brain. And, um, and that is, that is a huge part of what therapists work on and PTSD work. So you go through and you do that, then you come back to the threshold again. And, um, and then at that point, you, you start a different movement with it where, um, where you say, you know, like, um, I'm gonna welcome this new stuff in.

• 31:47Speaker 03

  And then you go back to the places where you just named those things and you name what you want. Right? Like, let this room hold softness or like, let this kitchen feed joy. And you go around and you do it again, you do it again, then you end up back at the threshold and you say like, let the new begin. And this can have the same kind of effect, um, that, uh, something called EMDR, which is the sort of gold standard for dealing with PTSD, in that it can help move, begin to move those memories from this emotional side over to the logical side.

• 32:27Speaker 03

  It's not a replacement for EMDR. I would never say anything like that, but it's doing the same thing, um, in the brain. And if you approach it by like, thinking of it in these literal terms, like, I'm gonna believe that this smoke is literally taking away. Like, that's weird. That's weird as hell.

• 32:47Speaker 00

  Well, that's an EMDR therapy. It's like, okay, you, where are you feeling that in your body?

• 32:53Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 32:53Speaker 00

  And you try to localize it and then come up with something that to you. Is going to make it feel like you're removing it from your body. Like I'm gonna take a deep breath and blow it out or I'm going to.

• 33:06Speaker 03

  Then you and then you move your eyes back and forth. And you have this bilateral stimulation.

• 33:11Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 33:11Speaker 03

  That actually is so crazy and it's hard, but really, really amazingly powerful.

• 33:17Speaker 01

  Well, I wanted to touch on something. I, I was gonna kind of save this idea and maybe bring it in, but you've said the word literal a number of times. Don't take it literally or blah, blah. And one of the things that I wanted to, to push you on a little bit.

• 33:30Speaker 03

  Yeah, please do. I love this.

• 33:33Speaker 01

  Is that I, okay, I'm, uh, I, I have ADHD. I, I am likely on the spectrum.

• 33:40Speaker 03

  Same.

• 33:41Speaker 01

  I also have what's called aphantasia, which is that I can't see images and I don't have a mind's eye. I don't, I'm, I am telling you.

• 33:52Speaker 03

  Fascinating.

• 33:53Speaker 01

  None of this stuff really work, really connects for me well. Like I'm not, I, I am not the ideal audience for.

• 34:01Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 34:01Speaker 01

  Ritual stuff in part because the ADHD part of me loses the plot quickly.

• 34:09Speaker 03

  For sure.

• 34:09Speaker 01

  The, the tism part of me doesn't like takes, wants everything to be more literal. Like I have all of these things working against me with this sort of thing. And I was thinking about it and what I realized is that I do have rituals in my life. There are certain, I do New York Times games every morning. And like, you know what I mean? Like there's a.

• 34:31Speaker 03

  Right.

• 34:31Speaker 01

  There's various things that are still ritual, but what I realized about this is that

• 34:37Speaker 01

  it is ritual in this case is a technology. And, and like it's the way that you interface with it that's important. And not every piece of the technology is going to work the same for everybody.

• 34:51Speaker 03

  Right. And that's why in the book, each, each ritual has a page of like, how are you going to change this? Like I changed it. I like took the God out of it. Like there's a, there's a place where for you to constantly to be like, this was bullshit. I hated this, but this was really cool. I'd like to, right? Because I, I hear you, but you know, and the other thing that I think. That's really, I like your, the Aphantasia, I'm, I'm learning something new today.

• 35:20Speaker 01

  I don't mean to throw that at you. You haven't had time to think about that one.

• 35:24Speaker 03

  No.

• 35:24Speaker 01

  It does make, it does, because the latter half of your book is, is meditations.

• 35:29Speaker 03

  And that's, yeah, that's.

• 35:30Speaker 01

  And that's right out the window for me.

• 35:31Speaker 03

  Yeah, for sure.

