{"podcast":{"title":"Thought for the Day","slug":"thought-for-the-day-385283","podcast_index_feed_id":385283,"rss_url":"https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/p00szxv6.rss","website_url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00szxv6","image_url":"http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/3000x3000/p058ghkx.jpg","author":"BBC","episode_count":26,"summary":"Reflections from a faith perspective on issues and people in the news.","last_synced_at":"2026-07-28T20:17:08.183060+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/thought-for-the-day-385283"},"episode":{"title":"Mark Vernon","slug":"mark-vernon","published_at":"2026-06-12T11:47:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/thought-for-the-day-385283/mark-vernon","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/thought-for-the-day-385283","url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0nrn9mw","audio_url":"http://open.live.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/6/redir/version/2.0/mediaset/audio-nondrm-download-rss/proto/http/vpid/p0nrn7ct.mp3","summary":"A friend relates the stresses of getting up in the morning. Her child has stubbed a toe but is it broken, poor kid? Simultaneously, the radio on, there is news of bombs again in the Middle East. And then, another worry: the erratic weather and what that might mean for a shifting climate. On top of that again, a background of disturbed domestic politics. Where is that leading? A hotch-potch of anxieties mount up. My friend and I talked about how to handle these confused concerns, some smaller, some massive; some nearer, some afar. They crash in on us. Little wonder that some people become politically frazzled or mentally fatigued – or over-stimulated or drop out altogether. The wisdom traditions offer advice on how to deal with such turbulence. A label often given to this advice is non-attachment. The idea is not to not care. But rather to learn a skilfulness in how you care. Jesus was one figure who taught as much, captured in sayings such as: “Give no thought for the morrow.” To be preoccupied with what might happen, or how things might go, is paralysing. And freezing in the present moment, or conversely over-reacting, is a disaster because the present moment is the only one to which you can respond well. The advice continues with caring for the soul, or how we are in the world, which effects how we act in the world. Or to put it another way: tend to the jostling facets of ourselves, what might be called our temperamental inner community. That internal unrest shapes our interactions with the wider community that exists around and about us. How we are inside will much effect how we are in the outside world. Cultivating a non-attached attention also opens up awareness of something spiritual. Staying with what is present is an admission that there are many things that we…","meta_description":"A friend relates the stresses of getting up in the morning. Her child has stubbed a toe but is it broken, poor kid? Simultaneously, the radio on, there is…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":183,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/thought-for-the-day-385283/episodes/mark-vernon/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/thought-for-the-day-385283/mark-vernon.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}