0:03

Meditation does not require you to

0:05

clear your mind or to stop

0:08

thinking or to stop being distracted. That's

0:10

impossible, as I like to joke, unless

0:12

you're enlightened or you have died. What

0:15

we're doing in meditation instead is focusing the mind

0:17

just for a few seconds, actually a few nanoseconds

0:19

really, at a time, usually on something simple like

0:22

the feeling of your breath coming in and going

0:24

out. And then every time

0:26

you get distracted, which will happen a million

0:28

times, you just start

0:30

again and again and again and again. And

0:33

this is like a bicep curl for your brain. And

0:36

people think when they see how

0:38

distractible they are that they are

0:40

uniquely dysfunctional. But actually, the seeing

0:42

of the distraction is proof that

0:45

you're meditating correctly. Why? Because

0:47

the whole point of this exercise is to

0:49

get familiar with how fucking crazy

0:51

you are with how wild your mind

0:53

is so that it doesn't

0:55

own you as much. That's mindfulness.

0:58

It's my B. Alex breakdown. Breakdown.

1:00

She's going to break it down. She's going to break it

1:03

down. Hi, I'm my B. Alex. And I'm Jonathan Cohen. And

1:15

welcome to our breakdown. This is the place where you break things

1:17

down so you don't have to. Today we've

1:20

got someone who is so good at

1:22

breaking down meditation and making us

1:24

10% happier. We're

1:26

going to be talking to Dan Harris, author

1:28

of 10% Happier. He's

1:30

an author, podcaster, and entrepreneur. He's

1:33

reported from all over the planet. He's

1:35

hosted Nightline and worked on

1:37

Good Morning America. You probably know him, but

1:40

he discovered meditation and he wrote 10% Happier.

1:44

And he has this podcast, 10%

1:46

Happier with Dan Harris. He has an

1:48

app and he has dedicated

1:50

his life to teaching even the

1:52

most unlikely among us about meditation.

1:55

Jonathan, how excited are we to talk to Dan Harris? This

1:57

is a very exciting episode because you

2:00

open up in a way that I haven't

2:02

heard you open up before. There are controversial

2:04

topics in this. I think

2:06

people are going to be excited to hear this. It's a

2:08

sexy one. It's a very sexy

2:10

episode about meditation. Meditation

2:13

is a bicep curl for your brain and

2:15

maim gets a workout. Let's

2:17

welcome to the breakdown, Dan

2:19

Harris. Break it

2:22

down. Dan Harris,

2:24

it's really, really exciting to have you here.

2:27

I've had the pleasure of speaking with you

2:29

on your podcast, but we're

2:32

really excited to have you and I have

2:35

to give a shout out. You changed my ex-husband's

2:37

life. He wants me to tell you

2:40

that every time I get to speak

2:42

to you. He is a person who

2:44

read 10% happier and it really,

2:46

really connected with him and really changed

2:48

his life. It changed. I

2:51

mean, he's a daily

2:54

meditator, like literally a

2:56

daily meditator since your book.

2:58

I don't

3:01

want to say that I think your

3:03

book changed my life, but I actually,

3:06

as you were logging on, I

3:08

decided to go ahead and I downloaded

3:10

the 10% happier app. You

3:13

should know that I am not a person

3:15

who downloads apps. I don't really

3:17

use apps for much of anything. I didn't

3:20

even tell Jonathan I was doing this, but I just

3:22

filled out my questionnaire. I would have assumed

3:24

you didn't know where the app store was. I

3:27

found the app store because

3:32

I went through your

3:34

book again. It's the

3:36

fifth anniversary edition that I happen to have. You have

3:38

the fifth anniversary edition. Oh, I have the fifth anniversary,

3:40

but there is a 10. That's correct. But this is

3:43

the one that I'm holding. I also

3:45

read Meditation for Fidgety

3:50

Skeptics because I don't know

3:52

that I am a fidgety skeptic, but

3:54

I'm definitely fidgety. Something

3:56

really clicked for me this

3:59

time around. in going over

4:01

your life and your

4:03

journey. So I'm really excited

4:05

to get to talk to you. I

4:09

wonder if you would do us a

4:12

bit of a favor and

4:14

tell us a bit about where

4:16

we found you, we

4:19

as your readers, where

4:21

we found you when

4:23

you decided to

4:26

embark on this journey of meditation,

4:28

which really has, I mean, not only changed

4:30

your life, but the lives of so many. You

4:33

were a young professional,

4:35

you were a newscaster, you were in

4:37

a very coveted place in your life.

4:40

Can you tell us about what

4:43

happened and specifically this diagnosis

4:46

you had of depression? Where

4:49

were we finding you? No, I'm happy to

4:51

talk about that, I absolutely will. I wanna make a

4:53

mental note, we can talk about it now, or we

4:55

can talk about it later, we can talk about it

4:57

offline, but you said something clicked

4:59

for you, and I am

5:01

so curious what it was that clicked. So we

5:03

wanna do that now, you wanna hold? Oh, we'll

5:05

get to it. Okay. Oh, no,

5:08

no, you get to visit us here, I got

5:10

a whole list, it's all in order, I'll

5:12

get to it. I may not be like

5:15

Dan Harris the newscaster, but I have a

5:17

process here. All

5:19

right, I will. But yes, we're gonna get to it. I

5:21

will answer the question you actually asked me, I'll try not

5:23

to be a hospital witness, I will play along. It's

5:27

your fault for saying something interesting. Okay,

5:29

so you asked me where I was

5:31

found or where we found me. I

5:36

feel like I've been laughing to

5:38

myself recently, like there

5:40

are probably very few people on

5:45

the meditative path who can

5:47

say that their work

5:50

started with a coke-fueled, televised

5:52

panic attack, but that's

5:54

where mine did. So proud. Yeah,

5:57

I was... Just

6:00

to go back to, I'll start the story at age 28. I

6:03

arrived at ABC News after

6:05

working for many years in

6:07

local television. I got

6:09

this call to work at ABC News, which was a

6:12

huge deal for me. I'd grown

6:14

up watching Peter Jennings, who was the main

6:16

anchor of ABC's World News Tonight

6:19

at that time. Shortly

6:23

after I got to ABC and got this big opportunity,

6:26

9-11 happened. I

6:28

ended up spending many years

6:31

in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Israel, the

6:34

West Bank, Gaza, places that are in the news

6:36

now. I was in Iraq six or seven times,

6:38

often for months and months and months at a

6:40

time. I came home in the

6:42

summer of 2003 after six months in Iraq. That

6:45

was just my first trip. I

6:49

got depressed, although I didn't actually know I

6:51

was depressed. I

6:53

started to self-medicate with recreational drugs,

6:56

including cocaine. Then

6:58

in the summer of 2000, Wait, I

7:01

want to sound cute. You're

7:03

looking for some cocaine. You're asking if I got a number. Is that

7:05

where you're going? No,

7:08

you're a little bit older than me,

7:11

but not a lot. I knew the

7:13

guys who, many of us knew the

7:15

guys that did cocaine. There

7:18

was a definite profile. I'm

7:22

not saying you're not that profile,

7:24

but I was very

7:26

surprised to learn that you

7:28

took up cocaine at

7:31

a point in your life where you

7:33

were developing a career that was

7:35

really important and had a lot

7:37

of demands on you. You

7:40

talked in the book about how you were sneaking around.

7:46

You had a legit habit

7:49

that involved the things that we do when

7:51

we have addictions, but this was a time

7:53

in your life when you were supposed to

7:55

have your shit together, Dan. What happened? I

7:58

don't have any defense for this. It was coweringly

8:01

stupid. So if you're

8:03

looking for me to justify it,

8:05

I can't. I think

8:07

really it was that I

8:10

got fucked up being overseas. I

8:12

was in very hairy

8:14

situations. And

8:16

I want to be humble about this because the

8:20

action that I saw was nothing compared to the people

8:22

who were actually in the- Right. I

8:24

was going to say you weren't in combat. No, I was in

8:26

combat, but I wasn't actually fighting. I didn't have a gun, yes.

8:30

But I was seeing a lot, people I

8:32

know were dying and I was seeing a

8:34

lot of really gnarly things. And I

8:37

don't actually think I was traumatized the

8:39

way we think of trauma now. I think what

8:42

happened, and I spent a lot of time talking

8:44

to psychiatrists about this, is

8:46

that I got addicted to the adrenaline.

8:48

This is not uncommon among veterans who get

8:51

way more adrenaline than I ever got. And

8:56

there's a very unhealthy thing that can

8:59

happen, which is that life seems bland

9:01

when you're not getting shot at. And

9:05

I think what would happen was I would come

9:07

home in the interregnum between tours of

9:13

duty. And even

9:15

though my job at baseline was very exciting, national

9:17

television, covering I was covering, I covered the 2004

9:20

presidential campaign, and that was really fun.

9:22

But there's nothing that

9:24

can compare to being

9:28

somewhere you are absolutely not

9:30

supposed to be and getting

9:32

on television in the process. It

9:36

was really thrilling and it felt very

9:38

important. And I really was and

9:41

am quite idealistic about the role of journalists

9:44

to bear witness at the tip of the

9:46

spear to what's being done in our name

9:48

and with our tax dollars. So I believed

9:50

all of that and I was frankly addicted

9:53

to the adrenaline of all of it. And

9:55

when I came home, I couldn't

9:57

handle it and I didn't know what to

9:59

do. do and I had never done hard drugs before and

10:01

I was at a party one night and a friend of

10:04

mine had a bag of cocaine and you

10:08

know I grew up during the whole just say no

10:10

this is your brain on drugs they're frying a egg

10:13

in the frying pan and so I was

10:15

terrified of this stuff but I really felt

10:17

like shit I was having a

10:19

lot of trouble getting out of bed and I felt

10:21

ill all the time and I had done all of

10:23

these medical tests to try to figure out what it

10:25

was and nothing came back and so

10:27

I said you know what I'll

10:29

try a little of this cocaine and immediately

10:32

I felt better. This

10:34

is not a recommendation by the way

10:37

for cocaine it's terrible terrible. No and

10:39

you're actually describing the mechanism of what happens

10:42

with that kind of drug especially with the

10:44

way that you administer it. It is

10:46

an instantaneous it's a rush and that

10:48

is a sustained rush but as you

10:50

describe you describe yourself as having an

10:52

addictive personality and you know what I

10:55

think is so interesting when you talk

10:57

about it you know you you

11:00

immediately felt like I need to keep

11:02

this feeling going I mean that is

11:04

the sort of engine that drives addiction.

