How To Perform Under Pressure—With Both Peace and Confidence | Jim Murphy

A performance coach and bestselling author shares practical tools for thriving in crisis, shaving down the ego, and designing the life you want. #1 New York Times bestselling author Jim Murphy https://innerexcellence.com/ is a Performance Coach to some of the best athletes and leaders in the world. In addition to coaching professional athletes and executives, Murphy is the president of the Inner Excellence Freedom Project https://innerexcellencefreedomproject.org/about/ whose mission is to build communities to alleviate spiritual and physical poverty around the world. In this episode we talk about: A counterintuitive secret to performing under pressure How to "relanguage" the story you tell about yourself A crucial life question that everyone should be asking themselves Practical tools for "inner excellence" Jim's Four Daily Goals Cultivating non-attachment to results How to be less afraid of fear The "expect nothing" rule And the role of faith in his life Join Dan's online community here http://www.danharris.com/ Follow Dan on social: Instagram https://bit.ly/3tGigG5, TikTok https://bit.ly/3FOA84J Subscribe to our YouTube Channel https://bit.ly/3FybRzD Get ready for another Meditation Party at Omega Institute! This in-person workshop brings together Dan with his friends and meditation teachers, Sebene Selassie, Jeff Warren, and for the first time, Ofosu Jones-Quartey. The event runs October 24th-26th. Sign up and learn more here http://eomega.org/workshops/meditation-party-2025! Tickets are now on sale for a special live taping of the 10% Happier Podcast with guest Pete Holmes! Join us on November 18th in NYC for this benefit show, with all proceeds supporting the New York Insight Meditation Center. Grab your tickets here https://www.nyimc.org/event/great-cosmic-joke/! To advertise on the show, contact [email protected] or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/10HappierwithDanHarris Thanks to our sponsors: AT&T: Staying connected matters. That's why AT&T has connectivity you can depend on, or they will proactively make it right. Visit att.com/guarantee http://att.com/guarantee for details. Function: Our first 1000 listeners get a $100 credit toward their membership. Visit www.functionhealth.com/Happier http://www.functionhealth.com/Happier or use the gift code Happier100 at signup to own your health. Fabletics:  Treat yourself to gear that looks good, feels good, and doesn't break the bank. Go to fabletics.com/Happier http://fabletics.com/Happier, sign up as a VIP and get 80% off everything.

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:31Dan Harris?

  This is the 10% Happier Podcast. I'm Dan Harris.

• 0:46Dan Harris?

  Hello, everybody. How we doing? As somebody who once famously or infamously had a panic attack while delivering the news in front of 5 million people, I am deeply intrigued by the question of whether it is possible to perform with both peace and confidence while under massive pressure. That is the driving question behind the work of my guest today, Jim Murphy, who is perhaps best known for his book, Inner Excellence. There's a really cool backstory here. Before January of this year, very few people had heard of Jim Murphy or the concept of Inner Excellence. But then the star football player A.J. Brown went viral when he was caught on camera reading Jim's book on the sidelines

• 1:30Dan Harris?

  of a nationally televised Philadelphia Eagles game, which immediately propelled the book to bestseller status. And as you will hear, it also radically changed Jim Murphy's life, which at that moment was a little dicey. It's an amazing story, and you'll hear Jim tell it. A little bit more about Jim before we dive in here. He is a performance coach to some of the best athletes and leaders in the world. He began his career as a professional baseball player for the Chicago Cubs. Then he had some vision issues that ended his career. He went on to become a coach. He's worked with the Texas Rangers, the South African Olympic baseball team, and now with individual clients all over the world. In this conversation, we talk about counterintuitive secret to performing under pressure,

• 2:14Dan Harris?

  how to re-language the story that you tell about yourself, a crucial life question that everybody should be asking, a set of practical tools for Inner Excellence, Jim's four daily goals, cultivating non-attachment to results.

• 2:29Dan Harris?

  Harder than it sounds. How to be less afraid of fear. The expect nothing rule, which landed particularly hard with me. And we talk about the role of faith in Jim's life. We don't talk a lot about Christianity and God on this show because I'm neither a practicing Christian nor a believer per se in God, but I do value ideological diversity. And that's why I have guests, for example, like Father Gregory Boyle on the show. And as you will hear Jim explain, his advice can easily be followed by people who do not share his faith. You can think of it a little bit like when I interview Gregory Boyle, the famous Jesuit priest. You do not have to believe in God in order to adopt his brilliant advice.

• 3:13Dan Harris?

  Just a few things to say before we dive in here. Given that rewiring your inner dialogue is a key part of peak performance, we've got a guided meditation today that comes with this podcast tailored to this podcast. And it comes from our teacher of the month, Sabine Selassie. It's called How to Rewire Your Inner Critic. It's only for paying subscribers over on DanHarris.com. If you sign up, you'll also get weekly live meditation and Q and A sessions every Tuesday at four Eastern. The next one is with Seb. She'll be going live on October 28th. Next month, by the way, our teacher of the month will be Dr. Christiana Wolf, who's incredible. One more thing to say before we dive in. If you want to meditate with me in person, I've got two events coming up. There are a few tickets left for the meditation party retreat I'll be doing with Seb and Jeff

• 3:58Dan Harris?

  Warren and Afosu Jones-Cortez the weekend of October 24th at the Omega Institute in upstate New York. We do a mix of meditation, Q and A, socializing. There's also plenty of free time for yoga, massage, tennis, hiking, pickleball. You name it. It's a good time. If you can't make it to that, I'll be doing an event, an evening event in New York City on November 18th. It's a live taping of this podcast with the comedian Pete Holmes. It's a benefit for the New York Insight Meditation Center. If you want to come to either or both, there are links in the show notes. All right, we'll get started with Jim Murphy right after this.

• 4:35Dan Harris?

  If you care about supporting independent media, and if you care about being a node of sanity in an insane world, there are a few quick, easy, and free ways that you can support me and my team, which I would be really grateful for. One way to do it is to sign up for my newsletter, which comes out on Monday mornings. It's a little dose of sanity in your inbox at the beginning of a busy week. The second way to do it is to follow and subscribe to the show wherever you're listening or watching right now. That really helps. Three, share your favorite episode with a friend. This is a great and low-stakes way to connect with somebody in your orbit. And not for nothing, it also helps us grow. And all of these things take about 30 seconds, and they really do help. You will be supporting me and my team and our mission.

• 5:20Dan Harris?

  And I, as I said, would be immensely grateful. You can find everything we do at danharris.com. It's all right there. Thank you. I mean that seriously. We'll be right back with more show. If you care about supporting independent media, and if you care about being a node of sanity in an insane world, there are a few quick, easy, and free ways that you can support me and my team, which I would be really grateful for. One way to do it is to sign up for my newsletter, which comes out on Monday mornings. It's a little dose of sanity in your inbox at the beginning of a busy week. The second way to do it is to follow and subscribe to the show wherever you're listening or watching right now. That really helps. Three, share your favorite episode with a friend. This is a great and low-stakes way

• 6:04Dan Harris?

  to connect with somebody in your orbit. And not for nothing, it also helps us grow. And all of these things take about 30 seconds, and they really do help. You will be supporting me and my team and our mission. And I, as I said, would be immensely grateful. You can find everything we do at danharris.com. It's all right there. Thank you. I mean that seriously. We'll be right back with more show. Jim Murphy, welcome to the show.

• 6:29Speaker 02

  Thanks, Dan.

• 6:30Dan Harris?

  It's great to have you here. Can you tell the A.J. Brown story?

• 6:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was a really interesting, unique time in my life. My mom was dying. She's 91, had an amazing life, and I prayed that she would stop suffering. And so she died four days later. So January 12th was the wildcard game Eagles playing the Packers. January 16th is when she died. And that week, my life is kind of somber and slow and business was slow. And first time in years, didn't pay off my credit cards that month. So it was the most incredible change of scenery for me. And one thing that was really amazing was Sunday, January 12th is when the wildcard game was. So that afternoon, I'm walking around downtown Dallas. I'm there to lead a retreat.

• 7:18Speaker 02

  I look up the skyscraper and I feel like now it was God asking me. The question was, would you rather, and we'll get into your thoughts about that. Would you rather own this building straight out for whatever hundreds of millions of dollars it's worth? Or would you rather have written the book that you just wrote called The Best Possible Life? This book on the spiritual life? And I thought, no, I wouldn't trade it for hundreds of millions of dollars. That book I wrote, I'm really grateful to have written it. And so I thought, well, at least you got that, Jim. That's pretty cool. So walking around lonely downtown Dallas. And then a couple of hours later, sitting on my bed, watching my laptop. I was watching a bowl game, Notre Dame play Penn State. And then I look at my phone and I see all these texts. And so I thought my mom died.

• 8:04Speaker 02

  The text obviously said, you need to check out the wildcard game. Turn it on. And I looked at it and I was like, huh, I think this is going to be significant.

• 8:15Speaker 02

  It was very significant. My life completely changed on that day. But to finish the story about the skyscraper, a couple of days later, I'm in Philadelphia. I'm going to go to the next game, the snow game against the Rams. And this guy on the street asked me for some money and I didn't have any money. So I said, hold on right here. I'm going to run to the ATM, get some money. So I run to the ATM and try and get $300 out. It says insufficient funds, 200 insufficient funds, 100. I get the money, I find the guy, give him some money. The next day. My mortgage payment bounces, my checking account is negative. And it's not like I was at my last penny. I had money in savings or investments, whatever, but I just I don't check it very often and I didn't know where I was at. And that was the week we sell a hundred thousand copies and so.

