10% Happier with Dan Harris

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.

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Cognitive scientist Maya Shankar talks about how to get comfortable with uncertainty in an ever-changing world.

It seems like a design flaw in our species that we live in a world of constant change yet most of us are not comfortable with uncertainty.

In this episode, we talk to Maya Shankar about how to get better at dealing with change and to stop seeking what scientists call "cognitive closure."

Shankar is a former Senior Advisor in the Obama White House, where she founded and served as Chair of the White House Behavioral Science Team. She also served as the first Behavioral Science Advisor to the United Nations, and is currently a Senior Director of Behavioral Economics at Google. She is the host of the Pushkin Industries podcast A Slight Change of Plans, which was named Best Show of the Year in 2021 by Apple.

In this episode we talk about:

• Why humans are so uncomfortable with uncertainty and change
• What a behavioral scientist actually does in the world
• Why even the host of a podcast about change isn't immune to the uncertainties of life
• The benefits of cultivating a more malleable sense of self
• Why humans are such bad forecasters
• The importance of auditing yourself when you're undergoing a big change
• How to take advantage of big reset moments
• The concept of cognitive closure and why encouraging an open mind can make us more resilient

Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/maya-shankar-466

Where to find Maya Shankar online:

Website: mayashankar.com

Social Media:

• Twitter
• Facebook
• Instagram

Books Mentioned:

• The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language
• Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness
• Stumbling on Happiness

Additional Resources:

Download the Ten Percent Happier app today: https://10percenthappier.app.link/install

There's a great podcast we want to introduce you to today, hosted by our friend Rachel Martin at NPR. It's her new show, called Wild Card, which she describes as "part-interview, part-existential game show." It's a different way of approaching a celebrity interview, with a special deck of cards that helps shape the conversation. It's a really fun show, and she talks to some really big names, including David Lynch, LeVar Burton, Issa Rae, and US Poet Laureate Ada Limon.

Rachel was also a guest on this very podcast recently, and we had a great conversation and even played a little bit of the card game, so go back in your podcast feed and check that out. You can also listen to it here.

The Wild Card episode we're sharing with you today features Taylor Tomlinson, who has found the kind of success many comedians dream about, with multiple Netflix specials and a late-night hosting gig — After Midnight on CBS. She tells Rachel that part of the secret to her success is fear. They also swap stories about their Christian upbringings, the search for validation and getting things stuck up their noses.

So enjoy this episode, and check out Wild Card wherever you find your podcasts.

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.

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Cultivating resilience in the face of whatever comes up.

Ethan Nichtern is the author of Confidence: Holding Your Seat through Life's Eight Worldly Winds and several other titles, including the widely acclaimed The Road Home: A Contemporary Exploration of the Buddhist Path. A renowned contemporary Buddhist teacher and the host of The Road Home Podcast, Nichtern has offered meditation and Buddhist psychology classes at conferences, meditation centers, yoga studios, and universities, including Brown, Yale, and NYU. He has been featured by CNN, NPR, the New York Times, Vogue, and Business Insider and has written for the Huffington Post, Beliefnet, Lion's Roar, Tricycle, Buddhadharma, and more. He lives in Brooklyn. Visit him online at http://www.EthanNichtern.com.

In this episode we talk about:

• Authentic vs performative confidence
• The line between humility and confidence
• A Buddhist list called the Eight Worldly Winds
• A slew of little practices you can do in order to boost your confidence (or resilience or equanimity)
• The meaning of self-confidence in a tradition that argues the self is an illusion

Related Episodes:

• A Buddhist Approach to Money Worries | Ethan Nichtern
• The Dharma of the Princess Bride | Ethan Nichtern
• How To Get Ahead At Work, Buddhist-Style | David Nichtern
• #574. Do You Feel Like an Imposter? | Dr. Valerie Young (Co-Interviewed by Dan's Wife, Bianca!)

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Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://happierapp.com/podcast/tph/ethan-nichtern-819

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.

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Smart and practical strategies for living, in Maria's words, wonder-smitten by reality.

Maria Popova thinks and writes about our search for meaning — sometimes through science and philosophy, sometimes through poetry and children's books, always through the lens of wonder. She is the creator of The Marginalian (born in 2006 under the name Brain Pickings), which is included in the Library of Congress permanent digital archive of culturally valuable materials, author of Figuring, and maker of the live show The Universe in Verse — a charitable celebration of the wonder of reality through stories of science winged with poetry, which is now also a book.

In this episode we talk about:

• Wonder as a tool for improving all of your relationships
• The tyranny of the word should
• How the hardest thing in life is not getting what you want, it's knowing what you want
• Why she doesn't believe in making meditation a tool, even though she's been practicing for 14 years
• The illusion of certainty
• The immense value of intellectual humility
• Strategies for outgrowing your old habits
• Her new book, The Universe in Verse, which is a combination of science and poetry

From The Marginalian: How to Love the World More: George Saunders on the Courage of Uncertainty

Related Episodes:

• Bill Hader on Anxiety, Imposter Syndrome, and Leaning Intro Discomfort
• The Science Of Getting Out Of Your Head | Annie Murphy Paul
• George Saunders on: "Holy Befuddlement" and How to Be Less of a "Turd"
• The Profound Upside of Self-Diminishment | George Saunders
• A Radical Approach to Productivity, Self-Compassion Series | Jocelyn K. Glei

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Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://happierapp.com/podcast/tph/maria-popova-818

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.

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The radio stalwart addresses life's biggest questions.

