Love Actually – Messy Love Stories About Decent, Interconnected People Episode# 848
Zen Pop
Todd and Cathy Adams
4.9 • 637 Ratings
🗓️ 23 December 2025
⏱️ 76 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Cathy and Todd discuss Love Actually as part of their “Christmas movies that might not actually be Christmas movies” month. Released in November 2003 and written and directed by Richard Curtis, the film uses its London-at-Christmas setting, stacked ensemble cast, and interwoven stories of romantic, familial, awkward, and heartbreaking love to reflect a long-held worldview: messy humans and basic decency still matter. Cathy and Todd go through their categories, debate the storylines, and unpack why its message that “love is all around” became an annual ritual for so many—and what lands differently when we watch it now..
Some Ways to Support Us
Links shared in this episode:
For the full show notes, visit zenpopparenting.com.
This week’s sponsor(s):
- Avid Co DuPage County Area Decorating, Painting, Remodeling by Avid Co includes kitchens, basements, bathrooms, flooring, tiling, fire and flood restoration.
- David Serrano- Certified Financial Planner- 815-370-3780
- MenLiving – A virtual and in-person community of guys connecting deeply and living fully. No requirements, no creeds, no gurus, no judgements
- Todd Adams Life & Leadership Coaching for Guys
Other Ways to Support Us
- Follow us on social media
- Buy and leave a review for Cathy’s Book Zen Parenting: Caring for Ourselves and Our Children in an Unpredictable World
- Find everything ZPR on our Resources Page
- Guys- Complete a MenLiving Connect profile
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. |
| 0:05.0 | General opinion starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed. |
| 0:10.0 | But I don't see that. Seems to me that love is everywhere. |
| 0:14.0 | Often it's not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it's always there. |
| 0:19.0 | Fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends. |
| 0:25.9 | When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know, none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge. |
| 0:33.0 | They were all messages of love. |
| 0:35.3 | If you look for it, I've got a sneaky feeling you'll find that love actually is all |
| 0:41.3 | around. |
| 0:43.1 | Sweetie, love is all around. |
| 0:44.7 | I believe it. |
| 0:46.8 | I'm so excited to talk about this movie. |
| 0:49.0 | I've only seen it a handful of times until we just watched it two nights ago. |
| 0:52.2 | I have seen it many, many, many times. |
| 0:54.5 | And it's a wonderful thing. But first, do our little spiel. Hello, everybody. So, by the way, this is Kathy. That's Todd. Oh, yeah. He forgot to introduce himself after 15 years of podcasting. Yeah, I don't even know how I intro this podcast anymore. Don't we have a new name for it? Well, that's what I was going to say is so everybody, we realized that after six months of doing this show or however long, that we are really not talking about parenting. |
| 1:18.8 | We were talking about these movies that we love and these TV shows and music occasionally. |
| 1:22.6 | And even though we roll in the deep for sure and we go deep into the self-awareness and to, you know, the... |
| 1:28.7 | We roll in the deep big time. |
| 1:32.8 | So we're still talking about all the, like, the hits of what Zen parenting used to be, but the truth is we are Zen Pop. |
| 1:39.2 | That's what we are. |
| 1:40.1 | We are not Zen Pop parenting. |
| 1:41.3 | We are Zen Pop. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Todd and Cathy Adams, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Todd and Cathy Adams and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.