• 9:00Dan Harris?

  All right, let me just reset for a second. So just to restate the basic facts here. As of January of this year, 2025, you are in a reasonably bleak scenario where business was slow. You were having non-trivial financial problems. Your mother was very ill. And you were in a strange city and feeling lonely. So having a pretty bad day.

• 9:31Speaker 02

  I wouldn't say non-trivial financial problems. It's more, I don't really check my finances too often. So someone else, they wouldn't have bounced it. I just didn't know, you know, I don't really look at it too often.

• 9:41Dan Harris?

  But you hadn't been paying off your credit card bills. So there was.

• 9:43Speaker 02

  That month is the first month I didn't pay off my credit cards. So yeah, the income was a little slow the last month or two.

• 9:50Dan Harris?

  Okay, so we've established that. And then in the middle of a Eagles, who were the Eagles playing that night?

• 9:56Speaker 02

  The Packers.

• 9:57Dan Harris?

  Eagles Packers game, star player A.J. Brown is seen on camera reading your book, not the book you had just written and published.

• 10:06Speaker 02

  Right.

• 10:06Dan Harris?

  But your earlier book, which I believe you wrote in like 2004?

• 10:10Speaker 02

  2009, it came out, McGraw Hill, and I got the rights in 2018. And republished it, worked on for a couple more years, part-time, and that came out in 2020. So it was only available on Amazon. That's the one that A.J. Brown was reading.

• 10:24Dan Harris?

  Okay, so he's reading it on the sidelines at a huge game.

• 10:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 10:27Dan Harris?

  And so there's a lot of eyeballs on this game. There are a lot of eyeballs on every NFL game, but particularly this game and.

• 10:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was studying that football. There's no other game that I know of. It was the game on Wildcard.

• 10:38Dan Harris?

  And so he's sitting there reading your book.

• 10:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, during the game. Yeah, I was as surprised as anybody.

• 10:43Dan Harris?

  And then he gets asked about it in the post-game press conference and says a bunch of very kind things about the book. And your life explodes in the nicest possible way.

• 10:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's right.

• 10:54Dan Harris?

  What a reversal of fortune. It's pretty incredible.

• 10:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think about that. Like I said, I think that was God asking me that. It was almost like this little test, like, are you in it for the money? Like, where's your heart, Jim?

• 11:07Dan Harris?

  So the moment where you're looking at the skyscraper, in your view, was a test?

• 11:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, kind of a question, where's your heart from God?

• 11:15Dan Harris?

  You've referenced God a couple of times. For one reason or another, it's quite rare that I have anybody on the show who's devout in that way. There's a guy I've had on the show twice, Father Gregory Boyle, who is this incredible guy, an author, and he works with past and current gang members in LA, just an incredible human being. But other than that, it's pretty rare that, because this is a Buddhist show, and there's no real God, and Buddhism, and we basically either interview scientists who are largely secular, or Buddhists who are not particularly secular from the outside, but like, actually, if you scratch, there's not a lot of theism in there.

• 11:54Speaker 02

  And you're a Jibou agnostic?

• 11:56Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 11:57Speaker 02

  Happiness meditation evangelist.

• 12:00Dan Harris?

  Yes, yes. So it's pretty rare that I'm sitting with somebody who talks about prayer in this way, and God in this way. No beef, but I'm just curious, when you reference God, what is your conception? Is it the God of the New Testament, of the Old Testament? Is it like, Father Boyle's conception of God is sort of a loving presence in the universe, but that doesn't necessarily resemble the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel? So where are you?

• 12:25Speaker 02

  Right, yeah, I believe that there's a God that created the universe, sent his son to die for us, and to be the model for us. Christianity is the model of sacrificial love, which you talk about a lot. So I'm looking forward to get into that. And so, trying to model my life after, you know, to become like the son of God, that's what I aspire to do.

• 12:47Dan Harris?

  I hear that as evangelical Christian.

• 12:50Speaker 02

  Well, that word has really taken on a unique meaning in the last, I'd say, five or 10 years, that maybe is a little different than it was a while back. But this book I just wrote, The Best Possible Life, is really, it's a book about the spirit-led life. So Interexcellence is based on the Bible. The fundamentals are based on the Bible. And The Best Possible Life is really getting deeper. Like, if you really want to go deeper and get to the core of, why is it so powerful? This is the explanation. And it's really about understanding that- To be a Christian, which is not really a word used in the Bible, but that's kind of a, I guess, a recent word. Thrilled to live a life of sacrificial love. That's the essence of it. And so I think a lot of times the word is really maybe meant something else to other people.

• 13:35Dan Harris?

  Yeah. So when I say evangelical Christian, I'm not talking about it from a political standpoint. Because I know that even I spent a lot of time with evangelicals who are very political, but I more mean it as. And this may be the perspective of an ignorant, unchurched person, but generally speaking, when somebody describes themselves as believing the basics of the Jesus story, Son of God, born, reborn. I classify that as an evangelical Christian.

• 14:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:03Dan Harris?

  I could be wrong about that, but that's just generally how I classify it. Because I know a lot of Christians who I don't think take the Jesus story to be literally true. Does that land with you, the way I think about this?

• 14:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's great. So, so one thing that I love about you is this 21 years with ABC and your kind of, I don't know if the word obsession is, but your devotion to empirical evidence. I love this.

• 14:26Dan Harris?

  I'm becoming less obsessed with it, but I definitely like to have a foot in that territory. I guess the, the point I want to establish here is my understanding, and you'll correct me if I'm wrong, is that the practical, actionable advice that you have in your books does not require one to be a believer in the same way you are.

• 14:48Speaker 02

  No, I mean, I think it's just kind of looking at Buddhism, for example. If you read Interexcellence, you'll go, wow, this guy, there's a lot of similarities to Buddhism.

• 14:57Dan Harris?

  There are actually. I noticed that.

• 14:58Speaker 02

  Yeah. And even maybe Hinduism or the Bhagavad Gita, a lot of similarities. And so the way I think about it, whether it's yoga or whatever, is there's some truths that people have learned through the centuries that are really powerful. It's like the universe is created a certain way, like with gravity, with certain laws. And when you understand those laws, then you can thrive. And so, you know, I think yoga is just this understanding of how the body works that is in Eastern culture has just really understood a lot better than American culture for that aspect of it.

• 15:32Dan Harris?

  Yes. So you're drawing upon.

• 15:35Dan Harris?

  Millennia of contemplative wisdom, you happen to have your view of spiritual truth.

• 15:43Speaker 02

  Right. And I mean, there's no two people that have the exact same view anyway.

• 15:46Dan Harris?

  Right.

• 15:46Speaker 02

  Right. So I have mine, but I don't push it on people. In fact, I had this one client who told me, he said, Jim, I drink, I smoke, I do all these things, gamble, whatever. I don't think you do those. Can we work together? And I said, look, if you don't judge me for not doing those things, I won't judge you for doing those things. And we became great friends.

• 16:03Dan Harris?

  All right. So that was a brief digression, but just to reset, you had written this book back in 2009, and then you'd written another book in 2024. But your business was pretty slow and all of a sudden AJ comes along and changes everything. But I want to talk about what you were teaching in both of these books that was so electrifying for AJ and now tens of thousands of other people who've gone back to look at your work. Maybe let's start with you and your professional sports career and then the decision you made in, I believe, 2003 or four to go to the desert. Can you tell that story?

• 16:38Speaker 02

  Yeah. So my whole life I've obsessed about being a professional athlete. Since I was seven, eight years old, I told everyone I'm going to be a pro athlete, whether it's in the NFL or NBA or Major League Baseball. And so I got drafted by the Cubs and it was a dream come true. But you know, whenever you have a dream, right next to it is the fear of losing it. And it was totally my identity. And I got injured and had to retire. And when I lost that career, I felt like I lost everything, my identity, like Jim Murphy, pro baseball player, my ego. And I define ego as a part of your mind that's always comparing, always threatened, never satisfied, that we all have. I was just felt so lost. I'm nobody. I felt like I was nobody now.

• 17:18Speaker 02

  And I want to talk to you about the five remembrances because the fifth one is about action. You are what you do, kind of, I'm kind of new to it. Because this is a big point in Inner Excellence. And so. I'm just kind of feeling so lost. And then I get asked, coach high school baseball team in inner city, Seattle, O'Day High School. And we go undefeated. I had no interest in coaching, just never thought about it. And didn't know if I could help anyone, or if I would enjoy it at all. And it was amazing. We won undefeated and just was like, oh, I love coaching. So then, maybe kind of similar to you, I have this kind of obsessive personality. And I was like, okay, so I just coached these 15 year olds. How do I go to coach the New York Yankees and win the World Series? How do I get there now? So I went through this kind of a longer term

• 18:00Speaker 02

  plan, like 10 year plan in my mind to get a master's in phys ed, so I can get a job teaching PE and coach the baseball team at a high school and win a state championship, get a job in university, do the same thing, and then get a job in the pros. And I ended up going to the University of British Columbia, playing football there, hadn't played for eight years. It was an amazing experience. Started a baseball team there as well. Got a job with the Texas Rangers two weeks after graduation. I was a personal trainer in grad school. And this kind of life coach said, let's go for a job right out of grad school in pro baseball, skip the first two levels, by getting to know the people that can hire you. So I send a snail mail letter to every major league team, every manager and GM, say, I'm studying how to build a championship team. I'd like to speak to interview you in person. So I did that. That actually became

• 18:42Speaker 02

  my first book, dugout wisdom, 10 principles of championship teams. And then I got a job with the Texas Rangers two weeks after graduation. And then I quit six months later midseason in tears.