• 35:34Speaker 03

  Yeah. Well, I think another thing that, um, that religion and ritual does is it creates a, a pattern of life and reminders for you, right? And so one of the things is I think about the Mazzusa ritual that's in there. So like the, in the Jewish faith, like you put the sepulchre from Deuteronomy and this like fancy thing, you put it on the door and you touch it on your way in and on your way out. And it's this idea of like remembering who you are. And so in the ritual in the book, uh, you sort of write down some things that you want to be. And you put it at a threshold, either you want to put it on the wall, fine. You want to put it on the rug, doesn't matter. But the idea is that whenever you cross that

• 36:16Speaker 03

  threshold, you pause for a second and try to remember like, wait, like recenter, I want to be this person. These are the things.

• 36:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:25Speaker 03

  And it, and, and it's really about a reminder or a pattern and like a physical artifact in your life that helps you, helps remind you, uh, what you want to be, like the sticky note on your dashboard.

• 36:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. I think that's really interesting. And I think that that I, one of the things that I really appreciate about your book is what you were just talking about. The fact that it is, you're not saying, here's how you do this ritual. It's the only way to do this ritual. If you do it a different way, you're doing it wrong.

• 37:03Speaker 03

  Yeah. You will go to hell if you do it.

• 37:05Speaker 01

  Right. But that's how we're used to hearing about rituals. You know what I mean? Like the way ritual is presented to most of us is here's this ritual that we've been doing since time immemorial. And if you don't do it this way, then probably hell. You know what I mean? Like probably something really bad because, uh, because these rituals are sacred and holy.

• 37:32Speaker 01

  So I do think, I think that giving ourselves permission to, to just take these as a launch point.

• 37:41Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 37:41Speaker 01

  Is, it seems like a particularly useful idea.

• 37:45Speaker 03

  Yeah, and I, I feel like, I just want it to be like a pallet. I, I want it to be like a toy room or a playground, right? Get on the equipment, see what you like. If the thing that spins you around makes you want to puke, just like, you don't have to get on it again.

• 38:00Speaker 01

  Right.

• 38:01Speaker 03

  But if you love, if you love the slide, like, just keep going down the slide. Go down over and over again.

• 38:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:12Speaker 04

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• 38:41Speaker 05

  Hey, it's Micah Sargent. This week on Windows Weekly, we've got a great show for you. Paul talks about his time with the RTX Spark hardware, three different RTX computers, and the frustrations therein. We also talk about Xbox's Project Helix, and we get a special cocktail, the Theranos Cocktail. If you'd like to check out this episode of Windows Weekly, just look for Windows Weekly wherever you get your podcasts, or head to twit.tv slash W W.

• 39:10Speaker 06

  Hey, everybody. Jason Snell sitting in for Leo Laporte this week on MacBreak Weekly. There's so much going on in the Apple world, so much, a little too much, if you ask me. Look, next week, they're doing their Pro Event. OLED touchscreen MacBook Pros? A touchscreen Mac? Is it even possible? Plus, maybe a new iPad Mini. People love the iPad Mini. But that's not all. We're still dealing with the fallout from last week, when Apple introduced the $299 Apple TV 4K and the Home View. What's the app story there? And on top of all of that, it's iPhone Duo Week. Did we get our orders in? Are we getting it before the new year? We will find out all of that this week on MacBreak Weekly. Get it at twit.tv or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 39:55Speaker 00

  And I think there's also a degree to which some of these things may not really resonate with someone unless they're in a situation where they've experienced something that might bring up, might put them in a state where one of these things might be psychologically helpful for them. I'm thinking of the show The Pit. I don't know if you guys have watched the very first season. There's a brother and a sister, and their father is dying, and they've made the decision to allow him to die. And they're in the room with him where it happens. And Dr. Robbie, the main character, asks if they're religious, and

• 40:36Speaker 00

  like, no, no. And he's like, well, anyway, there's this thing called, in Hawaiian culture, ho'oponopono, where you say these four things. And he's like, I've seen people say these four things when someone is leaving, shuffling off this mortal coil, so to speak. And he's like, and it has seemed to be helpful. And so in that situation, and it was even a variation, it wasn't exactly what the ho'oponopono prayer or thing is, but it was the, it was, I love you, thank you, I forgive you, please forgive me. And then they narrativize how the brother and the sister each go through that process. But that was something that's not going to

• 41:17Speaker 00

  be relevant to them at any other time in their life until suddenly they're in a situation where this can be remarkably helpful for them. And so I imagine that some of the stuff in this book could be quite helpful for people who, maybe they haven't gone through these things yet, but maybe at some point they'll find themselves in a situation where this can be soothing, this can be healing, or this can allow them to go out and find something that they've been looking for for a long time.

