#848: From Stress to Stillness — Guided Meditation with Zen Master Henry Shukman

This episode is part of a series called Meditation Monday. The teacher, Henry Shukman, has been on my podcast twice before. He is one of only a few dozen masters in the world authorized to teach Sanbo Zen, and now, he’ll be your teacher. In addition to my long-form interviews each week, every Monday I’ll bring you a short 10-minute or so meditation, which will help you for the rest of the week. Over this four-episode series, you’ll develop a Zen toolkit to help you find greater calm, peace, and effectiveness in your daily life. Henry’s app, The Way https://thewayapp.com/tim, has changed my life since I first started using it. Unlike other meditation apps, where you’re overwhelmed with a thousand choices, The Way is a clear step-by-step training program guided entirely by Henry. Through a logical progression, you’ll develop real skills that stick with you. I’ve been using it daily, often twice a day, and it’s lowered my anxiety more than I thought possible. As a listener of my podcast, you can get 30 free sessions by visiting https://thewayapp.com/tim and downloading the app. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Tim Ferriss?

  Hello, boys and girls, ladies and germs. This is Tim Ferriss. Welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show. This episode is a brand new experiment called Meditation Monday. That means in addition to my long form interviews each week, every Monday, I will be bringing you a short 10 minute or so meditation, which will help you for the rest of the week. Over this four episode series, you'll develop a Zen toolkit specifically to help you find greater calm, peace, and effectiveness in your daily life. The teacher, Henry Schukman, has been on my podcast twice before. He is one of only a few dozen masters in the world authorized to teach what is called Sambo Zen, and I have found this particularly interesting and effective. And now he'll be your teacher. I've been using Henry's app, The Way, once, often twice a day, and it has lowered my

• 0:45Tim Ferriss?

  anxiety more than I thought possible. As a listener of the show, you yourself can get 30 free sessions by visiting thewayapp.com/tim. So if you like what you hear in these meditations, which will be valuable in and of themselves, you can get 30 free sessions by going to thewayapp.com/tim. And for the time being, please enjoy this Meditation Monday with Henry Schukman.

• 1:09Speaker 01

  Welcome to this meditation with me, Henry Schukman, on working with stress. Stress is a universal human phenomenon, and it's terribly widespread today in the way we are conditioned and socialized and the way we lead our lives with a constant pursuit of productivity, et cetera. Many pressures on us all the time. I personally grew up with a lot of stress from a very difficult chronic illness throughout my childhood that was highly stressful. And the moment I started to meditate around the age of 25, it made a massive difference to how I dealt with stress. So I hope to share something of that right now.

• 1:53Speaker 01

  We might think of stress as a thing that we want to kind of eliminate, and there's a lot of research that meditation can greatly help with that. But it's a counterintuitive way. The way to reduce stress is not to fight it, it's actually to learn to allow it and include it. That is the meditative approach. So let's come into a comfortable seated position, and we'll see how this can work. Yeah, get yourself settled.

• 2:25Speaker 01

  Find a comfortable position. Close the eyes or lower the gaze with the eyes open if you prefer that. You know, make any micro-adjustments of the body that will help you settle in.

• 2:42Speaker 01

  Just be in a position that feels good to you right now.

• 2:51Speaker 01

  Let's take a deeper inhale, fill the lungs, and slowly let it out.

• 3:00Speaker 01

  Let the breath turn and once again fill the lungs. Hold it a moment and slowly exhale.

• 3:10Speaker 01

  And one more time, filling the lungs, holding a moment, and releasing.

• 3:20Speaker 01

  And letting the breath return to its natural rhythm.

• 3:25Speaker 01

  So we're going to begin by becoming aware of the body. Feel your feet on the floor or whatever surface is beneath them. Just sense the contact that they're making.

• 3:40Speaker 01

  Feel your seat below your buttocks and whatever they're resting on. Feel that contact and perhaps some pressure.

• 3:54Speaker 01

  And be aware of your head now. Just sense your head and let it be in a restful position.

• 4:05Speaker 01

  Now let your shoulders, arms, and hands relax. Let them go slack, let them hang like old ropes.

• 4:21Speaker 01

  Let your legs also be completely relaxed, loose.

• 4:29Speaker 01

  So both arms and both legs are really at ease. They're not doing anything, slack.

• 4:43Speaker 01

  And let the whole torso, the chest area, the belly area, and the whole back of the body, let it all be relaxed, at ease.

• 5:01Speaker 01

  So just see if you can get a quick sense of the whole body. May almost be like a mental image of the whole body. Just sitting here, being still,

• 5:16Speaker 01

  and coming into its own state of rest.

• 5:25Speaker 01

  So stress shows up as a physical sensation in the chest. Some research suggests 94% of people experience stress in the chest area, if they look for it as a physical sensation. So just see now, how's your stress level right now? Can you sense any kind of sensation in the chest that might be associated with it? Perhaps a certain kind of tightness, or a certain heat,

• 6:06Speaker 01

  or sense of activation in the chest,

• 6:13Speaker 01

  or weight, or density?

• 6:18Speaker 01

  Then just back off from that and bring your awareness to the surface of your whole rib cage, the skin around your rib cage. Let that sheath around the rib cage become soft and warm, like warm wax.

• 6:45Speaker 01

  Let it be warm.

• 6:50Speaker 01

  And notice that in its softness and its warmth, it can contain and allow any other energies that are within the chest area. So whatever other kinds of energy may be subtly arising in the upper torso, this softness encircling them, softness of our rib cage

• 7:33Speaker 01

  and of the sheath around the rib cage that's warm and soft, it can hold all energies. It can allow them. So we're not actually trying to get rid of anything. We're developing or rediscovering our capacity to allow any sensations that are uncomfortable or uneasy.

• 8:12Speaker 01

  There's a way in which we can already be able to allow them and include them. It's as if there's a part of us that has an inbuilt capacity for patience, for a certain flavor of kindness, of compassion for ourselves.

• 8:48Speaker 01

  We allow ourselves to be as we are, including with the stress we sometimes feel.

• 9:01Speaker 01

  And to notice that we can hold it, we can allow it, that actually de-stresses us. It wakes up a more patient and compassionate side to us. One that is already somehow welcoming of our very own experience, just as it is.

• 9:39Speaker 01

  So just resting for a moment more, with whatever warmth and kindness toward ourselves we can taste right now, not making any demands on ourselves, letting ourselves be as we are.

• 10:08Speaker 01

  Perhaps tasting just a little bit of well-being in spite of whatever difficult feelings we may be experiencing. There's another kind of well-being that's here for us, part of our makeup.

• 10:32Speaker 01

  Okay, let's gently start to come out of the sit, bring a little movement into the upper body. You might sway a bit from side to side, you can move the shoulders, raise the eyes, look around you, have a little stretch.

• 10:52Speaker 01

  Great, thank you so much again for joining me. Please feel free to use this and any of this little set of meditations anytime you like. Anytime you're needing a little hit of quiet, of calm, of resetting yourself, just go through any of these meditations and make them your own to use as and when you wish. Have a wonderful rest of your day.