11:06

Absolutely I mean and this is the this is the problem

11:09

you know way more about this than I do so you'll

11:11

just fill in the blanks here where I mess up but

11:13

you know drugs like Xanax

11:15

that come on fast and go way

11:17

fast that is what is more that

11:19

is what is so addictive and cocaine

11:21

comes on really fast and goes away really fast and

11:23

so that's why people who are doing coke are like

11:26

constantly going to the bathroom for a bump and

11:30

that is one of the ways in

11:32

which this drug can just get its

11:34

you know claws

11:36

into you and for me

11:39

it really did make me feel better of course in it I

11:42

felt awful the next day it was barely

11:44

functional it wasn't worth it the math didn't

11:46

work out but I

11:48

you know I think we've firmly established

11:50

that I was being a moron during this period of time.

11:54

You also had experience with

11:57

ecstasy which is a much

11:59

longer lasting experience, but

12:01

you describe kind

12:03

of the depletion, like there's

12:06

a neurotransmitter depletion that occurs.

12:09

Can you talk a little bit about the ways,

12:11

I'm not asking for sensationalistic reasons,

12:14

I'm asking because I think it's really interesting that these

12:16

were the tools that you were trying to use

12:18

to quiet ultimately the voice

12:21

in the head. Talk a little bit about ecstasy and

12:23

kind of what the differences were in terms of that

12:25

self-medication. Well, so I'm very

12:27

down on cocaine. I

12:30

think it's something people should not

12:32

do. I'm not here to

12:34

tell you what to do with your life, but it

12:36

is, you're playing with fire because it is very addictive.

12:39

MDMA, which is the active ingredient in what we

12:41

used to call ecstasy and what

12:43

we now either call Molly or MDMA.

12:46

I actually think is quite a powerful

12:49

potential medicine for people and

12:51

it's being studied quite extensively,

12:54

especially for veterans with PTSD.

12:57

And the results from what I've seen are

12:59

actually quite promising. This is not a quick

13:01

on, quick off, quick

13:03

hit drug. It

13:06

comes on slowly and then it's state

13:08

you stay. The effects last for, from what

13:10

I can tell, four to six hours and

13:14

very meaningful things can happen. It's a drug

13:16

that's been used in couples counseling. It

13:19

really makes you feel a lot of warmth and

13:22

love. So

13:28

I see the potential for MDMA in ways

13:30

that I don't see for cocaine. So

13:36

actually, for me, I don't think it was the

13:38

MDMA that was screwing me up. I think it

13:40

was the coke. And the MDMA actually now, and

13:43

I don't think I would have said this

13:45

when the book came out, but I think

13:47

now I really think that those experiences were

13:49

onward leading. They were pointing to something that

13:51

was missing in my life, which was that

13:54

I've often, I've been described as like

13:56

a frosty New Englander. It

13:58

was natural for me. me to be an

14:01

anchorman because I am good at not showing my

14:03

emotion. And if you look at

14:05

the video of me having the panic attack, I'm

14:08

pretty good at keeping my

14:10

shit together. And MDMA, which

14:12

does bring you

14:14

out of your head and relax you

14:17

and help you to get in touch with

14:19

your emotions, for me there was something

14:21

in those experiences that actually I can come

14:23

back to now that is valuable. Mind

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I don't know about you all but there's a

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18:23

We had Matt Gutman on and he speaks

18:26

very, very colorfully about his panic disorder

18:30

and his long history of that. But

18:34

the timing of all these things in your

18:37

life story is what's so fascinating to me.

18:39

So this panic attack that you had,

18:42

I mean, also I

18:44

love that you kept asking your

18:46

mom for what to do as you were feeling

18:48

so shady. And I think you said it was

18:50

the third psychiatrist you went to who was like,

18:52

do you do drugs? And you were like, yeah.

18:55

And he was like, Oh, got it.

18:57

But this panic attack that you had, this

19:00

was, you know, on air, you know, you're

19:02

in this super high stakes, you know, high pressure

19:04

position. And essentially

19:06

you had kind of a

19:09

cumulative depletion, right? Of, of

19:11

what you were trying to balance out

19:13

between the depression and the cocaine. And

19:16

it sort of, I mean, it sort of

19:18

presented itself in this very public way. What

19:20

can you tell us? A lot of people

19:22

have anxiety attacks. A lot of

19:24

people have panic attacks. They are distinct

19:27

clinically. I'm that jerk that likes to

19:29

point that out. Can you describe what,

19:31

what those body sensations were? I think

19:33

it's really important now that you have

19:35

a little distance from it to describe what,

19:37

what does that feel like when you're in

19:39

that, in that acute situation of having that

19:41

kind of panic attack? When you're having

19:43

a panic, it feels awful. It feels, a lot of people report

19:45

it feels like you're dying. The,

19:49

for me, it's heart

19:51

racing. Mouth dries up,

19:54

palms start sweating. vision

20:00

gets contracted, a sort

20:04

of a dizziness, heavy feeling in the head. So

20:09

those are the physical sensations, which I often,

20:12

but depends, sometimes I notice those first or

20:14

sometimes it starts with fear-based

20:17

thinking. But

20:20

then what happens is, whether you start with the

20:22

physical sensations or the thoughts, they

20:25

then get into a noxious partnership.

20:29

And as the thinking of,

20:32

oh my God, I'm scared, I gotta

20:34

get out of this, as it interacts

20:36

with the bodily sensations, they ramp

20:38

one another up. And

20:41

on television, I was having the

20:43

physical sensations and then the mind

20:46

was registering them and then I was

20:48

unable to talk, which is inconvenient if you're

20:50

trying to anchor the news. And

20:53

then the mind was saying, well, everybody's watching

20:55

this, your career is fucked, you know, you

20:59

are in a lot of trouble here and then the

21:01

physical sensations would get worse and then the mental sensations

21:03

would ramp up. And that

21:05

for me is, you know, I don't,

21:08

that for me is the, is how it

21:10

goes. I don't know, I think I'm describing

21:12

something that is pretty close to universal for

21:15

those who suffer with panic, but you know,

21:17

it can take on various, you know, flavors.

21:20

You end up going on, you

21:22

know, this incredibly deep, journalistically fueled

21:24

kind of dive into the

21:26

world of what is actually going

21:28

on in Dan's brain and also

21:31

in Dan's body. And you

21:33

know, in, in 10% happier,

21:35

you know, you, you name

21:37

a lot of the big names, you know, you

21:40

name Eckhart Tolle and you talk

21:42

about Deepak Chopra and you get to sort

21:44

of start holding court with these people. And

21:46

so it's kind of cool, at least this is

21:49

the way I saw it, you kind of got

21:51

to do this research as

21:53

part of your job, but it also

21:55

ended up being this incredible

21:57

journey of self-discovery. How

22:00

many years from that panic

22:03

attack until this

22:06

incredible retreat that you

22:08

ended up going on? So,

22:10

yeah, the quick chronology is the

22:12

panic attack. I had two panic attacks, actually.

22:15

First one, the one that's on YouTube, was

22:17

2004. The

22:19

second one was 2005. That was

22:21

less visually interesting, so I never put

22:24

it out there. But

22:26

it was after the 2005 one that I went to a

22:28

psychiatrist. And then it

22:31

was many years before I got interested

22:33

in meditation and started meeting people

22:35

like Eckhart Tolle and Deepak Chopra, and that was

22:37

2008, 2009. And

22:41

then I did my first meditation retreat, which

22:43

was a 10-day silent death march in

22:45

2010. I

22:47

was very intrigued. And that was really

22:49

kind of my favorite part

22:51

of the book in a lot of ways, because

22:53

it's very convenient that

22:56

you're a journalist, because your

22:59

mind is, you know, you

23:01

are primed for detail,

23:03

for description. And for

23:05

a level of analysis that's very clinical,

23:08

but because it's about, like, kind

23:10

of the deepest inner workings of

23:12

Dan, it's a really thorough and

23:14

wonderful explanation of everything that happened

23:16

to you. So what

23:19

I really identified with, and

23:22

maybe we'll start there before we kind of

23:24

get into what ended up happening on day

23:26

five, which, like, I'm literally, like, emotional thinking

23:28

about your day five experience, even

23:30

though it didn't happen to me. I

23:34

wonder if you can talk about, you know,

23:36

one of the first things you started learning about

23:38

was the voice in our

23:40

head. And I think what a lot

23:42

of people hear about, like, you should meditate, or you

23:45

need to calm down. This is

23:47

a piece that is a critically important

23:49

part of traditional

23:52

meditation. The notion of

23:54

understanding the voice in your head, but

23:56

it's left out of a lot of

23:59

conversations, It's a

24:01

difficult one, but can you talk

24:03

about what it means to

24:05

start thinking about that voice

24:07

in your head? That voice in your

24:09

head you said told you to do cocaine. That seems

24:11

like a good idea. But talk

24:14

in general about sort of from

24:17

the Buddhist perspective in particular, what's that

24:19

voice? Yeah, there are lots of

24:21

different ... I'm glad you're asking about this

24:23

because for me this was the insight

24:26

that propelled me forward. I

24:29

had the panic attack and

24:31

started going to therapy and that was all very

24:33

useful. I stopped doing drugs. But it wasn't until

24:35

many years later that one of my colleagues recommended

24:37

that I read a book by

24:40

Eckhart Tolle who's a best-selling self-help guru.

