dHarmic Evolution

You are in for a real treat during this episode of the dHarmic Evolution podcast. James Kevin is joined by his good friend English Bob and special guest Peter Griffin from Family Guy. You may recall that Jacked Up Jimmy is on a bowling team with Peter Griffin, who is a fan of James Kevin’s music and podcast, so he stopped by the show. During the course of the conversation, English Bob revealed that he has never been to London because of the terrifying thought that London Bridge has fallen down or will fall down while he is there. When James Kevin asks if he might consider talking with a therapist about this fear, English says that he doesn’t think they exist in Lower Ipswich, and he doubts even that would work. James Kevin emphasizes that he expects English to be in London for his tour kickoff, and asks if it would help if Dr. Woofenboot came along. Still, English Bob remains adamantly against going to London. Suddenly, Peter Griffin shows up at the studio door, and while James Kevin is intrigued that he has come as a cartoon, English Bob is (of course) terrified. Peter greets James Kevin and English and says that he is a fan of James Kevin’s music even if Jacked Up Jimmy isn’t. He goes on to say that even though a lot of people are frightened when he shows up places as a cartoon, it has tremendous advantages such as being able to imagine and then become things and being indestructible, and also going out on Halloween as the Waldorf Astoria! Peter gets overly excited when James Kevin begins to describe his song “Three Miles Wide” and isn’t really able to concentrate on anything else for the rest of the show. Thanks for joining us, and be sure to connect with us on social media!

You are in for a treat during this episode of the dHarmic Evolution podcast as James Kevin is joined by his good buddy Jacked Up Jimmy. It is never a dull moment with Jacked Up, who is a business agent for the IBEW electrical union with quite a colorful life, though it seems completely normal to him. The first indication that James Kevin was in for an interesting interview with Jacked Up was his mode of transportation. Clancy Wagonblast loaned Jacked Up his “car” while Jacked Up was getting his snow tires put on, but the “car” turned out to be a backhoe instead. The new song that James Kevin is featuring during this episode is “Fifty-One Shades of Grey”, which is ironic because Jacked Up and his wife, Matilda, only have sex when it is absolutely necessary. Since this was not a safe topic of conversation, they moved on to talking about Jacked Up’s bowling league and his team, the “Hurry Kanes”, recently winning the championship, the coveted Plastic Cup. One of Jacked Up’s teammates is the infamous Peter Griffin of Family Guy fame, but it is still unclear whether he is a cartoon in real life. James Kevin will find out if Jacked Up follows through on his promise to have Peter come in for an interview on the show. Jacked Up was recently named the Honorary Elk of the Year, and in his attempt to get all dressed up for the event, he realized that he was out of razors. Given his limited time, he had to improvise by shaving with a hatchet he had lying around, and he posted the video to James Kevin’s channel (link below) for your viewing entertainment. Finally, Jacked Up gave James Kevin an update on the European tour that he and English Bob are planning, which sustained a few hiccups when Jacked Up and English got into a tussle and had to patch things up and then when Jacked Up encountered some problems with the dancers’ union in London. Apparently, he thought that James Kevin’s show needed dancers, but they got it all straightened out. The interview abruptly ended when Jacked Up’s beeper went off and he informed listeners that he had to go break some guy’s leg in Kearny, New Jersey.

Welcome to Episode 206 of the dHarmic Evolution podcast! On this episode, James takes listeners through his background and history with organized religion and how his spiritual journey has brought him to be a follower of Jesus. James attended parochial school until about 6th grade, and while he didn’t have any experiences as traumatic as some in terms of abuse, he felt that the way religion was presented in the Catholic Church was not conducive to him wanting to remain faithful to the Catholic Church. Ultimately, he found the way that sin was viewed and handled through the act of confession, the overall demeanor of several of the Sisters at the school, and the oddity of some of the Catholic practices drove his way from the Catholic Church but laid the foundation for his future involvement in organized religion. Particularly, James was enamored by the stories about Jesus that he heard in parochial school, and this led him to begin seriously reading the Bible when he was in his late 20s. A few years ago, James joined a Baptist Church – First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens, NJ – and he has been pleased with his experience there as well as the challenging teachings of the pastor there, which help James’ own faith and relationship with God develop. Whereas James found the Catholic Church to be liturgical and stodgy, his experience at the Baptist church has been characterized by celebration. Along the way, James has also been impacted by the writings of Vernon Howard on spirituality and contentment. James was even inspired to write his song “Geography of the Soul” song by Howard’s ideas about preferring to explore the territory of life over studying the map. Towards the end of this episode, James reads a passage from Howard’s “Mystic Path to Cosmic Power” and connects this message about the true self with ideas from the New Testament and Walt Whitman.  James has found his own spiritual awakening in being focused on the truth, open to learning, and quick to ask the Lord for help.

  On this episode of the dHarmic Evolution podcast, James discusses the ideas that inspired his song “Like I’m Home” on the recent “Gratitude” album and he is joined by English Bob later in the show.  James asks listeners the question “Where do you feel completely at home?” and encourages them to think about the structure, mindset, person, or physical location that makes them feel at home, secure and treated with dignity and respect. James feels most at home in his spiritual walk with Jesus and tries not to get too tethered to things of this world.  English Bob tries to answer the question, but he first fills listeners in on the latest happenings in Lower Ipswich. He has recently gotten very involved in learning and teaching fencing, even inventing his own move called the Ubiquitous Larchmont move,(patent pending) which he demonstrated in one of his YouTube videos, and he even started some UFC training on the spot as he was being chased by a pack of coyotes.  Meanwhile, Mama Bob has developed a condition called “don’t mention it” (dementia), so English and Mama Bob have been consulting with Dr. Woofenboot about the best treatments. So far, their midnight escapades have consisted of gathering huckleberries and waiting for wolves, the gangplank prank involving Nessie the Loch Ness Monster, and playing billiards in the garden.    It seems that the “don’t mention it” has been caused by Mama Bob’s accident last month that caused her to fracture her cranium and receive the zipper effect surgery. English Bob knew that there was an issue when he found Mama Bob in the garden holding a llama in a UFC Kimura hoof lock. Her other symptoms have been an obsession with watching UFC every night and consequently getting into fights of her own at Percy’s Pub.  English says that despite all of these dark spots, he sees glimmers of hope, and this patience, strength, and faith are the feeling of home to him. English Bob’s Fencing Instructional Video

The topic of this episode of the dHarmic Evolution podcast is meetings in corporate America. James shares his own experiences in meetings that seem to have no purpose except wasting time and money. Too often, James says that people abide by the “when in doubt, call a meeting” philosophy, but when you are paying people to stop their normal work in order to attend a pointless meeting that could have been an email, the system is broken. James mentions Jeff Haden, a writer, and editor of Inc. Magazine, who has written on this topic. Many industries thought leaders like Seth Godin don’t even take meetings anymore because they have found that it is more productive to handle the problem or project in a smaller and more direct setting. In addition to just having fewer meetings in general, James also thinks that people should not be allowed to “think out loud” during a meeting because they should have been fully prepared ahead of time. He also advocates for having meetings at odd times like 9:03 or 11:54 so we don’t neglect the lonely numbers that never get scheduled. Finally, James plays a recorded Skype call between English Bob and Jacked Up Jimmy in which they discuss James’ European tour. English and Jacked Upstart the call by discussing an upcoming meeting with an unknown purpose and unknown attendees. They decide that they should schedule a meeting before that meeting, so they can determine what the meeting should be about, where it should take place, what they should eat, and who should be invited. After a few minutes of banter resembling Abbott and Costello, hopefully, listeners get the point that more thought should go into calling meetings.