• 18:53Dan Harris?

  Why?

• 18:54Speaker 02

  It just wasn't a good fit. One time I was assistant coach for the Savannah SandNets, now the Bananas.

• 19:00Dan Harris?

  Savannah Bananas.

• 19:01Speaker 02

  Yeah. After one of the games, he's saying this spiel to the team. And he's like, Murph, what do you got? And I said something. And then afterwards, he's like, Jim, when I say, what do you got? Don't say anything. And so in other words, they really just wanted me to put in my time and not really say anything. So that was hard for me. And there was just a lot of egos in pro baseball that was, two coaches almost got in a fistfight from our organization when I was there. And that's just kind of the culture that was I was in. And I felt like a total failure when I left. The realization came for me, we had a rare off day, and I was making probably 35,000 a year. Like, I mean, it's like you're 550 an hour, your first job. I was making my first job as a pro baseball player, I think I was making

• 19:46Speaker 02

  550 a month, 550 a month. So on a rare off day with the Rangers, I'm golfing by myself and I see this gal with a lineup of, you know, her cart for lattes. And I was like, what would I give to trade my life with hers? Have a little apartment here in Savannah. And I was like, okay, Jim, if that's what you're, where you're at right now, you need to quit. So I quit. And so devastated again, lost my identity. I have my identity completely wrapped up in my role and my actions. And then I get a call from Major League Baseball saying, would you like to coach South Africa, be their hitting coach for their Olympic trials? And so I fly down to South Africa, extraordinary experience, completely opposite. The head coach says, I was the hitting

• 20:27Speaker 02

  coach who said, they're your team. Coach them however you want. And so that was amazing. I'm still friends 25 years later. I'm still, we're still on a WhatsApp group with this team. It was the most incredible experience. I, well, I'd never seen poverty like that before. Our bat boy is living in the shit of our baseball field with his mother and little brother, Gift and Gupay, went on to play in the big leagues, Pittsburgh Pirates. I got to meet Nelson Mandela, marched in opening ceremonies. We had one of the biggest upset victories in Olympic baseball history, in the Sydney 2000 Olympics. It was an amazing experience. But then after that, what do I do now with my life? This guy who has this obsessive personality, I want to do something extraordinary with my life. And I went back to personal training for a couple of years. And then one day I was just getting really

• 21:10Speaker 02

  restless. And then my girlfriend just kind of said, Jim, what are you doing? I know you're restless. And that same time, my teammate in pro ball, Ricky Scruggs, my former teammate, he calls me and says, I'm starting a baseball academy in Tucson, Arizona. Can you come help me launch it? And then I just, this idea said, why don't you move down there, give away your possessions, move there, live a life of solitude and figure out what to do with your life. So that's what I did.

• 21:35Dan Harris?

  So you didn't do the baseball academy?

• 21:37Speaker 02

  I flew to Arizona to help him, the baseball academy in Tucson, give away most of my possessions, including my TV, because I knew that I didn't want to waste my time down there and be lonely and waste my time. So yeah, it was a lonely time for a couple of years. And when I was there, I decided to become a personal coach to pro baseball players and teach them how to have peace and confidence under pressure. First two athletes do amazing. Okay, I'm going to give them, put together a little manual for future clients on how to have peace and confidence under pressure. That becomes five years of full time writing and research. That becomes the book Inner Excellence.

• 22:10Dan Harris?

  I see. And you were obsessed with one question when you were writing Inner Excellence? Can you restate the question?

• 22:18Speaker 02

  Initially, I was just like, okay, I'm gonna write the best book ever written on mental toughness. So I decided to call up a sports psychologist and ask him, how can a pro baseball player, game seven of the World Series, bottom of the ninth, two outs, bases loaded, full count, how can that guy have peace and confidence under that sort of pressure? And similarly, how can an Olympic athlete train for four years for an event that may last less than a minute? How can she have peace and confidence with so much out of her control? I didn't really get the answers I wanted, so I called another psychologist and another and another, and that turned into five years of full-time writing and research. That became Interexcellence.

• 22:57Dan Harris?

  What's the punchline?

• 22:59Speaker 02

  Well, there's a couple of things that I learned in those five years, should I share with you?

• 23:04Dan Harris?

  Please.

• 23:04Speaker 02

  Well, the first thing I realized as I'm going down this rabbit hole of research was, I went there to go find something that I could devote my life to, that I was willing to live and die for, which I just didn't have. I realized, why would I devote my life to helping someone perform better, become a world champion or Olympic gold medalist, if it doesn't improve their life or make the world a better place? Like, your tattoo, F T B O A B.

• 23:31Dan Harris?

  Yeah, you have a good memory.

• 23:32Speaker 02

  For the benefit of all beings. And so, why would I spend my life doing this if it's not even meaningful? So I was really kind of caught in this quandary, like, I want to do something meaningful with my life. And then the thing that I learned changed my life. And what I learned was that the path to having the most peace and confidence under the most pressure is the same path as living the best possible life. For anybody. Both paths for anyone. And in fact, a lot of people in America and around the world have a lot more pressure than a pro athlete, because they're working two jobs, kids at home, they've got no coach like me to help them, to motivate them, give them some skills to work on, and they don't have massage therapists, they don't have an off-season.

• 24:16Speaker 02

  And so, yeah, this path is a wholehearted path. It's developing yourself, your spirit. When I say heart, I mean your spirit or your will, the deepest part of you, like your soul. And that's what Interexcellence is about, is this transformation of our human nature that is naturally self-centered to become someone who is, puts others first. Like in meditation, who responds with love rather than reacts with emotion. That's what Interexcellence is, this heart transformation to become someone like that.

• 24:51Dan Harris?

  Is it interesting? Because I can imagine the motivation of somebody who wants to be a champion. I can imagine the initial impulse would be pretty self-centered. I want to be on the winner's podium. I want to be the guy kissing the trophy surrounded by adoring crowds. What you're saying is actually the best way to get there is to shave down the ego.

• 25:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, absolutely. Well, it's really to understand what I mean when I say ego, because that can be very confusing. And like you've talked about, the holy grail is this non-attachment to results. But then we have the fifth remembrance, which is your actions are what matters. You've kind of shared how you've been wrestling with this idea, like serenity versus ambition. And this is really what Interexcellence is. I was at the Ryder Cup and a top 10 player in the world, golfer, he said, Jim, I'm too attached to my results. What do I do? And I said, well, answer this for me. Imagine there's a little kid who loves lollipops. And you want to take that lollipop from him very easily, where he readily hands it to you.

• 26:00Speaker 02

  Is there any way to do it? And he says, I don't know. And I said, what if you had a bigger lollipop? And you said, do you want to trade? What kid wouldn't want to trade, right? So you give him a bigger lollipop. And I said, that's what you need. You're obsessed about getting birdies and getting a good score and winning a match. And there's far too much out of your control. We need to focus on pursuing the life that you want to live, which means becoming the person that you want to become, which means this heart transformation. And having a bigger purpose for your life than just these temporary things that as you talk about in Buddhism or life is, you know, it's temporary, right? Everything is temporary.

• 26:42Speaker 02

  And so you need something beyond resultant circumstances if you want to have something that's going to really carry you under the pressure.

• 26:49Dan Harris?

  I think you might have just with those final words answered the question that was simmering in my mind, but I'm going to ask the question anyway. Just to say to the audience, I will explain the five remembrances for anybody who doesn't know what those are in a second, but let me just stay with the current flow of the conversation here. What I was wondering in my mind, which again, you may have answered it is how is it that to use your term transforming your heart will actually help you in crunch time, in bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, et cetera, et cetera?

• 27:20Speaker 02

  It's the respond versus react. We need to get to the subconscious level. So you're responding, not reacting. And so I think what you mean, and similar to what I mean when we say respond, not react, is react generally means this emotion that's not really in control. And respond means to respond in a way that's empowering, for example. And so we need to get to the subconscious level. And that's what's different between inner excellence and sports psychology, which is great, but we need to get to a deeper level than just your thoughts. We need to get to the heart and your subconscious, which work together. And so when you're squeezed, I always think about when you squeeze an orange, what comes out?

• 28:04Speaker 02

  It's orange juice 100% of the time. I was talking to my friend Darren McMaines. He shared this example with me. It's so true. And so when we're squeezed, when we're under pressure, what comes out of our mouth and our actions is what's in our heart, our spirit. That's why we need to train it. When you're under pressure, you're not really thinking about, and when you're performing your best, you're not thinking about what's happening. It's more of a subconscious thing, right? And so we need to get that subconscious connected, like you say, always trying to line up with a, I don't know if you say it this way, but. Align with the universe. There's an energy in the universe. And this is what interexcellence is. We're constantly trying to align with a power that's spinning the earth and growing the grass

• 28:48Speaker 02

  and, and holding the stars in place. There is a power that I personally believe comes from God, the Creator. It doesn't really matter. The truth is, there is this power that we can all connect with. And that's what heart transformation does. It connects with that.

• 29:03Dan Harris?

