Why mindfulness got weird

The Gray Area with Sean Illing

Vox Media Podcast Network

Politics, News, News Commentary, Philosophy, Society & Culture

4.5 • 11.1K Ratings

🗓️ 23 February 2026

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Mindfulness is everywhere now, which is kind of weird. What started as a countercultural practice has become a productivity hack and a billion-dollar app ecosystem. On one level, it’s great that more people are meditating. But somewhere along the way, the whole thing got flattened. When mindfulness is mainly about optimizing your output, we’ve probably missed the point. Today’s guest is Jon Kabat-Zinn, pioneer of the American mindfulness movement and author of the mega-bestseller Wherever You Go, There You Are. Jon’s work helped bring meditation into medicine, schools, sports, and everyday life. He’s also spent decades reminding people that mindfulness isn’t about escape, self-improvement, or becoming some perfectly serene version of yourself. Sean and Jon talk about what mindfulness actually is, why being present is so damn hard, and what happens when industry turns meditation into another tool for self-optimization. This episode originally aired in December of 2023. Host: Sean Illing (@SeanIlling) Guest: Jon Kabat-Zinn, author of Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life. We would love to hear from you. To tell us what you thought of this episode, email us at thegrayarea@vox.com or leave us a voicemail at 1-800-214-5749. Your comments and questions help us make a better show. And you can watch new episodes of The Gray Area on YouTube. New episodes drop every Monday and Friday. If you enjoy our reporting and want to hear more from Vox journalists, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/vox. Each month, our members get access to exclusive videos, livestreams, and chats with our newsroom. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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1:09.1	Hey everyone, it's Sean. You know, it's a chaotic time and it can be really hard to stay focused when things are so crazy. When I feel like that, I turn to one of my all-time favorite episodes of the gray area. It's a conversation with John Cabot Zen. John helped pioneer the mindfulness movement in the late
1:29.2	70s and early 80s, and he's just a remarkably calm and generous person. There is a lot here,
1:36.5	but really it's a conversation about being more present in your own life and why that can be so
1:41.9	hard. John is very insightful, and he actually helped
1:46.1	me think through some of my own struggles in this episode. Anyway, here's the show.
1:54.9	Capitalism is undefeated. That's the line you've probably heard me say a few times on this show. Usually when I'm
2:03.1	talking about the way that capitalism co-ops are culture's best ideas, whatever the domain,
	...

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