24:43

I had no interest in self-help, but I was

24:45

only reading it because I thought maybe

24:47

he would be a good story because I knew

24:49

he was beloved by celebrities and things like that. So

24:53

I started reading the book. Initially I

24:55

thought it was hogwash and then he started

24:58

to talk, Tolle did, about

25:01

what he calls the ego, what you

25:03

could call the voice in the head, the inner

25:05

narrator, Buddhists call it the monkey mind. Just

25:10

the fact that we all have this nonstop

25:12

conversation that we are having with ourselves,

25:14

this voice that chases us out of

25:16

bed in the morning and is yammering

25:18

at us all day long. We're

25:21

constantly wanting stuff, not wanting stuff, judging

25:23

people, comparing ourselves to other people, thinking

25:25

about the past or the

25:27

future instead of focusing on what's happening right now.

25:30

When you're unaware of this noise, which if

25:32

we broadcast aloud, you would be locked

25:35

up, when you're unaware

25:37

of this cacophony and chaos,

25:40

it owns you. When

25:43

I read that in Tolle's book, I thought,

25:45

oh, well, this is

25:47

just intuitively true. A and

25:49

B, this thesis about the

25:52

human situation explains why I had

25:54

a panic attack on national television because, as

25:56

you said, the voice in my head sent me off to

25:58

war zones without the consequences for

26:01

my psyche. Came home,

26:03

got depressed, insufficiently

26:05

self-aware to know it. Because

26:07

that's a voice too. Depression is like that's

26:09

a loop. Well, I think actually in my

26:11

case, depression definitely is a loop. In my

26:13

case, it was a weird thing because

26:15

my body knew I was depressed

26:18

and was trying to send me the signal,

26:21

but I had a mind that was not

26:23

ready to receive the package. And

26:28

so that was a voice of denial or

26:31

delusion of

26:34

being insufficiently aware of my own intuition,

26:36

what the body's trying to tell you,

26:38

which can sound a little new agey,

26:41

but is absolutely

26:43

true. So

26:49

I was very interested in what Tolle had to say. But

26:52

when I went and interviewed him, I found him very

26:54

frustrating because he didn't have, from what I could see,

26:57

any practical advice for dealing with the voice in the

26:59

head. He's a little clinical. He's

27:01

a little sterile. Yeah. I mean, I think

27:03

he's probably a straight genius. And at

27:06

the time I did not, now knowing what I know,

27:08

15 years after having

27:10

met him or whatever, I actually think he's

27:14

absolutely for real. He just wasn't

27:16

speaking my language and he

27:19

doesn't really give you stuff to do.

27:21

And so when I found Buddhism, they

27:25

do. I mean, meditation, that's what you can

27:28

do about it. There

27:30

are very simple ways in which meditation helps you get

27:32

in touch with the voice in your head and to

27:34

see it with some nonjudgmental remove and then not be

27:37

so yanked around by it. And that

27:39

is one of the principal value propositions

27:41

of the practice. The other

27:43

thing that I wonder if you can speak to,

27:45

and I understand that meditation for

27:48

fidgety skeptics is in particular kind

27:50

of addressing this, but

27:52

this is one of the things that

27:54

I hear the most from people is I

27:56

can't do that. I can't sit up still.

27:58

I can't stop thinking. I you call

28:01

it well, we call it spilka Where

28:03

where you and I come from and Jonathan

28:06

as well, but I think in the book

28:08

at one point it's called beans You got beans, you

28:10

know I

28:13

know that it's in some

28:15

ways. It's not your responsibility to fix this

28:17

for people But also you are you know,

28:19

the voice of understanding for so many aspects

28:21

of meditation for so many people What

28:25

what is the explanation? like

28:28

for Spilkas or for

28:30

beans or for that that fidgety

28:32

ness that feels like it cannot be satisfied

28:34

and What does

28:36

that mean for the mind and are

28:38

those the exact people who need to

28:40

be meditating? You know, you said it's

28:42

not my job to fix this for people Actually, I kind

28:44

of think you know, I used to have a different job

28:46

as an anchorman, which I don't have anymore I

28:49

actually think my job is to fix it for

28:52

people like because there's a very easy answer Well,

28:55

it's a very comprehensible answer. I don't know if it's

28:58

easy to do But it's it's quite

29:00

a simple answer, which is meditation

29:03

does not require you to

29:05

clear your mind Or to stop

29:07

thinking or to stop being distracted. That's

29:09

impossible as I like to joke unless

29:12

you're enlightened or you have died Clearing

29:14

your mind is not on the menu It's just

29:16

you know it unless you're in

29:19

a very deep or rare state of

29:21

meditation for most of us mortals It

29:24

doesn't happen what we're doing in meditation instead

29:26

is focusing the mind just for a few

29:28

seconds Actually a few nanoseconds really at a

29:30

time usually on something simple like the feeling

29:32

of your breath coming in and going out

29:35

And then every time you get distracted which will happen

29:38

a million times you

29:40

just start again and again and again and

29:42

again and this is like a bicep curl

29:44

for your brain and People

29:46

think when they see how distractible they are

29:49

that they are uniquely Dysfunctional

29:51

but actually the seeing of the distraction

29:53

is proof that you're meditating correctly Why

29:56

because the whole the whole point of this exercise

29:58

is to get familiar with

30:00

how fucking crazy you are, with how

30:02

wild your mind is, so

30:05

that it doesn't own you as much. That's

30:07

mindfulness. And this is one

30:09

of the aspects of, again,

30:12

revisiting the way you

30:14

present this information that I think

30:16

is critically,

30:18

it's missing. It's missing for

30:21

a lot of people because I think

30:23

that the notion is meditation's going

30:25

to teach me to be a different person. Literally.

30:29

Like, it's going to make me not

30:31

be the person that feels so miserable

30:33

that I'm looking for books on meditation,

30:35

right? I don't want to

30:37

be that person and I want it to

30:39

go away. We

30:41

fall down nine times and get up 10. That

30:45

literally is the basis

30:47

and foundation for this kind

30:50

of practice. The

30:53

other thing that I was glad you

30:55

bring up in the book, a

30:58

lot of people say, I don't need to meditate,

31:00

blank is my meditation. There's

31:03

people who are like, gardening is my

31:05

meditation, or drinking is my meditation. Usually

31:08

it's people kind of deflecting. That's

31:10

often not a legitimate conversation people

31:12

want to have, but I

31:15

specialize in taking things too

31:17

seriously. I wonder if you

31:19

can speak to people

31:21

who kind of want to dismiss

31:23

it, want to act like I don't need

31:26

that. And also, it's not for me to

31:28

go around and say, I think this person

31:30

is really messed up and they need to

31:32

meditate, but what is that in us that

31:34

has that resistance? Well,

31:37

I think there are a couple things. One

31:40

is whether we know it or not, we

31:42

might be scared to look at the

31:44

stuff that will likely come up when

31:47

we meditate or do therapy or

31:49

anything that involves deep

31:51

contemplation. The other is, and I

31:53

have a lot of sympathy for all of these, frankly. The

31:56

other is, we're busy and people are looking

31:58

for reasons not to add something. to their

32:00

to-do list and I get that. I absolutely

32:02

get that. I don't want

32:04

new shit on my to-do list either. I

32:08

think the good news there is, you know, as

32:10

you know, my little, I've got

32:12

these two little slogans, one

32:15

minute counts. I think all the

32:17

data around habit formation show that you

32:20

want to start small. So like one minute and

32:23

then daily-ish. You

32:25

don't have to, if you tell yourself you're gonna do

32:28

this every day for, you know,

32:30

in perpetuity, you will inevitably miss a

32:32

day and then the voice in your head will probably tell

32:34

you you're a failure and then you quit. So

32:36

you need some elasticity, some

32:39

flexibility and again this is

32:41

a data-backed assertion that

32:44

what we know works is to take it easy.

32:47

So to get back to your question,

32:49

I think it's at least two things. One

32:51

is fear, conscious or subconscious,

32:53

and two, you know,

32:55

feeling, we already feel overwhelmed and

32:57

so many people like resist the

33:00

idea of adding something new. There's also

33:02

a difference between something

33:06

that feels meditative, something

33:08

I'm gonna lose myself in like gardening

33:10

or like cleaning my car or where

33:12

I'm not hounded by

33:15

what might be my other anxiety and

33:17

actually meditating where you're sitting only

33:20

with that inner narrative and understanding

33:22

how it works. Yeah,

33:24

I think that's a great point, Jonathan. And

33:28

I want to be clear, I'm

33:31

really not heavy-handed about this like gardening,

33:34

Netflix, drink it with your buddies. I'm

33:36

for all that stuff. Whatever,

33:39

you know, as long as it doesn't tip over into

33:41

addiction, I'm for whatever's feeling good,

33:44

especially if you're doing it with

33:46

other people because that's actually probably the most

33:48

important variable in human flourishing is

33:50

social connection. And so I'm

33:53

not a meditation fundamentalist saying like you

33:55

got to do this or you know

33:57

you're never gonna be happy. You've got to

33:59

figure out what works for you. you. And some

34:02

of these other activities that take you out of

34:04

your morass are really helpful. And by the

34:06

way, there are forms of meditation that

34:08

are less oriented toward engineering

34:11

a collision between you and the voice in

34:13

your head and are more oriented. I think

34:16

you know, Jonathan, given your own practice, more

34:18

oriented toward focusing

34:20

the mind in ways that can feel quite

34:23

good. Or, in my case,

34:25

I do a lot of meditation that is actually

34:27

specifically designed to tune up your

34:29

capacity for warmth. That's called loving kindness meditation,

34:31

which sounds a little cheesy and actually is

34:33

a little cheesy, but a ton of science

34:35

to show that this can change

34:38

your physiology, your psychology, and even your

34:40

behavior. So there are a lot of

34:42

flavors on this menu. And

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for just 50 cents per week

37:14

for your first year. I

37:21

want to turn to this retreat that

37:24

you get into about halfway through of 10%

37:27

happier. I

37:31

felt really seen in your

37:34

description of, first of all,

37:36

your absolute resistance to going on this retreat at

37:38

all, and

37:41

your very, very specific

37:43

descriptions of everything you hated. In

37:47

particular, I really enjoyed reading

37:50

the thoughts that would come to you

37:52

when you tried to meditate before day

37:55

five. It

37:57

was like you were trying to just do it.