  Let me see if I can state this in my own words and you tell me if I'm in the neighborhood. Okay. When we're under pressure. So it could be for an athlete, big moment in a competition. But for a regular person, it could be giving a public presentation or having a tough conversation with our boss or our spouse or our kid. Or it could be just going through a crisis in our lives. When we're under pressure and we need to perform, we are going to be better able to perform if we've designed our life for maximal peace and confidence. And if you want to design your life for maximal peace and confidence, you will learn how to be less focused on yourself. Not in a catastrophically altruistic mode

• 29:48Dan Harris?

  where you're in a hair shirt, but plugged into the quality of your relationships in a service mode. As I sometimes say, the view is better when you pull your head out of your ass. Like, just not so stuck on your own petty concerns. Not to say that you never worry about yourself, but this kind of notion from the Dalai Lama that wise selfishness really is about being in service to other people. And that gives you the calm, the perspective to perform your best under pressure. Doesn't mean you're going to nail it every time, but it does up the odds that you will perform. How am I doing?

• 30:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's very, very good, very close, if not exact. So the human heart is created for love.

• 30:35Speaker 02

  Our greatest need is for love and connection. Most people spend their entire lives trying to get more, as I talk about inter-excellence, more possessions, more achievements, better looks, more money, more status. Their whole life trying to get these things improved so they can get that love and connection that they desperately want. And most people don't know that's why they're doing it. They just know that I'll feel better if I get this. And at least they think they'll feel better if I get these things. And so they're desperately trying to get that. And so the opposite of what we want most is rejection. And you've actually spent 48 hours in a place where the American penal system has understood this basic concept.

• 31:20Speaker 02

  The greatest punishment is solitude. It's this, you can't talk to anyone, see anyone, you're by yourself. How would you describe that?

• 31:30Dan Harris?

  Well, just to give some context, you're referring to the time that back when I was a TV news reporter, I spent 48 hours in solitary confinement in the Denver County Jail as part of a story on whether solitary confinement is a humane thing to do in a correction setting or any setting.

• 31:47Speaker 02

  This is a guy that goes all out, obviously.

• 31:49Dan Harris?

  Yes, yeah. Less so now, at least not in that way. Yeah, I think it's a horrible punishment. It goes right back to what you said before. It's funny because I was listening to you say these words and I was thinking this is the type of language that the old me would have just either reflexively rejected or tuned out or had some sort of gag reflex. When you say the human heart is designed for love, that is actually not a hallmark empty sentiment. If you think about it through the lens of evolution, and I'm not sure where you are on evolution, but if you think about it through the lens of how we developed as a species, we survived because we have this capacity to work together, to communicate, collaborate, cooperate.

• 32:32Dan Harris?

  And so in that sense, the human heart really is designed for love because without love, we're screwed. We're eaten by the tiger 100% of the time. And so, yeah, when you take that away in a pandemic or in a correctional setting, bad things happen to the human mind and heart.

• 32:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I think, you know, in many ways, we're always evolving. And so I think, to me, that's really, it doesn't matter. The truth is, like we talked about, very empirical, the truth is... Just think about the greatest moments in your life.

• 33:05Speaker 02

  What did you feel like there's love, right? These are the greatest moments in anyone's life. There's this love. And what's the greatest starro is when you're that love is gone. I mean, it doesn't take a scientist to understand this.

• 33:20Dan Harris?

  One of the things I talked about a lot on the show is that I have panic disorder and I get really bad claustrophobia and I've been doing a lot of exposure therapy in airplanes. And one of the things that my exposure therapist had me do was to make my wallpaper on my phone or my lock screen or whatever, a picture from the night before I retired, where my son and wife were hugging me.

• 33:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 33:46Dan Harris?

  There's a sort of cheesy concept or a cliched concept of safe place. What's your safe place? What's your happy place? That's what it is for me. And I think that is kind of universal. Like if we all interpolate back through our lives and think about, as you said before, like, when are you the most happy, the most fulfilled? It's gonna be when you feel connected.

• 34:07Speaker 02

  Can I share something you mentioned about, you called it my claustrophobia and panic or something? What do you think about not calling it yours?

• 34:16Dan Harris?

  I think that would be a really helpful move.

• 34:19Speaker 02

  In America today and around the world, there's so much anxiety. And one of the first things that I do when I work with somebody is I help them speak the truth. This is one of the nine disciplines of Interx1 that's not in the book, is to speak the truth about the past to create possibilities in the future. And so we want to make sure that we don't put labels on ourselves, that we don't want to be in the future and we don't say anything present tense that we don't want to continue. And so it's very common for people to say my anxiety because they identify with it so closely that it's been so much a part of their lives, they kind of, they start to own it as mine. And so as soon as we say the anxiety that I've had, now the subconscious, which is running your life is like, it's not mine. It's starting to break from that a little bit.

• 35:04Speaker 02

  It's very similar to be under the waterfall.

• 35:06Dan Harris?

  Behind the waterfall.

• 35:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, behind the waterfall. Yes, thank you. Where we got this separation, we're kind of watching the thoughts. We want to make sure that we attach, we'll get into this, to what is eternal and powerful and detach from what is not. Same ideas, we don't want to put these labels on ourselves that we don't want to continue. I can tell you a quick example.

• 35:28Dan Harris?

  Please.

• 35:29Speaker 02

  Yeah. A friend of mine, an Olympic athlete, was telling me about his day and talking about his sleep. And he said, he woke up and then all the night. And then he says, no big deal. And I said, oh, you woke up? He's like, yeah, every night. So it's no big deal. It's my whole life's been like that. I'm used to it. I was like, oh, okay. Is this something you want to continue? And he said, no. And I said, can you do me one favor tonight before you go to bed? Rather than saying, you know, I wake up every night, I want you to say, I'm very grateful for being able to sleep through the night every night. Since then, since the last time I talked to him, that's been his reality. Sleeps through the night every night. Now, this is Mr. Skeptical Newsman, empirical evidence. I'm not saying this will happen to you.

• 36:15Speaker 02

  I'm just telling you what happened to one person.

• 36:17Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 36:17Speaker 02

  And how powerful it is, beliefs is what's running your life.

• 36:21Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 36:21Speaker 02

  And beliefs come from what you think, say, and feel, especially what you feel. And so we want to make sure that what we say, like I said, when someone wants to work with me, the first thing we do is make sure their language is empowering, especially what they say to themselves.

• 36:34Dan Harris?

  Well, there's so much in there for me to react to. I'm just trying to line the planes up on the runway to get them to take off in the right order. First of all, I think it's setting aside the story about the sleep. I don't think there's any question, but that the unconscious has an enormous effect on our lives. And that we can use our conscious mind to have an impact on what our unconscious mind believes. And that could be very powerful. The second thing to say is that one modality for that is using language really skillfully.

• 37:11Dan Harris?

  And your point about my anxiety reminded me of a teaching that I've heard many times from Joseph Goldstein, who's my meditation teacher I've worked with for a long time. And he often gets people to do this little linguistic trick that I suspect you'll like. Instead of saying, I am angry, or I am fill in the blank, there is anger, or there is sadness. Then it becomes much more workable. You're not so identified with it. You're not so owned by it. It's a meteorological phenomenon as opposed to some sort of innate aspect of you. That makes sense?

• 37:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, well said.

• 37:49Dan Harris?

  Coming up, Jim talks about cultivating non-attachment to results, how to re-language the story you tell yourself about yourself, practical tools for inner excellence, a crucial life question that everybody should be asking themselves, how to be less afraid of fear, and more.

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• 39:10Dan Harris?

  You said something before about attaching and detaching, and you made a reference to maybe we should come back to that. Yeah, so we'll say more, please.

• 39:18Speaker 02

  So, people come to me, pro athletes mostly, but everybody. They come to me because they want better results and circumstances, better outcomes. And the problem is that we have this single story in our lives of how we think things should be. And when they don't go that way, because we get attached to it, because our identity is involved, then we run into problems like frustration and fear and anxiety and stress. But the truth is, say we look at your top 10 goals for Dan Harris. Are you 100% sure that those top 10 goals are good for you and your family?

• 39:58Dan Harris?

  No.

• 40:01Speaker 02

  I believe that the top 10 things that you have, like say your top 10 goals and the top 10 things that you think would be the worst for you and your family, it's possible they could be flip flopped. The worst things could be the best things for you. The things that you think are the best could be the worst.

• 40:18Dan Harris?

  Right. So sometimes I think about my business failing and me having to sell the house. I literally was having a negative fantasy about this this morning, stepping out of the shower. I was thinking about the business fails, I have to sell the house. How am I going to explain that to my son?

• 40:32Speaker 02

  Hmm. Yeah.

• 40:34Dan Harris?

  And what you're saying is maybe actually the thing that I'm fearing the most would be the best thing.

• 40:41Speaker 02

  Could be the very best thing for you, for sure. Yeah. And this is really important for you to know going forward, that for sure could be the very best thing for Alexander.

• 40:52Dan Harris?

  To watch his father endure adversity.

• 40:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, to learn and grow. There's so many more aspects to it. So you sell your house, now you're going to move into a new neighborhood because, you know, Alexander's a huge part, if not the most significant part of his growth is his peers, right? At least that's what Malcolm Gladwell said, that the book that influenced him the most, who I love is an amazing writer, The Nurture Assumption, that was the assumption that your peers influence your kids more than you do as a parent. And so it's possible that if this happened, he goes to another neighborhood and the peers there or some kid or some parent influences him in the most dramatic way that changes his life for the better. Is that possible?

• 41:35Dan Harris?