• 41:48Speaker 03

  Yeah, I can tell you, one of the things that really... It was really the impetus to start doing the work was one of my friends is a Mexican, American, and they're dual citizen, Mexico and the United States. And, and Dia de las Muertas was coming up, I mentioned this, and they invited me to, and a couple of other people, to create an ofrenda. And we brought, you know, the picture of our loved one. We brought food that was meaningful to them.

• 42:28Speaker 03

  And we lit candles and there's all this beautiful imagery with miracles and the butterflies and all of the like skulls and everything. And, you know, you bring them into the space. And so like, why do you have Diet Coke with peanuts in it? Right? And you get to tell stories. And, and I love, I love the way that it, it like pulls stories into the room. And, and you know, whenever we, whenever we talk about loved ones that have passed, I don't know, there is a deeply spiritual sensation that I get.

• 43:12Speaker 03

  Like I am bringing them into the room. Not literally, that's bullshit, but like I'm sharing that person with another person. And I don't know. And so at the end of that, like, it was very intense experience for me. I was like, okay, this, this is a thing.

• 43:37Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's in the book.

• 43:39Speaker 00

  Yeah, that part of my doctoral dissertation was looking into bereavement and how, how survivors experience the presence of deceased loved ones and what kinds of material media they might use to try to presence their loved ones. And that's like, that's not. It's an actual like studyable, discernible, data-driven. We can tell that the mind is generating a sense of presence. And it is because even when we are in someone's presence, it's not just us receiving passively stimuli. Our mind is projecting the experience of that stimuli as much as it's interpreting it. And so it's a very real process. It is not make believe.

• 44:24Speaker 00

  Now, that doesn't mean that this is something external to the mind. It is internal to the mind. But that kind of thing, those experiences can be healing. Those experiences can have a person experience something that they have needed to experience in order to be able to get closure, in order to be able to move on, in order to feel like they have said their piece that was left unsaid or something like that. So, yeah, absolutely. That's, it's, I think we, because again, religion has appropriated so many of these things. We tend to feel like you cannot get the patina of religion off of them. In reality, these are things that are just innate in all of us.

• 45:07Speaker 00

  Even if you, you know, even if psychologically you feel like you're less sensitive or you're lacking a part or something like that. There are a lot of ways that we can still participate in all these kinds of kind of deep psychological processes and events.

• 45:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know, one of the things that I want, I remember reading, I don't remember which ritual it was, but I remember reading one of the rituals and you had put a little trigger warning on there. And since we've gotten deep into grief and we've, we talked about the ritual that was about pain in a place and stuff. I think maybe we should talk a little bit about.

• 45:51Speaker 01

  There, there might be danger in just going in willy nilly on some of these things without prepping yourself.

• 45:58Speaker 03

  Yeah, you know, I, I don't, I'm curious which one that was. I can't, I can't recall exactly which one it was, but.

• 46:04Speaker 01

  I don't remember either. Sorry. Sorry. I should be more prepared.

• 46:08Speaker 03

  Yeah. You know, I think, I think part of it is, um, it's why I named the rituals the way I did. Um, instead of saying a Mizzou's adaptation.

• 46:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:23Speaker 03

  Because it knows, it helps you know what it's about, what you're going to be engaging in, at least at the basic level. So that if you're like, mm, I can't, I can't go there. Right? I'm in a state of grief. I can't think about that. Then you can, you can skip that.

• 46:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:46Speaker 03

  But yeah, like, uh, these things are, are, like I said, they're, they're psychologically powerful and, and they can bring up real, real feelings, real experiences. And, um,

• 47:03Speaker 03

  but I think that

• 47:07Speaker 03

  in a, in a structured way.