38:00

do in out, like say in on the

38:02

in breath, out on the out breath. And

38:05

you know, you said, I can't keep up

38:07

a volley of more than one or two breaths. And

38:09

you wrote in out in, holy crap, I think

38:12

my feet are going to snap off at the ankle.

38:14

Come on, dude, in. It feels like a

38:16

dinosaur has my ribcage in its mouth. Out.

38:19

I'm hungry. It's really quiet. And

38:21

I was like, oh, someone literally wrote down what

38:24

it's like. And

38:27

it doesn't get better. Meaning at first it gets worse.

38:29

Oh, yeah. Like you literally

38:31

you start off like angry, resistant and

38:33

wanting to leave. And it

38:36

really gets worse. That's how you

38:38

know it's working. That's right. In out. I

38:40

wonder if they'll have more of that fresh bread at dinner. Damn dude.

38:43

In. Did someone actually invent

38:45

and patent the sneeze guard or

38:47

like math and language? Was it

38:49

device in several disconnected civilizations, more

38:51

or less simultaneously, idiot, incompetent, irretrievably,

38:53

irrevocably, irredeemably stupid. So this was

38:55

literally what your experience was. And

38:57

also it was mostly silent. So

39:00

like you were just kind of

39:02

you said it was like a

39:04

zombie nation. You're all kind of wandering

39:06

about. But what

39:08

really, really. I

39:12

think for me, what's this missing

39:14

piece is that on day

39:16

five, you literally want to go home.

39:19

Like you're ready to go home. And

39:23

you at some point you have to speak to

39:25

different yogis who are there or you speak to

39:27

different like leaders and

39:29

teachers. And you

39:32

end up you

39:34

end up taking a chair. I think it's the first time you sit

39:36

in a chair as opposed to trying to sit on the floor. And

39:42

you say that a few minutes in something

39:45

just clicked for you. And

39:47

what happened is you you

39:50

call it choiceless awareness is what you think

39:53

you were tapping into. Once

39:56

you've built up enough concentration, they say you

39:58

can drop your obsessive focus on the breath

40:00

and just open up to whatever is

40:03

there. So every

40:05

object that arises in your mind, you

40:07

say I focus on with what feels

40:09

like total ease and clarity until it's

40:11

replaced by something else. I'm not trying,

40:13

it's just happening. It's so easy. It

40:15

feels like I'm cheating. Everything's coming at me and

40:18

I'm playing it all like jazz and

40:20

I don't even like jazz. So

40:24

it's not for me to say this is

40:26

the moment, but like this

40:28

feels like the moment because

40:30

while you've gone through ups

40:32

and downs in your life, the rest of the

40:35

retreat was not all sunshine and roses. You

40:37

experienced a realization in

40:39

that choiceless awareness that

40:42

seems to have awakened something in you. Tell

40:45

us what actually was happening. What

40:47

did it feel like? What did it mean?

40:51

I think you're absolutely right that it was the moment

40:53

and the word that's coming to mind is a

40:55

loaded word, faith. Faith,

40:58

and in the Buddhist context,

41:01

faith does not mean what

41:03

it often means in our

41:06

culture, like blind belief. In

41:10

Buddhism, faith, Buddhism, which

41:12

was basically designed by a skeptic for skeptics, I

41:14

mean, the Buddha often said to people, do

41:16

not take anything I say on faith value. Just

41:19

check it out in your own mind. His

41:21

little motto was come see for yourself. So

41:25

faith in this context means confidence,

41:29

confidence that the technology works. And

41:31

for me, having this

41:34

moment of seeing

41:36

what the, like the

41:38

gear works of the mind, that

41:41

we have this knowing

41:43

faculty in the mind, this

41:45

mysterious consciousness or awareness

41:48

that is knowing

41:50

what's happening, knowing the sound

41:53

of my voice right now, knowing

41:55

the feeling of your body as it

41:57

sits in whatever chair you're in or

41:59

moves through. Face. There's.

42:01

This raw knowing power to the

42:03

mind that lives. Separate

42:05

from all of your racing thoughts, all of

42:07

your judgments about the things you are knowing.

42:10

And. It. Impossible to

42:12

get in touch with that and

42:15

this may sound esoteric. esoteric are

42:17

weird, but actually it's. It's.

42:20

Really important. Because. We. We

42:22

get to entangled with too

42:24

credulous, have to in sore

42:27

sold by all of our

42:29

spending stories are habitual. Narratives.

42:32

Are ancient neuroses injected into us by

42:35

our parents? Are by the culture? And

42:39

we get very unhappy. And.

42:42

There. Is a different aspect to your

42:45

mind. We.

42:47

Are classified as a species as Homo

42:49

Sapiens Sapiens. You. Can think

42:51

of that as the one who knows. And.

42:54

Know that he knows and other words.

42:56

We have this capacity for medic cognition.

42:59

To. Be able to see that are our thoughts

43:02

with some nonjudgmental remove and not the own.

43:04

Buy them And and that's what I was

43:06

getting in touch with him. And it's

43:08

not. You. Don't have to go on a

43:10

retreat, it just ama I'm a hard case. The.

43:13

Description that you have that you just

43:15

the you just shared with the notion

43:17

that it's sort of outside of ourselves

43:19

and a little way or or lean

43:21

back yard. We had a conversation with

43:24

Michael Singer and he also describes it

43:26

as the observed bit the Observer as

43:28

this. Not outside of

43:30

ourselves, but not sort of in the

43:32

front of our heads the way we

43:34

normally operate and. I

43:37

was lucky enough to do like, about

43:39

twenty sessions of At Home Neurofeedback recently

43:42

and it's one of those devices that

43:44

makes you have to make the item

43:46

move across the screen and if you're

43:48

in the. Non ideal brain

43:50

stays you're trying too hard, basically the thing

43:53

stop since one of the one of the

43:55

activities as like a little. avatar

43:57

that see that in it's floating in the air And

44:00

you're like, why will it not keep

44:03

floating? And actually the harder

44:05

I try, the less it floats. And

44:07

it's only by pulling

44:10

myself out of thinking that

44:13

the brain gets into an optimal place.

44:15

And then whatever the sensor is realizes,

44:17

oh, I am not trying so hard.

44:20

So in your description, what I wanna

44:22

help people know is like, we

44:24

can actually feel it. Once you get to that place

44:26

and you know where it is, you

44:29

can almost like lock

44:31

into it and it becomes easier

44:34

to access. Yeah, yeah, it

44:36

becomes easier to access. And

44:38

I have spent a lot of time and

44:40

a lot of suffering trying to

44:42

quote unquote, get back to the moment. My,

44:45

I'm just read to us. And you

44:47

know, meditation is like a jacked up

44:49

video game where you can't move forward

44:51

if you want to move forward. Desire

44:54

is a principle hindrance in

44:56

meditation. So really what the

44:58

game is, it's very hard for type

45:00

A Westerners to get, wrap our

45:03

arms around this. But you have

45:05

to go back to the faith and confidence like, okay,

45:08

just do this practice. It

45:10

will unfold on its own. Don't push too

45:12

hard. What happened for

45:14

me in those first five days of the retreat is

45:16

I was clenching

45:19

too hard, pushing too hard, which is, we're

45:22

bred and raised to do this

45:24

these days. And so this is

45:27

a very counterintuitive activity where you

45:29

just, you gotta learn by

45:31

thrashing around and messing it up to

45:34

take it a little bit easy. And

45:36

that's when things open up. The

45:39

way you described it, I just, I can't get enough of

45:41

it. It's page 138 and 139. It's

45:44

like a curtain has been lifted. It's not

45:46

that anything in the passing show is so

45:48

amazing in itself. It's the sheer rapidity of

45:51

it all. The objects arising and passing ricocheting

45:53

off one another with such speed. And

45:56

Then you say, it's like I'd spent the past

45:58

five days being dragged by my head behind. A

46:00

motorboat. And now all of a sudden. I'm

46:02

up on water skis, And

46:05

this. Like. This

46:07

description you had. His.

46:10

Then followed by. You. Know subsequent

46:12

days where you are kind of your

46:14

brought. To tears. By

46:16

the the stepping back the

46:18

you're able to do and

46:21

it reveals this observation of

46:23

other people. That.

46:25

I sinks. In I'm

46:27

like I'm supposed to be the one who

46:30

understands the brain. This seems to be. What

46:33

Free You is a tremendous example

46:35

of the physiologically life changing potential

46:37

of meditation. Because it's not just

46:39

the work that you did on

46:41

your since you and you said

46:44

you got home and it's not

46:46

that you didn't have arguments with

46:48

people or that you and. Your

46:50

wife don't have hard times

46:52

but the the perspective. That.