  Possible. Absolutely.

• 41:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, all these things are possible, but we get so caught up in, it's like June 7th, 2004, on the set of Good Morning America, the way you described it was, I knew with rock solid certainty that I had a panic attack in front of 5.019 million people, right?

• 41:58Dan Harris?

  Your command of my biography is really impressive, but carry on.

• 42:01Speaker 02

  And so I watched that multiple times. And I thought, I would bet 95% of the people did not know you had a package.

• 42:10Dan Harris?

  I would agree with that.

• 42:12Speaker 02

  And so, but your version, your belief was rock solid.

• 42:16Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 42:16Speaker 02

  Right? And as you said, and so it doesn't matter what happened. What matters is what you believe. And in that moment, you believed that. And so that most horrible thing that you probably feared the most, I would guess, one of the things you feared the most actually happened. Here is a very powerful energy, but then what happened? It became this life-changing thing for millions around the world.

• 42:44Dan Harris?

  I've been dining out on it ever since.

• 42:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 42:48Dan Harris?

  So I think what I'm hearing you say, at least, I think there are two things that I'm hearing, but please correct me. One is that we can't get overly attached to some specific vision of how we want the world to be, how we want our lives to be, because first of all, that vision may be wrong. And second, and relatedly, it kind of leads to an inner clinch. We're too locked up around this particular vision and therefore can't respond well to

• 43:18Speaker 02

  Right.

• 43:19Dan Harris?

  things as they are.

• 43:20Speaker 02

  Well, I never tell people what to do. I ask a lot of questions about their life to see what they really want, and then I help them get it. And they'll share like, if this is really the situation that you're in right now, rather than saying this is what you should do. But yeah, that's correct.

• 43:32Dan Harris?

  And the other thing I was hearing you say, and is just about the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves. And you've made multiple references to this, that you work with people to kind of relanguage their stories about themselves.

• 43:45Speaker 02

  Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, for sure. So one of the biggest reasons that people do not reach their potential is because the story they have about themselves and their past, they're not willing to let go. Either they don't know how to let go, or they're not willing, one of the two. And so interexcellence is about expanding what you believe is possible and becoming someone you've never been before. I mean, the number one goal every day for interexcellence is to learn and grow, which by definition means you're going to become someone you've never been. And so in order to do those things, it's like in baseball, to steal second base, you gotta let go first. And most people are not willing to let go of their past because they're so afraid of, if I let go of my past, if I let go of who I've been. And who will I be?

• 44:30Speaker 02

  And they'll lose their identity and your identity is one of the most important. What I talk about in my retreats, the five deepest needs of the human heart is your identity is one of them.

• 44:39Dan Harris?

  So how can we get better at using language to empower instead of ossify or stick us in place?

• 44:49Speaker 02

  Well, let's look at your, what you called your claustrophobia and your panic attacks. If I was working with you, I would say, do you want to continue the claustrophobia and panic attacks?

• 44:59Dan Harris?

  No, thank you.

• 45:00Speaker 02

  I never assume, I just always want to make sure that I'm helping you get what you want most. And so if you don't want to, the first thing would be was like we said, we never call it yours, either one. And so you would always say them as past tense. The anxiety that you've had in the past, the claustrophobia you had in the past. Never say it is mine and never say it is what I have.

• 45:22Speaker 02

  Make sense? We could do a little test right now, actually, if we got a moment.

• 45:26Dan Harris?

  Of course, yeah.

• 45:26Speaker 02

  So would you just say the claustrophobia that I have and panic attacks that I'm having? Say that out loud and see how it feels inside.

• 45:39Dan Harris?

  The claustrophobia I have and panic attacks I have.

• 45:42Speaker 02

  Yeah. So see how that feels. And then now I want you to say the panic attacks I had in the past and the claustrophobia I had in the past.

• 45:51Dan Harris?

  Right. The panic attacks I've had in the past and the claustrophobia I've had in the past.

• 45:55Speaker 02

  And see how that feels. Do they feel identical?

• 45:59Dan Harris?

  No, definitely not.

• 46:00Speaker 02

  Beliefs are feelings. And so to expand what you believe is possible, we need to make sure we're saying empowering things. Like, for example, the thing that you say every morning when you wake up, my purpose is to make incredible stuff, although you didn't use the word stuff.

• 46:18Dan Harris?

  Okay, no, I didn't.

• 46:20Speaker 02

  And so I don't use that word only because I'm maybe hyper focused on saying only empowering things for me and others. And I just want to make sure that every word out of my mouth, I'm not saying I'm good at it. That's another thing, I'm not saying I'm an expert at anything, really. It's just that I try to make sure that the words that I use are empowering about myself and others.

• 46:43Dan Harris?

  I just want to nudge you to say a little bit more about why that's so important and how it works in terms of the messages it's sending to your unconscious and to your body, that this isn't just being a language police. There's a real purpose here.

• 46:58Speaker 02

  Beliefs are what's running your life. Beliefs come from everything you think, feel, and say, especially what you feel. And your feelings are going to come largely from your thoughts and the words that you use. When you say, "The claustrophobia I have," your subconscious goes and looks for it. "Oh, yeah. Okay, like, a month ago, a year ago. Yeah, okay." So it looks for the memories, and then the pattern's like, "Okay, got it." That's exactly what we don't want it to do, but that's what happens. Soon as you say that I had in the past, your subconscious, because it's got two main roles, to protect you and to line up your results and circumstances with what you believe. And so, as soon as you say that's in the past, your subconscious is like, "Okay, what's next? Give me more."

• 47:44Speaker 02

  But as soon as you say, "This is who I am, this is what I have," then it's like, "Okay, I got that. I know how to do that one." We grab onto that one, bring it from the past into the present, which is obviously what we don't want to do, which you're not going to do anymore.

• 47:55Dan Harris?

  This reminds me a little bit of this communications technique, this technique I got from my communications coaches. So that's going to sound like a strange phrase, "communication coaches," but for the last seven years, I've been working with this fantastic couple, Dan Clerman and Mudita Nisker, and they teach people how to communicate better. Not all of it, for the reasons that you're articulating, but some of it, for sure. You know, some of it is just about having better relationships, which is really important. But some of it is like, how are you talking to yourself about yourself, or to others about yourself, because that can, it can create a reality that you don't want.

• 48:31Speaker 02

  Right.

• 48:32Dan Harris?

  And so they have this concept called provisional language, which takes into account that everything's changing all the time. So instead of saying, "Things are this way," or "This is going to happen," so just get better at using words like "maybe," or "perhaps," or "probably," or "possibly," as a way to, and I notice as I do this, my nervous system feels better, because there's a subtle pain to dogmatism, to certainty. But actually, if you're just getting yourself in the habit of talking about things provisionally... Tentatively, it aligns you with reality and it feels better. So anyway, that's a lot to say. Does it land with what you're saying?

• 49:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, absolutely. So since January 12th, I don't know how many flights I've taken, say 20. I would say at least two thirds of them have changed since when we book it and then when the one I take is changed. And so I remember I was in Madrid and someone said, when are you leaving? And I said, I've got a flight tomorrow to Seattle. Am I getting on the plane? I don't know. I don't know what God's gonna do. And so I no longer, I try to not any longer say, yes, I'll be here then. And this is what I'm gonna do. I'm saying, this is the schedule, or this is the plan. And then I always try to add, you never know what God's up to.

• 49:46Dan Harris?

  You said before that I was maybe obsessed with empirical evidence, which I think is maybe true. But what I'm even more obsessed with is giving people, in this context, I mean, listeners or viewers, practical things to do. So if it's cool with you, for the remainder of our time, I would like to focus on practical steps people can take toward inner excellence.

• 50:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 50:07Dan Harris?

  As I say those words, are there exercises that pop into your mind that you want to talk about?

• 50:13Speaker 02

  Well, you know, the first thing I think about when I work with someone is how do you want to feel in your life? So if we start with you, like, how do you want to feel in your life, like when you're in studio in Gotham Studios? How do you want to feel?

• 50:25Dan Harris?

  Gotham Studios is where we're working today. It's funny, the answer that came into my head immediately is so not what I would have said before, because not what I would have said maybe 10 years ago even. Because it's gonna sound a little cheesy. Side note, I heard a great expression right here on the show once. If you can't be cheesy, you can't be free.

• 50:47Speaker 02

  Unembarrassable.

• 50:48Dan Harris?

  Unembarrassable. Yeah, there's something to that.

• 50:53Dan Harris?

  The answer that I was gonna say is connected. You know?

• 50:58Speaker 02

  Powerful, yeah.

• 50:59Dan Harris?

  And it goes right back to what you said about the human heart being designed for love. The first time I heard, there's some, I think it was Ian Forster or somebody, some great writer, has these words, this kind of exhortation, "Only connect." As a life guide, "Only connect." And I thought that was a little overwrought the first time I heard it. But I'm growing into a conviction that that actually is pointing at something crucial.

• 51:22Speaker 02

  Powerful, I like it. Okay, so you want to feel connected. So this is the first thing that I do when I work with somebody is, I want to know how they want to feel in their life. Because we're gonna start to design habits of thought and action around getting that feeling more and more often. And because essentially, I have a good idea, even though I've, you know, we met before, we're friends. But what you want, even before I met you. But you can tell me if I'm wrong, or how far off am I? You'd like to live a life with amazing experiences and deep enriching relationships, where you're learning and growing and making a difference in the world. Because I already know that, and that's kind of like the human, Interexcellence is about human optimization. I already know that most people, like, we're all gonna want to walk in love, not fear, for example.