• 47:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:11Speaker 03

  Right? Where you're not just opening yourself up to do whatever. There's like, we're going to go through whatever this is. And there's a method, um, though I would say, like, everybody needs therapists. Like, if you don't have a therapist, what the hell? Like, go get a therapist because, um, because it's possible that you, you go through something like this and it brings up stuff that you didn't realize. Because I think one of the things that, that was clear when I was sort of researching ritual in general, is that one of the things is there are things that you're like subconscious mind is needs, tries to bubble up. Right? And especially with meditation, um, you're, uh,

• 48:01Speaker 03

  It sort of occupies the conscious mind in a way that allows the subconscious to to bubble things up. Like guided imagery meditation is really fascinating, Dan, sorry.

• 48:16Speaker 03

  But you know, really good guided imagery meditation leads, you know, opens up the creativity, opens up the imagination and leads to moments where that can be filled in, right, by, by the subconscious. And so like, one of the ones is like, you're searching for something and you can't find it. We never name what you're searching for. And, and there's like a companion you sense with you along your way. And then you, it leads you to this moment where you find a box, you open it up, and the question is like,

• 48:57Speaker 03

  what's in the box? And your brain puts something in the box. And then you flip it up and there's something written on the inside of the, on the lid of the box. What's written there? I was doing this with somebody over Zoom and, you know, in the box was this, this paintbrush. And, and then written on the inside of the box was this phrase, when she was a kid, she went to her church to help with Vacation Bible School and they were painting, her and this old lady were painting sets and she felt like she messed it up. And the lady said, you

• 49:41Speaker 03

  know, you know, you, it's only messed up if you stop painting. You can always keep painting, or something like that. And like, she was in a moment in her life where she felt like she had messed up and she felt like quitting and like, like just this defeatist and like that, that, that was what she, her subconscious needed to communicate to help her get through that. And

• 50:13Speaker 03

  Yeah, but I don't know. I'm just, the brain is so fascinating to me.

• 50:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:18Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 50:19Speaker 01

  I think, yeah, I think, you know, I, I wanted to bring up a little warning, you know, trigger warning thing that like, if it's too intense, you probably should be careful. But like, also, you're right that this is a structured thing. So it's, so it's, it's an interesting way to access things that we don't necessarily access through just sort of sitting and thinking about it, or

• 50:43Speaker 03

  Right.

• 50:43Speaker 01

  You know, you know, just a lot, a lot of times, uh, we, especially in modern society, we forget how to inject intentionality into how we address

• 50:57Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 50:57Speaker 01

  important things.

• 50:59Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 50:59Speaker 01

  And I think this gives a vehicle for, uh, for injecting that intentionality into, into life.

• 51:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's it.

• 51:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, there was no question there. I should have ended that. I should have thrown a question onto the end of that. But, uh, yeah, it's what I appreciated about this was that it was, you know, and maybe you should talk a little bit about, uh, the fact, you know, you mentioned how you steal the Eucharist and you talk about how you, uh, you, you, you sort of modify smudging, which is a, which originally is a Native American, uh, sort of idea. I, by the way, I'm going to take a little, sorry, I'm going to detour just a little bit and tell you a story about a time that I was in a, a witch store here in Salt Lake.

• 51:46Speaker 03

  I love that. Yeah. I love a good occult shop.

• 51:49Speaker 01

  Sure, sure. Uh, and I overheard a, a conversation between the, the proprietor of this store and one of her customers. And they were just talking, you know, because they sell like bundles of sage so that you can smudge or whatever. And one of the women was just like, well, I, you know, I get these people and they come in and they just want to smudge everything and they just don't realize that they are, it's like a nuclear bomb. They're getting rid of all of the energy and blah, blah, blah. And it was very funny to me. I, you know, I don't have any magical beliefs. I'm not a, I'm not a person who believes in sort of, uh, any kind of,

• 52:30Speaker 01

  Magic thinking of any kind. And so, so that was really funny. And I always kind of, I try not to, you know, sniff and, and roll my eyes at,

• 52:43Speaker 03

  Right.

• 52:43Speaker 01

  at people who do this, but it was so great for you to come in with smudging as, and just say, no, there's not, you're not, you're not doing something magical here. You're doing something psychological here. And that, that was helpful. But also I can hear a lot of our very liberal listeners thinking to themselves, what, what about appropriation? What, what, what about that?