46:55

Shifted in the way that you

46:57

saw yourself, then shifted the perspective

46:59

with which you saw everyone else.

47:02

That's the part that I'll be

47:04

honest, I have no at experience

47:06

and I've been trying to manage

47:09

paid and like I'm gonna start

47:11

crying because like I like. In.

47:14

Of I am in a. I'm

47:16

in the safest bind with

47:18

myself. and when you interviewed

47:20

me, You. Said to me.

47:23

Name a diagnosis you haven't had.

47:25

Like why? And it's

47:27

interesting because it took me a caught me

47:29

so of guard. Not that I haven't thought

47:31

about it before. But. As I read

47:33

this book and especially because I knew I would get

47:36

to talk to you about it. I

47:39

realized. So. Many of

47:41

the diagnoses that I've been given

47:43

the pills I've been put on.

47:45

You know the that, eat this,

47:47

don't drink that you know. take

47:49

this supplement. Don't take this medication.

47:51

So much of that journey has

47:53

been this: Site. It's

47:56

this. Fight with the voices

47:58

in my head. the stories

48:00

that I was told and in many cases

48:02

the stories that I was conditioned with. And

48:05

for those of us who experience the kind

48:07

of life that I experienced, which I don't,

48:09

you know, I talk about in some detail,

48:12

for some of us, those patterns in

48:14

our brain are, they're so deeply

48:17

grooved. It is like

48:19

every piece of information that comes in

48:21

is just there to confirm the deepest,

48:25

most negative, penetrating stories

48:27

that I will repeat.

48:30

So when I read this, this was the part

48:32

that I said, I have

48:34

not had that. And

48:37

that is what I need

48:39

to keep me going

48:41

back to sitting again. I

48:44

think there's a lot to unpack here. So let's, let's

48:46

stay in the zone if you're okay with it for

48:48

a minute. You asked, I

48:50

really appreciate you saying everything you just did. And I

48:53

think this is what you were pointing at earlier when

48:55

you said, when you talked about something clicking for you.

48:58

Am I right about that? Mm hmm.

49:00

Okay. So I,

49:02

I mean, mainly that I'm a

49:04

gigantic loser. I don't have what Dan Harris

49:07

has, and I never will. Okay, that's a

49:09

story. I

49:11

know, I know. I'm kind of getting, not

49:13

really though. This might be a good

49:15

place to start. And then we can get back to

49:17

the you of it, because I'm very interested in this.

49:20

What was happening there for me, I think there

49:22

were two things that were happening that were are

49:24

easier to understand than the rather esoteric stuff, Jonathan

49:27

and I, and I were just talking about consciousness

49:29

or awareness, or the observer,

49:32

I think there are two very easy things

49:34

to understand in the moment that

49:36

you just read to us, that I think

49:38

relate directly, I think relate directly to what's

49:41

going on with you. The first was, as

49:44

you build up your powers

49:47

of concentration in meditation, as you're doing

49:49

this exercise of trying to focus on

49:51

your breath or whatever it is, getting

49:53

distracted, starting again, getting distracted, starting again.

49:55

After a while you, you're, you're you

49:58

kind of drag your brain. and

50:00

mind into the present moment and

50:03

you start to see something that we're all

50:05

aware of theoretically but not

50:08

aware of molecularly which is that

50:11

everything is changing all the time boom

50:14

boom boom if you really pay attention to

50:16

what's happening in your mind right now it's

50:18

thought seeing something feeling

50:21

my tush in the chair thinking another thing

50:23

hearing something in the corner of the room

50:25

thinking about what's for dinner based on that

50:27

and it's very rapid the mind is just

50:31

we don't see most of it because we're distracted

50:34

but you take away all of the

50:36

distractions and put somebody

50:38

in the middle of Marin County

50:40

in August 2010 with nothing else

50:42

to do and you know surrounded

50:44

by a bunch of old men

50:46

who look like wavy gravy you

50:49

you start to see what

50:51

the mind is actually doing when

50:54

undistracted by the stories so

50:57

that's the first thing the second thing is as

51:01

your mind is pulled out of

51:03

the self-centered stories and more open

51:06

to the raw data of

51:08

your senses you're less

51:10

self-centered you

51:12

have more bandwidth for other

51:15

people and

51:17

you mentioned my weeping I

51:19

that happened during a round of

51:21

loving kindness meditation which I had previously

51:24

dismissed as you know

51:26

inexcusably cheesy but

51:29

here I was envisioning people in my life

51:31

and sending them good wishes and I started

51:33

to weep which is not a common thing

51:35

for me and so

51:38

I'm I'm I'm saying all that

51:40

because I'm wondering whether this combination

51:42

might be useful for you and

51:44

for everybody one to see how

51:48

how the how rapid everything is in

51:50

your mind and in the world and

51:52

when you see that you can't help

51:54

but see that all of your stories

51:56

are impersonal and impermanent and

51:59

changing All the time too. And

52:02

then if you can if you can on hook

52:04

from some of these stories you have

52:07

more room more availability for what's

52:09

left which is the world.

52:13

That is any day these words

52:15

land for you no no no so that's really

52:17

helpful and i think also. You

52:20

know as a person who for most of my

52:22

life has been. In the

52:24

public eye right like when people like

52:26

most people don't really care as much

52:28

about you as you think they do

52:31

and i'm like well sometimes for some

52:33

of us. People care disproportionately about what

52:36

we wear who we date what

52:38

we say how much weight we

52:40

gain so there's this notion that.

52:43

You know for me and i think this kind of came

52:45

up when i got to speak to you and when you

52:47

know you sort of you know ask me those kinds

52:49

of questions like. I

52:52

think that there's there's a real

52:54

sense i think when we look

52:56

at celebrity in general of like gosh it's

52:58

such a self centered culture and Hollywood is

53:00

you know like it's a lot about like

53:02

let me talk for an hour about my

53:04

hairstyle that i'm going to wear for you

53:06

know the emmys or whatever it's a very

53:08

self centered culture that kind of. Celebrity

53:11

culture but then i think for for

53:13

those of us who happen to be. Very

53:16

sensitive people you know i'm a highly

53:18

sensitive person and i have this platform

53:20

you know where i do talk often

53:22

about things that are going on. There's

53:25

a real self consciousness because it does

53:27

feel very self indulgent you know

53:30

to say like i go to therapy and

53:32

i do this treatment and i try this

53:34

modality and i'm trying to fix myself right

53:36

and i'm getting to talk about it in

53:38

this public arena. But i think that that

53:41

that hit on something so important is

53:43

that we all have

53:45

that we all have this self

53:47

centeredness. Which we often

53:50

hide as this is

53:52

my diagnosis this is what's wrong with

53:54

me you should feel sorry for me

53:56

right it can manifest in so many

53:58

different ways but i think. that's, I

54:01

think that is getting more to the root

54:03

of it is that this kind of

54:05

meditation and doing it

54:07

with regularity because it is a

54:09

muscle, you have to practice it. That is

54:13

a skill that you then get to

54:15

learn, which allows you to take that

54:17

focus off of yourself.

54:19

Right? I mean, that's the goal. Yes.

54:21

The, the, there's this, I'm

54:24

sure my staff has a drinking game on this because

54:26

I say it all the time, but, um, I think

54:30

it's so beautiful. This is why I

54:32

say it all the time in Tibetan.

54:34

The word for enlightenment roughly translates into

54:36

the following, a clearing

54:38

away and a bringing forth. And

54:42

if you can clear away your stories

54:44

about yourself, your stories about

54:46

the people you resent, if you can just

54:48

start to see those as ephemeral bursts of

54:50

energy in the mind, you don't

54:52

have to attach to them as

54:55

much. That doesn't mean that

54:57

they don't have any relationship to the truth, but you

54:59

can not be so, you can

55:01

just turn the volume down on them. Let's say,

55:04

well, then what remains as

55:07

a social species, as an, as a species that,

55:11

you know, a natural selection, you know,

55:14

primed us for connection with

55:16

other humans, cause that's how we survive. I

55:18

think what, what's left, what's there to be

55:21

brought forth once you stop thinking about yourself

55:23

so much is other people.

55:26

And you know, we, we, you on

55:28

this show and me on my show, I

55:31

am I show, we talk a lot about

55:33

the ways to get happier, but from

55:35

what I've seen in the data, the number one

55:38

most reliable way to get happy is

55:40

to have good relationships with other people in your life. And it

55:42

is hard to do that if you have your head up your

55:44

ass, you know, if you're just constantly thinking

55:46

about yourself and we can call that ego and

55:49

often when we use the word ego, we talk

55:51

about positive stories, but ego can be negative too.

55:53

It can be a bunch of

55:55

stories about woe is me or,

55:58

or I'm broken. I'm

56:00

not as good as this person. I'm stuck in a

56:02

comparing mind, which by the way, social media is far.

56:04

Dan, get out of my head. You can't play that

56:06

game with me. Social

56:08

media is terrible for all of this. And

56:11

I have not just sympathy, empathy,

56:13

and compassion for this. I

56:15

feel have these feelings too. That full

56:17

human repertoire is available to me just as

56:19

it is to you. But

56:23

so I'm not here to criticize. I'm just

56:25

saying it's painful to be stuck in these

56:27

stories. And meditation is one of

56:29

many ways to get out of it. I

56:32

just had one last thing to

56:34

say about daily meditation is

56:37

incredibly helpful. We have a ton of evidence

56:39

to show this. And

56:41

you don't have to go on a meditation retreat if that

56:43

sounds horrifying for you. I wonder

56:45

if you can talk about the concept.