• 52:06Speaker 02

  And so I help them learn, okay, what I really want. I think I want to have this, this podcast that's number one in the world, and just getting more and more viewers, and more and more money, and just happily ever after. That's what I think I want. What I try to do is help you understand what you really want is not that circumstance or outcome. What you really want is to live a certain life, this meaningful life that has these amazing experiences and deep enriching relationships. And so we do that by starting off with how you want to feel, connected. And one of the big challenges that people run into is, is when they're not really clear on how they want to feel in their life. And then they let trivial things take them out of that feeling. And so get cut off in traffic, or any sort of circumstance that they didn't have time for.

• 52:51Speaker 02

  Then, you know, they lose that connection. And so I want to know how you want to feel, and how you want to live, like, how you want to face adversity, like we talked about earlier. And the type of person you want to become. So then we're gonna design your life around that. And that's really what inner excellence is. And then there's tools, a tool is something that you do in the moment. I'm frustrated, I'm afraid, nervous. What do I do right now? I'm just not present. What do I do in the moment? So we would use a tool. But this is all under the overarching theme of I want to learn and grow and become someone that lives this meaningful, fulfilling life.

• 53:23Dan Harris?

  I want to get to the tools in a second, but your sounds like the foundational move that somebody at home could do right now is to ask themselves the crucial question, like, how do I want to feel in whatever remains of my life?

• 53:35Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And then so you can just think about it like the best moments in my life. What does it felt like? If you're a parent, maybe it's with your kids, or if you have a dog, or usually it's some aspect of love.

• 53:47Dan Harris?

  So then, once you come to that answer, you look at your life circumstances and say, how can I design? How can I optimize for more of the good stuff?

• 53:57Speaker 02

  Yeah. And so I want to learn and grow to become a sort of person that feels connected more often. And so what adds to that and what takes away from it? And so like, for example, being attached to your results and circumstances, this can take away from it, obviously, because so much is out of our control. Right? And so that's where I said, we want to attach to something that's eternal and empowering, not things that are temporary.

• 54:22Dan Harris?

  So it's something that would be an eternal is, given that the human heart is designed for love, I want to feel more of that. That's a good thing to attach to.

• 54:33Speaker 02

  Yeah. And joy comes from love. And so this is something we haven't talked about yet, but I think would be helpful is 10% happier is the name of the podcast. So I define happiness as a positive temporary feeling based on what's happening. And I define joy as a deep sense of well being, freedom and gratitude, independent of circumstances, and inner buoyancy and delight that comes from love. This is what I how I define joy. And I think the thing that would help people the most that are focused on meditation or Stoicism or asceticism, Buddhism, is to understand that joy.

• 55:15Speaker 02

  Is one of the most powerful forces in the universe. We need joy to thrive. We're created for joy. This joy comes from sacrificial love. And so if you want to have more joy, that kind that I described, it's living this life of love.

• 55:32Dan Harris?

  You use that term sacrificial love early in this interview, and I made a mental note to come back to it. This strikes me as the type of thing that could be easily misunderstood. There's a term that Tibetans, who are big fans of compassion, but they use this term idiot compassion. You could hear a term like sacrificial love and go right to, I think I said this before, like catastrophic altruism, or people pleasing, or something like that. Can you say a little bit about that?

• 55:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, sure. So personally, I love high fives and hugs. But if I spend my whole time high fiving and hugging everybody, I'm not going to get anywhere. I want to make a difference in the world. I told you how I want to live and feel like everyone else. Unconditional love has strict boundaries. And so, and the Bible talks about give to all who ask, which is what I try to do. However, it doesn't say give what they ask to everybody. And so what I try and do is give to all who asks, is give them what I think is the most loving thing, and thinking of the group first. And so sacrificial love, you can think about as a five year old. My nephew, Boaz, he's six now. Like if he asked me, can I go play out on the highway? Doesn't matter if he asked me 10 times or 100 times, it's gonna be no every single time,

• 56:43Speaker 02

  because sacrificial love has strict boundaries. So to me, love is the most powerful force in the universe. It's completely fearless. That's where I think this Buddhist ideal can really come into play here. Selfless is fearless. The problem that we have as humans is that we're naturally self-centered, which leads to fear. We need to think about ourselves to get through life. But the problem is when we're constantly thinking about ourselves, now our subconscious, which is designed to protect us, which is always on the lookout, it reminds us of our failures and our weaknesses. And we don't like to feel like a failure or weak. So then we look around to compare. Then the ego says, oh yeah, look at that person, look at that person. But there's always someone that has more better things than you.

• 57:27Speaker 02

  So then it goes down to this road of anxiety and frustration, because our deepest need, the ego knows, our deepest need is for love and connection. And so if I'm lining up a putt, or if I have a podcast that I really want to be successful, if I do it well, if I make the putt, if it's successful, I'm going to get the love that I want theoretically. If I don't, I'm not going to get the love that I want, which is the worst possible thing.

• 57:51Dan Harris?

  What you're describing completely lands for me that we get into fear and insecurity because we're outsourcing our self-worth to something not eternal, to use your language. So the work around here is, because I can imagine people listening to this and saying, well, that's very hard to undo that wiring, but it sounds like what you're saying is that actually, you know, it really starts with what we've already been discussing, which is asking yourself, how do you really want to feel, anchoring that to something true and abiding as opposed to temporary and unreliable, and designing your life from there. Am I saying this correctly?

• 58:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, and then there's, there's a lot of tools, like for example, the four daily goals is something that we can talk about.

• 58:34Dan Harris?

  Please, I want to hear about it.

• 58:35Speaker 02

  So like I said earlier, the number one goal every day is to learn and grow. We want to learn and grow in what I call love, wisdom, and courage. Love, because selfless is fearless, and wisdom, which is this deep connection to possibilities, to God and the universe, and to others, and to self, connection to beauty. Or, as I also describe wisdom, is to know who God is, and therefore who you are, what he's doing in the world, and how you can join in. If I'm talking to Buddhists or atheists, I probably wouldn't add that last part, because I don't want them to shut me out. The third part, courage, I think

• 59:14Speaker 02

  that's the biggest superpower that we all have the access to. Like Tom Cruise said, you know, he's, he's famous for his doing all these stunts and being this megastar. The difference, I think, between myself, Tom saying, and others is I'm afraid, but I'm not afraid to be afraid. And when I heard that, I was like, oh, that is so powerful. Are you willing to face your fears? Are you willing to have this feeling that you've been afraid that you didn't want to feel? Are you willing to have that feeling? And the great question to ask is, are you willing to face any feeling? Cause if you're willing to face any feeling, then you got possibilities. And I think panic attacks often happen because of the fear of certain feelings.

• 59:57Speaker 02

  And like, oh, I just, my day will be fine as long as I don't get that one feeling that I hate the most. And so what I do and help people overcome mental blocks, for example, is that we go look for the feeling that they hate. Cause that's our teacher. Where we're the most uncomfortable, that's the edge of our beliefs of what's possible in our lives. That's showing you, it's like, you want to live an extraordinary life. Here's the edge. Are you willing to sit in this discomfort? Are you going to run? And if you're willing to sit in it, then the fear goes away. Well, the fear diminishes, I should say.

• 1:00:26Dan Harris?

  As somebody who's in the middle of extended exposure therapy, to my ear, it's exactly what you're describing. I've been taking these airplane flights with my exposure therapist. Well, once I did it with my wife, where I don't take any medicine and I just, you know, meaning I don't take any anti-anxiety medicine, which I've been using for flights. And I just feel the panic. We're like, really sit in the panic, which is extraordinarily uncomfortable.

• 1:00:53Speaker 02

  Well, I can tell you something about that. Um, we'll get to the four goals after this.

• 1:00:56Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:57Speaker 02

  But exposure therapy can be very helpful. I think it's helped a lot of people. The only thing is, I think it's a very slow way to go through this and it doesn't help everybody.

• 1:01:05Dan Harris?

  I'm open to both of those possibilities, but I was just going to say that the realization I had on the fourth flight was, I'm probably going to panic today, but like, okay.

• 1:01:17Speaker 02

  That's powerful. You're, you're like, okay, that's okay. I can, that's really powerful.

• 1:01:21Dan Harris?

  I'm less afraid of the fear.

• 1:01:23Speaker 02

  Yeah. One other thing about that, people that have some sort of a phobia, for example, it came from an experience that you had in your life. And so what I would do, or someone that's better than me would do, my background is in neuro-linguistic programming. Anthony Robbins, you're probably familiar with how, how he started.

• 1:01:42Dan Harris?

  I don't actually, I've heard that term, NLP many times. I don't actually know what it is.

• 1:01:46Speaker 02

  This is kind of, yeah. So Anthony Robbins kind of made it famous, but it's really a study of the subconscious mind. And a lot of what I learned came from that. So with a phobia, there's this experience that you had at some point in your life. You may not even remember it, where all of a sudden the belief became. Airplanes are scary.

• 1:02:04Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:05Speaker 02

  And so what I would do, or someone that's better than me would do in NLP would ask you, how do you want to feel in your life and how do you not want to feel? And then the, the feeling that you've gotten in the past on airplanes, that's how you don't want to feel. We would look through that. When have you had that feeling through your whole life? And we'd go to the earliest, most strongest negative feeling when you've had that exact feeling that you got on the planes. And we would rewire that feeling, that memory from maybe you're 10 years old and something happened. And I don't know if you remember it or not, but when you started to become afraid of, in the past, afraid of planes.

