The Five: “Before You Knew Better”
Listen
Every week on The Five, we find one headline and one deeper idea across all five pillars of aligned living — Spirit, Mind, Body, Money, and Creativity — and ask what they mean for the life you're actually trying to build.
This week, one thread ran through every pillar before we went looking for it: the things you gave up in the process of becoming competent.
In Spirit, the science of awe — why the emotion that makes you feel small might be one of the most important things you can regularly experience, and what happens when you stop letting yourself be stopped.
In Mind, the case for boredom — new research confirms that the idle hour isn't wasted time, it's where your best thinking actually happens, and most of us have engineered it out of our lives.
In Body, we get into Zone 2 cardio — the slow, unglamorous training that fitness culture ignores and the longevity science says you can't skip.
In Money, the financial shame loop — why anxiety about money is rarely a math problem, and how avoidance makes it worse — plus the latest on the Fed's rate decision under Warsh, May CPI, the jobs report, and where the market stands.
And in Creativity, we look at the research on adult play — what Dr. Stuart Brown found across 6,000 life histories, why the opposite of play is depression, and what your eight-year-old self might still be trying to tell you.
Five pillars. Five conversations. This is The Five.
Show Notes
Spirit
How Wonder Can Replace Worship — The Humanist (January 15, 2026)
How Wonder Reduces Stress and Supports Mental Health — EverHealth (March 2, 2026)
Mind
Scheduled Rest Boosts Output by 34% — Cognitive Science (2026), via DeepFocusPro (December 2025)
Being Bored Can Be Good for You — If You Do It Right — Time (February 2026)
The Science-Backed Value of Boredom at Work — Atlassian Work Life
Body
What 2026 Research Shows — Health Crunch (February 6, 2026)
Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity — Dr. Peter Attia — Harmony Books (2023)
Money
Why Financial Shame Makes Money Problems Worse — Psychology Today (June 8, 2026)
2026 Financial Well-Being Poll — National Endowment for Financial Education — NEFE (January 2026)
Economy and Personal Finance Survey — Gallup (April 2026)
Federal Reserve June 2026 FOMC Rate Decision — Fox Business (June 17, 2026)
CPI Inflation Report — May 2026 — CNBC (June 10, 2026)
S&P 500 Year-to-Date Performance and Wall Street Targets — Yahoo Finance (June 2026)
Creativity
Let's Play! A Conversation with Stuart Brown, MD — MAPP Magazine (June 2026)