56:48

You talked about what

56:50

we can be taught through meditation. And

56:53

what I'm really kind

56:55

of moved by is this

56:57

is not a book about how to

57:00

get happy. Your platform is not about

57:02

happiness. The notion that

57:04

we can be 10% happier. The

57:08

goal of meditation though is not any

57:12

one particular thing. It's this sort of evolving

57:14

process. But you mentioned that

57:16

happiness is a skill that we can learn.

57:19

And that really stuck with me. Like

57:22

you said, we can teach old

57:25

dogs new tricks. But

57:27

it doesn't just come. You

57:29

have to work at it. Can you talk

57:31

a little bit about what that exercise is

57:34

that you have found through meditation and that

57:36

things like your app, which again, just signed

57:38

up for, what are

57:41

you actually teaching? Meaning what are

57:43

we learning that leads us to

57:45

say, this is a

57:47

skill. Like being happy, being 10% happier, is

57:51

something that I can learn to get to.

57:53

Yeah, I mean, I think of happiness. It's

57:55

such a loaded word. Talk about loaded words. it

58:00

as like an overarching

58:02

term that includes everything from

58:06

calm, connection, generosity,

58:10

gratitude, equanimity,

58:14

love. So it's a

58:17

catch-all term. It's not to

58:20

be confused with like the dopamine hit you get

58:22

from winning the lottery, which is I think what

58:24

people think of when they think of happiness.

58:27

But so how does, how

58:29

does, will you learning through meditation? I

58:31

think there's, there, it has, it

58:34

has many different benefits. And one of them is we

58:36

are so distracted and

58:38

part you can blame evolution for this

58:40

because having a racing mind kept

58:42

you alive and got your DNA into the

58:44

next generation. We were primed to be looking

58:46

for threats and food and

58:49

sexual partners. And, and so

58:51

we, we, the mind is kind of

58:53

flitting all over the place. And that

58:56

is exacerbated by technology these days. And

58:58

so meditation, this process of

59:00

just trying to focus on one thing, usually

59:03

the breath, and then getting distracted and starting again

59:05

and again and again and again, it

59:08

changes, it rewires the part of the brain

59:10

that regulates focus and attention. And so that's

59:12

one thing you're learning. The second

59:14

thing you're learning is we,

59:17

I keep using this word mindfulness, which

59:19

is just like the self-awareness to

59:22

see what's happening in my head, to see

59:25

how wild it is in there without

59:27

acting on it. And so, you know, I think most

59:29

of us, we're just controlled

59:31

by the malevolent puppeteer of our

59:34

thoughts. And, you know, we, we,

59:36

we have the thought, Oh, I should say this

59:38

clever thing that's going to ruin the next 48

59:41

hours of my marriage, or I should eat

59:43

that sleeve of Oreos. And then we just do it.

59:45

There's no buffer between the

59:47

stimulus, like our urge, and then our

59:49

blind reaction to it. And what I

59:52

think meditation teaches you is to react,

59:54

to respond wisely instead of reacting

59:57

blindly. And that's a huge skill.

59:59

And I think If you take these two

1:00:01

together, the increased

1:00:04

focus and the lowered emotional reactivity,

1:00:07

what that also ladders up to is

1:00:09

an increased sense of well-being and calm in

1:00:12

your life. And

1:00:14

it's not perfect. As you mentioned before,

1:00:16

I have bad days. I still get

1:00:18

into fights with my wife or have

1:00:21

business disputes. Earlier

1:00:24

today, I kind of didn't really snap at

1:00:26

somebody, but I expressed some frustration and

1:00:29

the person pointed out, like, you're actually spiraling for

1:00:31

no good reason. I was like, oh yeah, you're

1:00:33

right. I am spiraling for no good reason because

1:00:35

I hadn't gotten enough sleep or whatever. I

1:00:38

think all of that stuff is going to happen.

1:00:40

It just happens for me less frequently and I'm

1:00:42

much quicker to apologize. So I think

1:00:44

that's just one path that one

1:00:46

can go down if you learn to meditate

1:00:49

on my app or anywhere. Since

1:00:54

you said it's your job to fix things for people

1:00:56

about meditation, I'm going to bring something else up that

1:00:58

I'd like you to fix. I mentioned

1:01:00

falling down nine times and getting up 10,

1:01:02

which is this lovely notion that I'd love

1:01:05

to say is like, that's the story of my

1:01:07

life. But there is something

1:01:10

about meditation that

1:01:13

I think is really tripping me

1:01:15

up. And this came up kind

1:01:17

of throughout the book and I kept seeing it over

1:01:19

and over. You say

1:01:21

with extreme ease, like,

1:01:23

oh, if your mind goes elsewhere, don't

1:01:26

be judgmental about it. Just bring

1:01:29

it back and just start again. There's something

1:01:31

about this that like literally makes

1:01:33

my stomach feel like

1:01:35

it's getting tied in a knot and

1:01:37

it rises up. There's

1:01:40

something about this notion

1:01:42

that feels like failure to me. And

1:01:45

I think this literally might be

1:01:48

the place that I

1:01:50

keep getting stuck, meaning every time I

1:01:52

meditate, every time I'm trying to meditate,

1:01:55

it kind of feels like the first time. And

1:01:58

I keep doing it. doing it over

1:02:00

and over and I keep saying

1:02:03

like just one breath have one breath

1:02:05

where I can follow the in and

1:02:07

the out right but there is something

1:02:09

about this

1:02:12

level of just

1:02:14

start again it's okay that

1:02:16

makes me feel like it's

1:02:18

not worth it I can't

1:02:21

do this I

1:02:23

I am not whatever benefit

1:02:25

is waiting it

1:02:27

is beyond my reach and I'm

1:02:29

reaching and I'm reaching and I'm

1:02:32

like I'm doing vagal breathing while reaching

1:02:34

like I'm doing all the

1:02:36

different things but I think this is

1:02:38

a place that you make it sound

1:02:41

very easy and this is not easy

1:02:43

for me I don't think it's easy

1:02:45

for anybody so if I made

1:02:47

it sound easy that's a mistake

1:02:49

it's a it should be simple but

1:02:51

not easy that's the cliche um

1:02:54

but let me let me get let's let's let's

1:02:57

get under the hood here when you when you say so

1:03:02

when you get distracted in meditation and

1:03:04

then you notice the distraction instead

1:03:06

of just lightly

1:03:09

going back to your breath or whatever it

1:03:11

is that you've chosen to focus on in

1:03:13

your meditation right there

1:03:15

you just start feeling like a huge failure

1:03:17

and that causes resistance right so so

1:03:20

I'm gonna just I'm gonna pick an arbitrary you

1:03:22

know you talk about kind of raising that that

1:03:24

you know the the the baseline point right so

1:03:26

let's say I'm just gonna give you a number let's say I'm

1:03:28

at a 50 when I start right

1:03:31

every time I get pulled away it feels like

1:03:33

it's taking me down a notch

1:03:37

and and I get pulled away so much

1:03:39

that it's like I never feel like I'm

1:03:41

getting I'm getting the chance to

1:03:44

meditate it feels like

1:03:46

I'm never starting it feels

1:03:48

like it's always getting interrupted and

1:03:50

there's likely a story I'm telling

1:03:52

myself about that but I never

1:03:54

this is it I never feel

1:03:56

like I'm returning back to where

1:03:58

I started I've been taken

1:04:00

down a notch and

1:04:03

that keeps happening so then instead of

1:04:05

50 you know by the end of

1:04:07

a five-minute meditation I'm at like 22

1:04:09

you know okay so this

1:04:12

this is a you're actually doing a public service

1:04:14

by asking these questions so I appreciate it let

1:04:16

me take a couple things and then you tell

1:04:18

me if any of these land and if they

1:04:20

don't we can find something else one is I

1:04:23

hear in what you said some

1:04:26

expectations about how you want to feel

1:04:30

me this is very

1:04:32

common so I'm in no way

1:04:34

criticizing you and this is a

1:04:38

rabbit hole I've gone down many times and

1:04:40

we were saying before that meditation

1:04:43

like one of the big hindrances is

1:04:45

desire like wanting to feel a

1:04:47

certain way but meditation isn't about

1:04:49

trying to feel anyway it's

1:04:52

about feeling whatever you feel clearly

1:04:55

say that again say it again okay meditation

1:04:57

is not supposed to make you feel a

1:04:59

specific way mindfulness meditation in particular is not

1:05:01

supposed to make you feel you don't want

1:05:03

to go in with a goal of feeling

1:05:05

calmer or whatever you want to go in

1:05:07

with the goal of feeling whatever is there

1:05:11

why because the better you get at just being

1:05:13

cool with whatever is happening easier

1:05:18

your life is gonna be because the

1:05:20

problem in your life is rarely the

1:05:22

problem itself it's your resistance to the

1:05:24

problem and meditation helps you just

1:05:26

sit with whatever is happening

1:05:29

and you'll see like you don't need

1:05:31

a defibrillator you're okay you can feel

1:05:33

this thing you don't want to feel

1:05:35

and that is enormously

1:05:38

empowering the second thing is when

1:05:41

you notice the disappointment the

1:05:43

feeling of failure the judgment

1:05:46

instead of getting lost in it that's

1:05:48

just another thing to be mindful of

1:05:51

you can make a little mental note in your mind

1:05:53

this is a this is a meditation

1:05:55

technique be paying attention to your

1:05:57

breath and then every time you get distracted you can

1:06:00

Oh my god, I'm really beating the shit out of

1:06:02

myself. Just make the little mental note in your mind

1:06:04

of judgment. Just put it,

1:06:07

so like a little soft, as

1:06:09

my meditation teacher says, whisper in the mind,

1:06:12

that's judgment. And maybe even sit with

1:06:14

that for a second. Oh, what does judgment feel like? Is

1:06:16

that a sinking feeling in my stomach? Is it, does

1:06:19

my head feel heavy? Oh, let's

1:06:21

just sit with this for a second. In

1:06:24

so doing, you're not, you're kind of

1:06:26

knocking yourself out of your identification and

1:06:29

wallowing in the judgment, and you're actually

1:06:31

just journalistically interrogating

1:06:33

what is judgment like. And

1:06:36

then once that passes, you can go back to your breath.