• 1:02:38Dan Harris?

  Coming up, Jim talks about his four daily goals, the Expect Nothing Tool, and much more.

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• 1:03:56Dan Harris?

  Okay, so the four goals.

• 1:03:58Speaker 02

  Yes, the four daily goals. So the first one is to give the best of what you got each day. And so understanding that some days you're only going to have thirty or forty percent of your best. This is important to understand. A lot of days, we're not going to be very good results wise, skill wise, we're just not going to be great. And so the reason people really struggle, a lot of it is because they don't assess themselves and understand. I've got all this adversity happening right now, the stress, whatever, and I may not be very good today. But that's okay. All I can do is give my best. And so if you recognize that I'm just going to give the best of what I have, because we want to have four goals that we can control. Because there's so much out of your control in the world today. And so the first one is to give the best of what you have. And then the second one is to be present.

• 1:04:42Speaker 02

  There's no fear in the present. Fear is a future self-centered thing. And so when I say present, what I mean at the highest level, this fully engaged heart, mind and body, unattached to what you're trying to do. There's a real sense of freedom and joy and a sense that anything's possible. It's far more than I think some psychologists say of just like being where your feet are. To me, what we're going for is something far beyond that. This amazing connected feeling. That's two, work on being present. And because when you're fully present, like I said, there's no fear, no concern for self. There's no self-protection, any of those things that lead to fear. And then three is gratitude. Gratitude is directly linked. So be grateful.

• 1:05:25Speaker 02

  Directly linked to inner peace and inner strength. And then four, focus on your routines and only what you can control.

• 1:05:34Dan Harris?

  And how do you recommend? People effectuate this, that they get up in the morning and is it akin to the five daily remembrances, which I still haven't explained? How do you get this into your life in an abiding way?

• 1:05:48Speaker 02

  Interexcellence is really a series of habits of thought and action. And so from the moment we wake up, we're starting to put in these routines. Like, for example, music. Music is a big one for me because music has such a powerful impact on how we feel. And so when I wake up, I want music that's connected to my purpose and how I want to feel. I have a playlist, my morning playlist, I'm going to play the same playlist every day in the same order. And I got this from Tim Ferriss. Essentially, we don't want to make any decisions the first hour. We want to have that first hour of your day kind of pre-planned. Like, I want to know what my purpose is. I want to have music that lines me up with that purpose, gets me feeling a certain way. And then I'm going to do whatever it is with hydration and exercise and meditation, these sort of things.

• 1:06:34Dan Harris?

  So as it pertains to the four daily goals, would you write them down and put them up on the wall?

• 1:06:40Speaker 02

  Yeah. So, okay, that's a great question. So you write them down and then we're going to, you can grade yourself every day. Say a scale of one to five, for example, five is the best. How did I do on giving the best?

• 1:06:49Dan Harris?

  At the end of the day.

• 1:06:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, end of the day. And how did I do on being present? And being grateful and focusing on my routines and only what I can control.

• 1:06:58Dan Harris?

  Just to say the five daily remembrances, which you've referenced, and I've also referenced several times. I might mangle this, but my understanding, these are five things that the Buddha said you should remember or call to mind. I think once in the morning, once in the evening, there was a teacher on the show, a meditation teacher showed up on the show several months ago, Vinnie Ferraro, who was talking about this, and I've now tried to get it into my life twice a day. So the five are, this body is of the nature to get old, to grow old. This body is of the nature to get sick. This body is of the nature to die. The fourth is, I will someday lose everything and everyone I hold dear. And then the fifth is, the only real possessions I have are my actions.

• 1:07:41Dan Harris?

  And I found it really helpful. And it, these four daily goals seem like a cousin in that, you know, when you wake up in the morning and you've got your morning routine, you want to be thinking about these four north stars for your day. And at the end of the day, you want to come back to them and think, okay, how did I do? What can I learn?

• 1:07:59Speaker 02

  Yes. And the fifth remembrance of all I have is my actions.

• 1:08:05Speaker 02

  My concern is that what if your actions weren't very good? Which being human means that's going to happen a lot. Or for example, if you're a pro baseball player, what if you went over four and you know, made an error and had a couple of strikeouts? So you're going to be like, oh, what a terrible day. And so the way I think about it is you're responsible for two things. Your effort and your heart, not your results. To me, actions and results are so closely intertwined. So I wouldn't say you're not responsible for your actions because in a way you are like it's so closely tied to your decisions. But your results, now that's different.

• 1:08:43Dan Harris?

  Yeah, I think in the in the Dharma and Buddhism that there is a clear separation between action and results and there there is, as you discussed before, a kind of idea of not being attached to the result and instead being focused on the effort and crucially, your motivation during that effort. So I I believe that what the Buddha was talking about is fully consonant with what you're talking about. Does that make sense?

• 1:09:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, for sure.

• 1:09:08Dan Harris?

  And motivation is a huge emphasis in the idea of like karmic unfolding or the law of cause and effect. It doesn't mean that if you have a good motivation, the outcome will necessarily be positive. But it's just if you think of karma, and again, not in a metaphysical sense, just as, as I said a moment ago, the law of cause and effect. What leads to what this happens, so this happens. Then when motivation becomes really important in your unfolding of your life, because it will have, it may be over my skis now, but I think it ups the odds that you'll have a positive result. And even if it's not the result that you had in mind, it's more likely to be wholesome or beneficial. Does that make sense in these ramblings?

• 1:09:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:51Dan Harris?

  Okay. All right. Well, in our remaining time, let's do some more practical tools because your book is filled with them. I can look at my list of questions or you can say whatever's popping into your head of what you'd want to discuss.

• 1:10:05Speaker 02

  So yeah, I'll give you, so I was doing more meditation. So in my life, I do this meditation, which is like a tool or habit or routine. You can think of it as a tool. I have this 10 to 20 minutes with, I think of it as time with God. And so in that time, the way I do it is I put on my timer, say like this morning, it was 10 minutes. Put my countdown timer on 10 minutes. Soon as I see it hit 9:59, then I'm putting it away. So I don't have to think about how much time's left. And then I'm putting on this music that's connecting me to my purpose and to God that I feel really connected. And again, it's the same music. This is different than my morning playlist, different playlist. It's the same music every single time in the same order. And this is important. So a lot of people, they wake up and they're like, okay, how am I feeling? What do I want to listen to? And they start scrolling.

• 1:10:51Speaker 02

  So I think this is a mistake. So I think it's way more powerful to think about these things that we've talked about, like what's my purpose? How do I want to live? How do I want to feel? Who do I want to become? And start to arrange your life around that, like with your music. Because the music is not just, I'm bored, I want to not be bored. It's doing two things. It's aligning you with your purpose and it's programming your mind. We're getting the words of the person that you want to become into your mind. And so every day, and so I have this, turn on the timer for 10 minutes, I put on the music, and then I sit there and it's this prayerful meditation. And I have this thing that I got from a friend of mine, Ken Chigamatsu in Vancouver, B.C.

• 1:11:31Speaker 02

  And he says, and this is God talking to Jim, "Jim, you are the beloved, like someone that I love and whom I delight." And so I repeat that over and over for 10 minutes. It's just like meditation, right? Your mind starts to wander. And so like today, I don't know, I've probably said it maybe 10 times. Like our greatest need is for love. If you don't feel that love when you start your day, what are you gonna do when you go out? You're gonna try and get it. How? Generally from the, what I call the palms, possessions, achievements, looks, money, status. You know, you're gonna try and be someone who deserves love. But then the problem is, you could do everything right and they may reject you.

• 1:12:14Speaker 02

  Do everything right and your boss may not like it. And you know, way too much out of your control. And so then it leads to this obsession, frustration, et cetera, this cycle, whereas... But say if you don't believe in God, it's really connecting with having a purpose beyond yourself, where understanding that love is the most powerful force in the universe. And because you do the loving kindness meditation.

• 1:12:36Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 1:12:37Speaker 02

  This is very similar to have this purpose. I want to walk in love and share that with the world. This is really powerful.

• 1:12:45Dan Harris?

  Would I be correct in saying that what you're doing here is kind of teaching your nervous system and your unconscious that you're safe? So that you're not scrambling for what you call the palms.

• 1:12:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, so now we're getting into what we talked about, like the heart transformation. So it's daily transforming the subconscious security would definitely part of it. So you're not there like trying to be someone that other people can love.

• 1:13:12Dan Harris?

  And I would imagine when you're going through a difficult day, like before the game on January 12th, when your mother is desperately ill and work life isn't going the way you wanted and you're a little lonely in a town that's not your home, having taught your nervous system that you're okay, that you're loved, allows you to perform well in extremis.

• 1:13:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, it really comes down to like, what is the purpose of your life? And what are you doing all this for? Why are you doing the podcast? And what is my life about? Is it about so Jim Murphy can have certain pleasures and things and be somebody like, what is that? What am I all about? And like, I think the whole understanding that selfless is fearless. I want to go out into my day every day where there's no concern for self. And you've used the term self referential a lot, right? So that's, this is kind of the human condition is so self referential, which I say in Inter Excellence leads to fear. It's constant referring to self because there's so much out of our control and we try to build this security, but they become walls that imprison us.

• 1:14:17Speaker 02

  And so the best possible life is a life of deep connection to others where you're serving and connecting to others.

• 1:14:24Dan Harris?