• 53:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's fair. And I, you know, as I was getting started with this, I had a couple of conversations with people of different religious traditions, asking them like this question about appropriation, because I am a liberal snowflake. I don't want to be appropriating other cultures. And, and what I, the response that they gave me, and of course, they're also liberal, snowflake Jewish people or whatever, like we're, we're all in the same, same tribe as far as that's concerned is,

• 53:52Speaker 03

  well, one of them said, it feels to me like what you were trying to do is give access to this truth that we have worked on for all these years to everybody. And I think that we would, I would be happy if somebody tried this thing in a way that made it accessible to them. And then another person, they were like, nothing that we do is actually unique.

• 54:30Speaker 03

  They said, this is human knowledge, right? Like smudging, it's First Nations, it's hoodoo, it's voodoo. You talk about a sacred meal communion in Christianity, but that the sacred meal is everywhere. Ancestor veneration, you, there's not one group of people that gets to claim ancestor veneration. Right? And so that person was like, I think what you're doing is you are, you are taking a meta view and, and trying to, to take all of this practice and make it accessible. He's like, I wouldn't feel like you were appropriating my, my faith.

• 55:12Speaker 03

  So, yeah, I, but at the same time, uh, it's a valid, it's a valid pushback. And I, I own that. And for me, it's, it was worth taking that risk in order to give access to this human knowledge to people who, who, um, who, who would have lost it.

• 55:35Speaker 01

  Well, and if we do, you know, if, if, if me calling it a technology earlier is valid, then, you know, what you're doing is just iterating on a technology, you know? That's what we do as humans. We take, we take what we have access to and we say, how do we make this work well for us? Or better, or, you know, what, how, we, we do, we, we modify things. So taking the culture out of it.

• 56:03Speaker 03

  Well, basically what I'm hearing you say is I'm the Steve Jobs of ritual and I appreciate that.

• 56:08Speaker 01

  That's literally it. That's exactly, I'm, I'm glad you chose Jobs and not, uh, you know, not, uh,

• 56:17Speaker 00

  The more recent guy.

• 56:18Speaker 01

  One of the other.

• 56:19Speaker 03

  Oh, no, no, no.

• 56:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, Musk or something.

• 56:21Speaker 03

  Also, I, I'm more of a Jobs than a Wozniak, but you know.

• 56:25Speaker 01

  I, I can totally see you in a turtleneck. I can, uh, it makes sense.

• 56:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, so what are you, what are you hoping? What's, what's?

• 56:39Speaker 01

  As our, you know, as our listeners and viewers consider going out and buying this thing, which we're going to tell you how to do, uh, it's, I mean, it's available everywhere, but, but you should do it through Jeremy's website. Cause

• 56:50Speaker 03

  No, for sure.

• 56:51Speaker 01

  The best way to do it. But, but what's your hope as this thing goes out into the world?

• 56:57Speaker 03

  I just, I just want people to be able to, to access this and to play, right? To, uh, there's, there's no reason that, that all of these things have to be controlled by a system that is trying to bilk you out of money or, you know, tell you you're going to hell or, or whatever. Like we own this, humanity owns this. And so, uh, I just hope that it can free this from the, the systems of, um, of control that have tried to, to

• 57:39Speaker 03

  keep all of this as their own. Um, and, uh, and let people, I don't know, have fun and maybe find some life in it and maybe laugh at themselves as they're walking around with sage in their house. Right? Um, yeah.

• 57:58Speaker 01

  I love it. I love it. Uh, keep, keep your rituals playful, everybody. Uh, well, and Dan, unless you have anything else, I think, uh, I think that that's a great place to, uh, to button this. Let's talk about-

• 58:13Speaker 00

  We should talk about, uh, Jeremy's website skepticpastor.com. If you'd like a signed copy of his book and some bitchy little stickers, uh, that he will send you.

• 58:25Speaker 03

  Yeah. God is not a white man. Uh, deconstruction is in a phase, Karen. I've also got a dad joke. Uh, I survived deconstruction and all I got with this was a sticker. Uh huh. Yeah. Yeah.