1:06:39

And then the third thing to say is, you

1:06:42

said, I never feel like I'm getting to

1:06:45

the actual meditation. But

1:06:48

what you're doing is textbook,

1:06:50

correct, gold star level

1:06:52

meditation. That is the

1:06:55

practice. Starting it's

1:06:57

humiliation after humiliation, except for I'm

1:07:00

saying that jokingly, because after a

1:07:02

while, it won't feel like humiliation. It will just be like, oh,

1:07:04

I'm getting to know my mind better. And

1:07:07

that what you're you are meditating correctly.

1:07:10

The Olympic level, perfect meditation,

1:07:12

it should be this process

1:07:15

of just seeing what the mind is

1:07:17

like over and over and over again,

1:07:19

it dropped the expectations, dropped the goals,

1:07:21

it's just being with whatever's

1:07:23

happening. And that is produces equanimity,

1:07:25

a kind of an

1:07:28

armor, like a bulletproof calm.

1:07:30

It's not I'm overstating it

1:07:32

because, you know, I've been doing

1:07:34

this for a few years and I still lose it

1:07:36

sometimes. But it just gives you

1:07:38

this resilience in the face of whatever's

1:07:40

happening in life that is incredibly valuable.

1:07:42

Do any of those words make sense?

1:07:45

Yeah. I mean, what

1:07:48

I hear is I mean,

1:07:51

it's a little bit it's a little bit

1:07:53

circular in that I'm doing it right, but

1:07:55

I don't think I'm doing it right. So

1:07:58

the the actual wrong thing. is

1:08:01

that I think I'm not doing it right.

1:08:03

The wrong thing is the expectation to

1:08:05

feel a certain way. That's what I mean, right. And

1:08:08

that's another thing you can note. Just

1:08:10

note it as desire, because that's what it

1:08:12

is. You're wanting to feel a certain way.

1:08:14

But that is the primary

1:08:17

obstacle. And so anything

1:08:19

can be co-opted and included in

1:08:21

your meditation, whatever you're seeing. Just

1:08:24

let's give it a look. My meditation

1:08:26

teacher, who you

1:08:28

mentioned, Sharon Salzberg, she

1:08:30

lives in a house that is connected

1:08:32

to another house, where my teacher lives,

1:08:34

Joseph Goldstein. And

1:08:37

Joseph talks about it like

1:08:39

a Dharma shootout, like

1:08:42

a little like, like a

1:08:44

gentle nerf gun you're firing at all of

1:08:46

these neuroses, just like judgment wanting.

1:08:51

And just you're firing off these kind of humorous

1:08:53

little notes, and

1:08:56

the more clearly you see these

1:08:58

things, that's the getting up

1:09:00

on water skis that we mentioned before. Okay,

1:09:03

so that's what I was gonna ask you. So

1:09:06

let's say I'm able to

1:09:08

start quieting some of these

1:09:10

expectations, right. Also

1:09:13

the sort of psychology term for what's happening is

1:09:16

these are all parts, right. Like in the internal

1:09:18

family says, these are all the parts of you. We

1:09:20

have a part that's judgmental. We have a

1:09:22

part that feels weak. We have a part

1:09:25

that feels lonely, right. So once these parts,

1:09:27

you know, kind of take a backseat, right,

1:09:29

for this period of time, well,

1:09:32

what one would hope happens

1:09:34

is that with regularity, meaning with some form

1:09:37

of consistency, the app will tell me what

1:09:39

I need to do, with

1:09:41

some form of consistency, what are my

1:09:43

goals here, Dan? It's gonna get

1:09:46

easier, more

1:09:49

pleasurable, I'm

1:09:51

gonna feel better. Like

1:09:53

what am I looking for? Over time,

1:09:55

the mind does get better at staying

1:09:58

focused and less distracted. That happens

1:10:00

okay and that's just because that's just

1:10:02

like a muscle it's like if you want

1:10:04

to lift the heavy weight you start light

1:10:07

and you consistently work up to it believe

1:10:09

you can do it do other things that

1:10:11

support that meaning like don't drink smoke and

1:10:13

eat junk food like. That's just

1:10:15

gonna happen that i think

1:10:17

also something people don't understand like you

1:10:19

have to practice it it's like a

1:10:21

muscle. Yes and then the

1:10:23

other thing that's gonna happen is not that

1:10:26

it's gonna get more pleasurable i can in

1:10:28

no way guarantee you that and wanting that

1:10:30

is a problem in and of itself what

1:10:32

i think will happen is you'll get more

1:10:34

okay feeling whatever it is you're feeling. Also

1:10:37

because of practice yes yes

1:10:39

but that's distinct from. What's

1:10:42

related to but not the

1:10:44

exact same thing as boosting your powers

1:10:46

of non distraction or

1:10:48

concentration. So separately will

1:10:50

probably also boost your capacity for mindfulness

1:10:52

and equanimity which is seen clearly what's happening

1:10:54

in your mind and being okay with it

1:10:57

and actually this is not a bad

1:10:59

little speaking of joseph goldstein one of the

1:11:01

little slogans or mantras that he recommend people.

1:11:04

Is it okay so you

1:11:06

can be sitting there meditating and

1:11:08

feeling shame doubt. Self

1:11:12

criticism frustration

1:11:15

and then if you can just remember to say okay i

1:11:18

can i can feel it i'll be fine. I

1:11:22

felt this my whole life and actually

1:11:24

been running from it and self medicating

1:11:26

and with whatever and i just didn't

1:11:29

want to feel this but like actually

1:11:31

this radical turning in place and

1:11:33

just being with it. Is

1:11:36

okay and i think what's gonna

1:11:38

happen to you over time is if you adopt

1:11:41

this attitude and keep up with the practice by

1:11:43

the way your persistence is admirable. I'm

1:11:46

nothing is not. Something

1:11:49

smiling if you if you just stick

1:11:51

with this i think what's gonna

1:11:53

happen is you're gonna get better not only while

1:11:55

meditating but in the rest of your life. I'm

1:11:58

just feeling the things you don't want to feel. that

1:12:01

often propel you to behaviors

1:12:04

that are not working for you. I do think

1:12:06

it's important because Mime paints herself

1:12:08

a certain way and I'm not saying

1:12:10

that what she's describing is

1:12:13

not true and not her experience. However,

1:12:16

as an outside observer, I've

1:12:19

seen over the even the last three years

1:12:23

drastic differences in her

1:12:26

in terms of reactivity, in terms

1:12:28

of general overall peace

1:12:30

of mind, going from

1:12:32

someone who definitely was a self-admitted

1:12:35

workaholic, filling every ounce of

1:12:37

her day, especially with a TV

1:12:39

schedule and then podcasting and parenting

1:12:41

where there was almost no time

1:12:43

to have downtime. And she's

1:12:46

also one of these people who has

1:12:48

an enormous awareness

1:12:50

of how she's feeling when she

1:12:53

does settle into herself. If

1:12:55

you get her in a

1:12:57

contemplative moment, her

1:13:01

vocabulary about what's happening in her inner

1:13:03

world is so vast that I think

1:13:05

it's important to just qualify

1:13:07

some of her self-deprecating humor with

1:13:09

the intensity of work that she

1:13:11

has in the awareness that she

1:13:14

shows off and off camera. Yeah,

1:13:17

no, I'm glad you said that because I can

1:13:19

be like Mime and that I

1:13:21

can in

1:13:24

a desire and I think largely a helpful

1:13:26

desire to normalize difficult feelings

1:13:28

and various diagnoses and conditions in

1:13:30

a healthy desire to do all

1:13:33

of that and to get some

1:13:35

help from myself. I can talk

1:13:38

about my experience and my behavior, my

1:13:40

being in the world in ways that

1:13:42

are maybe a little too hard

1:13:44

on myself and maybe that's happening

1:13:46

with Mime a little bit too. First

1:13:49

of all, thank you. And I

1:13:52

wonder if you can be even one

1:13:54

more level of specific for

1:13:56

me. And I don't just mean for me, but I

1:13:58

mean for someone like me who's... struggling

1:14:00

with certain aspects. In

1:14:03

meditation for a fidgety skeptics, there's

1:14:05

meditations throughout. Meditations I've never even

1:14:07

thought of. They

1:14:09

all start with the same kind of

1:14:12

basic premise, but there's different focus

1:14:15

for each one. And I

1:14:17

was particularly intrigued by the

1:14:19

do nothing meditation. And it had

1:14:23

never occurred to me that that's a style of

1:14:25

meditation. And throughout the book, there's also little icons

1:14:27

that I think relate to the app. So you

1:14:30

can actually pull them up, which I'm really excited

1:14:32

to do. But I wonder,

1:14:34

I was very interested. Well, investigating

1:14:37

patterns was interesting to me. Do

1:14:39

nothing was interesting to me. Surf,

1:14:41

the urge was interesting to me.

1:14:44

Given what I've told you about things that are challenging

1:14:46

for me, is

1:14:48

there a type of meditation that in

1:14:50

your experience might be a good one

1:14:52

for someone like me to start with

1:14:54

someone who really struggles to get past

1:14:56

the first breath? Yes, I'm glad

1:14:58

you're asking this because because the thought I've

1:15:00

been having along is actually does go back

1:15:03

to love and kindness meditation. Oh, Jesus, Dan.