Rachel Martin is the co-creator and host of the podcast Wild Card, an interview game show about life's biggest questions. She invites notable guests to play a card game that lets them open up about the memories, insights, and beliefs that have shaped their lives.

Martin spent six years as a host of Morning Edition, and was the founding host of NPR's award-winning morning news podcast Up First. She previously hosted Weekend Edition Sunday. She served as National Security Correspondent for NPR, where she covered both defense and intelligence issues, and also worked as a NPR foreign correspondent. Martin also previously served as NPR's religion correspondent.

In this episode we talk about:

• How to survive the news
• How to make a huge career pivot
• What it's like to become an orphan as an adult
• Insomnia and meditation
• How to decide what matters in your life
• We play the game Wild Card!
• We talk about how good we are at being wrong
• And lastly, something light… mortality and the infinite universe.

Related Episodes:

3 Buddhist Strategies for When the News is Overwhelming | Kaira Jewel Lingo

How To Find Meaningful Work in a Rapidly Changing World | Bruce Feiler

Why We Panic: A Journalist Investigates Anxiety, Fear, and How To Deal With It | Matt Gutman

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Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/tph/podcast-episode/rachel-martin

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers

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Lessons learned from the psychiatric hospital

We've got a fascinating and very personal discussion today about the often very painful gap between the way you feel on the inside and the way the world perceives you. We also cover the urgency and difficulty of sitting with your own discomfort.

Anna Marie Tendler is an artist and writer. She is also the author of a new memoir called 'Men Have Called Her Crazy'.

In this episode we talk about:

• The circumstances of her checking into a psychiatric hospital in 2021
• The difference between our interior emotions and our exterior selves
• The help she found through Dialectical Behavior Therapy – DBT
• We dive into a very specific theme of the book – and its title – the insidious ways in which men have impacted her life.
• And lastly, how she found a way to sit with discomfort and pain, while showing up in the world authentically to herself.

Related Episodes:

#510. Me, a Love Story: How Being OK With Yourself Makes You Better at Everything | Sharon Salzberg

The Science Of Speaking Up For Yourself | Elaine Lin Hering (Co-interviewed by Dan's wife Bianca!)

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Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/tph/podcast-episode/anna-marie-tendler

A personal program for working with election-induced anxiety.

We're dropping a special/experimental pod today, because we know a lot of you are freaking out about the election — so Dan's going to talk through some strategies he is personally using to keep it together during this turbulent time.

Additional Resources:

Podcast episode with Bill Doherty (Braver Angels)

Feedback form: let us know what you think!

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Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/tph/podcast-episode/dan-harris-election

Additional Resources:

• Download the Ten Percent Happier app today: https://10percenthappier.app.link/install

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.

Dan dweebs out with a dad rock icon.

Jeff Tweedy is the lead singer and songwriter of the Grammy award winning rock band, Wilco. The band have put out 13 albums… and shortly after this interview was conducted, the band put out a new EP. Jeff has released two solo albums and has written three books, including his latest, which is called World Within A Song: Music That Changed My Life And Life That Changed My Music.

This interview is part of an occasional series we do called Boldface, where we talk to well known people who are willing to go there. We've already dropped two Boldface episodes this week: the rapper and author Common and the actress, activist and author Goldie Hawn.

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Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://happierapp.com/podcast/tph/jeff-tweedy-813

Additional Resources:

• Download the Ten Percent Happier app today: https://10percenthappier.app.link/install

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.

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This multi-hyphenate opens up about his four pillars of health and success

Common is an Oscar, Golden Globe, Emmy, and Grammy Award–winning music artist. He is an actor and producer, and has appeared in numerous critically acclaimed films, as well as hit TV series. He is the author of One Day It'll All Make Sense and Let Love Have the Last Word, which were both New York Times bestsellers. He was raised in Chicago and currently resides in Brooklyn.

In this episode we talk about:

• Common's relationship with self esteem growing up, and where he eventually found his own self worth.
• What it's like dealing with rejection as an artist
• His book 'And Then We Rise'
• The four different wellness pillars in his book; food, the body, the mind, and the soul
• The positive impact that therapy has had on his life
• What his meditation practice looks like
• The evolution of vulnerability in hip hop
• The evolution of vulnerability in his life
• And his relationship with spirituality

Related Episodes:

Rewire How You Talk To Yourself | Ofosu Jones-Quartey

#597. Mike D On: The Value of Failure, the Addictive Power of Adrenaline, and How a Beastie Boy Got Into Lovingkindness

#311 Karamo: How To Actually Do Self-Love

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Ten Percent Happier online bookstore

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/tph/podcast-episode/common

New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.

Don't be fooled by the bubbly public persona.

Goldie Hawn is an Academy Award winning actress, producer, director, and best-selling author. She's written two best-selling books, a memoir called A Lotus Grows in the Mud and then, more recently, 10 Mindful Minutes, which is for kids and parents. She is also the Founder of MindUP, a charity that equips children with mental fitness.

In this episode we talk about:

• How she got interested in meditation — a story that, like Dan's, involves panic attacks
• The power of curiosity
• What she means when she talks about God
• What it means to take a "brain break"
• Why jealousy has never really been part of her repertoire
• And how to make a romantic relationship last.

Related Episodes:

How To Live A Happier Life | The Dalai Lama & Dr. Richard Davidson

Sign up for Dan's weekly newsletter here

Follow Dan on social: Instagram, TikTok

Ten Percent Happier online bookstore

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Our favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular Episodes

Full Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/tph/podcast-episode/goldie-hawn

Additional Resources:

• Download the Ten Percent Happier app today: https://10percenthappier.app.link/install