• 58:39Speaker 00

  Yeah. So that'll come along with the, with the signed copy of the book.

• 58:43Speaker 01

  I will, I will-

• 58:44Speaker 00

  skepticpastor.com.

• 58:45Speaker 01

  Do my darndest to try to remember to put a link to that in the show notes. So you should be able to see that in your show notes. Um, Otherwise, it's available where, you know, where you get books.

• 58:57Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 58:57Speaker 01

  So.

• 58:58Speaker 03

  Right. Wherever that is. Like bookshop.org, which everybody should try. It's like Amazon, but you choose your local bookstore and they're the ones who get the profit instead of some massive corporation that's ruining the planet.

• 59:12Speaker 01

  Oh, I love that. I love that. All right. Uh, go out and do a ritual, everybody. Uh, Jeremy Steele, thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciate you coming on and chatting with us.

• 59:22Speaker 03

  Absolutely. Next time in Salt Lake City, you've got to go to the drag show with me.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  We're doing it. We're, and we'll do the karaoke as well. Uh, it'll, it'll be a lot of fun. We'll make Dan do karaoke. That'll be.

• 59:32Speaker 00

  Yeah. I, I got booed off the stage last time I did karaoke. So.

• 59:36Speaker 01

  That's what we're shooting for, baby. If you listen, karaoke is a ritual. It is a sacred practice.

• 59:42Speaker 00

  Ritual. Yes.

• 59:43Speaker 01

  Right. And you are not allowed, and karaoke is not about singing well. Anybody tells you, anyone who tells you different is, uh, just doesn't understand what, what it's about. All right. Uh, that's it for today, friends. If you would like to hear more of Jeremy and hear our wild conversation, uh, please be, consider becoming a patron of the show. Uh, and also, will you guys consider sharing this episode with someone who you think might benefit from some, uh, some ritual for them? Uh, anyway, you can go over to patreon.com slash data over dogma to, to join in. By the way, uh, we should also mention that we launched our website. You can go to, uh, data over dogma pod.com.

• 1:00:27Speaker 01

  And, uh, there's some merch there that you can go and check out and, uh, and, and there's also other stuff. It's, it's still kind of in process, but, uh, please enjoy and, uh, and do that. Thanks so much to, uh, Roger for editing the show. Thanks to JJ for being our producer. Thanks to Sam for being our, uh, our web guru as well as our YouTube dude. We appreciate all of you and thanks to all of you all for tuning in. We'll talk to you again next time.

• 1:01:01Speaker 00

  Bye, everybody.

• 1:01:06Speaker 01

  Data Over Dogma is a member of the Airwave Media Network. It is a production of Data Over Dogma Media LLC, copyright 2026, all rights reserved.

• 1:01:16Speaker 07

  In January of 1915, Ernest Shackleton's ship, Endurance, became encased in the ice in the Weddell Sea. Through determination, grit, and savvy, Shackleton would lead his men through a brutal winter, then over hundreds of miles of Antarctic ice, followed by 800 miles across some of the roughest waters in the world. It is one of the most extraordinary and inspirational journeys in the history of exploration. Find this story and many others at the Explorers Podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts, or at explorerspodcast.com. Every Sunday, we cover the week's tech news on This Week in Tech. Hi, this is Leo Laporte from the Twit Podcast Network, inviting you to join me this week for a doozy. Jason Calacanis and Gina Smith join me. We're going to talk about so many things: the flying

• 1:01:59Speaker 07

  car from Tesla, the guy who bugged the OpenAI conference room, wrapped it in toilet paper, and the new Surface Laptop. It's all coming up on Twit. You'll find it at twit.tv and wherever you get your podcasts.

• 1:02:16Speaker 05

  Hey there, I'm Travis Hoyam, one of the hosts of Motley Fool: Hidden Gems Investing. Each weekday on Motley Fool: Hidden Gems Investing, we talk through the business news you need to know and the stories moving stocks on Wall Street. On weekends, we game plan personal finance strategies and dive into the industries shaping tomorrow, and host the experts, authors, and executives that understand them. Tune in for insights and a long-term perspective on investing, and of course, stock ideas, plenty of them. To quote a listener, "It pays to listen." Check us out and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.