  But you know, one of the things that I'm so attracted to vis a vis my own tattoo that you referenced earlier, F T B O A B for the benefit of all beings is that the A, the penultimate letter there, all beings includes me. So self-interest is not off the table. And yet you're saying, and this kind of goes back to sacrificial love and I want to walk through the day, as you just said, with no concern for self. And yet you're putting out books, you're starting a podcast, like you have to have some concern for self.

• 1:14:56Speaker 02

  Yeah. So now we can talk about the, uh, the wise self.

• 1:14:59Dan Harris?

  Wise selfishness.

• 1:15:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, from the Dalai Lama. Being human means that you're going to be thinking about yourself. What I know is that the more I think about self, the more chance I have to move towards anxiety and fear. But it's just like when I'm coaching an athlete or a team. Our goal is to win a championship. We don't need to talk about it. I don't need to say, Jim, look out for self, like that's inherent. I'm gonna, I'm just being human. I'm gonna look both ways when I cross the street and feed myself and whatever. The problem is not me losing concern for self. The problem is my concern for self turns into fear. This is the issue.

• 1:15:37Dan Harris?

  So how does that work practically? You can put out as many books and start as many podcasts as you want, but you try to the best of your ability to have your overarching goal.

• 1:15:51Speaker 02

  Can I interrupt for one second?

• 1:15:52Dan Harris?

  Please.

• 1:15:53Speaker 02

  I'm thinking about Dan's book and his career, 21 years on ABC and how he was like, Peter Jennings is like, okay, Dan, you're going to take over the religion section or whatever. And then you're like, um, Peter, you know where I grew up and who I grew up to? Like my parents said, I've, there's no Santa and there's no God when I was nine. And so I think you got the wrong guy. And then, you know, it led to this life-changing experience.

• 1:16:17Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:18Speaker 02

  And so as you're saying that I was thinking about your life and how, so sorry to interrupt. Go ahead, go again.

• 1:16:24Dan Harris?

  It's okay. Well, I think what you're saying is you can take action in the world, you can build your own career. But if you can frame it as a service, like, okay, I, Jim Murphy, I'm going to start my own podcast in the future. I, Jim Murphy, I'm going to put out a couple more books in, in the not too distant future. But the goal is not for the aggrandizement of Jim. It is for the benefit of all beings.

• 1:16:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, very well said. It's like one of the big challenges that a lot of, say, Christian pro athletes have, like, how do I devote my life to God, but also try and be world number one? To me, I think it's a, it's a state of your heart.

• 1:17:03Speaker 02

  Like, why am I doing these things? Podcasts coming out and writing more books, et cetera? Is it for me? And this is the default that it's going to be for me. What I'm saying is that this is not the best possible life. This sort of selfish bent is going to hurt me in the long run, at least compared to a selfless life. And so the selfless life is a fearless life. It's the best possible life. Most people spend most of their day judging self, circumstances, or others. And this creates a negative energy. They lose their vision. They lose their creativity because they're concerned for self.

• 1:17:45Speaker 02

  And this is most people, most of the time, most of my life has been like this. And I don't want to live like this. I want to have deep content and joy and confidence every day of my life is how I want to live. And through how I understand the universe is created, how it works, this is the best way to do it.

• 1:18:03Dan Harris?

  Right, but I think where it gets tricky for me in my own life is, and this is really, I think, part of the art of life is because we do need to take care of our needs and pay our mortgage and things like that. We can't be utterly selfless in the way most people understand that word. We do have to look out for our own interests to a certain extent, but that can be a very slippery slope.

• 1:18:26Speaker 02

  And so where would you say is the part where you can't be selfless? What does that intersect?

• 1:18:33Dan Harris?

  It's not that I can't be selfless. It's that it's just very easy for my old conditioning to kick in. When I'm thinking about, okay, what projects should I take on? And why? Should I write this next book? Why? What's my motivation really? I do have to kind of police myself pretty consistently so that I'm not being carried away by the lesser angels of my own nature, which are deeply wired in. Does that make sense?

• 1:19:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, so where was the point where being selfless would lead you away from being able to achieve or live a great life? Because I think that's what you were saying earlier.

• 1:19:10Dan Harris?

  Yes, I think it may be in how you're understanding selfless, right? Because I think most people hear that word and they think, I can't have any thoughts for myself. I can't design a life where I'm happy. But what I think what you're saying is, well, if you understand happiness or joy or well being, human flourishing as being of service and a benefit, well, then it all works together.

• 1:19:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:19:35Dan Harris?

  And in that context, start as many podcasts as you want, be as ambitious as you would. Try to be world number one at whatever you want, but frame it as altruism, selflessness.

• 1:19:48Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, and when you say frame it, I think what you mean and what I mean is, why are you doing it?

• 1:19:52Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 1:19:52Speaker 02

  Because if like, for example, the inner excellence mindset is I compete to raise the level of excellence in my life to learn and grow in order to raise it in others. It's for others. I'm still gonna work every day as hard as I can to raise a level of excellence in my life, which to me really is focusing on learning and growing and love, wisdom and courage. And it's all so I can raise it in other people's lives.

• 1:20:17Dan Harris?

  Right, so I can want to be number one at whatever because the process of doing that is gonna, if I pursue that in the right way, is going to challenge me in many, many helpful, self-actualizing ways that can make me a better, more impactful, more beneficial human in the world.

• 1:20:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, I think wisdom is calling out every day to all of us all day long. The question is, are we gonna notice it? And also, like I shared earlier, is having a great podcast the best thing for you?

• 1:20:51Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:51Speaker 02

  It may not be.

• 1:20:52Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:52Speaker 02

  And so that's why I want to hold it loosely and say, okay, I've got these goals. And like, I think both of us, we could say we're both fairly ambitious. And so we have these goals that we want to achieve. For me, I don't know if these goals are good for me, let alone the best thing for me. And so, of course, I have these goals and I want to, I want to have the best podcasts in the world and I want to live an extraordinary life or making a difference all over the world and being on Dan Harris's podcast. But I don't know what's best for me circumstance wise, what I call the third world, the world of results and circumstances. And so I want to hold it loosely and understand what I really want is have this deep connection to the creator of the universe and to live

• 1:21:34Speaker 02

  the life that I was created to live. And I don't really know what that looks like. That's why I just hold it loosely. I have my goals, my vision, my dreams, and then every day it may unfold differently.

• 1:21:46Dan Harris?

  Maybe this is a good place, a practical place to end it. There was a quote in your book, can't remember who it was from, you were quoting somebody and I actually used it in conversation earlier today. I'm probably going to mangle it, but it's something to the effect of, I don't expect anything and I'm prepared for anything.

• 1:22:07Speaker 02

  Yeah. So the Samurai, and you have your own Samurai code, the 10 kind of principles. So they have this tool that I call expect nothing, where you take a long, slow, deep breath before you're about to perform or compete or whatever, you have some sort of presentation. You take this long, slow, deep breath in and you say, I expect, and then hold it and then you exhale and then you say nothing. And so to me, what it means is, not that I don't expect good results, it's I have no needs. I don't expect that person to be a certain way, or the crowd to react a certain way, or the weather to be a certain way, or the umpire. I have no needs. I can handle anything. So this tool, I expect nothing, I can handle anything. I found very powerful in my life.

• 1:22:49Dan Harris?

  Yeah, yes. Because you're not overly attached to some sort of result, you can be grounded in the confidence that whatever comes up, I can handle it because I've done it before. I've handled so much, we all have, right up until this very moment, we can handle whatever comes next. Jim, it's great to talk to you.

• 1:23:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, thank you so much.

• 1:23:11Dan Harris?

  Before I let you go, can you just remind everybody of the names of your books? If people want to check them out and anything else you want us to know about?

• 1:23:18Speaker 02

  Sure. So Interexcellence, you can get that in most bookstores. The Best Possible Life, How to Live with Deep Contempt, Joy and Confidence, No Matter What. That comes out February 3rd. Should be able to find that in most bookstores. I'm also kind of following in your footsteps, or trying to, I should say, getting a sub stack and I have a newsletter. You can go to innerexcellence.com right now to sign up for that.

• 1:23:39Dan Harris?

  Awesome. Thank you. Appreciate it.

• 1:23:41Speaker 02

  Thanks for having me.

• 1:23:46Dan Harris?

  Thanks again to Jim. Great to meet him. Shout out to our mutual agent, Jay Suris at UTA. Jay's awesome. Don't forget, there's a guided meditation that comes with this podcast if you're a subscriber over at DanHarris.com. It's called "How to Rewire Your Inner Critic." It'll help you take what you've just learned and kind of pound it into your neurons. It comes from our Teacher of the Month, Sabine A. Selassie. If you sign up at DanHarris.com, you'll also get invited to our weekly live meditation and Q&A sessions. We do these every Tuesday at 4 Eastern. The next one is October 28th. Sabine A. Selassie will be going live then. Also, there are links in the show notes if you want to come to either

• 1:24:28Dan Harris?

  the meditation party retreat I'm doing the weekend of October 24th, or the live taping of this podcast I'll be doing in New York City with Pete Holmes in November. Before I go, thank you very much to everybody who works so hard on this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson and Eleanor Visili. Our recording and engineering is handled by the great folks over at Pod People. Lauren Smith is our managing producer. Marissa Schneiderman is our senior producer. DJ Cashmere is our executive producer. And Nick Thorburn of the band Islands wrote our theme.

• 1:25:11Speaker 07

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