1:15:05

Well, okay. Well, let me let me give

1:15:07

you an alternate way to do it. Because

1:15:10

a lot of people struggle as

1:15:13

a result of the fact that traditionally

1:15:15

the instructions are start with yourself and

1:15:17

send yourself loving kindness. That

1:15:19

actually comes from Asian cultures where

1:15:21

people don't actually hate themselves

1:15:24

as much generally. In

1:15:27

fact, there's a classic story about

1:15:29

the Dalai Lama being asked by

1:15:32

Sharon Salzberg, what is

1:15:34

his advice for self hatred? And he turned to

1:15:37

his translator, he didn't

1:15:39

understand the concept. So

1:15:41

in the East, it makes sense to start with

1:15:43

yourself. But in the West, a

1:15:45

great hack is to begin your

1:15:48

loving kindness meditation with what's called an

1:15:50

easy person. So I

1:15:52

would say so from from my own

1:15:54

loving kindness meditation, I will sit

1:15:57

quietly, close my eyes. I

1:16:00

will bring to mind, I actually do two

1:16:02

easy people to start my practice. So I

1:16:04

start with, we have a new kitten,

1:16:06

his name is Curtis. I start with

1:16:08

Curtis and I envision

1:16:10

him and

1:16:13

then maybe like lazing in a

1:16:15

sunspot and then I repeat the four phrases,

1:16:18

may you be happy, may be

1:16:20

safe, may be healthy, may

1:16:22

you live with ease. Then

1:16:25

I got a little bit of juice flowing and then I actually

1:16:27

go to my son who's nine and he's hilarious, he loves to

1:16:29

make fun of his dad and I

1:16:31

picture him and may

1:16:33

be happy, safe, healthy,

1:16:36

live with ease. Then I

1:16:39

do a little bait and switch, then

1:16:41

I put myself in and

1:16:43

then I go on with the

1:16:46

progression to a mentor,

1:16:49

my dad, a

1:16:51

neutral person, somebody I might overlook

1:16:54

like a, who I see all

1:16:56

the time but I might overlook. And

1:16:58

then finally, then two more, a

1:17:00

difficult person, best not to pick

1:17:02

like whole pot or somebody like

1:17:04

really, really horrible, like mildly annoying

1:17:07

is the right framework for

1:17:09

that category. And then finally,

1:17:12

all beings everywhere. And there are a couple of

1:17:14

reasons why I recommend this. First

1:17:16

is this technique is really

1:17:18

good for distractibility. It

1:17:21

is classically used as a practice

1:17:23

that helps you hone your

1:17:26

ability to stay focused, which is one of the

1:17:28

frustrations I'm hearing from you in your breath

1:17:30

oriented practice. And so this might be a

1:17:33

good on ramp for you because it's

1:17:35

great for concentration. And the second is it's

1:17:38

gonna, it may be annoying at first

1:17:40

and for me it's still annoying, but

1:17:42

over time, and again, there's been a lot

1:17:45

of scientific research into this particular practice that's been

1:17:47

shown to change people's physiology,

1:17:49

psychology, and even behavior. Preschoolers

1:17:51

who were taught this practice are more likely to give

1:17:53

their stickers away to kids they don't like. Over

1:17:57

time, this will make your inner

1:17:59

weather. Balmere

1:18:02

and so it requires a little faith a little

1:18:05

Stick to it ofness, but if the if

1:18:07

you're if you're feeling like a frustrated and stuck

1:18:10

around this meditation practice that you're doing

1:18:12

now I think

1:18:14

this would be a great place to start. You don't have to

1:18:16

listen to me, but oh, I'm gonna listen to you It's

1:18:19

nice because it's active, you

1:18:21

know, there's and that there's a

1:18:23

creative activity there that Involves

1:18:26

both the mind and and your

1:18:28

emotions and the interplay But

1:18:31

sometimes when you just have to sit in silence

1:18:33

and try to not think

1:18:35

or only focus on the breath It can feel

1:18:37

overwhelming where something like this is a

1:18:39

little bit more active. I agree

1:18:41

totally and one quick thing to say that that

1:18:44

a transformative piece

1:18:48

of advice to have in your

1:18:50

head as you go into this practice is

1:18:52

you don't need to feel any specific way

1:18:54

even When you're picturing the easiest

1:18:56

person and you might find that you feel

1:18:58

nothing. That's totally fine The goal here is

1:19:00

not to gin up any specific emotion. It's

1:19:03

just to do the practice Let

1:19:05

it take care of itself So don't worry

1:19:08

if even even if you're like it's not

1:19:10

uncommon for people to do this practice and

1:19:12

feel Nothing or negative

1:19:14

or whatever it that doesn't matter.

1:19:16

It's just do it and over

1:19:18

time. It's like you're working I

1:19:21

was on Nick Cannon's erstwhile TV show a

1:19:23

couple months ago and I said this is

1:19:25

practice that Helps

1:19:28

you grow your love muscle and he said

1:19:30

that sounded pornographic to him, but you

1:19:32

get you get my point. Yes Dan

1:19:37

it has been such a pleasure to get to talk to

1:19:39

you and I really appreciate you letting me Literally

1:19:41

pick your brain and use you as my meditation

1:19:43

therapist If you have not

1:19:46

read 10% happier, I have to

1:19:48

tell you it's time. It is

1:19:50

time to read 10% happier How

1:19:53

I tame boys in my head reduced stress

1:19:55

without losing my edge and found self-help It

1:19:57

actually works a true story and also meditation

1:19:59

for fidgety That takes is delightful

1:20:01

and follows literally a road trip

1:20:03

that that it's even third to

1:20:06

bring his meditation to the masses

1:20:08

of. And it has all of

1:20:11

these. Incredible! Really helpful meditation throughout. It's

1:20:13

really such an honor to get to talk

1:20:15

to more. I appreciate your candor and of

1:20:17

really allowing us to be so open with

1:20:19

you and very vulnerable. I'm I'd like to

1:20:22

say that your book taught me to do

1:20:24

that though. Thank you so much Thank you

1:20:26

so much! Ram Mail is is super fun

1:20:29

and I appreciate your candor like us. You.

1:20:32

You beat yourself up for this little bit. but. You.

1:20:34

Know because I think maybe you think you're whiny or

1:20:36

something. I have the opposite view I

1:20:38

think. That. When people have a public foot

1:20:40

platform and they're. Brave. Enough to

1:20:43

use it to talk about what's going on for

1:20:45

them. It gives everybody a permission to be a

1:20:47

mess. Because. That's the human

1:20:49

condition and so I see. This is a

1:20:51

public service on your part. so. It's.

1:20:53

Great to talk to you and Bravo! I

1:20:58

did not expected to do. Here is about the

1:21:00

things that I just voted in Harris about. I

1:21:03

treated. Him like he was my

1:21:05

freakin' meditation therapist. I had to.

1:21:07

You know when you're talking because normally I'm your

1:21:09

therapist on the show. I

1:21:12

heard a lot of expectations

1:21:14

and rewriting of narratives. That.

1:21:16

Your bumping up against and you're sitting

1:21:18

down your meditating. There's no reason why

1:21:20

you should have to be so hard

1:21:22

on yourself. You. Know I

1:21:24

really, I think I think we need. I

1:21:27

think I'm gonna start. using.

1:21:29

The app. And I think we need to start

1:21:31

cataloging this. Because. I think it's

1:21:34

a journey that I feel for

1:21:36

some reason when I read this

1:21:38

book and revisited it, I was

1:21:40

like I get a thing that's

1:21:42

missing. An in the gentlest

1:21:44

way possible. I think this a try

1:21:46

and do it. Else. Within should

1:21:48

catalog all the narratives that you

1:21:50

have while you're meditating. Bring.

1:21:53

them to the podcast will do a short

1:21:55

form where i rewrite them for you and

1:21:57

then you have to do them aloud will

1:21:59

be a know form of mantra

1:22:01

specifically designed based on your

1:22:03

personal personal narratives. Jonathan,

1:22:06

I think first of all that that would be

1:22:09

an amazing book that possibly only my mother

1:22:11

would purchase, but I also

1:22:13

think that it's such a it's such

1:22:15

a boutique thing. We could have people

1:22:17

send us their horrible narratives about themselves.

1:22:20

Jonathan will turn them inside out and

1:22:22

will send it back to you and

1:22:24

we will fix people through meditation one

1:22:26

person at a time. I'm so

1:22:29

into this. Everything is changing all the time.

1:22:31

Just because you believe something one minute doesn't

1:22:33

mean that you will believe it the next.

1:22:35

Also that man's got a great head of hair. I'm

1:22:38

really sorry he's not on television anymore. Great head of

1:22:40

hair. Great voice. Great head of hair. I mean

1:22:43

how did he I feel like he was three

1:22:45

years old and he had that voice. It's like

1:22:47

what else are you gonna do in life besides

1:22:50

become a newscaster. It's unbelievable. Captivating. If you're

1:22:52

not watching this you didn't notice how

1:22:54

he leans in when he's paying attention.

1:22:56

Great. Just like the Dalai Lama did when

1:22:58

the Dalai Lama met him. We didn't get

1:23:00

to ask him what MDMA provided that he

1:23:02

was missing, but we'll do a follow-up. Maybe

1:23:04

we'll do an Instagram live. No,

1:23:07

but he actually hinted at

1:23:09

it. He hinted at that sense

1:23:11

of love, that sense of bigness,

1:23:13

that sense of being of service

1:23:15

to other people as an act

1:23:17

of meditative love. I totally get

1:23:19

it and I also think meditation

1:23:22

is a much more predictable way

1:23:24

to get there than ecstasy, but

1:23:26

that's just my opinion. From our

1:23:28

breakdown to the one we hope you never have. We'll see you

1:23:30

next week.